Page 81 of Modern Romance Collection February 2025, 5-8

His father was the first to smile. His mother soon followed. Ana wouldn’t know, but Aston could see the slight strain on both of their faces. Their expressions were not as open as he would otherwise have expected.

‘Hello, I’m Simon. This is Camille. Come in! Welcome to our home.’

They followed his parents into the house, to a sitting room where Aston knew pre-dinner drinks would be served. Aston introduced Ana with her official title. She blushed, her cheeks reddening, her flush heightened by the glorious colour of her dress.

‘Please, call me Ana.’

His mother walked up to Ana and kissed both her cheeks. ‘I cannot believe I had to find out my son was engaged this way, through themedia.’ She glanced over at him, the words almost a rebuke, but also an acknowledgement of the distance between them.

‘We wanted to tell you, but we were outed before we could,’ he said.

‘It was all very sudden,’ Ana added.

‘And the ring. Excuse me for being gauche, but I must see the treasure which led me to discovering my son was engaged.’

Ana held up her hand, the perfect gem glittering in the light as she and his mother talked about the auction, the excitement.

With his mother and Ana engrossed in conversation, his father put a hand on Aston’s shoulder, an affectionate gesture. ‘You did well, son. I thought we could open this.’

He handed Aston a bottle. Aston whistled.

‘The 1972 vintage.’ It was a collector’s item, their most sought-after vintage of all.

‘Of course. It’s not every day our son gets engaged to a princess. You deserve the best.’

Aston might have imagined it, but his father’s eyes looked a little glassy in the lights. Simon turned away and began to pour, then handed out the glasses.

‘I’d like to propose a toast,’ he said. ‘To Aston and Ana. Congratulations. May you be as happy as Camille and I are.’

Aston took a sip of the magnificent wine. Its appearance represented a clear thawing of thefroideurthat had been between his parents and him. Any issues in their family tended to be settled at the table with food and wine. Hopefully tonight was no different.

Ana came to his side, smiling as she raised her glass and drank. She looked happy and more relaxed than he had ever seen her before. He watched on as she and his mother talked about her family, her school days. Ana laughed, listening to his mother recount stories of the antics the girls had got up to when they’d boarded. Ana’s mother had seemed to stay well out of most of the trouble, but still, anything that made Ana happy pleased him.

‘How did you both meet?’ his mother asked. A loaded question for sure, but an easy one to answer.

‘We met at a trade mission.’ Aston stilled. Ana answering first came as a surprise.

‘The moment I saw him, he caught my eye.’

Her admission surprised him even more. He’d had no idea she’d remembered him. That day she’d been the perfect ice princess—cool, polite, the consummate royal. Ana looked up at him with a gentle smile on her face. Her eyes were full of emotion, something soft and warm. Warming him to his frozen core.

‘She caught my eye too,’ he said, the truth. He’d wanted to crack through her hard shell that day and find the woman beneath. The woman he saw now. ‘Then the Spring Ball. She was a goddess.’

‘You were a god.’

They were having a moment, something profound, he just couldn’t name what it was. Simon clapped Aston on the shoulder. ‘This story sounds familiar, doesn’t it, Camille?’

‘Tout à fait. Although, I hope my son’s proposal was more romantic than his father’s.’

‘Why, what did Simon do?’ Ana asked.

His mother put her hand to her chest. ‘He made me climb amountainwith him.’

‘Goodness, which one?’

This was an old story, one of his parents’ favourites and one they often told. His father chuckled. ‘Camille makes it sound like a trial. It wasn’t so much of a climb, more like a walk—easy.’

‘It tookfivehours uphill. And Kosciuszko is a mountain. You told me it was the tallest in Australia. I thought it would never end.’

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