Marco's Pride

by Jane Porter

  “I’m not going to have you sleeping on a couch when you’re paying for the rooms.”

  “I could care less about the money,” he answered impatiently. “Why do you do that? Why do you even bring up money?”

  He muttered something, clearly irritated and opened his address book as if to make a phone call but he didn’t reach for the phone. “Money can buy a lot of things but it can’t buy happiness or peace of mind. And that’s what we need most right now. Calm and quiet. A restful week with our children.”

  When focused, no one rivaled Marco’s determination or drive. This was the Marco she believed in, and trusted. “I agree.”

  Slightly mollified, he sat back in his chair at the desk. “Have you thought about when you’ll tell the girls what is happening?”

  “No.”

  “You can’t leave them in the dark. It’s not right. Wouldn’t be fair.”

  “Well, I’m certainly not going to tell them that I’m sick, that I have the same sickness my mother did, and my aunt. They know what happened to them. I won’t have the girls worrying.”

  “But they’ll worry regardless.”

  “Which is why I need you to make them feel extra loved, extra wanted. I know that you have a lot going on right now, and I know I’m adding another burden—”

  “Jesus, Payton!” he interrupted, swearing violently. “Do I have to ring your neck? What kind of unfeeling monster do you think I am? The girls are not a burden. They’ve never been a burden, and for that matter,” he shot her a savage glance, “neither have you.”

  This statement was met by profound silence. Payton’s head felt a bit fuzzy, as is she couldn’t see her way clear through the stream of words to the meaning.

  “The whole marriage thing—our marriage,” Marco clarified grimly, “was not the great tragedy you seem to think it was. I never saw marrying you as a negative thing. It became difficult later, but not initially. I wouldn’t have married you if I’d found the idea abhorrent.”

  “But—”

  “But nothing. I would not have married you if I hadn’t had feelings for you. I would not have married you just to be correct.”

  Feelings. Payton blinked, not certain if she should laugh or cry. He’d had feelings when he married her. Was that good, or was that bad? And if the feelings had been good, why hadn’t their marriage lasted?

  “You’ve done a good job with the girls,” he added more quietly. “They’ll miss you if you leave them in Milan.”

  Her eyes felt gritty. “I’ll miss them, too. But I think it’s better if they don’t see me when I’m not at my best. I think it’s better if they don’t have to see me go through the side effects.”

  He didn’t say anything for a long moment. He rubbed his jaw and then shook his head before abruptly rising. “I’m going to postpone the wedding.”

  “No!”

  He shrugged off her protest. “There’s no way I could get married and go on a long honeymoon now. My daughters will need me near and Marilena is a woman, an adult. She understands complications. The children don’t. It’s the children I’m worried about. In the light of your illness, all other problems become insignificant.”

  “You should at least talk to Marilena before you make this decision.”

  “Whether I do or don’t, I’ve made the decision. The girls are my priority. The girls, Payton, must come first.”

  She smiled faintly. “You would have been a wonderful emperor in ancient Rome.”

  “I know.” Then he smiled, too, and grooves formed next to his mouth. He was mocking himself and when Marco laughed at himself like this he was at his most charming. “Now get some sleep. You should rest while the girls are quiet. And don’t worry about me in here. I’m fine. I have plenty of work to do anyway.”

  Shutting the bedroom door behind her, Payton stretched out on the queen-size bed. Her head ached, her heart ached, she felt as though she were on fire. It was getting harder and harder to be around Marco and keep things light, casual. It was harder to keep perspective. Harder to keep her heart in check.

  As difficult as it would be to leave the girls behind, it’d be so much easier once she’d put distance between her and Marco.

  Marco still had that crazy effect on her where she felt so much, wanted so much, craved so much.

  It was awful playing this game, awful hiding all her feelings, squashing them down until her heart ached endlessly.

  It’d been less than a week since she arrived in Milan and already she felt wrung out. It was getting harder to act nonchalant around him, harder to deny the intensity of her feelings. She hated having to pretend she didn’t love him, or that she felt nothing everytime she heard his voice, or his name.

  How to ignore the leap of her heart? How to numb hope? How to behave as though she didn’t mind that Marco belonged to another woman? Because she did mind. Very much. She loved Marco, but she hadn’t forgotten the excruciating failed marriage, either.

  In the end Payton couldn’t sleep and she finally left the bedroom to join Marco on the balcony. The sun was rapidly disappearing in a gorgeous red and purple sunset.

  Marco ordered a bottle of wine and something to eat from room service, and an exquisite tray of meats, marinated vegetables, and selection of cheeses was promptly delivered to their suite.

  “What’s this?” Payton asked as Marco opened the bottle of red wine.

  If she didn’t know him better, she’d say Marco was being romantic, setting the scene for seduction. But she did know him and she knew he didn’t have romantic or sexual feelings for her.

  They stood on their hotel balcony and watched the sun sink into the ocean. It was a rare moment of tranquillity, she thought. It’d been ages since she felt any peace. She’d had so much worry on her mind for so long. “This is nice,” she said, standing beside Marco, leaning on the railing.

  “It is,” he agreed.

  Yet as the sun’s red glow faded, Payton couldn’t help the twinge of regret. She didn’t have much time left with the girls. She’d be leaving Italy in a week’s time. The girls would adjust to life without her—but would she?

  How would she handle an empty house day after day after day? There’d be no one to come home to. No one to get up for. No one to kiss good-night.

  “That’s a heavy sigh,” Marco said, looking at her, the evening breeze ruffling his dark hair.

  “I’ve been thinking about my life lately, about all the mistakes I’ve made.” She turned her head, looked at him. “I’ve made a lot of mistakes.”

  “Who hasn’t?”

  “I’m not talking business.”

  A muscle pulled at his jaw. “Neither am I.” He reached behind her, lifted the bottle of wine from the table and topped off their glasses. “Want to talk mistakes? I shouldn’t have let you return to California with the girls. It was the worst thing I could have done.

  “I missed them so much it hurt,” he continued. “Visiting you made it worse. Every time I got on the plane to come home I couldn’t breathe. I felt like—” he looked away, features tightening “—like I was being buried alive.”

  “So you stopped coming.”

  “It was better staying away than saying goodbye over and over again.” He took a quick drink from his glass. “But it wasn’t the right thing to do. I failed them. And I failed you. I’m sorry.”

  His apology lingered in his mind long after they headed inside to dress for dinner before waking the girls. Payton slipped into white silk trousers and a turquoise silk peasant blouse with full sleeves and a drawstring neck. Once dressed, they took the elevator to the restaurant on the top of the hotel for dinner.

  Although it was last minute and they had no reservation, the mâitre d’ recognized Marco and seated them right away in a prime seat by the window. Situated on the top floor, La Terrazza had amazing views of the city, port, and mountain and the girls were entertained during the meal watching the large cruise ships arrive and depart from the harbor.

  Marco suddenl
y reached out and covered her hand with his. “This is right, what we’re doing. Going to Capri together. Putting aside our differences. If you have any doubts at all, just look at our daughters.”

  She’d been thinking the same thing and she shivered, moved not just by his touch, but his words. He understood, she thought, more than she’d given him credit for.

  But when he lifted her hand to his mouth and kissed the back of her fingers, she felt a thrill that had nothing to do with maternal devotion or protective instinct. The warmth of his mouth against her skin made her hot and made her want.

  Despite everything she was still a woman, and in the past two years there had been no one. No one to touch her. No one to love her. She hadn’t wanted anyone but Marco and yet he wasn’t hers to have.

  His eyes met hers. “Capri is just what you need.” He turned her hand over, kissed the inside of her wrist. His lips felt like fire on the wild beating of her pulse. “It might just be what I need, too.”

  She’d spent so much time boxing up her feelings, shutting down her emotions, and yet it only took a moment for Marco to undo all her carefully constructed control.

  Pull away, she told herself, as heat rushed through her, heat and desire which threatened to crumble the last of her resistance. And somehow she did.

  In the morning as they were checking out of the hotel, Marco’s cell phone rang. “Marilena,” he said, answering the call. He moved away a little bit and Payton stood with the girls and their suitcases near the lobby door waiting for the taxi that would carry them to the port.

  Payton didn’t hear much of the conversation. She didn’t want to hear much of the conversation and she intentionally busied herself playing a game counting red cars with the girls to keep her focus out on the street instead of on Marco.

  Marco glanced at Payton from beneath his lashes as he listened to Marilena describe a party he’d missed the night before. “Everyone asked about you,” the princess said. “You were definitely missed.”

  “I’ll be back in a week,” he answered, wondering why he felt so irritated. He and Marilena had always been so social together; they were quite a power couple in their strata-sphere.

  “How is it going? How was your night in Naples?”

  “The girls enjoyed Naples,” he answered, watching Payton crouch beside the girls at the glass window. It looked almost as if they were playing a game and Payton was laughing as Gia and Livia argued over who’d gotten the last point. “We had dinner at La Terazza.”

  “You took the children to La Terazza? But darling, it’s not a restaurant for children.”

  “They behaved beautifully.” He saw the taxi pull up and the hotel doorman gestured to Payton. “I need to go,” he said. “Our taxi is here. I don’t want to miss our shuttle to Capri.”

  “All right, darling, call me soon. Bye bye.”

  The taxi whisked them from the hotel to the bay and they arrived at the port just in time to board one of the high-speed hydrofoils that would carry them to Capri. It was only a forty-minute ride, Marco explained. Hundreds of tourists made the round trip every day in summer.

  The hydrofoil picked up speed and Payton watched the steep hillsides with the cascade of pastel houses recede. Naples from the water was even more spectacular. Indeed the whole coastline—all green and blue and jewel tone colors—sparkled in the sun.

  As Naples dwindled from the view, Payton thought back to the dream she’d had in high school. The dream had been to come to Italy, to see the great art and cathedrals of ancient Rome. She’d wanted to take an apartment in Milan and study fashion with the top designers. She’d longed to drink coffee and watch the sun rise over the land where great art and great minds had given the world culture.

  An hour later, the hydrofoil pulled alongside the harbor and the crew turned to the task of docking. The sun felt warmer already.

  Marco suddenly leaned forward and kissed Payton’s forehead, his hand tangling in her long loose curls. “You look happy,” he said. “It’s good to see you smile.”

  She blushed, heat blooming through her middle at his touch.

  He dipped his head again and this time kissed her cheek, near her mouth. She smelled the spice of his cologne—his own signature fragrance, Marco, which sold like mad in the States, felt the rough edge of his beard despite the fact that he’d shaved earlier that morning, felt his warmth from the dazzling Italian sun.

  She could feel him, smell him, and it all seemed surreal. Funny how everything could change but nothing changed. But everything had changed. Marco was not hers. Even if the wedding had been postponed, he was still promised to another woman. He still belonged to another woman.

  Marco’s hand slid from her hair and she ducked beneath his arm, took a quick step away. It’d been two years since their divorce. She’d had two years to accept reality.

  So why couldn’t she? Why couldn’t she accept that she no longer had a future with Marco? And why on earth didn’t the pain—and longing—go away?

  “What’s wrong?” he demanded.

  “Nothing.” Dammit. She couldn’t do this, couldn’t start feeling all these old feelings again. She’d worked so hard to shut down her emotions, to bottle up the want and need. Yet being around him was making her feel so much and what she felt terrified her.

  There was only one man for her. Only Marco, and yet Marco wasn’t an option.

  His house wasn’t actually in Capri, but Anacapri, on the other side of the massive mountain. It was built on a slope above the ocean and it sprawled in elegant terraces. Flowers cascaded over the balconies and more flowers surrounded the pool on the lower terrace.

  With Liv in one arm and Gia in the other, Marco gave her the grand tour. The house had been his mother’s, and his grandparents before. His mother’s family had come to Anacapri for generations and although they were less than a mile from downtown Capri, Marco’s neighborhood felt peaceful, almost rural.

  In Payton’s bedroom he opened the door to the balcony and walked outside into the sunshine. Marco drew a deep breath and exhaled. The girls giggled.

  “Smell the air here,” he said. “Feel the sun. Isn’t this wonderful?”

  Payton couldn’t tear her gaze away from him. It was wonderful. It was wonderful and awful and she didn’t know how she’d survive the next seven days alone with him.

  The girls were here but in some ways the girls made it harder. The girls were a constant reminder that she and Marco had been close once. Intimate. They’d made love.

  Payton closed her eyes, took a steadying breath. She couldn’t let herself think about making love, couldn’t let herself remember how amazing it had been with Marco.

  His touch had been perfect. His hands knew how to touch her. His body felt like heaven against hers.

  She’d heard from friends that sex the first time wasn’t always pleasurable. She’d heard that it sometimes took practice—experience—for the physical act to make physical and emotional sense.

  It hadn’t been like that with Marco. The first time had been incredible. She’d cried when he’d moved inside her, cried at the intense pleasure, the unbelievable sensation of him in her, of him with her.

  When he brought her to an orgasm she cried yet again and Payton knew, despite her limited experience, that she’d never be with anyone else who made her feel this way, and decided then that if she couldn’t be with Marco, she’d rather be with no one.

  “It is wonderful,” she said after a moment, turning to smile at the girls and Marco, doing her best to hide the heartache.

  Marco set the girls on their feet. “This island is magical. It has the power to heal, the power to make whole.”

  Payton’s heart turned inside out. “Enough for a miracle?”

  His intense gaze met hers and held. “Without a doubt.”

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  THEY spent the first couple of days acting like tourists, visiting the popular spots with the throng of Americans and Europeans visitors who’d taken the boat over from th
e mainland for the day.

  Finally, though, Marco had enough of the tourist crush and suggested a picnic away from the crowds and frenzied shoppers in town.

  To the girls’ delight, they took one of Capri’s rambling buses and bumped along the road until Marco signaled to the driver that they wanted off.

  The driver dropped them just above the Villa Damecuta. The villa had once been one of Tiberius’ twelve imperial villas on Capri but was nothing more than ruins now. Yet the ruins had a spectacular view of the water and offered a perfect spot for picnics.

  Payton spread the blanket out on a grassy knoll and they munched on sandwiches and drank lemonade before the girls set out to explore.

  Payton followed the girls and then sat down on what was left of an old stone wall. Marco took a seat next to her. The sunshine was glorious. The day was glorious.

  “You couldn’t ask for more perfect weather,” he said, leaning back a little, arms braced behind him.

  She turned her head and smiled. He was wearing a navy knit shirt, sleeves pushed up to his elbows and it was a very casual look but very sexy. “I think heaven must be like this.” Her smile faltered a fraction, suddenly self-conscious.

  She looked back at the twins who were oblivious to all, intent on their game of hopscotch among the ruins. “The girls are so happy here. You must bring them here again. Promise me.”

  “Of course. Capri is my second home. The house here has been in my mother’s family for generations.” He leaned forward, adjusted her hat to better shield her face. “You don’t talk about your mother much. Why?”

  “It’s difficult.” Payton was grateful for the straw hat’s brim. His gentleness, his protectiveness, was still so new. She wasn’t accustomed to a tender Marco.

  “She had cancer, too, didn’t she?” Marco persisted.

  Talking about her mother wasn’t much easier than contemplating her own future but Marco would need to know these things. Someone should tell the girls about their mother’s family. “I loved my mom,” she said simply. “We were very close. It was just the two of us growing up. Dad left years ago—he remarried and has another family somewhere—so it’s been Mom and me for almost as long as I can remember.”