Page 76 of Modern Romance Collection February 2025, 5-8

Except as he held her he noticed her trembling, as if she was freezing. He placed his hands on her shoulders and looked down at her. Her face was deathly pale, her eyes wide. It was a look familiar to him from those final, terrible moments with Michel when he’d paled, gripped Aston’s hand and said, ‘I think I’m going to die... Live for me...’ and then crashed.

The look on Ana’s face was fear.

Would you keep me safe?

Are you in danger?

All of him stiffened, on high alert. He’d asked that on his yacht, but Ana hadn’t really answered. He’d told her he cared for what was his. What had he missed?

‘Ma chèrie, what’s wrong?’

‘I can’t...’

Her breaths came in heaving gulps. He led her inside to the sofa, sat down and took her with him. He simply wrapped her in his arms and held her.

‘Tell me. Take your time. Nothing can harm you here.’

He stroked his hand over the fine silk of her robe and cradled her till the tremors that racked her body eased and she was ready to speak. To let him know what was wrong.

‘It’s everywhere.’ Her voice was the barest whisper. ‘We’reeverywhere—the ring...us...where you live.’

Ah.

He wasn’t sure why that stung, the thought she was upset that their engagement, such as it was, had been picked up by the press. He checked his phone. The stories weren’t unexpected. Where he lived was no secret. There was a text from the private secretary to her parents, admonishing him for not keeping things discreet. Asking for their official announcement, which he was happy to ask his own team to draft.

‘It was to be expected. Nothing remains secret for too long. They were going to find out soon enough.’

‘I thought I had time.’

Her voice sounded shrill, panicked. He released her and took her chin, tilting up her face so he could see her. Ana’s eyes were full of tears. He didn’t have much time for sentiment or feeling, but his heart cracked, seeing her like this. He’d skirted around the situation for too long. Usually Aston knew when to keep his cards close and when to play them. Right now, they needed to be in play.

‘Why are you afraid?’

‘No one believes me.’

‘I will.’

He waited, and a story simply came tumbling out of her about a man she believed had been sending her fan mail that made her skin crawl. How she thought he’d begun to follow her. Then about a night in Monaco...

‘I was with friends. I’d been sure I’d caught glimpses of him earlier in the night. Then Isawhim, in the casino. He smiled at me. It wasknowing. I had to go. I asked a driver to take me away and my friend followed to make sure I was okay. All I’d wanted was to have fun, to live a little...’

She told him about an unfamiliar driver, a potent combination of alcohol, prescription medication and speed. An accident which had hurt her friend Carla badly, and had hurt Ana too. She talked about her crushing guilt, the way she’d been treated by the press, her family.

The anger ignited and began to burn in his gut like acid at how afraid she sounded, at how her parents didn’t believe her. How the man she blamed for it all was going to be granted a medal for bravery for pulling her out of the car when, in truth, the accident had been due to the terror he’d caused her andno onebut her sister had supported her.

‘And I heard his voice as he was trying to pull me from the car: “you’ll scar, and no one but me will love you now.”’

Aston had never considered himself a violent man but, right now, it was all he could do not to break something, anything within reach. Though that wouldn’t help Ana. She needed his calm, his control.

‘Now he knows where I am. I—I think he was downstairs, watching. Or maybe I imagined it.’

Aston gently placed Ana on the sofa next to him. Stood, and strode to the terrace. Her breakfast sat spoiling in the sun, yoghurt splattered on the table-top. He looked out over the street but couldn’t see anyone. That didn’t mean someone wasn’t there...

‘There’s no one...’ he said as he came back inside. Ana’s face began to crumple, tears welling in her eyes. She needed to know that he wasn’t someone who’d ignore her very real fears. ‘Goddess, I believe you.’

He had influence and power, so the fix was easy enough. Aston called his security firm in her presence so she could hear what he was doing. He told them the situation, and then called the building’s owners to updated them on his arrangements. The place was secure, but more would never go amiss. Within the half hour, there would be residential security in the building, and if he and Ana left the premises, close personal security would guard them. It had been laughably simple. How her family, aroyalfamily, hadn’t done the same was inconceivable.

Finally, he contacted the building’s concierge to give him some warning and to ensure that nothing which hadn’t been vetted by his security was to come to their apartment.

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