Page 87 of Modern Romance Collection February 2025, 5-8

‘You could never understand—a woman who’s been caged her whole life, with no sense of adventure.’

As he said those things, she jerked, as if having taken a blow.

‘You’re blaming me for something that’s out of my control. I was limited by my family and my role. Itdoesn’tmean I don’t have a sense of adventure or want to do things. But I’m not going to irrationally risk my life for a dream that isn’t mine.’

It was as if an awful history was repeating itself. He remembered those days, talking to Michel about a woman he’d met. Remembered how desperate he’d been to keep her, but at the same time how torn he was, being asked to give up what he loved. Aston had thought then that he was witnessing the limits of pain. How naïve he’d been; it had only been the beginning.

‘You want to hear about my brother? Let me tell you a little story. Michel had one love in his life—climbing the mountains. Until he met Greta.’

How desperately in love Michel had seemed, how obsessed. Because his brother had always had a dark side to him. It was as his mother had said. Michel had been the moon, Aston the sun.

‘She was meant to be a holiday romance. Michel had plans for life, plans we were working on together.’

To reach the top of the world had always been Michel’s dream, taking the ice-axe from their father’s own failed expedition. He’d wanted Aston to join him—two brothers climbing Everest together. He’d sold it with a kind of religious zeal that was impossible to ignore.

‘But with Greta, their relationship, there was always some drama, some crisis. She wanted his only focus to be her. Everything else came second.’

Ana stood there, arms round her waist, her teeth worrying her lower lip. ‘How old was he?’

‘Nineteen.’

‘So young.’

Too young to be in a coffin in a graveyard. Aston had raged at the universe for a year, for taking him.

‘He didn’t want to stop climbing. But she told him it was her or the mountains, one or the other. He wanted both.’

Aston turned his back. He couldn’t look at Ana’s pity. She’d never understand. She was just another woman trying to change a man, to fit him into her own image.

She’d taken enough from him already. Even now, it was near impossible to get out of bed in the early mornings. He had to drag himself away from her. If he wanted to climb to the top of that damned mountain and keep climbing, she could not win this battle, never. The promises he made, his life, depended on it.

‘My brother had some of the most single-minded focus I’ve ever seen in another human being, yet on his last climb he wasn’t thinking about what he should be doing, but of a choice—Greta or the mountains. On a climb where there should have been no distractions, no loss of focus, he was thinking of her. He fell and he died.’

Aston gripped the counter-top till his fingertips blanched white. The pain of that day was never ending. ‘Because of a woman, he died for love.’

The pain in Aston’s voice threatened to break Ana. What a burden he carried, one that no one saw. She understood now what drove him. Why he was lashing out. What he held back. She wanted to go to him, hold him, but she realised that he was a man with an ego showing his wounds. It had been difficult enough for her, being honest about her own. She was sure he wouldn’t react well to pity. For now, all she had was words.

‘I’m sorry. So sorry that happened to Michel, to you and your family.’

He gave a bitter laugh. ‘And yet here you are, trying to do the same.’

She shook her head, even though he couldn’t see her, holding onto the bench-top as if it was the only thing keeping him upright. ‘I won’t. I want you to do it for the right reasons. Tell me you want this. Tell me it’s your dream and I won’t say anything else.’

‘Lies. You need to be reminded, Ana—this was meant to be a convenient marriage, nothing more. You know why I married you? The real reason?’

It was as if she’d swallowed something bad, now congealing in the pit of her stomach. Here was the real story. Did she want to hear it?

‘You said it was time to settle down.’

‘My parents demanded I marry or they’d write me out of their will. Girard would no longer be mine. But I knew the real reason. They knew I’d do anything to keep Girard and they hoped that once I was happily married, I’d forget all about this climb. But they were wrong. You see, like my brother, I have two loves—the mountains and the wine.’

Not her.

No one but me will love you now...

She tried to shut that voice down but it kept whispering, taunting her with what she’d never have. Aston’s love.

‘My father and mother erred. No person will ever prevent me from making that climb. I asked you to marry me because it was the way to keep Girard and the mountains. Why should you have cared? I believed you understood the meaning of a convenient marriage. Now this.’

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