Page 104 of Modern Romance Collection December 2024 Books 1-4

There was no way she could leave. He wouldn’t allow it. He’d just keep on making her so happy she’d never leave him.

Yet no matter what he told himself, the icy feeling in his gut wouldn’t go away.

A reminder on his watch went off, letting him know it was time for Nell to sit down again, so, gripping her elbow and murmuring a few excuses, he steered her away from the charity CEO and over to a comfortable-looking couch placed in a nook by a pillar.

‘This is getting tiresome,’ she said as she sat down. ‘I was enjoying that conversation.’

‘I know. But you will have plenty more opportunities to talk once the babies are born.’ He sat down next to her, keeping her hand in his, not wanting to release it. ‘We should probably go. You need rest.’

‘I’m fine.’ She squeezed his hand reassuringly. ‘How are you?’

‘Tonight’s occasion has been surprisingly bearable,’ he said, trying to force down the strange pressure that had been building in his chest. ‘You will have to come with me whenever I’m invited to these interminable things.’

She smiled and the pressure increased, making his heart feel full of air, inflating hard against his ribs. ‘Of course. Just buy me another pretty dress and a gorgeous necklace like this one, and I’ll go wherever you ask.’

She was teasing him, making him feel as if living weren’t quite as heavy as it was. As if there were something light to be found in it, something joyful.

Happiness. Was this what she meant when she said she wanted to be happy? This effervescent feeling, as if he were full of champagne bubbles, all rising and bursting and rising again. It made him want to keep this moment, lock it in amber somehow, her dark eyes full of warmth and tender amusement, her mouth curving in the most beautiful smile and all for him.

Your mother smiled at you, too, remember? Just before she walked away.

Ice pierced him and his fingers around hers tightened. ‘You can’t leave, Nell,’ he said far too abruptly, the ice closing around his throat. ‘You can never leave.’

A brief look of shock flickered through her eyes. ‘What do you mean never leave?’

‘You can never leave me.’ He held onto her hand even tighter, feeling all at once as if he would drown if he let her go. ‘You can’t. I won’t let you.’

She stared at him, her smile fading, the excitement vanishing.

This is what you will do to her. What you do to everyone. It’s no mystery why your mother walked away. You lack something fundamental that makes anyone want to stay.

His heartbeat in his head sounded like a funeral march.

‘Bear?’ She looked concerned now. ‘What’s wrong? Why are you talking like this?’

He’d make her smile fade, make her go pale. He’d keep her on the island, imprison her so she’d never leave, yet in doing so, he’d suffocate her.

He would keep her from what she wanted most.

Love.

Pain knifed through him all of a sudden as another thought came to him.

The babies, his children. His son and his daughter. He’d thought loving them would be automatic, but what if it wasn’t? Cesare loved his daughter, but then Cesare loved his wife too. What if Aristophanes couldn’t? What if he couldn’t love his children? He remembered that moment the week before, at Cesare’s villa, when he’d met Nell’s gaze and known that they’d both been thinking about how they would be together as a family. But...what if he couldn’t do that? If he couldn’t love Nell, how could he love them?

Nell raised her free hand and laid her palm against his cheek. ‘Bear?’

It took everything he had, but he managed it, opening his hand and letting her fingers slide from his. Then he took her palm from his cheek and laid it back down on the red silk of her lap.

‘You were right,’ he said roughly. ‘You were right all this time.’

‘Right?’ Not even a ghost of a smile turned her mouth now. ‘Right about what? What’s going on, Aristophanes? You’re scaring me.’

He’d never hated his name more than he did in that moment. ‘You do deserve to be loved, Nell. You deserve to have the family you lost, and you deserve happiness. You deserve much more than anything I can give you.’

Her eyes went wide, as if he’d slapped her. ‘What are you talking about?’

‘I can’t give you the love you want.’

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