She lifted an eyebrow. “And how’s that worked out for you?”
He shook his head, his hands in his pockets, as he toed the ground around him. “I’d say it’s a work in progress,” he said. “But a really good one. When finished it’s going to be unbeatable.”
They were interrupted by Clementine, who made the toast to the happy couple. “I don’t think there’s anything better than to have loved so deeply, and lost it, but then to find it again in your life,” she said. “We’re all so proud of our mum for allowing herself to love—and be loved—again. And beyond thrilled that she’s making an honest man of Alastair by truly making him a member of our family.” She raised her glass. “To living and loving life to the fullest.”
Gabriella handed a flute of champagne to Edouardo. The glass looked so diminutive in his strong, work-hardened hands. She tipped her glass to his and nodded. “To living and loving life to the fullest,” she repeated.
For a few minutes everyone became busy chattering while they toasted and shared wedding cake. There were a few touching speeches made, but likely everyone there knew the most important thing spoken that morning was when Edouardo voiced his acceptance, finally.
Gabriella was petting a few of the dogs that had come out to join in the fun when Edouardo approached her again. “Would you mind taking a walk with me?”
She shrugged. “I suppose.”
He placed his hand at the base of her back to steer her away from the crowd, heading off in the direction of his little farm. They walked in silence for long minutes, the quiet punctuated only by the chirp of crickets and the occasional caw of a crow or the trill of a songbird. The sounds of silence empowered Edouardo—nature provided its own narrative. It’s what spoke to him to the depths of his soul.
Finally, he spoke. “I don’t know where to begin,” he said. “I behaved in such a cowardly manner that day, Gab. I don’t have any good excuses for it. I was confused and angry and upset and, to be honest, jealous. I was so certain you were about to ditch me for him—”
“Uh, did you not notice he was a bit of a lunatic?”
“Maybe he wasn’t the only one,” he said. “I was so consumed with protecting our relationship, with preserving our little cocoon that I really didn’t consider I’d made it a bit of a prison that way. Instead of being there for you, I was just interested in ensuring you were there for me. That was kind of dickish of me, you know?”
Gab laughed, pursing her lips. “Yeah, I do know,” she said.
“And then afterward, well, there was no way in my mind to fix that mess. It was too far gone. And you were pissed, and I’d made such a fool of me and us and everything. I just decided to let it all go. It was the only thing that made sense.”
“You gotta do what you gotta do, Edouardo.”
He nodded, as they arrived at his fields. He spread his arms, showing her what his weed-infested mess had become. “It turns out if you take good care of things, they’ll be much healthier in the long run,” he said. “That applies to soil and farms and people and relationships.”
Gabriella looked at what he’d accomplished, her mouth agape. “Edouardo, you did this all by yourself?”
He nodded. “I turned every inch of that earth. Many times over. I took something that was a tangled mess and made it into something that is going to be productive and valuable and beautiful.”
“I guess that explains these,” she said, as she reached for his hands, drawing her fingertips over his calloused palms.
“Proof of my labor of love,” he said, then pulled out the box from his pocket. “Now I want you to think on this before you make any rash decisions,” he said as he extracted his mother’s diamond from the box. “I know we’ve been through a lot and we’ll want to take things slowly. But I wanted you to have this, as a sign that I intend to treat you with the love and care and passion that I’ve put into this.” He spread his arms out.
“This was my mother’s, a gift from my father to her. It was a symbol of his deep and abiding love for her, and I hope that you’ll accept this with the same sentiments from me. Gabriella, I love you. Despite myself, despite my crazy behavior and occasionally agitated temperament and all of that, I know that you make me want to be a better person, to be the best me that I can be. And I want to take the rest of our lives proving to you that I can do that.”
Gabriella looked at him, a twinkle in her eye. “Occasionally agitated temperament?” She smiled. “In a way it feels impulsive for me to go off and get engaged again. My whole plan was to not do that, at least not until I figured me out a bit. Only now, I realize I’ve done a whole lot of figuring me out, thanks to you. I’ve learned a lot from you: how to overcome adversity, how to forgive and move on, and how to keep on trying to be the best that you can be. And I can’t think of anyone else I’d want to continue on this life journey with than you.”
Edouardo let out a whoop so loud that everyone at the wedding party looked up to see what was happening. But he couldn’t have cared less if they were the center of attention: finally, he was in a place where that’s exactly where he wanted to be.
~*~
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Turn the page for a sneak peek at A Court Gesture, book 8 in the It’s Reigning Men series.
A Court Gesture
Chapter One
Larkin Mallory normally loved her job. Retained unexpectedly in the Rome bureau of The International Chronicle after her one-year internship suddenly morphed into a staff position (thanks to a reporter who decided not to return after maternity leave), she often found herself waking up in the most breathtaking European cities, sent there by her editor to cover stories that ranged from hard-hitting journalism to special-interest feature pieces.
It gave her a chance to really spread her wings professionally, sometimes doubling down with her journalistic chops to cover meaty stories, but also being able to delve into fluffier pieces about, say, cheese rolling contests in England. You’ve not lived until you’ve watched a bunch of crazed participants race down a steep hill in pursuit of runaway wheels of cheddar. Especially considering paramedics are at the ready for the inevitable injuries that come with being accidentally run over by nine-pound spools of wayward cheese coming at you with the velocity of a speeding train.
Never once had she challenged her editor, Piers Woodberry, a paunchy, balding, white-haired Brit who’d held stints at various European tabloids before settling down to work for the more austere international paper. He was usually fair-handed in assigning stories, and Larkin couldn’t think of a time she got stuck having to interview someone she didn’t want to talk to.
The fair-skinned reporter with cascading blonde curls and soft blue eyes tended to hide behind thick tortoise-shell eyeglasses and enjoyed her quiet little slice of the world. She dressed in neutral colors so as to not draw attention to herself, and loved to travel, but only when she could do so on her terms. Not one to indulge in expensive hotel rooms, fine dining or fancy clothes, she was perfectly happy wandering the streets of a given city in yoga pants and trainers, grabbing easy street food (crêpes in Paris, kebobs in Istanbul or supplì in Rome) rather than having to dine alone in a restaurant where she feared she’d stick out like a sore thumb.
Even though the reality was that she was alone, and she made no mistake about it. The very nature of her job meant she didn’t get to focus on nurturing friendships, apart from a few colleagues in her office. So while Larkin’s professional life was fulfilling, her personal life was
somewhat lacking, right alongside her wardrobe and her sense of self.
Somehow she wasn’t particularly good at envisioning herself as more than the nuts and bolts reporter she was, even though she had the good fortune of doing it in a wonderful part of the world. After all, she wasn’t stuck covering city sewer commissions into the wee hours of the night back home in Virginia where she grew up. Instead, she could as easily find herself strolling along the Champs-Ëlysées as through the rabbit warren-like streets of the medieval medina in Marrakesh. In some ways it was a gilded life she led, but somehow she managed to tamp down the exotic nature of it by insisting on being plain old Larkin Mallory, the girl who played flute in her high school marching band and wore thick corrective glasses that perhaps helped others to not see her for who she was, which was fine by her.
Larkin was finalizing a story on a man who was walking through the Swiss Alps backwards when her boss shouted for her.
“Mallory,” her barked. “You’re going to Fashion Week. Milan. I just lost Silvia, who was supposed to cover it. She’s got bed bugs and isn’t coming back until she’s rid of them. Which means you’re on the Fashion Week beat until I say you aren’t.”
Larkin blanched. Fashion Week? She no sooner belonged in the rarified world of high fashion than she belonged in a medical lab concocting the cure to cancer. Both environments were so not in her stratosphere. She knew precisely nothing about fashion except that you put on your clothes every day and hoped that they matched. And wearing all black kept you from having to even worry about that.
“But Mister Woodberry,” she said, a pleading look in her eyes as if she were a cow imploring the butcher sharpening his knife not to proceed with the impending slaughter. “You’d be better off asking anyone to do that than me. Take Paolo, for instance,” she said, pointing at her colleague standing at the Nespresso machine fixing his fourth espresso of the morning. “Paolo, see, he’s Italian. He knows the world of fashion. Just look at him! He dresses in various shades of black, always so chi-chi and clearly up on the best of what to wear.”
Paolo looked up from his task. “But of course,” he said, tossing back his espresso as he returned to sit at his desk. “La bella figura. It’s the Italian way.”
“Bella figura?” Larkin said. “What the heck is that?”
Paola stood up again, placing his hands casually in his pockets and striking a pose. He cut quite the handsome figure in his hipster-cut black wool pants and dark gray pin-striped button-down, with a coordinating lighter gray silk tie. His dark hair was perfectly groomed, his face cleanly-shaven, his shoes polished and stylish. “La bella figura is the Italian way of life,” he said, adjusting the knot in his necktie as if to punctuate his point. “It’s about presenting our best face to the world.” He swept his hands along his front as if to demonstrate.
Larkin nodded. “So yeah,” she said, nodding at her colleague. “That.”
“That?” Piers said.
“I mean Paolo’s your man,” she said. “He’d be perfect to cover Fashion Week. He’s clearly knowledgeable about it and very fashion-forward. He’s Italian, and that helps. He’s handsome, which I’m sure will get him in with all of the beautiful fashion models for interviews and such.”
Her boss shook his head. “Too late,” he said. “Paolo’s traveling with the Pope to Africa.”
“Awwww, man,” she said. “I’d love go with the Pope to Africa. I’d do a great job. I like that pope. He’s a good guy.”
“No can do,” Piers said. “Paolo’s up on his shots and has been taking his malaria medicine. Besides, you don’t cover someone to be a cheerleader for them. If I wanted that I’d give you pom-poms and a megaphone. Sorry,Mallory, everyone around here is locked into assignments and you’re the only one I can spare,” he said, tapping her on the nose with the tip of his pen. “That’s what comes with being low man on the totem pole.”
Larkin sighed. Crap. It was going to feel like high school all over again: the dowdy girl in the band trying to fit in with the prima donna in-crowd beauties. This was gonna suck massively.
Chapter Two
His Royal Highness, Monaforte’s Prince Luca Francesco DeMaio, Duke of Bartolomea, had the reputation of being a bit of a player. If you asked him if this was indeed fact, he’d flat-out deny it. Although he made a point of never publicly responding to such assertions, opting instead to do his own thing and not give a care about whatever judgments were made about him. He was all about enjoying his life and couldn’t be bothered with what others thought about him, even if maybe he did tend to opt for the “love the one you’re with” philosophy more than you average guy.
Nevertheless, he was easy to judge, what with his soothing blue eyes and fresh-out-of-bed head of wavy black hair, and so the tabloids loved to regale readers with eyewitness accounts of his latest conquests, most of whom were famous celebrities, super models and other European royalty. Luca’s reputed love interests seemed to enter and exit through a revolving door with the regularity of the change of seasonal fashions, a veritable parade of who’s who and who’s wearing what. Which was fitting, since the prince was often seen with them at the premier fashion events in New York, Paris, and Milan.
He hadn’t planned to attend Milan this time, however, until his friend and distant cousin, Alessandro Romeo, principle of the world-famous Cantine Marchesi Romeo, makers of some of the best Chiantis Italy had to offer, enlisted his support at the last minute.
“I’m begging you, mio cugino,” he said, imploring his cousin in his Italian-interspersed English. “You know I wouldn’t do this if it wasn’t important to me.”
Important to Sandro meant that his latest girlfriend, one very tall, very thin, very demanding Gia Sandretti was walking the catwalk for one of the hottest new Italian designers, and Sandro had promised to bring along plenty of moral support. Not like she’d have a cheering squad or anything while strutting her stuff, but Sandro knew that it mattered to Gia, and his cousin was happy to accommodate him.
“Dude, no need to grovel,” Luca said. “That’s what family’s for. I’m totally down with a few days in Milano,” he said. “I’ll stay at Nonna’s villa and enjoy some home-cooked meals. It’ll be perfect.”
~*~
Sandro greeted Luca as his driver dropped him off in front of Ciao, Bella, a hot, new nightclub where all the most beautiful people in Milan could be found. Of course with this being fashion week, that meant that Ciao, Bella, would be crawling with preternaturally gorgeous humans, all pressed flesh-to-flesh on the dance floor surrounded by a throbbing backbeat and a multitude of sweat-gleaming bodies.
“Ciao, Luca,” Sandro said, kissing his cousin on both cheeks as was the custom in Italy. “It’s been too long. Grazie mille. Thank you for showing up for Gia’s big debut.”
“Mio amico,” he said to his good friend. “How could I refuse? Besides,” he said with a gentle elbow to the ribs, “I know you’ll make it worth my while to visit, no? I’ve seen Gia with her friends in all of the magazines. One more stunning than the other. Who do you have lined up for me tonight?”
Sandro shook his head. “Surely you don’t want me to choose for you,” he said. “I presumed you’d rather have the pick of the litter yourself.” He winked at him as he led Luca past a long line of club-goers hoping to gain admission into the place. As they reached the front of the line, a large mustachioed bouncer with a shaved head and steroid-swollen arms that looked like they could drill pilings into concrete unhooked the velvet rope to let them by.
The bouncer motioned for them to walk past one more doorman who was vetting the wannabes to Luca’s right just as Luca noticed a somewhat plain young woman raising her voice at the man surprisingly loudly. It was amazing that he could even hear her with the din of the crowd in line and the pulse of music seeping out from inside.
“Listen, sir,” the woman said with a stern no-bullshit voice, flicking her wavy, long blonde hair back over her shoulder, reaching for some sort of pass dangling from her nec
k. Luca turned to stare at her; something about her was intriguing despite her being dressed in a non-descript gray smock dress and simple flat shoes. She was clearly not a fashionista; the woman looked nothing like the type of guests he’d expect to be in attendance. “I have a press pass, see?” she said in her American accent as she pointed to the nametag dangling from her neck. “I’m allowed to be here.”
The only problem was that the bouncer apparently spoke no English and appeared to be fluent only in the language of beautiful people: in other words, if you were extraordinarily beautiful, you got in. If not, you were out of luck. He folded his arms across his ample chest, frowned, and shook his head, pointing past the woman’s shoulder and looking through her as if she were invisible, indicating in no uncertain terms that she should leave.
The woman started to cry, though Luca couldn’t tell if they were tears of rejection or rage.
“But that’s not fair,” she said as she stomped her foot to no avail. “I’m going to lose my job if I don’t get in here.”
Luca felt badly for the poor thing. She couldn’t help that she hadn’t been born into the rarified world of exceptional beauty. Hell, he knew the only reason he was even getting into this elitist venue was thanks to the sheer good fortune of his birthright. Not that he was bad-looking; he wasn’t. But that wasn’t the currency he was trading in, whereas it would be with most guests attending this evening. Luca could gain admittance pretty much anywhere simply because of his royal lineage, even though his good looks never hurt. For the American Plain Jane standing near him, though, not so much.
“Mi scusi, signore,” Luca said, interjecting himself into the conversation. “Pardon me, but if I could interrupt here. This lady,” he said, pointing at the plain blonde. “She’s with me. So please allow her to enter the club.”
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