Page 65 of Modern Romance Collection February 2025, 5-8

‘The need for heirs. Someone to ensure the family legacy.’

Ana stilled.Children. She hadn’t really thought about wanting them before. They were simply expected for someone who was going to marry a prince. Now the idea of children was tangled up with the need to bare herself. The thought of that...

The air cut off in her throat. What was this proposed marriage, the need for a legacy, if not for children as well? Still, he wasn’t pressuring her. He said if she didn’t like what she saw he’d take her to Isolobello and there’d be no need for an engagement. She just needed to remind him.

‘I can’t make promises.’

His gaze was like a pilot light, blue and bright, shining directly onto her. His attention made her question everything about herself.

‘You did. I’ll ask nothing of you you’re not willing to give.’

Was this how she wanted her life to be—a negotiation, a series of bargains? It reminded her that Aston wasn’t the man of her fantasies. A sense of powerful disappointment hit her once more. The main of duck, which at first she’d thought was delicious, now seemed dry and tasteless. This—running away together on a magnificent yacht with a man so handsome it could break her heart—should have been everything she’d dreamed of. She hated that the reality was all so artificial, so hollow.

‘How romantic.’

‘What about this—’ he motioned to the table ‘—isn’t romantic?’

‘Because it’s contrived.’

She couldn’t escape the stabbing sense of unfairness that this would never be more. Even if she wanted it to be, he’d talked about a convenient relationship without love being freeing. What if shewantedthe love?

‘Romance is one of the most contrived things on the planet,’ he said. ‘You think otherwise? Why? You were prepared to marry Caspar Santori, and don’t tell me that had anything to do with romance.’

When would people ever stop reminding her of it, as if her inability to marry the man was a kind of personal failing? ‘That’s different.’

‘How? Explain it to me.’

Her problem was, she hadn’t been attracted to Caspar. Aston, on the other hand... Tonight he was dressed in casual chinos which hugged his narrow hips, his shirt gripping the hard planes of his body and his broad shoulders. Maybe everyone was shallow and all that mattered was how they looked, the objectification.

Yet Caspar hadn’t done to her what Aston did whenever he was near—didn’t cause the frisson of pleasure and expectation that seemed to ripple through her at his attention. His mere presence causing goose bumps to sparkle across her skin. And when he looked at her, truly looked, the heat threatened to scorch her.

Being near Aston Lane was like sitting too close to a bonfire. She was bound to get burned.

‘Princess, you could destroy a man’s ego if he didn’t have a healthy one. You devour me with your eyes, yet spit me out with your words.’

Was that what she wanted? She wasn’t sure of anything any more apart from the need to get away. She’d been trapped this morning and going with Aston had seemed like the best worst choice.

She couldn’t sit here any longer, not with the flowers on the table, candles and string lights. The place was dressed up for romance, the pretence making a mockery of the word. Ana stood, making her way to the stern of the yacht. They were clearly a fair way offshore, but the lights on the land hugged the horizon. She wished she could be there, feeling grounded, rather than this sensation of being cut adrift.

‘When people try to escape it usually fails, because what they’re running from is most often themselves,’ Aston said. His voice was close behind her, so he must have followed from the table. She gripped the yacht’s railings to tether herself. It was as if he saw her better than she saw herself.

What if she agreed to marry him, what then? She’d have to expose herself and if Aston was revolted by her scars, rejected her, where would she be? She wasn’t sure she’d survive it.

‘Have you ever been in a situation where your choices have been taken away?’ she asked.

‘We’re all constrained in some way, whether in reality or of our own making.’

‘I have trouble accepting that where you’re concerned.’

Yet his words had sounded so heavy, like a dead weight dragging him down under the waves.

‘Everyone has their shackles, Princess, yet most people are blissfully unaware of what holds them back.’

She turned. He stood there, so tall, so imposing, seemingly strong and solid. To look at him she wouldn’t sense there was a single crack in him, yet every word suggested chinks in his armour.

‘What are yours?’

His expression changed fleetingly. It was almost as if he winced, as though recalling something painful. He didn’t seem present. There was a distance to him, as if he was far away somehow, all the while standing in front of her.

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