by CC MacKenzie
"Why do I feel as if I'm balancing on a tightrope? One wrong step and I'll fall to my death?" she sobbed into his neck. She shifted and stared up into his face. The pouty mouth made him want to kiss her. "Why is love so hard? Why isn't love easy?"
The ache in his ribs was not heartache, Olivier told himself. Love sprang up as he stared into her beautiful face, those curls black as night tumbling around the delicate bones, delicate skin. And that love, fiercely possessive, rose so fast it took his breath away. Would he ever get used to feeling like this every time he so much as looked at her? Her blue eyes were huge as she stared into his.
Now his hand rose to play with her hair.
"I told you that life with you is not easy. A man might expect a woman who has just said she loves him to kiss him, but not you."
"I've spoilt it for you, haven't I?"
To stop his smile, his teeth bit down hard on his bottom lip.
"I can think of many ways you can make it up to me."
At his words, Anastacia dropped her head on his chest and inhaled. She could smell soap, the just washed scent of his shirt and something else that was pure man. For some reason, it made her feel acutely female.
"When word gets out about my father, and especially that I'm in a serious relationship with you, I'm worried about the press attention," she whispered.
She smiled when his chest moved as he laughed.
"Ignore it."
Her head lifted.
Her eyes met his.
"How can I ignore it when I hate it?"
"Hate is a strong word."
"I hate having my picture used in the press, all the speculation in that crap newspaper."
"The one that called you a gorgeous, dark-haired angel with violet eyes?"
"See this face? Is it laughing?"
"It is not a big deal, piccolino. It comes with the territory," he said.
"They need to keep their nose out of my business."
He leaned back to study her face.
"Of all the people in the world, you would be the first to tell me that because I am in the public eye that makes me fair game."
Anastacia couldn't help but pout at that comment, which was a fair one. Hadn't she said something similar when they'd talked about the advertising campaign?
"Excuse me, you are the one in the public eye, not me. You are the football star, that's your job, not mine," she argued. "I am a private citizen and a private person and I have a basic human right to have my privacy protected."
"More rules?"
"It's got nothing to do with rules, it's got to do with fair play."
"Unfortunately for you, being my girlfriend makes you a target." Rather than tossing him a bad tempered come-back, Anastacia heaved a heavy sigh. "At least they got one thing correct," he summed up. "I think of you exactly like a dark-haired angel, with a touch of the devil."
She placed a lazy kiss on his glorious mouth.
"The thing is, I don't like sharing you. I don't like sharing what we have with... judgemental assholes on social media and the press."
His eyes went gentle as his dimple popped.
"That, cara mia, is the sweetest thing you have ever said to me."
The tone of his voice had her heart beating fast along with a new feeling of love growing in her. "I hate feeling as if I'm being stalked, everything we do, where we go, on social media. I hate losing that private part of me."
Olivier shrugged with a feigned indifference as a crazy idea made his heart race.
"Romance makes the world go round. So do births, deaths and... marriage, when it involves people in the public eye."
"Once the Ferranti Boutique hotels campaign gets underway, it's only going to get worse. Because you're hot at the moment, and I'm not just talking about football, the more interest there will be in you and in us as a couple. I'm not looking forward to it."
"You think I am hot?"
She wound her hands around his neck and kissed him.
"Of course you're hot. You know you're hot."
"I could always walk away from the campaign. You did not want me in it in the first place," he reminded her.
"Don't be stupid."
He kissed her, a whisper of lips against lips.
And took the plunge.
"I know one answer to your problem."
"You do?"
"Si. We get married."
Stunned blue eyes, as if she'd been coshed over the head with a blunt instrument, stared with what appeared to be mounting disbelief into his.
Silence.
"You cannot be serious."
Not ready, he realized, and could have kicked himself.
But it was too late for wishing the words unsaid.
"Think about it. Social media sites would back off. People blissfully in love are boring."
"Think about it? You're saying we should marry because we don't want to be talked about on the internet? I've never heard anything more ridiculous in my entire life."
"I do not care. I am not the one making it an issue. I have come up with a solution."
"A solution? So you want to marry me to appease me?"
He couldn't help it, he rolled his eyes.
"How can a beautiful and intelligent woman be so stupid? If I devoted my whole life to appeasing you it would end in abject failure. I want to marry you, in fact I will marry you, because I love and adore you. It will happen anyway so you had better get used to the idea."
Wide blue eyes searched his.
And all the while his heart went crazy in his chest.
Irritation with him rose in those big eyes. "But... but, what if I'm not ready to get married?"
She hadn't said an outright no.
Olivier took strength from it, even though he was making a hell of a mess of his first (and last he vowed) marriage proposal.
"Tough." His brows rose, watching her with the same irritation bubbling in his throat. "I am ready, more than ready, to marry you."
"I don't care," she shot back. "I'm not ready and might never be ready. So what are you going to do about that?"
"At the moment, not a damn thing."
She pushed off his knee and stood in front of him like a warrior readying for battle.
"Let me just say that that was the most pitiful attempt at a marriage proposal I have ever heard. No woman in her right mind would ever agree to be told she was going to marry a man. What the hell is wrong with you?"
Olivier wished he knew.
Maybe he was losing his mind.
He stood on legs that weren't quite steady.
Then he dropped to his knees and took her trembling hands in his.
He stared up into eyes wide with shock and something like terror.
He knew the feeling and took a deep breath.
"With every breath I take, I love you. Each and every day I promise to do everything within my power to make you happy. I love you so damned much. Please, Anastacia, will you marry me?"
Shitty, shit, shit.
Eyes brimming over, Anastacia gazed down into dark eyes filled with love, for her. With need, for her. And found herself saying,
"Yes. Yes, I'll marry you."
She dropped to her knees, too, and their kiss was so sweet and filled with a mutual promise.
He was about to speak, but she pressed a finger to his mouth.
She knew she owed him nothing but the truth.
"But not yet..."
It Doesn’t Stop Here
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CC MacKenzie is a USA Today Bestselling Author of contemporary and paranormal romance. She loves to hear from her readers; you can find her at:
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Other Books Available by CC MacKenzie
US and UK Links Listed where appropriate
Ludlow Hall Series - Contemporary Romance
Reckless Nights in Rome - Book 1
Reckless Nights in Rome US
Reckless Nights in Rome UK
A Stormy Spring - Book 2
A Stormy Spring US
A Stormy Spring UK
Run Rosie Run - Book 3
Run Rosie Run US
Run Rosie Run UK
The Trouble with Coco Monroe - Book 4
The Trouble With Coco Monroe US
The Trouble With Coco Monroe UK
The Fall of Jacob Del Garda – Book 5
The Fall of Jacob Del Garda US
The Fall of Jacob Del Garda UK
A Film Star, A Baby. and a Proposal – Book 6
A Christmas Story 1
A Film Star, A Baby. and a Proposal US
A Film Star, A Baby. and a Proposal UK
Delicious and Deadly: Invitation to Eden - Book 8
Delicious and Deadly: Invitation to Eden US
Delicious and Deadly: Invitation to Eden UK
An Affair to Remember - Book 9
An Affair to Remember US
An Affair to Remember UK
‘A Daddy for Daisy’ - Book 7 in The Ludlow Hall Series is due out in 2015
Desert Princes Series - Thriller, Adventure Romance
Desert Orchid – Book 1
Desert Orchid US
Desert Orchid UK
Vampyre Legal Chronicles Series – Paranormal Romance
Vampyre Legal Chronicles – Marcus Book1: US
Vampyre Legal Chronicles – Marcus Book 1: UK
The Vampyre Legal Chronicles - James Book 2: US
The Vampyre Legal Chronicles - James Book 2: UK
Her Rules
A Ludlow Nights Story
Once soccer star Olivier Conti fixes his mind on something he sets about getting it. And as soon as he spots Anastacia Morgan, he knows she is the perfect woman for him. Winning her heart is a hard-won battle but he falls hard for Anastacia and she falls for him. They are madly in love, so what on earth can go wrong?
Since pitching head first into crazy love Anastacia's life is one mind-bending rollercoaster. In the space of a day she's meets her father for the first time, discovers she has a family and agrees to marry Olivier Conti, at some time in the dim and distant future.
However, as the song says, the course of true love never does run smoothly. As Olivier and Anastacia move their advertising shoot to Paris for the Ferranti Boutique hotel campaign, an unwelcome blast from her romantic past plunges Anastacia into emotional turmoil.
And she's not the only one having trouble with a man, style guru Danni Pebbles joins her best friend in Paris and discovers the powerful and wealthy Pascale Wolfe is determined to give her a run for her money - but that just makes Danni even more determined to keep him at arm’s length.
However, they quickly find that they are an equal match in terms of an attraction that will not be denied by mutual bad temper and sheer stubbornness, but when an old enemy from Pascale's past begins stalking Danni, Anastacia and Olivier and Pascale combine forces to keep her safe...
When I saw you I fell in love, and you smiled because you knew
William Shakespeare
Excerpt
Olivier Conti was a very happy man.
Very happy.
Anastacia Morgan loved him. She might believe and say she loved him. But did she trust him? He wasn't so sure she did, yet. The woman he loved was as jittery about love, about intimacy, as he was about abseiling. Throwing himself off the top of a mountain had never appealed. And until she'd met him, love had never appealed to Anastacia either.
They'd tied up and finished the London shoot for their ad campaign. And now the team were waiting for the interior decorators to finish in the Ferranti Boutique hotel in Paris.
In their relationship things were going well, too. Anastacia appeared happy, and he was happy, but something was bugging him. His instinct told him that she was waiting for him to make one wrong move. She'd already ordered him not to dream about wedding bells or the pitter-patter of tiny feet anytime soon. Fair enough. He'd jumped the first hurdle. He had her promise herself to him, so he'd take it nice and slow and steady. His goal was to get her far enough down the road to happy-ever-after that she'd accept his engagement ring. He'd been irritated and annoyed when she'd refused to fly to Rome for the weekend to meet his mother and his sisters. When he'd become irritated, Anastacia had become incredibly, cool. His sister Michelle had already spilled the beans about Anastacia to Mama Conti. Plus, his madre was keen to meet the woman who had been pictured kissing her son so passionately in the street, in public. He winced. His mama would not be an easy sell. He knew she only wanted what was best for him. And what was best for him, according to his madre, was a nice Italian girl. A nice Italian girl like Olivia Cavallini.
He'd gone out with the girl twice and kissed her once. Events which hardly constituted wedding bells. But he knew his mother was very keen on Olivia, the daughter of her closest friends. The idea of Olivier and Olivia, the way their names sounded together, had made his sisters howl with laughter, and he'd laughed himself at the ridiculousness of the situation. The thought entered his head that he should call Olivia and tell her he'd met the woman he wanted to marry. But then he decided against that bright idea, there was no point in making something out of nothing.
That morning over coffee, the woman he loved had accused him of trying to control her.
He wasn't trying to control Anastacia? Was he? He wanted to be a part of her life. A big part. While she was still determined to run her own life exactly as she'd always done. He knew her need to be independent was a direct result of her background, her past. Although she still hadn't made all of that past clear to him, not yet. And one of the things that bugged him was her refusal to let him spend the night in her bed, which meant most nights they slept in his. Why he felt... hurt, about something that shouldn't matter, he'd no idea. She was basically living with him, but they were not living together. So this morning Anastacia had raced out the door to work, leaving him at a loose end.
This was why he was driving out of London on his way to Ludlow Hall to have lunch with his pal, Nico. And he wanted to have a little chat with Nico about a number of other things. The first thing was about Christopher Rucker, and why Nico hadn't told him about Anastacia's father. Anastacia still hadn't met her step-mother and half-sisters. She wasn't ready, she said. Fair enough. But Christopher was pushing. The man needed to learn that if he pushed Anastacia, she would shove back, hard. Since he was a friend of Christopher Rucker, maybe a word in Nico's ear might be a good idea.
He slid the car into fifth and put his foot down.
He was going to handle Anastacia, and sort out her father at the same time.
That wasn't controlling.
Was it?
