The Runaway Bride And The Billionaire
The Runaway Bride And The Billionaire
Kate Hardy
He’ll help her forget her past, and may just give her a future too!Immi Marlowe ran away after she was jilted… and on arrival on Isola dei Fiore gorgeous billionaire Matt Stark sweeps her off her feet! On the island’s golden beaches they really connect but, when her past secrets are revealed, what will Matt do to prove they can go the distance?Summer at Villa Rosa – Book 3 of 4
A Mediterranean escape!
Heartbroken jilted bride Immi Marlowe flees to Isola dei Fiore, desperate to get away. But just around the corner from Villa Rosa, a gorgeous billionaire is waiting to sweep her off her feet...
Matt Stark shares Immi’s sense of adventure, and on the island’s golden beaches they form a connection that neither wants to end. Immi’s stay is supposed to be temporary—but with her secret past revealed, how far will Matt go to prove they can go the distance?
Immi noticed that Matt was still holding her hand; she really ought to find a tactful way of removing her hand from his…
Yet for the life of her she couldn’t pull away, because she liked the feeling of his fingers tangled with hers.
They lay there in a strangely companionable silence, just watching the stars, and Matt pointed out a couple more constellations. ‘That one’s Lupus—the wolf.’ They lay until the air started to get chilly, and then Matt sighed. ‘I guess we’d better get back.’
He saw her back to the house—and they still seemed to be holding hands.
This time he kissed her on the cheek. ‘Goodnight, Immi.’
Her skin tingled where his lips had touched her, and it was the easiest thing in the world to kiss his cheek back. Except somehow he’d moved, and she ended up brushing her mouth against his. It felt as if she’d been galvanised. She felt him go very still, too. And then he dropped the blankets and cushions he’d been holding in his free hand, slid his arms round her and kissed her properly.
It felt as if she were floating among the stars they’d just been watching.
Summer at Villa Rosa (#uc9b9894d-55db-5ce6-bd02-d6a675a26020)
Four sisters escape to the Mediterranean...
Only to find reunions, romance...and royalty!
Villa Rosa holds a very special place in the hearts of Posy Marlowe and her three sisters. It’s filled with memories of idyllic summer holidays on L’Isola dei Fiori. And her recent inheritance of the beautiful but fading palazzo from her godmother, Sofia, couldn’t have come at a better time for them all!
Now, this summer, they all escape to L’Isola dei Fiori and discover Villa Rosa again.
Don’t miss all four books in this fabulous quartet:
On sale June: Her Pregnancy Bombshell
by Liz Fielding (Miranda’s story)
On sale July: The Mysterious Italian Houseguest
by Scarlet Wilson (Portia’s story)
On sale August: The Runaway Bride and the Billionaire
by Kate Hardy (Imogen’s story)
On sale September: A Proposal from the Crown Prince
by Jessica Gilmore (Posy’s story)
Only in Mills & Boon Romance.
And on August 7
Jessica Gilmore brings you an exciting online read—a prequel to Summer at Villa Rosa.
Available at millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk).
The Runaway Bride and the Billionaire
Kate Hardy
www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
KATE HARDY has always loved books, and could read before she went to school. She discovered Mills & Boon books when she was twelve and decided this was what she wanted to do. When she isn’t writing Kate enjoys reading, cinema, ballroom dancing and the gym. You can contact her via her website: www.katehardy.com (http://www.katehardy.com).
To Liz Fielding, Scarlet Wilson and Jessica Gilmore—
I thoroughly enjoyed our time creating
the Marlowe girls and Villa Rosa!
Contents
Cover (#u426b7b25-9f28-5efb-8a2a-2262fbfd52ac)
Back Cover Text (#u7f872a3d-3427-57cc-bdb5-25be3b1264f6)
Introduction (#u54c26ca1-3791-52aa-a375-e7a0082f1f0e)
Summer at Villa Rosa (#u2d8d9f52-b901-5741-84a7-6186bc1499ea)
Title Page (#u0f2e06f9-5be7-5143-9d87-09b784e66583)
About the Author (#ufca49fcb-0853-51da-881e-acaa6eeda1de)
Dedication (#ua469ac7f-9fc0-503b-93ae-132caeb8e5e3)
PROLOGUE (#u66b0862b-c62e-5876-9a07-ca131e84aa0b)
CHAPTER ONE (#uf18ef576-e123-5ca2-9958-d266d0a5e5a5)
CHAPTER TWO (#u4be86c64-9537-5ae9-9b39-1f57997a04ca)
CHAPTER THREE (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER FOUR (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER FIVE (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER SIX (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER SEVEN (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER EIGHT (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER NINE (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER TEN (#litres_trial_promo)
EPILOGUE (#litres_trial_promo)
Extract (#litres_trial_promo)
Copyright (#litres_trial_promo)
PROLOGUE (#uc9b9894d-55db-5ce6-bd02-d6a675a26020)
YOU WEREN’T SUPPOSED to be jealous of your twin.
Especially when you knew she’d just been through a rough time and she deserved every bit of happiness. And especially when it was her wedding day.
Immi really hoped that Andie was feeling so loved-up with Cleve that her twin-sense was temporarily muted and she had no idea that one of her bridesmaids was having a serious wobble.
Though, actually, Immi had a feeling that all three of the bridesmaids were having a serious wobble right now. Posy, the baby of the family, had a smile so bright and brittle that it was practically cracking. The same was true of Portia, the oldest of the Marlowe girls: the family rebel who was behaving so perfectly that she might as well have ‘faking it’ written across her forehead in bright red lipstick.
Maybe she should suggest a midnight rendezvous on the beach, where the three of them could sit and talk—just as they had when they’d been children, snuggling up beneath a duvet and having whispered conversations late into the night. Maybe they could help each other with their problems. But Posy seemed to have closed off to everyone since she’d joined the ballet corps and Portia wasn’t given to talking about personal stuff.
And what did Immi have to whine about anyway? She had a job she loved, helping to run Marlowe Aviation, the family firm; and she was in the run-up to her wedding to Stephen Walters, who was all set to be promoted to her father’s second-in-command at work.
Except Stephen didn’t look at her the way that Cleve looked at Andie.
And Immi had a nasty feeling that she didn’t look at him the way that Andie looked at Cleve: as if there was nobody else on the surface of the planet.
She shook herself. It was probably just the stress of organising her own wedding making her so antsy. There were only two months to go and it had snowballed into a massive affair. Everything was completely under control—organising was what Immi did best—but now she’d seen how gorgeous her sister’s quiet, understated wedding was, it brought home to her that the bridezilla stuff wasn’t what she really wanted for herself, either.
The doubts had been creeping in for weeks. She’d overheard Stephen’s best man Jamie saying that all he had to do was keep his nose clean until Imogen said ‘I do’ and he got the corner office. At the time, she’d tried to dismiss it as banter, but now she wondered if there was something more to it. Stephen had said he was too busy to take time off for Andie’s wedding, and because it was only a small affair he was sure nobody would mind if he didn’t make it. But was a man as ambitious as Stephen Walters really too busy to attend the wedding of the boss’s daughter—his own fiancée’s twin? Or did he have other reasons for not wanting to be here?
Oh, for pity’s sake. She had to stop overthinking things.
And she really had to stop the paranoia. What had happened eight years ago wasn’t going to repeat itself. So what if it was a cliché, marrying the boss’s daughter? Stephen said he loved her. Wanting all the extra frills was just being selfish. Immi was done with being selfish. She’d put her family through enough worries. No more.
* * *
Imogen Marlowe looked amazing, Matt thought.
The first time he’d met her, she’d been wearing a power suit, all businesslike and slightly intimidating and determined to find out exactly what was going on with her twin. The second time he’d met her, early this morning, she’d been barefoot, wearing ankle-grazer faded jeans teamed with an oversized sweater, with a streak of mud on her face from where she’d been raiding the garden for flowers—the beautiful white marguerite daisies that she’d turned into raffia-tied bouquets for the bride and the bridesmaids, and the osteospermum that graced the tables in tin cans with an organza ribbon tied in a bow around them.
Right now, she looked the epitome of cool elegance in a teal-coloured vintage couture gown. The dress was sleeveless, with straps a finger width wide and a neckline that just skimmed her collarbones. A large round brooch made from tiny white seed pearls and four large black pearls was pinned on a vertical bow in the centre of the empire line bodice, and she wore a matching pearl collar. Her dark hair was cut in an immaculate, sharp bob and her make-up was discreet and understated.
And Matt really, really wanted to untie that bow and unwrap her from that dress. Find out exactly what that material was hiding.
He shook himself. Maybe it was the wedding making him soppy. The best man and the bridesmaid, indeed.
But, as the best man, he was supposed to dance with the bridesmaid.
At that very second, human speech seemed to have deserted him. Which was crazy. What was it about this woman that made him feel all tongue-tied?
‘That’s a gorgeous dress, Imogen,’ he said in the end, knowing it sounded lame but not having a clue what else to say.
‘Thank you. It’s one of Sofia’s—my sister Posy’s godmother. And the amazing costume jewellery belonged to her too.’ She gestured to the brooch and the collar.
‘I kind of guessed that.’ He smiled. ‘It’s nice that all four of you sisters are wearing one of her dresses.’
‘It’s almost like her still being here with us,’ Immi agreed. ‘I remember coming to the villa as a child and Sofia always let us play dress-up with her amazing clothes. Though I guess that was because we always treated her stuff with respect—we didn’t smear chocolate everywhere or rip things.’ She smiled. ‘I don’t ever remember seeing this dress when I was little, but it’s so stunning: like an eighteenth-century mantua dress, but updated to have a modern profile.’
‘Mantua?’ he asked.
She gestured to the bow. ‘An open-fronted dress with a matching train and petticoat, and the train’s lifted up to show the petticoat.’
‘Mantua. I’ll remember that.’
‘I only know that because my guilty secret is watching historical dramas,’ she said, giving him a rueful smile that made his heart feel as if it had done a backflip. ‘Portia knows more about that stuff than I do, really.’
Portia was the Hollywood reporter, he remembered. The oldest sister.
‘And it’s good of Posy to let us all borrow the dresses and jewellery. Strictly speaking, they all belong to her now—along with the villa.’
‘But sisters always share. At least, mine do,’ he said.
‘You have sisters?’ She looked surprised.
‘Four. All younger than me.’
‘So you’re used to all the talking, then.’
It was his turn for the rueful smile. ‘Just a bit. Um, as the bridesmaid and the best man, I’m guessing we ought to...?’
‘That would be lovely,’ she said, and let him lead her onto the temporary dance floor.
* * *
This was bad, Immi thought. Seriously bad.
Matt Stark was Cleve’s best man—a guy who lived in the cottage down the road and had kept an eye on the Villa Rosa since Sofia’s death. According to Andie, he was a computer genius who’d made a fortune from a computer program that helped people run their homes by voice control—everything from turning a house alarm on or off to opening curtains, changing the thermostat on a heating system or dimming a light. Immi had been introduced to Matt’s mother Gloria earlier, and understood at that moment exactly what had driven her son to make the program: Gloria was in a wheelchair, crippled by arthritis, and Matt’s computer system had given her back some of her independence.
He’d kept an eye on Sofia, too; although he hadn’t managed to persuade her to let him install a satellite phone for emergencies, she had agreed to let him rig up a bell she could ring if she needed help.
And he’d rescued Immi’s spider-hating twin from having to stick her head in a cupboard full of cobwebs.
Matt Stark was one of the good guys, and it was fine for her to like him instantly.
It was also fine for her to appreciate that he was good-looking—tall, with brown eyes and dark hair brushed back from his forehead, and a tiny little quirk at the corners of his mouth that told her he smiled often.
What wasn’t fine was for her to tingle where he touched her. Particularly because she didn’t feel like that when her husband-to-be touched her.
She needed to get a grip. Make an excuse that she needed to go and fiddle with the flowers on the table, or something. But for the life of her she couldn’t pull herself out of Matt’s arms. It felt as if she was under some weird kind of spell. All the social graces she used every single day in business had simply deserted her. She had no idea what to say to him.
Worse still, she found herself looking at his mouth again. Wondering. Supposing it was just the two of them and the night and the music? Dancing under the stars, in the garden that overlooked the sea, with the air full of the scent of roses...
And he was looking at her mouth as if he was thinking exactly the same thing. Wondering what it would be like if they kissed. Wondering how she tasted.
She couldn’t breathe.
This was all wrong. She shouldn’t even be thinking about kissing another man. She was getting married in eight weeks’ time. She was meant to be in love with her fiancé, not thinking about kissing Matt Stark in front of her entire family at her twin sister’s wedding.
And yet she could feel her lips parting. Feel him drawing her that tiny bit closer, enough that she could feel the heat of his body against hers. Feel herself tipping her head back...
* * *
Insta-lust, that was what his sisters called this feeling, Matt remembered. Instant crazy attraction.
It had nothing to do with the glamorous dress or the high heels, and everything to do with the woman in his arms. She felt soft and sweet and the perfect fit. And he was pretty sure she felt it, too: because her hazel eyes had turned almost golden, her pupils were huge and that perfect rosebud mouth was parted ever so slightly.
All he had to do was dip his head...
And he was just about to do it when he noticed something.
Something that made him feel as if several buckets of ice-cold water had been dropped on him.
How the hell had he missed that rock on her left hand? That huge hands-off-she’s-mine signal?
It might be traditional for the best man to dance with the bridesmaid, but that was as far as this could go. Much as Matt wanted to kiss Imogen Marlowe, he couldn’t. He didn’t remember seeing her with anyone at the actual wedding, but that massive diamond practically screamed that she was engaged.
He forced himself to ask, ‘Is your fiancé here this evening?’
And then he saw all the colour drain out of her face and horror fill her eyes. As if she were completely shocked by what had almost just happened.
‘I—er, no. He couldn’t make it. Business,’ she said swiftly.
Business was more important than the wedding of his fiancée’s twin sister?
If Immi had been his sister and her fiancé hadn’t shown up to the wedding of any of the other sisters, Matt would’ve been asking some very serious questions. Starting with whether said fiancé was the right man for her, if he couldn’t put her first in his life.
But this was none of his business.
And he wasn’t going to get involved with someone who wasn’t free.
‘Pity,’ Matt said, keeping his voice as expressionless as possible. And as soon as the dance was over, he gave her his politest smile. ‘I guess I need to dance with the other bridesmaids now.’
‘Best man duties. Of course,’ she said, looking relieved.
‘See you later.’ And he’d make very sure that there was distance between them for the rest of the evening. No more up close and personal. Because Imogen Marlowe was completely off limits.
CHAPTER ONE (#uc9b9894d-55db-5ce6-bd02-d6a675a26020)
A month later
‘HONEY, I’M HO—’ Immi stopped mid-word in the entrance hall of her flat.
There were shoes lying in the middle of the floor, clearly kicked off and abandoned without a thought—women’s shoes that weren’t hers.
A little further on was a skirt. Also not hers.
A top. Also not hers.
A black lacy push-up bra, just outside the door to her bedroom.
She dragged in a breath. There had to be good reason for a trail of another woman’s clothes leading to her bedroom. Stephen knew she wasn’t due back from her business trip until tomorrow. Maybe he’d lent the key to the flat to one of his friends.
Because the logical explanation made her sick to her stomach.
Her fiancé wouldn’t be cheating on her, in her own bed, a month before their wedding...would he?
But there were noises coming from the bedroom. Familiar noises. And the hope that she was making a fuss over nothing died as she heard a woman screaming, ‘Oh, Stephen!’
Oh, God...oh, God...oh, God...
This was eight years ago, all over again. When she hadn’t been feeling well at a party and had gone to get her coat from the bedroom, only to discover her boyfriend having sex under the pile of coats with another girl.
Except this time was so much worse. Because it wasn’t the teenage boy she’d given her virginity to, the boy who’d sneered from under the pile of coats that he’d only slept with her for a bet because nobody would have really wanted to sleep with Immi the Elephant.
This was the man she was meant to be marrying.
Cold seeped all the way through her. There had to be some mistake.
‘Oh, Stephen, yes!’
No mistake, then.
She dragged in a deep breath. She could back away, close the front door quietly, pretend she hadn’t seen anything and then go to a coffee shop. Then she could call Stephen to say that she’d managed to conclude her meeting early and would be home in an hour. It would give him enough time to get his girlfriend out of her flat and clean up all traces of the woman’s presence. Immi could simply forget what she’d seen and pretend that nothing had happened.
But did she really want to spend the rest of her life living a lie? Marry a man who clearly didn’t love her, despite his protestations—because why else would he be seeing another woman behind her back?
Immi the Elephant.
She shook herself. She wasn’t an insecure, unhappy teenager any more. And she wasn’t going to do what she’d done back then and try to starve herself into what she’d thought was an acceptable shape. She’d worked hard to become who she was now: Imogen Marlowe, a strong, successful businesswoman.
And she was going to deal with this exactly as a strong, successful businesswoman would.
Lifting her chin, she marched over to the bedroom door. She banged on it twice—judging that it would give Stephen’s girlfriend just about enough time to cover herself with bedding, because Immi definitely didn’t need to be faced with the total naked truth—and opened the door.
‘What the—?’ Stephen began.
‘Who the hell are you?’ the girl squeaked, holding the bedclothes tightly against herself. ‘Stevie? What’s going on?’
Immi stared at the girl. She looked young, easily impressed. No doubt Stephen had turned on the charm. Charm that Immi now knew was as designer as his clothes and just as easily shed. ‘I,’ she said quietly, ‘am the person who owns this flat. Stephen’s fiancée.’ She gave a tight smile. ‘Well, I was his fiancée up until about two minutes ago, when I walked in to find your clothes all over the floor in my hallway and you screaming his name in my bed.’
The girl at least had the grace to blush and fall silent.
‘Immi! Look, this isn’t what you—’ Stephen began.
‘On the contrary,’ Immi cut in. ‘It’s exactly what I think it is. And now I know what Jamie meant by keeping your nose clean until the wedding. Pity you didn’t listen to him. But I’m glad you didn’t—because if I’d come home early from business and caught you in my bed with a girlfriend after we were married, it would’ve been that much worse. At least now I don’t have the mess of a divorce to deal with.’ Just a big, glitzy wedding to unpick. A wedding that had already snowballed until it felt as if it had taken on a life of its own.
Stephen looked too shocked to say another word.
Good.
Because she was only just holding herself together as it was.
She took his engagement ring off her finger and dropped it on the floor. ‘I’m going out for an hour and a half,’ she said. ‘When I get back, I expect you, your girlfriend and all your stuff to be gone.’
‘But, Immi—’
‘And you needn’t bother returning your key or getting it back from however many women you’ve given it to,’ she cut in, not wanting to hear any excuses, ‘because I’m getting the locks changed.’
‘Immi, don’t do this. I love you.’
A month or so ago, she might have believed him. But not after her twin’s wedding. Not after seeing the emotion in the eyes of a man who really did love the woman walking down the aisle towards him. ‘No,’ she said. ‘You love the idea of being married to the boss’s daughter. Getting the corner office.’ And how it hurt to admit it. She’d been Immi the Elephant, the means to win a bet, to Shaun. She’d been the means to an end for Stephen. She’d spent her teen years battling the feeling of inadequacy, and even now she had days when the doubts swamped her—but she still knew she deserved better than this. ‘I’m guessing Dad might not be too keen on that idea, now.’
He went white. ‘Immi—’
If he’d said that he was sorry, she might’ve considered listening to him. But instead he’d tried to pull the wool over her eyes. Tried to lie his way out of it. Tried to tell her that finding him completely naked with another woman in her own bed wasn’t what she thought it was.
Did he think she was that pathetic and needy, that she’d go ahead and marry a man who clearly had no respect for her?
‘No,’ she said, and turned on her heel and walked out.
A few minutes later, Immi was sitting in a quiet corner of a nearby coffee shop, without a clue how she’d managed to walk there or how she’d even ordered anything, but in front of her was an espresso and her phone.
The phone whose ringer she’d turned to silent, but every time Stephen’s name flashed up on the screen she hit the ‘ignore’ button.
She ignored his texts, too.
Well, she’d seen them on her screen. Each one was increasingly desperate—no doubt as he realised that the glittering prize of Marlowe Aviation was slipping out of his grasp.
Immi, please.
Forgive me.
I don’t know why I did it.
I love you.
No. He didn’t love her at all. And he knew exactly why he’d slept with that girl: because he wanted to.
She couldn’t forgive him for a betrayal like that.
Particularly as he still hadn’t said the little five-letter word that might’ve made her talk to him. So clearly he wasn’t sorry at all. Or maybe just sorry that he’d been caught.
She took a sip of the coffee. It didn’t taste of anything, but she forced herself to drink it. She was not going back to being the bad twin, the one everyone worried about because she’d gone off the rails and starved herself as a teen—not quite far enough to need hospitalisation, but enough to need counselling. The girl whose family looked at her collarbones before they looked at her face, and who made a point of hugging her just to check for themselves that she wasn’t any more slender than the last time they’d hugged her.
Though at the same time she couldn’t blame them. If Andie, Portia or Posy had been the one who’d had anorexia, she would’ve been worried sick and done exactly the same. She knew they all did it out of love.
OK. She’d do this Immi-style. Super-organised. She’d make a list, and tick each item off as she did it.
1: Book a locksmith for two hours’ time.
2: Tell her family that the wedding was off.
3: Work through the list of everything she’d arranged for the wedding so far and cancel the lot.
Oh, wait. First things first. She blocked Stephen from her phone. At least then she could make her call to the locksmith in peace.
That was the easy one.
Now for the tough one. How did you tell your family that your wedding was off? They’d all want to know why. It made her squirm in her seat. Not only was she the cliché, engaged to her father’s second-in-command, she was the one who’d been cheated on. It made her feel grubby. Stupid. She’d thought she’d made a safe choice of partner, a man her father approved of. She’d thought that Stephen would never treat her the way Shaun had. But she’d ended up hurt, just the same.
Maybe she’d wait for a couple of hours until she could think of the right words. The last thing she wanted was for everyone to rush back from their corners of the world: Andie from Kent, where she was settling in to married life and pregnancy with the man she loved more than anyone on earth and who loved her all the way back, Portia from LA, Posy from wherever she was dancing with the ballet corps—she was being even more elusive than usual—and her parents from their ‘gap year’ in India.
She could do this.
Though she still hadn’t found the right words by the time she got back to her flat. As she’d half feared, Stephen was still there.
‘Immi! Oh, thank God. I was so worried about you.’
Did he really expect her to believe that?
‘You didn’t answer any of my calls or my messages.’
Obviously. And he hadn’t taken the hint—or her explicit request that he should leave before she got back.
‘I asked you to leave,’ she reminded him.
‘I couldn’t—not until we’d talked. Immi, it was a mistake.’
She took a step back before he could sweep her into his arms. She didn’t want him to hold her and try to make her feel better. He was the reason she felt bad in the first place. And he’d made the choice. Even if the other woman had come on to him, he could’ve said no. Could’ve stayed faithful. Could’ve told her that he was flattered but he was getting married next month and wouldn’t cheat on his fiancée.
He’d chosen to do the opposite.
‘It doesn’t have to be over,’ Stephen said, his eyes beseeching.
How easy it would be for her to agree. Then she wouldn’t have to unpick the wedding. Wouldn’t have to feel as if she’d let everyone down. Wouldn’t have to face her family knowing what a naive, stupid fool she’d been, thinking that the man she loved felt exactly the same way about her.
But Immi looked at Stephen now and realised that, actually, she didn’t love him any more. She’d thought maybe she was having an attack of cold feet at Andie’s wedding: but it had been more like a wake-up call. If she married this man now, she knew she’d spend the rest of her life wondering if he was making another ‘mistake’ he expected her to forgive. Every time either of them went away on business, every time she visited her sisters on her own because he was ‘too busy’ to make it, would there be another woman keeping her place warm in his bed?
‘Was she the first?’ Immi asked.
Stephen looked shocked. ‘How do you mean?’
Was he really going to be evasive, even now? ‘I need you to be honest with me,’ she said evenly. ‘Was that girl the first time you’d cheated on me?’
He looked away, and she knew the truth. ‘So that’s what Jamie meant about keeping your nose clean.’
He blinked. ‘How do you know about that?’
‘I overheard.’
He frowned. ‘You didn’t say anything.’
‘Because I thought I was overreacting. That I was tired. That I was letting the stress of the wedding get to me.’ She paused. ‘Were you with her when I was at Andie’s wedding?’
‘No.’
She didn’t think he was lying. But she needed to know the whole truth, not just part of it. ‘Were you with someone else?’
‘It was a—’
‘—mistake,’ she finished for him, feeling sick. So that was at least two women he’d cheated with. How many others had there been? ‘I don’t want a marriage based on a mistake.’
‘Immi, we’re good together.’
She took another step backwards when he reached for her. ‘No, we’re not. If I was enough for you, you wouldn’t be looking elsewhere.’
His skin turned a dull red. ‘I guess.’
He’d been honest with her. Maybe she should be honest with him—and herself. ‘And you’re not enough for me.’
He stared at her. ‘You what? Are you telling me there’s been someone else for you, too?’
‘No. Because I’ve never cheated on you.’ That almost-kiss at Andie’s wedding hadn’t been cheating, because Immi hadn’t actually done it. She’d thought about it, though, which was almost as bad in her view and it made her feel guilty.
‘It’s over, Stephen,’ she said. ‘I can’t trust you, and I don’t want a marriage that’s full of suspicion and lies.’
‘But—’ He stared at her, looking horrified. ‘We’re getting married in a month.’
‘Maybe you should’ve thought about that before you brought that girl home. To my bed.’ Immi dug her nails into her palms. ‘I can’t marry you. But I’ll deal with cancelling the wedding.’ Because then at least she would know everything had been done properly. Stephen had completely undermined her trust in him. Maybe she was being a control freak, but she’d rather know that things had been cancelled instead of skipped over.
‘What are you going to tell your parents?’
Good question. She still wasn’t sure. ‘I’ll tell them the wedding’s off.’
‘So I’ve lost my job.’
Why did she feel that that upset him more than losing his wife-to-be? ‘I don’t know if Dad will sack you.’ Paul Marlowe would probably want to sack Stephen—but whether he could actually do it in legal terms, Immi didn’t know. Besides, surely any decent person would offer to resign? She didn’t think her respect for Stephen could’ve withered any more, but apparently it just had. ‘Dad isn’t here.’ And Stephen, as his temporary second-in-command, would hardly sack himself. ‘I’ll be speaking to Priya in HR, but I guess it’s going to be awkward in the office tomorrow.’ She paused. ‘Unless you maybe call in sick.’
‘And then get sacked for lying?’ he scoffed. ‘Hardly.’
So, even though he was completely in the wrong, he wasn’t going to make this easy for her? ‘Your choice,’ she said. She couldn’t do anything about the work situation, but she could at least do something about the home situation. And this was her flat, not theirs. He hadn’t paid a penny towards the mortgage and he couldn’t claim any rights in it. ‘Did you pack your stuff?’
‘No.’
Clearly he’d expected to talk her round. He’d got that one wrong, too. Something else to add to her list, then. ‘Go and stay with Jamie. I’ll have your stuff delivered to his place.’
‘Immi, it doesn’t have to be this way,’ he said urgently. ‘We can get through this.’
‘No, we can’t,’ she said. She’d never told him about Shaun’s betrayal, and she wasn’t going to tell him now. But she’d never, ever trust him again. Personally or professionally. ‘I’m not going to change my mind. The wedding’s off. Please just go, Stephen.’
For a moment, she thought he was going to argue with her. But then, to her relief, he left without a fight.
As she double-locked the door behind him, she realised that he still hadn’t said sorry.
And that was somehow the saddest thing.
She was halfway through composing a text to her family when her phone beeped.
The message was from Andie.
You OK? Xxx
Twin-sense again.
I’m fine.
She wasn’t quite sure if it was true or not, right at that moment, but she knew she would be fine. She’d get through this.
Have news. Telling everyone at same time. Give me five minutes. xxx
Please, don’t let her twin think that Immi was playing catch-up again and following in her footsteps with news about a baby. That wasn’t happening any time soon. If ever. Not that she’d ever discussed any of that with her family.
And now she definitely had to tell her family about her broken engagement. She had less than five minutes.
There wasn’t a way to break the news gently. She blew out a breath and typed the bald statement.
Am calling off the wedding.
If she told them why, all hell would break loose. Then again, if she didn’t tell them why, all hell would break loose. Better to tell the truth.
Stephen has met someone else.
Though she didn’t have to tell them quite how she’d found out, did she?
I’m fine. Don’t worry. But I don’t want to talk to anyone right now, OK?
No way would her family respect that. But she wanted to allay the fears she knew they’d all have straight away. The fears they’d always have, thanks to her teenage years: anorexia was a mental illness with physical symptoms, and of course they’d worry that she’d relapse. Even though she’d spent quite a while in counselling and worked hard to overcome her problems.
PS I *am* eating. Don’t worry.
She ended with a smiley face she didn’t feel. And three kisses.
Then she added a second text to her parents.
Please do *not* rush home from India. All is under control. Or it will be. See you next month. Love you! xxx
Then she called their HR manager. ‘Priya, I’m so sorry to call you outside work, but we’ve got a bit of a tricky situation.’ She explained what had happened.
‘What a bastard,’ Priya said, sounding outraged. ‘I can’t believe he did that to you. Are you all right?’
‘I will be,’ Immi said. ‘I was kind of hoping he’d offer to resign.’
‘But he’s too selfish for that.’ Priya sighed. ‘What he did was despicable—but it’s to do with his personal life outside work. So, much as I’d like to sack him, I can’t. I can’t even give him a written warning or put him on gardening leave.’
‘Dad will probably want to kick him out.’
‘And then Stephen could take him to a tribunal and make a claim for unfair dismissal.’ Priya paused. ‘Do you think it’s likely that he can do any damage to the business?’
Would he really turn out to be that nasty, and try to damage the business now his ambitions had been thwarted? ‘I guess anything he does will leave either a paper trail or an electronic trail that would lead straight back to him. If he’s determined to stay then I don’t think he’s stupid enough to do anything where Dad could sue him for misconduct or negligence.’
‘Do you want to move your desk to my office first thing, so you don’t have to face him?’ Priya offered.
‘You are the world’s biggest sweetheart,’ Immi said, ‘and I really appreciate the offer, but no. I’m not letting him drive me out of my office. Maybe seeing me every day will make him feel guilty enough to do the right thing and leave.’
‘Once people know what he’s done—and it won’t be from me,’ Priya said, ‘I have a feeling that nobody in Marlowe Aviation is going to talk to him ever again.’
‘It’s a mess,’ Immi said. ‘But I’m going to stick it out. I’m not letting him drive me out of my family’s business.’
‘Good,’ Priya said. ‘And my door is open any time you need it, OK?’
‘Thanks.’
When she’d finished the call, she saw she had a screen full of texts.
Get that you don’t want to talk, her twin said, but do you need a hand unpicking the wedding?
Typical Andie, being practical.
Immi texted back.
Thanks, but am fine.
And she was surprisingly fine. It felt as if a huge weight had just been lifted from her shoulders—which in itself told her that cancelling the wedding had been the right thing to do. Marrying Stephen would’ve been a huge, huge mistake.
Will let you know if I get stuck on anything.
There was one from Posy.
Love you, let me know if you need anything. Portia’s been at the villa. Go there if you need a break. xxx
Thanks. Might take you up on that later. Love you, too xxx, she texted back to Posy.
Getting the next flight home. Will sack him first thing in the morning, was her father’s response.
This one she definitely had to handle in person. Sighing, she called her father’s mobile. ‘Dad?’
‘How dare he hurt you like that? Who the hell does he think he is?’ Paul Marlowe raged.
‘Dad, I’m fine,’ she said. ‘And you can’t sack him. I’ve already spoken to Priya. If you sack him, he can sue you for unfair dismissal.’
‘What—after what he’s done? That’s totally unacceptable.’
‘It’s the law,’ she said gently. ‘Dad, really. It’s fine. I’ll manage. Don’t cut your trip short. You’re not supposed to be home until next month.’ Which should’ve been for her wedding, but that wasn’t going to happen now. ‘You and Mum have planned this trip for ever and I don’t want you missing out. It’s fine.’
‘Hmm,’ Paul said. ‘Your mother wants to speak to you.’
There was a brief pause, and then she heard her mother say, ‘Are you all right, Immi?’
‘I’m fine,’ Immi said.
‘Are you sure?’
‘Yes. Actually, Stephen’s probably done us both a favour. When Andie got married, I realised that he doesn’t look at me the way Cleve looks at Andie, and I don’t look at him the way Andie looks at Cleve. I thought maybe I was just having cold feet, but...’
‘If it isn’t right, it isn’t right.’
But Immi could hear the worry in her mother’s voice. ‘Mum, I’m eating,’ she said gently. ‘I promise, I’m not going to start starving myself. I’m older now and much, much wiser. Do you want me to video myself eating every meal and send you the evidence?’
‘Yes,’ Julie said. ‘Well, obviously that’d be a bit excessive. But I’m your mother. I wouldn’t be human if I didn’t worry about you. I let you down last time.’
‘No, you didn’t. I was a teenager, and teenagers are very good at hiding things we don’t want our parents to know. Honestly. I’m eight years older than I was back then, and the counselling really sorted me out. My head’s in a good place. Yes, I’m angry and hurt, and I might tape Stephen’s picture on a punchbag at the gym and pound it to shreds, but that’s as far as it’ll go. Don’t worry. I really want you and Dad to finish your trip.’
‘I should be home, helping you cancel all the wedding stuff.’
‘It’s fine. I have lists. Andie’s already offered to help. It’ll be fine,’ Immi soothed.
‘But you’ll ring me if you need me?’
‘I’ll ring you,’ Immi promised. ‘But you and Dad have been looking forward to India. Just go to all the places and take a gazillion photos to show me when you get home. Love you, Mum.’
‘Love you, too,’ Julie said.
Immi had just finished packing the last of Stephen’s stuff into a box when her phone beeped again. This time it was Portia.
OMG. When did this happen? Want me to come home and scalp him?
Immi laughed and texted back,
Tonight. I’m fine. Going to tape his pic to punchbag at gym tomorrow. You OK?
Yes.
Good.
Need a hand with cancelling stuff?
No, I’ve got it. But thanks.
Right at that moment, Immi really missed her sisters and she would’ve liked nothing better than to spend an evening with the four of them curled up by the fire with mugs of hot chocolate and a plate of brownies, talking about nothing in particular. But her sisters all had busy lives. And she wasn’t going to drag everyone back to Cambridge just because her own life was taking a bit of a wobble.
See you soon, yes?
Laters, Portia texted back.
So that was the first hurdle dealt with, Immi thought. Now she needed to put her list together of people she needed to call to cancel the ceremony, the reception, the dresses and the flowers, the photographer... And she might just take her little sister up on her offer of a bolt hole in a month’s time. Facing everyone this week would be tough enough, but the week when she was supposed to have been married? That was the week she’d rather be as far away from here as possible.
And in the meantime she had work to do.
CHAPTER TWO (#uc9b9894d-55db-5ce6-bd02-d6a675a26020)
A month later
IMMI PAID THE taxi driver, thanked him and collected her bags from the back of the car.
The Villa Rosa loomed before her in all its pink faded glory.
The last time she’d come here to L’Isola dei Fiori had been for Andie’s wedding. When she’d still been engaged to Stephen...while he’d been seeing someone else behind her back.
She shook herself. Enough of the pity party. It was bad enough that she was behaving like the Runaway Bride—actually running away from things on the week she should’ve been getting married. But she really couldn’t bear to be in Cambridge facing everyone’s pity right now; plus her father was back at the helm of Marlowe Aviation, so it wasn’t as if she was letting him down. And she really needed time away from the whole situation to decide what she really wanted from life.
Thank God Posy’s godmother Sofia had left her this place. It had been a gift to Sofia years ago by her besotted lover Ludano, the King of L’Isola dei Fiori; and Sofia had bequeathed it to her goddaughter, the youngest Marlowe girl.
OK, so the house needed some work doing. A lot of work, Immi amended, given that the stucco was faded and there were even weeds growing out of a crack in the wall. But it had been a bolt hole that all of Posy’s sisters had needed this spring and summer. Andie, giving her time to come to terms with a life-changing event. Portia, when her career was teetering on the brink. And now Immi herself, giving her space to decide what she was going to do with her life now her marriage wasn’t happening.
Best of all, the garden here had run pretty much wild. Which meant that Immi could spend her days doing what she loved second-best in the whole world—working in a garden—and it would make her so physically tired that she wouldn’t be able to brood about the might-have-beens. She could just concentrate on the plants and let a few ideas bubble in her subconscious.
The keys were right where Posy said they’d be, underneath a flowerpot in the back garden, and she let herself in.
The house was clean—as Immi had expected, given that her older sister Portia had been staying here—and there had definitely been some work done: the cracked glass panels in the double-height conservatory had been replaced, meaning that the room was pretty much watertight again. Several other walls had been replastered, though not painted, and the once-gorgeous painted drawing room still had a crack running through the fresco; it had been repaired, but nobody had touched up the paint.
She hauled her bags into the kitchen. Just as she remembered from the weekend of the wedding, the room was large and comfortable, and she thought she could probably use it as her base. The oven was ancient but in working order, as was the fridge. The kettle sitting on the worktop was the kind you had to boil on top of the stove, rather than the electric kind with a light that switched off when the water had boiled, but again it was workable; the pans, although worn and not the non-stick kind she was used to, were serviceable enough. The place felt as if it had been stuck in the early nineteen-seventies, but it had a certain charm.
There was a note propped against the kettle; she picked it up and read it.
Posy said you were coming. Have put milk in fridge and bread in the cupboard. We’re in the white cottage down the lane if you need anything.
Matt Stark
Matt.
Immi remembered that almost-kiss at the wedding and caught her breath. Back then, she hadn’t been free to act on that unexpected and unfair surge of desire. Now she was. Though right now she wasn’t in a place where she wanted to get involved with anyone. Just let it go and chalk it up to the actions of a kind neighbour, she told herself.
And it was kind of Matt to have brought her some milk and bread. She’d planned to go shopping once she got here, but her flight had been delayed and she’d missed her original ferry crossing from the mainland to Sant’Angelo, meaning that she’d arrived at the villa much later than she’d intended. She knew the shops in the village would be closed now; hopefully Portia had left some cereal or something in one of the cupboards, but if not then toast and milk would see her through until tomorrow. She’d call in and thank Matt for his kindness in the morning.
But how good it was right now not to have to talk to anyone.
It felt as if she’d spent the last month doing nothing but talking, cancelling every single thing she’d arranged for the wedding and uninviting all the guests. Everyone had wanted to know why the wedding was off. She’d squirmed at the idea of telling people the truth, not wanting to have to face all the pity; but not telling the truth left her open to all the gossip and speculation, and even the blame—flighty Imogen Marlowe changing her mind and cancelling the wedding at the last minute, leaving poor Stephen devastated.
Ha. The only flying she was doing was in aeroplanes; and Stephen wasn’t devastated at losing her. He was devastated at losing his chance to run Marlowe Aviation.
She’d fudged her way through it, simply saying that Stephen had let her down badly over a really important issue, and the marriage would’ve failed. Better to call it off now than to go through with it and then end up with a messy divorce.
Work had been harder.
Facing him, every single day, had been tough. The first few days, Stephen had started trying to charm her round, bringing her fresh flowers for her desk every day. When she hadn’t given in, he’d moved on to blaming her for his behaviour, saying that he’d only strayed because she hadn’t been enough for him. Words that had cut deep because they’d brought back her old teenage fears of being inadequate. He’d probably said it just to hurt her when she’d refused to take him back, but the barb had landed on target. She’d been close to punching him, but she wasn’t going to give him the satisfaction of slapping her with an assault charge.
The blaming had been followed by a week of sneers and nasty little digs. Immi had managed to ignore them, for the most part, but when he pushed her to almost her breaking point she’d asked Priya to send him a formal letter about standards of professional behaviour in the office. He’d backed off after that.
But then there had been a week of fielding the tension between her father and Stephen, once Paul and Julie Marlowe had returned from their extended trip to India. Immi had had to try to stop her father going off at the deep end and leaving himself open to having to pay Stephen massive compensation at an industrial tribunal—because having to pay compensation to the man who’d cheated on her would’ve really added insult to injury.
Being away from that whole toxic situation was bliss; and, even though she still worried that her father would lose his temper, Immi knew that Priya would sit him down and talk him through the legal issues. With Priya not being his daughter, there was a chance that Paul Marlowe might actually listen to her.
A few days here on L’Isola dei Fiori, on her own, and she might be able to work out exactly where she went from here. What she was going to do with the rest of her life. With no internet—and spotty mobile phone reception only on some parts of the island, if she was lucky—she wouldn’t have to answer any questions until she was ready. Though it might be an idea to take selfies of herself eating and send them to her sisters and her mother, just to reassure everyone that she wasn’t slipping back into her old ways. She’d need to wait until tomorrow, when she had a little more than just bread and milk in the cupboard.
To her relief, Portia had left decent instant coffee and hot chocolate.
Immi made herself a mug of coffee, unpacked her stuff in Sofia’s faded yet comfortable downstairs bedroom, then headed for the garden with a notebook and pen so she could walk round and start making a list of what needed doing and where.
Alberto, Sofia’s old gardener, was too old and frail now to keep everything under control. According to Andie, one of his and Elena the housekeeper’s sons cut the grass every spring, and it didn’t tend to grow much during the summer. The shrubs and the roses, however, were well out of control, overgrown and with whippy stems that could catch the unwary and draw blood. It was just as well that she’d brought her own secateurs and gardening gloves from home, and she might need something even sturdier than that to tackle the thicker stems. Hopefully there was a saw or something in the garage.
She found an ancient and slightly rusted wheelbarrow in the garden shed, and hauled it over to the border nearest the house. Might as well get a bit of weeding in; and then tomorrow she’d put her list in order and start working her way through cutting back the tangle.
The physical work did her good; by the time she’d spent a couple of hours weeding, she was tired and ached all over.
Bath and an early night, she decided. She made herself some toast, then waited for the massive bath to fill. Back in the day, this must’ve been really special, she thought. Now, the bath had patches where the enamel had worn away, and several of the sumptuous peacock-blue-and-gold tiles had cracked. The grouting was nothing short of horrible, and no amount of scrubbing was going to fix it. Some of the black-and-white-chequered lino had cracked. The whole place was going to need a lot of love to bring it back to its former glory—and probably more money than she, Posy, Portia and Andie had between them.
Unless maybe Portia could use some of her contacts to get a television programme made about the restoration, with experts and tradesmen giving their time and labour in return for the national or even international exposure on TV... Immi made a note on her phone to suggest it to Portia, then stepped into the bath and scrubbed herself clean.
Without a shower, she’d had to use a jug from the kitchen to rinse the shampoo from her hair; she tucked a towel sarong-style around herself and wrapped her wet hair in a smaller towel before going back to Sofia’s bedroom, where she tripped over something and pitched head-first onto the bed.
‘Way to go, Immi,’ she said, rolling her eyes, and got back onto her feet. She could hear a bell clanging somewhere, and assumed it was the church in the village. Maybe that was somewhere to explore tomorrow.
She changed into her pyjamas and combed her hair, then headed for the kitchen to make herself a mug of hot chocolate. But as she reached the doorway she could see torchlight flashing. For a second, she froze. Was it a burglar? There was nothing here to steal. Sofia’s jewellery was gorgeous, but it was all costume and not worth anywhere near what the value would’ve been if it had been real.
All the same, she couldn’t let the house be ransacked. She ran into the kitchen and snatched up the first thing to hand, then yelled, ‘Va via! Ho chiamato la polizia!’
Hopefully the burglars wouldn’t know she had no landline and no signal for her mobile phone, and would believe that she really had called the police. And hopefully they’d make a run for it.
To her shock, the kitchen light was slammed on. She shrieked and was about to whack the burglar with the saucepan she was holding, when she suddenly recognised him.
Matt Stark.
She blew out a breath and put the saucepan down on the nearest worktop. ‘You scared me.’
‘I’m sorry,’ he said, his dark eyes filled with sincerity, ‘but you rang the bell. I assumed you needed help.’
‘I thought you were a burglar,’ she said, and then his words sank in. ‘Rang the bell? What bell?’
‘There’s a cord fixed by Sofia’s bed and in the living room by her chair,’ he explained. ‘Her phone line came down several years ago and has never been fixed.’
Probably, Immi thought, after Ludano’s death Sofia had no longer had any access to the palace staff to fix any problems. And Posy’s godmother had been too proud to admit that she couldn’t afford to fix the phone line.
‘And she wouldn’t let me rig up any kind of satellite phone for her,’ he continued, ‘so we compromised on her ringing a bell if she needed me.’
‘I didn’t pull any cord,’ she said, and then wrinkled her nose. ‘Oh. That’s what I must’ve tripped over. And I did hear a bell—I just didn’t connect it with tripping over. I thought it was the village church.’
‘Well, now you know,’ he said.
Her skin prickled with awareness—of him, and of the fact that she was only wearing thin cotton pyjamas that didn’t exactly hide her shape. She sucked in a breath. She needed to calm herself down. Remembering her manners would be a good start. ‘Thank you for the bread and the milk,’ she said. ‘I was going to call in tomorrow to say thank you and give you the money for it.’
‘There’s no need. I think I can afford to buy a neighbour a couple of pints of milk and a load of bread.’ He paused. ‘So why were you tackling what you thought were burglars on your own?’
She looked at the saucepan she’d just put down. ‘That wasn’t going to be much use against a determined intruder, was it?’
‘Hardly,’ he said dryly.
* * *
Imogen looked amazing in those pyjamas. The soft strappy top revealed her curves, and although her shorts were demure enough he could see just how long her legs were. And Matt really had to remind himself that she was off limits.
‘So why wasn’t your fiancé tackling the burglars?’ he asked. It was like a scab he couldn’t stop picking at.
‘He’s not here.’ She took a deep breath. ‘And he’s not my fiancé any more.’
She was free?
But the split must’ve been recent. He’d seen her only two months before, with that massive rock on her left hand. Had she been the one to instigate the break-up, or had her fiancé called off the engagement? Right now Matt knew he needed to tread carefully. ‘I’m sorry.’
‘I’m not.’ She lifted her chin. ‘Marrying Stephen would’ve been the biggest mistake ever.’
‘So you called it off?’
She spread her hands. ‘Some people would say that was enough to make me the Runaway Bride.’
He somehow didn’t think that Imogen Marlowe would run away from anything. There was a lot more to this than she was telling.
Not that it was any of his business. And he didn’t need to get involved. ‘Well, if you’re not being attacked by burglars, I guess I’d better leave you be,’ he said.
‘Or,’ she said, ‘I could put some proper clothes on and make you a cup of hot chocolate.’
* * *
Why on earth had she said that?
Wasn’t the whole point of her stay in L’Isola dei Fiori to be on her own, and to think about her future without having to talk to a single person? Why was she asking Matt to stay? This was particularly stupid of her, given that almost-kiss at Andie’s wedding reception. This was playing with fire.
His expression was unreadable. Then he nodded. ‘You’re probably wearing more right now than the average tourist would on the beach, but I’ll make the hot chocolate while you get changed.’
‘Deal. The hot chocolate’s in the top cupboard to the right of the stove, the milk’s where you put it, and the pan...’ She smiled. ‘Well. Let’s just say it hasn’t been used to smack a would-be burglar round the head.’
‘Indeed.’
He smiled back, and all of a sudden she was covered in goosebumps. Which was ridiculous. For pity’s sake, she was nearly twenty-five, not fifteen. She shouldn’t be flustered just because a seriously attractive man smiled at her.
She went upstairs and changed into a clean T-shirt and jeans. When she came back down into the kitchen, the milk was just on the boil. Matt stirred the milk into the hot chocolate powder, then handed one of the mugs to her.
‘There’s a good spot in the garden,’ he said, ‘to look at the stars. Because there are so few homes on this part of the island there’s hardly any light pollution so you get an excellent view of the night sky.’
‘Sounds good to me,’ she said. She’d been too busy around Andie’s wedding—and too miserable—to notice the stars.
She slipped on a pair of canvas shoes but didn’t bother lacing them up, then followed him and his torchlight out through the garden. The path wound through more of the overgrown shrubs, and a couple of times she started to wonder if this fabulous viewpoint of his even existed. She certainly didn’t remember it from her childhood stays here. Wouldn’t it have been easier just to sit on the ancient pink rocking chair she’d noticed on the terrace? But Matt seemed completely sure-footed, and eventually she found herself next to an old wooden bench in front of the wall that ran round the edge of the garden.
‘I know it looks as if it’d be more sensible to just follow the wall,’ he said, ‘but the tremor a couple of years back caused the wall to crumble in places, so it’s not brilliantly safe. Especially when it’s not daylight, when you can’t see where you’re going and you’re less likely to avoid tripping over a branch and going over the edge.’
‘Right.’ She knew the island was on a volcanic ridge. A tremor explained the cracks in the house; and they probably hadn’t been fixed for the same reason as the phone line. ‘I’m assuming the house needed attention before the wall round the garden did.’
He nodded. ‘Cleve’s done a bit of repairing—well, after almost burning down the kitchen—and when Javier was here with Portia he fixed the glass in the conservatory and plastered some of the walls.’
Immi had known Cleve for years and wasn’t surprised that he was good with his hands, but she couldn’t quite get her head round the idea of a movie star doing building work. Particularly as, from what she’d seen, the job looked pretty professional. But Portia had kept a lot of things about her new husband quiet, including the wedding: it was the only way to get real privacy when one of you lived so much in the public eye.
As Matt had promised, the bench that was perched on the edge of the cliff, facing out to sea, provided an expansive view of the star-filled sky and it was utterly beautiful.
It was a relief that he didn’t fill the silence with small talk, either; they just sat there together in companionable silence, sipping hot chocolate and watching the stars twinkling brightly above.
‘Thank you,’ she said quietly. ‘I think I needed that.’
‘Time and space to think?’ he asked, his voice equally soft.
‘Yes. I’m pretty much at a crossroads in my life right now.’ She wrinkled her nose. ‘The plan is to sort out the garden here; if you’re having to concentrate on physical work, you’re giving your subconscious time to deal with the problem.’
‘It’s a plan,’ he said.
‘It sounds as if you don’t think it’s a good one.’
He lifted both hands in a gesture of surrender. ‘No judgements. I’m doing the same kind of thing myself right now.’
There was something like sadness in his dark eyes and she wondered why he was at a crossroads. Though it was none of her business and it felt too intrusive to ask. ‘Maybe I ought to paint the walls instead of tackling the garden,’ she said. ‘I’ll have to talk to Posy about paint.’
‘Are you good at painting?’ he asked.
‘I’m better at pruning,’ she admitted.
‘Then do the garden,’ he advised. ‘If you need space to think in the back of your head, it’s easier to do it while you’re doing something you love.’
What did he do when he needed to think? she wondered. Again, she felt too awkward to ask. Which was weird, because normally she got on well with people and never had a problem chatting to them.
But she knew what it felt like to be stuck.
And he’d been kind to her sisters and to Sofia. Time for payback. Maybe she could help him. ‘I’m normally good at sorting things out,’ she said, ‘so if you want a non-judgemental neighbour to bounce ideas off...’
‘Someone who doesn’t know me and is outside the situation so might see it more clearly? I like that. Thank you.’ He paused. ‘I’m pretty good at sorting things out usually, too. So if you want...’ He left the offer hanging open.
‘Thanks, but it’s a pretty tangled web.’
‘They’re the sort that could do most with an outside viewpoint.’
‘I guess.’ She paused. She could tell him what had happened. And that might put enough of a barrier between them to stop her doing something stupid. Like giving in to the pull she felt towards him. Or maybe it wouldn’t. ‘But maybe not today?’
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Kate Hardy
He’ll help her forget her past, and may just give her a future too!Immi Marlowe ran away after she was jilted… and on arrival on Isola dei Fiore gorgeous billionaire Matt Stark sweeps her off her feet! On the island’s golden beaches they really connect but, when her past secrets are revealed, what will Matt do to prove they can go the distance?Summer at Villa Rosa – Book 3 of 4
A Mediterranean escape!
Heartbroken jilted bride Immi Marlowe flees to Isola dei Fiore, desperate to get away. But just around the corner from Villa Rosa, a gorgeous billionaire is waiting to sweep her off her feet...
Matt Stark shares Immi’s sense of adventure, and on the island’s golden beaches they form a connection that neither wants to end. Immi’s stay is supposed to be temporary—but with her secret past revealed, how far will Matt go to prove they can go the distance?
Immi noticed that Matt was still holding her hand; she really ought to find a tactful way of removing her hand from his…
Yet for the life of her she couldn’t pull away, because she liked the feeling of his fingers tangled with hers.
They lay there in a strangely companionable silence, just watching the stars, and Matt pointed out a couple more constellations. ‘That one’s Lupus—the wolf.’ They lay until the air started to get chilly, and then Matt sighed. ‘I guess we’d better get back.’
He saw her back to the house—and they still seemed to be holding hands.
This time he kissed her on the cheek. ‘Goodnight, Immi.’
Her skin tingled where his lips had touched her, and it was the easiest thing in the world to kiss his cheek back. Except somehow he’d moved, and she ended up brushing her mouth against his. It felt as if she’d been galvanised. She felt him go very still, too. And then he dropped the blankets and cushions he’d been holding in his free hand, slid his arms round her and kissed her properly.
It felt as if she were floating among the stars they’d just been watching.
Summer at Villa Rosa (#uc9b9894d-55db-5ce6-bd02-d6a675a26020)
Four sisters escape to the Mediterranean...
Only to find reunions, romance...and royalty!
Villa Rosa holds a very special place in the hearts of Posy Marlowe and her three sisters. It’s filled with memories of idyllic summer holidays on L’Isola dei Fiori. And her recent inheritance of the beautiful but fading palazzo from her godmother, Sofia, couldn’t have come at a better time for them all!
Now, this summer, they all escape to L’Isola dei Fiori and discover Villa Rosa again.
Don’t miss all four books in this fabulous quartet:
On sale June: Her Pregnancy Bombshell
by Liz Fielding (Miranda’s story)
On sale July: The Mysterious Italian Houseguest
by Scarlet Wilson (Portia’s story)
On sale August: The Runaway Bride and the Billionaire
by Kate Hardy (Imogen’s story)
On sale September: A Proposal from the Crown Prince
by Jessica Gilmore (Posy’s story)
Only in Mills & Boon Romance.
And on August 7
Jessica Gilmore brings you an exciting online read—a prequel to Summer at Villa Rosa.
Available at millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk).
The Runaway Bride and the Billionaire
Kate Hardy
www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
KATE HARDY has always loved books, and could read before she went to school. She discovered Mills & Boon books when she was twelve and decided this was what she wanted to do. When she isn’t writing Kate enjoys reading, cinema, ballroom dancing and the gym. You can contact her via her website: www.katehardy.com (http://www.katehardy.com).
To Liz Fielding, Scarlet Wilson and Jessica Gilmore—
I thoroughly enjoyed our time creating
the Marlowe girls and Villa Rosa!
Contents
Cover (#u426b7b25-9f28-5efb-8a2a-2262fbfd52ac)
Back Cover Text (#u7f872a3d-3427-57cc-bdb5-25be3b1264f6)
Introduction (#u54c26ca1-3791-52aa-a375-e7a0082f1f0e)
Summer at Villa Rosa (#u2d8d9f52-b901-5741-84a7-6186bc1499ea)
Title Page (#u0f2e06f9-5be7-5143-9d87-09b784e66583)
About the Author (#ufca49fcb-0853-51da-881e-acaa6eeda1de)
Dedication (#ua469ac7f-9fc0-503b-93ae-132caeb8e5e3)
PROLOGUE (#u66b0862b-c62e-5876-9a07-ca131e84aa0b)
CHAPTER ONE (#uf18ef576-e123-5ca2-9958-d266d0a5e5a5)
CHAPTER TWO (#u4be86c64-9537-5ae9-9b39-1f57997a04ca)
CHAPTER THREE (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER FOUR (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER FIVE (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER SIX (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER SEVEN (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER EIGHT (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER NINE (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER TEN (#litres_trial_promo)
EPILOGUE (#litres_trial_promo)
Extract (#litres_trial_promo)
Copyright (#litres_trial_promo)
PROLOGUE (#uc9b9894d-55db-5ce6-bd02-d6a675a26020)
YOU WEREN’T SUPPOSED to be jealous of your twin.
Especially when you knew she’d just been through a rough time and she deserved every bit of happiness. And especially when it was her wedding day.
Immi really hoped that Andie was feeling so loved-up with Cleve that her twin-sense was temporarily muted and she had no idea that one of her bridesmaids was having a serious wobble.
Though, actually, Immi had a feeling that all three of the bridesmaids were having a serious wobble right now. Posy, the baby of the family, had a smile so bright and brittle that it was practically cracking. The same was true of Portia, the oldest of the Marlowe girls: the family rebel who was behaving so perfectly that she might as well have ‘faking it’ written across her forehead in bright red lipstick.
Maybe she should suggest a midnight rendezvous on the beach, where the three of them could sit and talk—just as they had when they’d been children, snuggling up beneath a duvet and having whispered conversations late into the night. Maybe they could help each other with their problems. But Posy seemed to have closed off to everyone since she’d joined the ballet corps and Portia wasn’t given to talking about personal stuff.
And what did Immi have to whine about anyway? She had a job she loved, helping to run Marlowe Aviation, the family firm; and she was in the run-up to her wedding to Stephen Walters, who was all set to be promoted to her father’s second-in-command at work.
Except Stephen didn’t look at her the way that Cleve looked at Andie.
And Immi had a nasty feeling that she didn’t look at him the way that Andie looked at Cleve: as if there was nobody else on the surface of the planet.
She shook herself. It was probably just the stress of organising her own wedding making her so antsy. There were only two months to go and it had snowballed into a massive affair. Everything was completely under control—organising was what Immi did best—but now she’d seen how gorgeous her sister’s quiet, understated wedding was, it brought home to her that the bridezilla stuff wasn’t what she really wanted for herself, either.
The doubts had been creeping in for weeks. She’d overheard Stephen’s best man Jamie saying that all he had to do was keep his nose clean until Imogen said ‘I do’ and he got the corner office. At the time, she’d tried to dismiss it as banter, but now she wondered if there was something more to it. Stephen had said he was too busy to take time off for Andie’s wedding, and because it was only a small affair he was sure nobody would mind if he didn’t make it. But was a man as ambitious as Stephen Walters really too busy to attend the wedding of the boss’s daughter—his own fiancée’s twin? Or did he have other reasons for not wanting to be here?
Oh, for pity’s sake. She had to stop overthinking things.
And she really had to stop the paranoia. What had happened eight years ago wasn’t going to repeat itself. So what if it was a cliché, marrying the boss’s daughter? Stephen said he loved her. Wanting all the extra frills was just being selfish. Immi was done with being selfish. She’d put her family through enough worries. No more.
* * *
Imogen Marlowe looked amazing, Matt thought.
The first time he’d met her, she’d been wearing a power suit, all businesslike and slightly intimidating and determined to find out exactly what was going on with her twin. The second time he’d met her, early this morning, she’d been barefoot, wearing ankle-grazer faded jeans teamed with an oversized sweater, with a streak of mud on her face from where she’d been raiding the garden for flowers—the beautiful white marguerite daisies that she’d turned into raffia-tied bouquets for the bride and the bridesmaids, and the osteospermum that graced the tables in tin cans with an organza ribbon tied in a bow around them.
Right now, she looked the epitome of cool elegance in a teal-coloured vintage couture gown. The dress was sleeveless, with straps a finger width wide and a neckline that just skimmed her collarbones. A large round brooch made from tiny white seed pearls and four large black pearls was pinned on a vertical bow in the centre of the empire line bodice, and she wore a matching pearl collar. Her dark hair was cut in an immaculate, sharp bob and her make-up was discreet and understated.
And Matt really, really wanted to untie that bow and unwrap her from that dress. Find out exactly what that material was hiding.
He shook himself. Maybe it was the wedding making him soppy. The best man and the bridesmaid, indeed.
But, as the best man, he was supposed to dance with the bridesmaid.
At that very second, human speech seemed to have deserted him. Which was crazy. What was it about this woman that made him feel all tongue-tied?
‘That’s a gorgeous dress, Imogen,’ he said in the end, knowing it sounded lame but not having a clue what else to say.
‘Thank you. It’s one of Sofia’s—my sister Posy’s godmother. And the amazing costume jewellery belonged to her too.’ She gestured to the brooch and the collar.
‘I kind of guessed that.’ He smiled. ‘It’s nice that all four of you sisters are wearing one of her dresses.’
‘It’s almost like her still being here with us,’ Immi agreed. ‘I remember coming to the villa as a child and Sofia always let us play dress-up with her amazing clothes. Though I guess that was because we always treated her stuff with respect—we didn’t smear chocolate everywhere or rip things.’ She smiled. ‘I don’t ever remember seeing this dress when I was little, but it’s so stunning: like an eighteenth-century mantua dress, but updated to have a modern profile.’
‘Mantua?’ he asked.
She gestured to the bow. ‘An open-fronted dress with a matching train and petticoat, and the train’s lifted up to show the petticoat.’
‘Mantua. I’ll remember that.’
‘I only know that because my guilty secret is watching historical dramas,’ she said, giving him a rueful smile that made his heart feel as if it had done a backflip. ‘Portia knows more about that stuff than I do, really.’
Portia was the Hollywood reporter, he remembered. The oldest sister.
‘And it’s good of Posy to let us all borrow the dresses and jewellery. Strictly speaking, they all belong to her now—along with the villa.’
‘But sisters always share. At least, mine do,’ he said.
‘You have sisters?’ She looked surprised.
‘Four. All younger than me.’
‘So you’re used to all the talking, then.’
It was his turn for the rueful smile. ‘Just a bit. Um, as the bridesmaid and the best man, I’m guessing we ought to...?’
‘That would be lovely,’ she said, and let him lead her onto the temporary dance floor.
* * *
This was bad, Immi thought. Seriously bad.
Matt Stark was Cleve’s best man—a guy who lived in the cottage down the road and had kept an eye on the Villa Rosa since Sofia’s death. According to Andie, he was a computer genius who’d made a fortune from a computer program that helped people run their homes by voice control—everything from turning a house alarm on or off to opening curtains, changing the thermostat on a heating system or dimming a light. Immi had been introduced to Matt’s mother Gloria earlier, and understood at that moment exactly what had driven her son to make the program: Gloria was in a wheelchair, crippled by arthritis, and Matt’s computer system had given her back some of her independence.
He’d kept an eye on Sofia, too; although he hadn’t managed to persuade her to let him install a satellite phone for emergencies, she had agreed to let him rig up a bell she could ring if she needed help.
And he’d rescued Immi’s spider-hating twin from having to stick her head in a cupboard full of cobwebs.
Matt Stark was one of the good guys, and it was fine for her to like him instantly.
It was also fine for her to appreciate that he was good-looking—tall, with brown eyes and dark hair brushed back from his forehead, and a tiny little quirk at the corners of his mouth that told her he smiled often.
What wasn’t fine was for her to tingle where he touched her. Particularly because she didn’t feel like that when her husband-to-be touched her.
She needed to get a grip. Make an excuse that she needed to go and fiddle with the flowers on the table, or something. But for the life of her she couldn’t pull herself out of Matt’s arms. It felt as if she was under some weird kind of spell. All the social graces she used every single day in business had simply deserted her. She had no idea what to say to him.
Worse still, she found herself looking at his mouth again. Wondering. Supposing it was just the two of them and the night and the music? Dancing under the stars, in the garden that overlooked the sea, with the air full of the scent of roses...
And he was looking at her mouth as if he was thinking exactly the same thing. Wondering what it would be like if they kissed. Wondering how she tasted.
She couldn’t breathe.
This was all wrong. She shouldn’t even be thinking about kissing another man. She was getting married in eight weeks’ time. She was meant to be in love with her fiancé, not thinking about kissing Matt Stark in front of her entire family at her twin sister’s wedding.
And yet she could feel her lips parting. Feel him drawing her that tiny bit closer, enough that she could feel the heat of his body against hers. Feel herself tipping her head back...
* * *
Insta-lust, that was what his sisters called this feeling, Matt remembered. Instant crazy attraction.
It had nothing to do with the glamorous dress or the high heels, and everything to do with the woman in his arms. She felt soft and sweet and the perfect fit. And he was pretty sure she felt it, too: because her hazel eyes had turned almost golden, her pupils were huge and that perfect rosebud mouth was parted ever so slightly.
All he had to do was dip his head...
And he was just about to do it when he noticed something.
Something that made him feel as if several buckets of ice-cold water had been dropped on him.
How the hell had he missed that rock on her left hand? That huge hands-off-she’s-mine signal?
It might be traditional for the best man to dance with the bridesmaid, but that was as far as this could go. Much as Matt wanted to kiss Imogen Marlowe, he couldn’t. He didn’t remember seeing her with anyone at the actual wedding, but that massive diamond practically screamed that she was engaged.
He forced himself to ask, ‘Is your fiancé here this evening?’
And then he saw all the colour drain out of her face and horror fill her eyes. As if she were completely shocked by what had almost just happened.
‘I—er, no. He couldn’t make it. Business,’ she said swiftly.
Business was more important than the wedding of his fiancée’s twin sister?
If Immi had been his sister and her fiancé hadn’t shown up to the wedding of any of the other sisters, Matt would’ve been asking some very serious questions. Starting with whether said fiancé was the right man for her, if he couldn’t put her first in his life.
But this was none of his business.
And he wasn’t going to get involved with someone who wasn’t free.
‘Pity,’ Matt said, keeping his voice as expressionless as possible. And as soon as the dance was over, he gave her his politest smile. ‘I guess I need to dance with the other bridesmaids now.’
‘Best man duties. Of course,’ she said, looking relieved.
‘See you later.’ And he’d make very sure that there was distance between them for the rest of the evening. No more up close and personal. Because Imogen Marlowe was completely off limits.
CHAPTER ONE (#uc9b9894d-55db-5ce6-bd02-d6a675a26020)
A month later
‘HONEY, I’M HO—’ Immi stopped mid-word in the entrance hall of her flat.
There were shoes lying in the middle of the floor, clearly kicked off and abandoned without a thought—women’s shoes that weren’t hers.
A little further on was a skirt. Also not hers.
A top. Also not hers.
A black lacy push-up bra, just outside the door to her bedroom.
She dragged in a breath. There had to be good reason for a trail of another woman’s clothes leading to her bedroom. Stephen knew she wasn’t due back from her business trip until tomorrow. Maybe he’d lent the key to the flat to one of his friends.
Because the logical explanation made her sick to her stomach.
Her fiancé wouldn’t be cheating on her, in her own bed, a month before their wedding...would he?
But there were noises coming from the bedroom. Familiar noises. And the hope that she was making a fuss over nothing died as she heard a woman screaming, ‘Oh, Stephen!’
Oh, God...oh, God...oh, God...
This was eight years ago, all over again. When she hadn’t been feeling well at a party and had gone to get her coat from the bedroom, only to discover her boyfriend having sex under the pile of coats with another girl.
Except this time was so much worse. Because it wasn’t the teenage boy she’d given her virginity to, the boy who’d sneered from under the pile of coats that he’d only slept with her for a bet because nobody would have really wanted to sleep with Immi the Elephant.
This was the man she was meant to be marrying.
Cold seeped all the way through her. There had to be some mistake.
‘Oh, Stephen, yes!’
No mistake, then.
She dragged in a deep breath. She could back away, close the front door quietly, pretend she hadn’t seen anything and then go to a coffee shop. Then she could call Stephen to say that she’d managed to conclude her meeting early and would be home in an hour. It would give him enough time to get his girlfriend out of her flat and clean up all traces of the woman’s presence. Immi could simply forget what she’d seen and pretend that nothing had happened.
But did she really want to spend the rest of her life living a lie? Marry a man who clearly didn’t love her, despite his protestations—because why else would he be seeing another woman behind her back?
Immi the Elephant.
She shook herself. She wasn’t an insecure, unhappy teenager any more. And she wasn’t going to do what she’d done back then and try to starve herself into what she’d thought was an acceptable shape. She’d worked hard to become who she was now: Imogen Marlowe, a strong, successful businesswoman.
And she was going to deal with this exactly as a strong, successful businesswoman would.
Lifting her chin, she marched over to the bedroom door. She banged on it twice—judging that it would give Stephen’s girlfriend just about enough time to cover herself with bedding, because Immi definitely didn’t need to be faced with the total naked truth—and opened the door.
‘What the—?’ Stephen began.
‘Who the hell are you?’ the girl squeaked, holding the bedclothes tightly against herself. ‘Stevie? What’s going on?’
Immi stared at the girl. She looked young, easily impressed. No doubt Stephen had turned on the charm. Charm that Immi now knew was as designer as his clothes and just as easily shed. ‘I,’ she said quietly, ‘am the person who owns this flat. Stephen’s fiancée.’ She gave a tight smile. ‘Well, I was his fiancée up until about two minutes ago, when I walked in to find your clothes all over the floor in my hallway and you screaming his name in my bed.’
The girl at least had the grace to blush and fall silent.
‘Immi! Look, this isn’t what you—’ Stephen began.
‘On the contrary,’ Immi cut in. ‘It’s exactly what I think it is. And now I know what Jamie meant by keeping your nose clean until the wedding. Pity you didn’t listen to him. But I’m glad you didn’t—because if I’d come home early from business and caught you in my bed with a girlfriend after we were married, it would’ve been that much worse. At least now I don’t have the mess of a divorce to deal with.’ Just a big, glitzy wedding to unpick. A wedding that had already snowballed until it felt as if it had taken on a life of its own.
Stephen looked too shocked to say another word.
Good.
Because she was only just holding herself together as it was.
She took his engagement ring off her finger and dropped it on the floor. ‘I’m going out for an hour and a half,’ she said. ‘When I get back, I expect you, your girlfriend and all your stuff to be gone.’
‘But, Immi—’
‘And you needn’t bother returning your key or getting it back from however many women you’ve given it to,’ she cut in, not wanting to hear any excuses, ‘because I’m getting the locks changed.’
‘Immi, don’t do this. I love you.’
A month or so ago, she might have believed him. But not after her twin’s wedding. Not after seeing the emotion in the eyes of a man who really did love the woman walking down the aisle towards him. ‘No,’ she said. ‘You love the idea of being married to the boss’s daughter. Getting the corner office.’ And how it hurt to admit it. She’d been Immi the Elephant, the means to win a bet, to Shaun. She’d been the means to an end for Stephen. She’d spent her teen years battling the feeling of inadequacy, and even now she had days when the doubts swamped her—but she still knew she deserved better than this. ‘I’m guessing Dad might not be too keen on that idea, now.’
He went white. ‘Immi—’
If he’d said that he was sorry, she might’ve considered listening to him. But instead he’d tried to pull the wool over her eyes. Tried to lie his way out of it. Tried to tell her that finding him completely naked with another woman in her own bed wasn’t what she thought it was.
Did he think she was that pathetic and needy, that she’d go ahead and marry a man who clearly had no respect for her?
‘No,’ she said, and turned on her heel and walked out.
A few minutes later, Immi was sitting in a quiet corner of a nearby coffee shop, without a clue how she’d managed to walk there or how she’d even ordered anything, but in front of her was an espresso and her phone.
The phone whose ringer she’d turned to silent, but every time Stephen’s name flashed up on the screen she hit the ‘ignore’ button.
She ignored his texts, too.
Well, she’d seen them on her screen. Each one was increasingly desperate—no doubt as he realised that the glittering prize of Marlowe Aviation was slipping out of his grasp.
Immi, please.
Forgive me.
I don’t know why I did it.
I love you.
No. He didn’t love her at all. And he knew exactly why he’d slept with that girl: because he wanted to.
She couldn’t forgive him for a betrayal like that.
Particularly as he still hadn’t said the little five-letter word that might’ve made her talk to him. So clearly he wasn’t sorry at all. Or maybe just sorry that he’d been caught.
She took a sip of the coffee. It didn’t taste of anything, but she forced herself to drink it. She was not going back to being the bad twin, the one everyone worried about because she’d gone off the rails and starved herself as a teen—not quite far enough to need hospitalisation, but enough to need counselling. The girl whose family looked at her collarbones before they looked at her face, and who made a point of hugging her just to check for themselves that she wasn’t any more slender than the last time they’d hugged her.
Though at the same time she couldn’t blame them. If Andie, Portia or Posy had been the one who’d had anorexia, she would’ve been worried sick and done exactly the same. She knew they all did it out of love.
OK. She’d do this Immi-style. Super-organised. She’d make a list, and tick each item off as she did it.
1: Book a locksmith for two hours’ time.
2: Tell her family that the wedding was off.
3: Work through the list of everything she’d arranged for the wedding so far and cancel the lot.
Oh, wait. First things first. She blocked Stephen from her phone. At least then she could make her call to the locksmith in peace.
That was the easy one.
Now for the tough one. How did you tell your family that your wedding was off? They’d all want to know why. It made her squirm in her seat. Not only was she the cliché, engaged to her father’s second-in-command, she was the one who’d been cheated on. It made her feel grubby. Stupid. She’d thought she’d made a safe choice of partner, a man her father approved of. She’d thought that Stephen would never treat her the way Shaun had. But she’d ended up hurt, just the same.
Maybe she’d wait for a couple of hours until she could think of the right words. The last thing she wanted was for everyone to rush back from their corners of the world: Andie from Kent, where she was settling in to married life and pregnancy with the man she loved more than anyone on earth and who loved her all the way back, Portia from LA, Posy from wherever she was dancing with the ballet corps—she was being even more elusive than usual—and her parents from their ‘gap year’ in India.
She could do this.
Though she still hadn’t found the right words by the time she got back to her flat. As she’d half feared, Stephen was still there.
‘Immi! Oh, thank God. I was so worried about you.’
Did he really expect her to believe that?
‘You didn’t answer any of my calls or my messages.’
Obviously. And he hadn’t taken the hint—or her explicit request that he should leave before she got back.
‘I asked you to leave,’ she reminded him.
‘I couldn’t—not until we’d talked. Immi, it was a mistake.’
She took a step back before he could sweep her into his arms. She didn’t want him to hold her and try to make her feel better. He was the reason she felt bad in the first place. And he’d made the choice. Even if the other woman had come on to him, he could’ve said no. Could’ve stayed faithful. Could’ve told her that he was flattered but he was getting married next month and wouldn’t cheat on his fiancée.
He’d chosen to do the opposite.
‘It doesn’t have to be over,’ Stephen said, his eyes beseeching.
How easy it would be for her to agree. Then she wouldn’t have to unpick the wedding. Wouldn’t have to feel as if she’d let everyone down. Wouldn’t have to face her family knowing what a naive, stupid fool she’d been, thinking that the man she loved felt exactly the same way about her.
But Immi looked at Stephen now and realised that, actually, she didn’t love him any more. She’d thought maybe she was having an attack of cold feet at Andie’s wedding: but it had been more like a wake-up call. If she married this man now, she knew she’d spend the rest of her life wondering if he was making another ‘mistake’ he expected her to forgive. Every time either of them went away on business, every time she visited her sisters on her own because he was ‘too busy’ to make it, would there be another woman keeping her place warm in his bed?
‘Was she the first?’ Immi asked.
Stephen looked shocked. ‘How do you mean?’
Was he really going to be evasive, even now? ‘I need you to be honest with me,’ she said evenly. ‘Was that girl the first time you’d cheated on me?’
He looked away, and she knew the truth. ‘So that’s what Jamie meant about keeping your nose clean.’
He blinked. ‘How do you know about that?’
‘I overheard.’
He frowned. ‘You didn’t say anything.’
‘Because I thought I was overreacting. That I was tired. That I was letting the stress of the wedding get to me.’ She paused. ‘Were you with her when I was at Andie’s wedding?’
‘No.’
She didn’t think he was lying. But she needed to know the whole truth, not just part of it. ‘Were you with someone else?’
‘It was a—’
‘—mistake,’ she finished for him, feeling sick. So that was at least two women he’d cheated with. How many others had there been? ‘I don’t want a marriage based on a mistake.’
‘Immi, we’re good together.’
She took another step backwards when he reached for her. ‘No, we’re not. If I was enough for you, you wouldn’t be looking elsewhere.’
His skin turned a dull red. ‘I guess.’
He’d been honest with her. Maybe she should be honest with him—and herself. ‘And you’re not enough for me.’
He stared at her. ‘You what? Are you telling me there’s been someone else for you, too?’
‘No. Because I’ve never cheated on you.’ That almost-kiss at Andie’s wedding hadn’t been cheating, because Immi hadn’t actually done it. She’d thought about it, though, which was almost as bad in her view and it made her feel guilty.
‘It’s over, Stephen,’ she said. ‘I can’t trust you, and I don’t want a marriage that’s full of suspicion and lies.’
‘But—’ He stared at her, looking horrified. ‘We’re getting married in a month.’
‘Maybe you should’ve thought about that before you brought that girl home. To my bed.’ Immi dug her nails into her palms. ‘I can’t marry you. But I’ll deal with cancelling the wedding.’ Because then at least she would know everything had been done properly. Stephen had completely undermined her trust in him. Maybe she was being a control freak, but she’d rather know that things had been cancelled instead of skipped over.
‘What are you going to tell your parents?’
Good question. She still wasn’t sure. ‘I’ll tell them the wedding’s off.’
‘So I’ve lost my job.’
Why did she feel that that upset him more than losing his wife-to-be? ‘I don’t know if Dad will sack you.’ Paul Marlowe would probably want to sack Stephen—but whether he could actually do it in legal terms, Immi didn’t know. Besides, surely any decent person would offer to resign? She didn’t think her respect for Stephen could’ve withered any more, but apparently it just had. ‘Dad isn’t here.’ And Stephen, as his temporary second-in-command, would hardly sack himself. ‘I’ll be speaking to Priya in HR, but I guess it’s going to be awkward in the office tomorrow.’ She paused. ‘Unless you maybe call in sick.’
‘And then get sacked for lying?’ he scoffed. ‘Hardly.’
So, even though he was completely in the wrong, he wasn’t going to make this easy for her? ‘Your choice,’ she said. She couldn’t do anything about the work situation, but she could at least do something about the home situation. And this was her flat, not theirs. He hadn’t paid a penny towards the mortgage and he couldn’t claim any rights in it. ‘Did you pack your stuff?’
‘No.’
Clearly he’d expected to talk her round. He’d got that one wrong, too. Something else to add to her list, then. ‘Go and stay with Jamie. I’ll have your stuff delivered to his place.’
‘Immi, it doesn’t have to be this way,’ he said urgently. ‘We can get through this.’
‘No, we can’t,’ she said. She’d never told him about Shaun’s betrayal, and she wasn’t going to tell him now. But she’d never, ever trust him again. Personally or professionally. ‘I’m not going to change my mind. The wedding’s off. Please just go, Stephen.’
For a moment, she thought he was going to argue with her. But then, to her relief, he left without a fight.
As she double-locked the door behind him, she realised that he still hadn’t said sorry.
And that was somehow the saddest thing.
She was halfway through composing a text to her family when her phone beeped.
The message was from Andie.
You OK? Xxx
Twin-sense again.
I’m fine.
She wasn’t quite sure if it was true or not, right at that moment, but she knew she would be fine. She’d get through this.
Have news. Telling everyone at same time. Give me five minutes. xxx
Please, don’t let her twin think that Immi was playing catch-up again and following in her footsteps with news about a baby. That wasn’t happening any time soon. If ever. Not that she’d ever discussed any of that with her family.
And now she definitely had to tell her family about her broken engagement. She had less than five minutes.
There wasn’t a way to break the news gently. She blew out a breath and typed the bald statement.
Am calling off the wedding.
If she told them why, all hell would break loose. Then again, if she didn’t tell them why, all hell would break loose. Better to tell the truth.
Stephen has met someone else.
Though she didn’t have to tell them quite how she’d found out, did she?
I’m fine. Don’t worry. But I don’t want to talk to anyone right now, OK?
No way would her family respect that. But she wanted to allay the fears she knew they’d all have straight away. The fears they’d always have, thanks to her teenage years: anorexia was a mental illness with physical symptoms, and of course they’d worry that she’d relapse. Even though she’d spent quite a while in counselling and worked hard to overcome her problems.
PS I *am* eating. Don’t worry.
She ended with a smiley face she didn’t feel. And three kisses.
Then she added a second text to her parents.
Please do *not* rush home from India. All is under control. Or it will be. See you next month. Love you! xxx
Then she called their HR manager. ‘Priya, I’m so sorry to call you outside work, but we’ve got a bit of a tricky situation.’ She explained what had happened.
‘What a bastard,’ Priya said, sounding outraged. ‘I can’t believe he did that to you. Are you all right?’
‘I will be,’ Immi said. ‘I was kind of hoping he’d offer to resign.’
‘But he’s too selfish for that.’ Priya sighed. ‘What he did was despicable—but it’s to do with his personal life outside work. So, much as I’d like to sack him, I can’t. I can’t even give him a written warning or put him on gardening leave.’
‘Dad will probably want to kick him out.’
‘And then Stephen could take him to a tribunal and make a claim for unfair dismissal.’ Priya paused. ‘Do you think it’s likely that he can do any damage to the business?’
Would he really turn out to be that nasty, and try to damage the business now his ambitions had been thwarted? ‘I guess anything he does will leave either a paper trail or an electronic trail that would lead straight back to him. If he’s determined to stay then I don’t think he’s stupid enough to do anything where Dad could sue him for misconduct or negligence.’
‘Do you want to move your desk to my office first thing, so you don’t have to face him?’ Priya offered.
‘You are the world’s biggest sweetheart,’ Immi said, ‘and I really appreciate the offer, but no. I’m not letting him drive me out of my office. Maybe seeing me every day will make him feel guilty enough to do the right thing and leave.’
‘Once people know what he’s done—and it won’t be from me,’ Priya said, ‘I have a feeling that nobody in Marlowe Aviation is going to talk to him ever again.’
‘It’s a mess,’ Immi said. ‘But I’m going to stick it out. I’m not letting him drive me out of my family’s business.’
‘Good,’ Priya said. ‘And my door is open any time you need it, OK?’
‘Thanks.’
When she’d finished the call, she saw she had a screen full of texts.
Get that you don’t want to talk, her twin said, but do you need a hand unpicking the wedding?
Typical Andie, being practical.
Immi texted back.
Thanks, but am fine.
And she was surprisingly fine. It felt as if a huge weight had just been lifted from her shoulders—which in itself told her that cancelling the wedding had been the right thing to do. Marrying Stephen would’ve been a huge, huge mistake.
Will let you know if I get stuck on anything.
There was one from Posy.
Love you, let me know if you need anything. Portia’s been at the villa. Go there if you need a break. xxx
Thanks. Might take you up on that later. Love you, too xxx, she texted back to Posy.
Getting the next flight home. Will sack him first thing in the morning, was her father’s response.
This one she definitely had to handle in person. Sighing, she called her father’s mobile. ‘Dad?’
‘How dare he hurt you like that? Who the hell does he think he is?’ Paul Marlowe raged.
‘Dad, I’m fine,’ she said. ‘And you can’t sack him. I’ve already spoken to Priya. If you sack him, he can sue you for unfair dismissal.’
‘What—after what he’s done? That’s totally unacceptable.’
‘It’s the law,’ she said gently. ‘Dad, really. It’s fine. I’ll manage. Don’t cut your trip short. You’re not supposed to be home until next month.’ Which should’ve been for her wedding, but that wasn’t going to happen now. ‘You and Mum have planned this trip for ever and I don’t want you missing out. It’s fine.’
‘Hmm,’ Paul said. ‘Your mother wants to speak to you.’
There was a brief pause, and then she heard her mother say, ‘Are you all right, Immi?’
‘I’m fine,’ Immi said.
‘Are you sure?’
‘Yes. Actually, Stephen’s probably done us both a favour. When Andie got married, I realised that he doesn’t look at me the way Cleve looks at Andie, and I don’t look at him the way Andie looks at Cleve. I thought maybe I was just having cold feet, but...’
‘If it isn’t right, it isn’t right.’
But Immi could hear the worry in her mother’s voice. ‘Mum, I’m eating,’ she said gently. ‘I promise, I’m not going to start starving myself. I’m older now and much, much wiser. Do you want me to video myself eating every meal and send you the evidence?’
‘Yes,’ Julie said. ‘Well, obviously that’d be a bit excessive. But I’m your mother. I wouldn’t be human if I didn’t worry about you. I let you down last time.’
‘No, you didn’t. I was a teenager, and teenagers are very good at hiding things we don’t want our parents to know. Honestly. I’m eight years older than I was back then, and the counselling really sorted me out. My head’s in a good place. Yes, I’m angry and hurt, and I might tape Stephen’s picture on a punchbag at the gym and pound it to shreds, but that’s as far as it’ll go. Don’t worry. I really want you and Dad to finish your trip.’
‘I should be home, helping you cancel all the wedding stuff.’
‘It’s fine. I have lists. Andie’s already offered to help. It’ll be fine,’ Immi soothed.
‘But you’ll ring me if you need me?’
‘I’ll ring you,’ Immi promised. ‘But you and Dad have been looking forward to India. Just go to all the places and take a gazillion photos to show me when you get home. Love you, Mum.’
‘Love you, too,’ Julie said.
Immi had just finished packing the last of Stephen’s stuff into a box when her phone beeped again. This time it was Portia.
OMG. When did this happen? Want me to come home and scalp him?
Immi laughed and texted back,
Tonight. I’m fine. Going to tape his pic to punchbag at gym tomorrow. You OK?
Yes.
Good.
Need a hand with cancelling stuff?
No, I’ve got it. But thanks.
Right at that moment, Immi really missed her sisters and she would’ve liked nothing better than to spend an evening with the four of them curled up by the fire with mugs of hot chocolate and a plate of brownies, talking about nothing in particular. But her sisters all had busy lives. And she wasn’t going to drag everyone back to Cambridge just because her own life was taking a bit of a wobble.
See you soon, yes?
Laters, Portia texted back.
So that was the first hurdle dealt with, Immi thought. Now she needed to put her list together of people she needed to call to cancel the ceremony, the reception, the dresses and the flowers, the photographer... And she might just take her little sister up on her offer of a bolt hole in a month’s time. Facing everyone this week would be tough enough, but the week when she was supposed to have been married? That was the week she’d rather be as far away from here as possible.
And in the meantime she had work to do.
CHAPTER TWO (#uc9b9894d-55db-5ce6-bd02-d6a675a26020)
A month later
IMMI PAID THE taxi driver, thanked him and collected her bags from the back of the car.
The Villa Rosa loomed before her in all its pink faded glory.
The last time she’d come here to L’Isola dei Fiori had been for Andie’s wedding. When she’d still been engaged to Stephen...while he’d been seeing someone else behind her back.
She shook herself. Enough of the pity party. It was bad enough that she was behaving like the Runaway Bride—actually running away from things on the week she should’ve been getting married. But she really couldn’t bear to be in Cambridge facing everyone’s pity right now; plus her father was back at the helm of Marlowe Aviation, so it wasn’t as if she was letting him down. And she really needed time away from the whole situation to decide what she really wanted from life.
Thank God Posy’s godmother Sofia had left her this place. It had been a gift to Sofia years ago by her besotted lover Ludano, the King of L’Isola dei Fiori; and Sofia had bequeathed it to her goddaughter, the youngest Marlowe girl.
OK, so the house needed some work doing. A lot of work, Immi amended, given that the stucco was faded and there were even weeds growing out of a crack in the wall. But it had been a bolt hole that all of Posy’s sisters had needed this spring and summer. Andie, giving her time to come to terms with a life-changing event. Portia, when her career was teetering on the brink. And now Immi herself, giving her space to decide what she was going to do with her life now her marriage wasn’t happening.
Best of all, the garden here had run pretty much wild. Which meant that Immi could spend her days doing what she loved second-best in the whole world—working in a garden—and it would make her so physically tired that she wouldn’t be able to brood about the might-have-beens. She could just concentrate on the plants and let a few ideas bubble in her subconscious.
The keys were right where Posy said they’d be, underneath a flowerpot in the back garden, and she let herself in.
The house was clean—as Immi had expected, given that her older sister Portia had been staying here—and there had definitely been some work done: the cracked glass panels in the double-height conservatory had been replaced, meaning that the room was pretty much watertight again. Several other walls had been replastered, though not painted, and the once-gorgeous painted drawing room still had a crack running through the fresco; it had been repaired, but nobody had touched up the paint.
She hauled her bags into the kitchen. Just as she remembered from the weekend of the wedding, the room was large and comfortable, and she thought she could probably use it as her base. The oven was ancient but in working order, as was the fridge. The kettle sitting on the worktop was the kind you had to boil on top of the stove, rather than the electric kind with a light that switched off when the water had boiled, but again it was workable; the pans, although worn and not the non-stick kind she was used to, were serviceable enough. The place felt as if it had been stuck in the early nineteen-seventies, but it had a certain charm.
There was a note propped against the kettle; she picked it up and read it.
Posy said you were coming. Have put milk in fridge and bread in the cupboard. We’re in the white cottage down the lane if you need anything.
Matt Stark
Matt.
Immi remembered that almost-kiss at the wedding and caught her breath. Back then, she hadn’t been free to act on that unexpected and unfair surge of desire. Now she was. Though right now she wasn’t in a place where she wanted to get involved with anyone. Just let it go and chalk it up to the actions of a kind neighbour, she told herself.
And it was kind of Matt to have brought her some milk and bread. She’d planned to go shopping once she got here, but her flight had been delayed and she’d missed her original ferry crossing from the mainland to Sant’Angelo, meaning that she’d arrived at the villa much later than she’d intended. She knew the shops in the village would be closed now; hopefully Portia had left some cereal or something in one of the cupboards, but if not then toast and milk would see her through until tomorrow. She’d call in and thank Matt for his kindness in the morning.
But how good it was right now not to have to talk to anyone.
It felt as if she’d spent the last month doing nothing but talking, cancelling every single thing she’d arranged for the wedding and uninviting all the guests. Everyone had wanted to know why the wedding was off. She’d squirmed at the idea of telling people the truth, not wanting to have to face all the pity; but not telling the truth left her open to all the gossip and speculation, and even the blame—flighty Imogen Marlowe changing her mind and cancelling the wedding at the last minute, leaving poor Stephen devastated.
Ha. The only flying she was doing was in aeroplanes; and Stephen wasn’t devastated at losing her. He was devastated at losing his chance to run Marlowe Aviation.
She’d fudged her way through it, simply saying that Stephen had let her down badly over a really important issue, and the marriage would’ve failed. Better to call it off now than to go through with it and then end up with a messy divorce.
Work had been harder.
Facing him, every single day, had been tough. The first few days, Stephen had started trying to charm her round, bringing her fresh flowers for her desk every day. When she hadn’t given in, he’d moved on to blaming her for his behaviour, saying that he’d only strayed because she hadn’t been enough for him. Words that had cut deep because they’d brought back her old teenage fears of being inadequate. He’d probably said it just to hurt her when she’d refused to take him back, but the barb had landed on target. She’d been close to punching him, but she wasn’t going to give him the satisfaction of slapping her with an assault charge.
The blaming had been followed by a week of sneers and nasty little digs. Immi had managed to ignore them, for the most part, but when he pushed her to almost her breaking point she’d asked Priya to send him a formal letter about standards of professional behaviour in the office. He’d backed off after that.
But then there had been a week of fielding the tension between her father and Stephen, once Paul and Julie Marlowe had returned from their extended trip to India. Immi had had to try to stop her father going off at the deep end and leaving himself open to having to pay Stephen massive compensation at an industrial tribunal—because having to pay compensation to the man who’d cheated on her would’ve really added insult to injury.
Being away from that whole toxic situation was bliss; and, even though she still worried that her father would lose his temper, Immi knew that Priya would sit him down and talk him through the legal issues. With Priya not being his daughter, there was a chance that Paul Marlowe might actually listen to her.
A few days here on L’Isola dei Fiori, on her own, and she might be able to work out exactly where she went from here. What she was going to do with the rest of her life. With no internet—and spotty mobile phone reception only on some parts of the island, if she was lucky—she wouldn’t have to answer any questions until she was ready. Though it might be an idea to take selfies of herself eating and send them to her sisters and her mother, just to reassure everyone that she wasn’t slipping back into her old ways. She’d need to wait until tomorrow, when she had a little more than just bread and milk in the cupboard.
To her relief, Portia had left decent instant coffee and hot chocolate.
Immi made herself a mug of coffee, unpacked her stuff in Sofia’s faded yet comfortable downstairs bedroom, then headed for the garden with a notebook and pen so she could walk round and start making a list of what needed doing and where.
Alberto, Sofia’s old gardener, was too old and frail now to keep everything under control. According to Andie, one of his and Elena the housekeeper’s sons cut the grass every spring, and it didn’t tend to grow much during the summer. The shrubs and the roses, however, were well out of control, overgrown and with whippy stems that could catch the unwary and draw blood. It was just as well that she’d brought her own secateurs and gardening gloves from home, and she might need something even sturdier than that to tackle the thicker stems. Hopefully there was a saw or something in the garage.
She found an ancient and slightly rusted wheelbarrow in the garden shed, and hauled it over to the border nearest the house. Might as well get a bit of weeding in; and then tomorrow she’d put her list in order and start working her way through cutting back the tangle.
The physical work did her good; by the time she’d spent a couple of hours weeding, she was tired and ached all over.
Bath and an early night, she decided. She made herself some toast, then waited for the massive bath to fill. Back in the day, this must’ve been really special, she thought. Now, the bath had patches where the enamel had worn away, and several of the sumptuous peacock-blue-and-gold tiles had cracked. The grouting was nothing short of horrible, and no amount of scrubbing was going to fix it. Some of the black-and-white-chequered lino had cracked. The whole place was going to need a lot of love to bring it back to its former glory—and probably more money than she, Posy, Portia and Andie had between them.
Unless maybe Portia could use some of her contacts to get a television programme made about the restoration, with experts and tradesmen giving their time and labour in return for the national or even international exposure on TV... Immi made a note on her phone to suggest it to Portia, then stepped into the bath and scrubbed herself clean.
Without a shower, she’d had to use a jug from the kitchen to rinse the shampoo from her hair; she tucked a towel sarong-style around herself and wrapped her wet hair in a smaller towel before going back to Sofia’s bedroom, where she tripped over something and pitched head-first onto the bed.
‘Way to go, Immi,’ she said, rolling her eyes, and got back onto her feet. She could hear a bell clanging somewhere, and assumed it was the church in the village. Maybe that was somewhere to explore tomorrow.
She changed into her pyjamas and combed her hair, then headed for the kitchen to make herself a mug of hot chocolate. But as she reached the doorway she could see torchlight flashing. For a second, she froze. Was it a burglar? There was nothing here to steal. Sofia’s jewellery was gorgeous, but it was all costume and not worth anywhere near what the value would’ve been if it had been real.
All the same, she couldn’t let the house be ransacked. She ran into the kitchen and snatched up the first thing to hand, then yelled, ‘Va via! Ho chiamato la polizia!’
Hopefully the burglars wouldn’t know she had no landline and no signal for her mobile phone, and would believe that she really had called the police. And hopefully they’d make a run for it.
To her shock, the kitchen light was slammed on. She shrieked and was about to whack the burglar with the saucepan she was holding, when she suddenly recognised him.
Matt Stark.
She blew out a breath and put the saucepan down on the nearest worktop. ‘You scared me.’
‘I’m sorry,’ he said, his dark eyes filled with sincerity, ‘but you rang the bell. I assumed you needed help.’
‘I thought you were a burglar,’ she said, and then his words sank in. ‘Rang the bell? What bell?’
‘There’s a cord fixed by Sofia’s bed and in the living room by her chair,’ he explained. ‘Her phone line came down several years ago and has never been fixed.’
Probably, Immi thought, after Ludano’s death Sofia had no longer had any access to the palace staff to fix any problems. And Posy’s godmother had been too proud to admit that she couldn’t afford to fix the phone line.
‘And she wouldn’t let me rig up any kind of satellite phone for her,’ he continued, ‘so we compromised on her ringing a bell if she needed me.’
‘I didn’t pull any cord,’ she said, and then wrinkled her nose. ‘Oh. That’s what I must’ve tripped over. And I did hear a bell—I just didn’t connect it with tripping over. I thought it was the village church.’
‘Well, now you know,’ he said.
Her skin prickled with awareness—of him, and of the fact that she was only wearing thin cotton pyjamas that didn’t exactly hide her shape. She sucked in a breath. She needed to calm herself down. Remembering her manners would be a good start. ‘Thank you for the bread and the milk,’ she said. ‘I was going to call in tomorrow to say thank you and give you the money for it.’
‘There’s no need. I think I can afford to buy a neighbour a couple of pints of milk and a load of bread.’ He paused. ‘So why were you tackling what you thought were burglars on your own?’
She looked at the saucepan she’d just put down. ‘That wasn’t going to be much use against a determined intruder, was it?’
‘Hardly,’ he said dryly.
* * *
Imogen looked amazing in those pyjamas. The soft strappy top revealed her curves, and although her shorts were demure enough he could see just how long her legs were. And Matt really had to remind himself that she was off limits.
‘So why wasn’t your fiancé tackling the burglars?’ he asked. It was like a scab he couldn’t stop picking at.
‘He’s not here.’ She took a deep breath. ‘And he’s not my fiancé any more.’
She was free?
But the split must’ve been recent. He’d seen her only two months before, with that massive rock on her left hand. Had she been the one to instigate the break-up, or had her fiancé called off the engagement? Right now Matt knew he needed to tread carefully. ‘I’m sorry.’
‘I’m not.’ She lifted her chin. ‘Marrying Stephen would’ve been the biggest mistake ever.’
‘So you called it off?’
She spread her hands. ‘Some people would say that was enough to make me the Runaway Bride.’
He somehow didn’t think that Imogen Marlowe would run away from anything. There was a lot more to this than she was telling.
Not that it was any of his business. And he didn’t need to get involved. ‘Well, if you’re not being attacked by burglars, I guess I’d better leave you be,’ he said.
‘Or,’ she said, ‘I could put some proper clothes on and make you a cup of hot chocolate.’
* * *
Why on earth had she said that?
Wasn’t the whole point of her stay in L’Isola dei Fiori to be on her own, and to think about her future without having to talk to a single person? Why was she asking Matt to stay? This was particularly stupid of her, given that almost-kiss at Andie’s wedding reception. This was playing with fire.
His expression was unreadable. Then he nodded. ‘You’re probably wearing more right now than the average tourist would on the beach, but I’ll make the hot chocolate while you get changed.’
‘Deal. The hot chocolate’s in the top cupboard to the right of the stove, the milk’s where you put it, and the pan...’ She smiled. ‘Well. Let’s just say it hasn’t been used to smack a would-be burglar round the head.’
‘Indeed.’
He smiled back, and all of a sudden she was covered in goosebumps. Which was ridiculous. For pity’s sake, she was nearly twenty-five, not fifteen. She shouldn’t be flustered just because a seriously attractive man smiled at her.
She went upstairs and changed into a clean T-shirt and jeans. When she came back down into the kitchen, the milk was just on the boil. Matt stirred the milk into the hot chocolate powder, then handed one of the mugs to her.
‘There’s a good spot in the garden,’ he said, ‘to look at the stars. Because there are so few homes on this part of the island there’s hardly any light pollution so you get an excellent view of the night sky.’
‘Sounds good to me,’ she said. She’d been too busy around Andie’s wedding—and too miserable—to notice the stars.
She slipped on a pair of canvas shoes but didn’t bother lacing them up, then followed him and his torchlight out through the garden. The path wound through more of the overgrown shrubs, and a couple of times she started to wonder if this fabulous viewpoint of his even existed. She certainly didn’t remember it from her childhood stays here. Wouldn’t it have been easier just to sit on the ancient pink rocking chair she’d noticed on the terrace? But Matt seemed completely sure-footed, and eventually she found herself next to an old wooden bench in front of the wall that ran round the edge of the garden.
‘I know it looks as if it’d be more sensible to just follow the wall,’ he said, ‘but the tremor a couple of years back caused the wall to crumble in places, so it’s not brilliantly safe. Especially when it’s not daylight, when you can’t see where you’re going and you’re less likely to avoid tripping over a branch and going over the edge.’
‘Right.’ She knew the island was on a volcanic ridge. A tremor explained the cracks in the house; and they probably hadn’t been fixed for the same reason as the phone line. ‘I’m assuming the house needed attention before the wall round the garden did.’
He nodded. ‘Cleve’s done a bit of repairing—well, after almost burning down the kitchen—and when Javier was here with Portia he fixed the glass in the conservatory and plastered some of the walls.’
Immi had known Cleve for years and wasn’t surprised that he was good with his hands, but she couldn’t quite get her head round the idea of a movie star doing building work. Particularly as, from what she’d seen, the job looked pretty professional. But Portia had kept a lot of things about her new husband quiet, including the wedding: it was the only way to get real privacy when one of you lived so much in the public eye.
As Matt had promised, the bench that was perched on the edge of the cliff, facing out to sea, provided an expansive view of the star-filled sky and it was utterly beautiful.
It was a relief that he didn’t fill the silence with small talk, either; they just sat there together in companionable silence, sipping hot chocolate and watching the stars twinkling brightly above.
‘Thank you,’ she said quietly. ‘I think I needed that.’
‘Time and space to think?’ he asked, his voice equally soft.
‘Yes. I’m pretty much at a crossroads in my life right now.’ She wrinkled her nose. ‘The plan is to sort out the garden here; if you’re having to concentrate on physical work, you’re giving your subconscious time to deal with the problem.’
‘It’s a plan,’ he said.
‘It sounds as if you don’t think it’s a good one.’
He lifted both hands in a gesture of surrender. ‘No judgements. I’m doing the same kind of thing myself right now.’
There was something like sadness in his dark eyes and she wondered why he was at a crossroads. Though it was none of her business and it felt too intrusive to ask. ‘Maybe I ought to paint the walls instead of tackling the garden,’ she said. ‘I’ll have to talk to Posy about paint.’
‘Are you good at painting?’ he asked.
‘I’m better at pruning,’ she admitted.
‘Then do the garden,’ he advised. ‘If you need space to think in the back of your head, it’s easier to do it while you’re doing something you love.’
What did he do when he needed to think? she wondered. Again, she felt too awkward to ask. Which was weird, because normally she got on well with people and never had a problem chatting to them.
But she knew what it felt like to be stuck.
And he’d been kind to her sisters and to Sofia. Time for payback. Maybe she could help him. ‘I’m normally good at sorting things out,’ she said, ‘so if you want a non-judgemental neighbour to bounce ideas off...’
‘Someone who doesn’t know me and is outside the situation so might see it more clearly? I like that. Thank you.’ He paused. ‘I’m pretty good at sorting things out usually, too. So if you want...’ He left the offer hanging open.
‘Thanks, but it’s a pretty tangled web.’
‘They’re the sort that could do most with an outside viewpoint.’
‘I guess.’ She paused. She could tell him what had happened. And that might put enough of a barrier between them to stop her doing something stupid. Like giving in to the pull she felt towards him. Or maybe it wouldn’t. ‘But maybe not today?’
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Kate Hardy
Тип: электронная книга
Жанр: Современные любовные романы
Язык: на английском языке
Издательство: HarperCollins
Дата публикации: 16.04.2024
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О книге: He’ll help her forget her past, and may just give her a future too!Immi Marlowe ran away after she was jilted… and on arrival on Isola dei Fiore gorgeous billionaire Matt Stark sweeps her off her feet! On the island’s golden beaches they really connect but, when her past secrets are revealed, what will Matt do to prove they can go the distance?Summer at Villa Rosa – Book 3 of 4