Читать книгу Modern Romance October 2019 Books 1-4 - Кейт Хьюит - Страница 21

Four months later

‘NICO JUST LANDED.’

Aurora, who stood in the cool of Reception, nodded to Francesca. ‘Everything is ready.’

The press were here for the official opening of the hotel, and the guests mainly consisted of Nico’s wealthy contacts and a few select people from the travel industry, who would be dining in the restaurant and staying in the sumptuous suites on this very exciting day for Silibri.

The real guests would start arriving next week.

Nico had made it clear—via correspondence rather than in person—that he did not want their luxury stay to be encroached upon by the opening celebration.

Nico had stayed well away from Silibri—had not been back since the funeral. And Aurora had never been more nervous in her life to see him—though that had nothing to do with work.

Work was the one thing in her life that was going very well.

The hotel was stunning: each suite had a sumptuous view, either of the ocean or of the ancient temple ruins. Many of the suites had their own private pool, and all had a balustrade balcony made from the same stone as the temple.

It was sheer opulent luxury, and it would change the village economy entirely.

Guests would soon be strolling through the long empty streets. Cafés that had closed and lain empty for years had been renovated and would be opening again—not just for the hotel patrons, but for the fleet of staff who would work at the hotel, as well as their families.

Life was returning to Silibri.

And soon Aurora would have no choice but to leave.

She was pregnant.

In the first few weeks after Nico had left Aurora had been too angry and confused to consider the possibility that she might be pregnant. She had been grieving for Geo, as well as mourning the loss of Nico from her life.

She had buried herself in work and it had been her saviour. She hadn’t just worked alongside Vincenzo, but off her own bat had made a gorgeous library of the photos she had taken of the renovations, which now had its own section on the hotel’s website.

Her first inkling that something was amiss had come when the new uniforms had arrived. Aurora had at first assumed there had been a mix-up and that she had tried on someone else’s.

The jacket had not done up across her generous bust.

The skirt had felt too snug on her hips.

Aurora had checked the label and seen that indeed it was her uniform—and then realisation had started to hit.

Stupido!

That had been her first thought as she had frantically tried to remember when her last period had been.

Stupido!

It had been her second thought too—but aimed at both of them. Because Nico hadn’t used protection and neither had he asked if she was on the Pill.

And she hadn’t told him that she wasn’t.

There had been no thought on that balmy afternoon—just his mouth and his hands and his touch and the heaven to which he had taken her.

Aurora had sent the uniform back and today she wore one a full size bigger—already it was too tight.

She could not stand to think of Nico’s reaction. He would consider that she had set out to get pregnant deliberately, Aurora was sure. That she was trying to trap him into marriage. It was an old-fashioned village and marriage was still a foregone conclusion for lovers who found themselves in the family way.

Family.

She gave a wry laugh at that.

Nico did not want one.

‘Aurora?’

Vincenzo was going through the list of questions that might come their way as they took their separate groups around the hotel. He, of course, had Nico and all the bigwigs, and she had the local dignitaries. It didn’t trouble Aurora, for it was an hour that she would not have to spend avoiding Nico’s eyes.

‘Right, I’m going to the oratory,’ Vincenzo said. ‘Good luck today. Any questions you can’t handle, just refer them to me—though remember I have to leave by eight.’

Vincenzo was appearing on breakfast television tomorrow and could not stop mentioning it.

‘Of course I’ll remember. You look very smart,’ Aurora added, for in his butterscotch suit indeed he did.

‘Thank you,’ Vincenzo said, smoothing his auburn hair. ‘So do you.’

She wore her hair up and had subtle make-up on, but it had taken some considerable effort to conceal her new curves.

Aurora had let out the waistband of her skirt herself, and her breasts were practically strapped down. She was bursting out of everything and was just a day away from telling her family the news—once Nico had safely flown out.

Today, though, he had flown in.

Should she tell him?

It was the question that she both woke and fell asleep to, and then asked herself a thousand times during the hours in between.

And as Nico and his entourage crossed the foyer she asked it again.

Should she tell the man who did not want her—the man who was attempting to cut all ties with her and the village—that she was having his baby?

Or rather, did she tell the man who wanted her only in bed and not by his side that she was pregnant? The same man who had told her as they made love to keep on wanting him.

Oh, she still wanted him—for even from this distance the sight of him jolted her senses and turned her on.

He wore a dark suit, presumably stitched by his usual master tailor, but to Aurora’s skilled eye it was looking a touch loose on him.

Nico had lost weight.

Not a lot, but enough that she wanted to race to the chef, scream for pasta and force-feed him. It was the Sicilian way.

But she restrained herself.

In fact, for once, Aurora was a picture of restraint.

‘It is good to see you.’ She smiled, and shook his hand. And this time, as Nico moved in to kiss her in the way old friends would, it was she who put up her hand to halt him. ‘I believe Vincenzo has your people gathered in the oratory.’

‘How are you, Aurora?’

‘Very well.’

She looked incredible.

Nico knew she had been working frantically, but she looked as if she had spent all these weeks lying on a recliner by the pool in the hot Sicilian sun. The Persian Orange of her uniform was indeed perfect, and brought out the little flecks of gold in her dark eyes. Her lips were plump and shaped in a mild smile.

He tried to gauge her level of hurt, and he checked for hostility in those amazing eyes, but saw none.

For there was none.

She loved him—and that, sadly, was that.

‘Aurora,’ he said as she went to move off. He spoke with his people and then nodded to Francesca, who took the group through to the oratory. ‘I need to see you.’

‘Of course.’ She fixed on a smile. ‘What do you need?’

‘Not here,’ Nico said. ‘Not now.’

Nico truly loathed his treatment of her on the day his father had been laid to rest. He regretted with every fibre of his being the way they had parted.

Her dignity.

His silence.

And he had missed her so. That throaty laugh, that raw passion for everything she did.

How to tell her of the mess in his head?

Where did he begin to explain to Aurora that if he were capable of love absolutely it would be with her?

‘Your schedule is very full,’ Aurora pointed out.

She did not want to be alone with him; she did not want to fall into his arms, to yearn for his kiss. To sob out that she was pregnant and then witness his dark reaction.

Aurora would tell him from a distance, she decided, then and there, because she felt like putty whenever he was near.

But Nico did not give up.

‘Later tonight?’ Nico said. ‘I shall be done around ten.’

‘But I finish at eight,’ Aurora said, and tried to inject regret into her voice. ‘Perhaps we could schedule a meeting for the morning?’

‘I don’t want a work meeting.’

No, he wanted sex. Aurora was very sure of that.

Nico was staying in the Temple Suite tonight, and no doubt he did not want to spend the night alone.

Damn you, Nico!

She corrected herself: she was not putty—more, she was a puppet on Nico’s string. He thought he could bed her at will. And the real trouble was that he could.

Perhaps she wouldn’t even have to tell him. She was feeling so hormonal right now that to be alone with Nico meant she would fall into his arms. He would just have to strip off her skirt and he would know. Or his hands would remove her bra and the heavy breasts that were now crushed against her chest would spring full into his hands…

Now he saw anger in her face. It flashed in her eyes and it formed in two red dots on her cheeks. But her smile remained.

‘I want to speak to you Aurora,’ Nico said.

But it would have to wait, for Vincenzo was making an approach.

‘Ah, Signor Caruso!’ Vincenzo said. ‘Benvenuto!’

‘Welcome?’ Nico checked. ‘What do you mean, welcome? It’s my damned hotel?’

‘What’s eating him?’ Vincenzo asked as Nico stalked off.

Aurora knew she now had to tell a lie, and she watched Vincenzo’s face fall as she spoke. But that lie would keep her sane.

It kept her sane even when Nico joined not the big-wigs’ group, but the local dignitaries as Aurora gave them her tour—fully thirty minutes behind Vincenzo’s schedule.

First she took them outside to the main pool, where the ruins of a Roman bath had been carefully brought back to life.

‘Most of the suites,’ Aurora explained, ‘have their own private pool, but this is the central one. Though it is positioned so that it can’t be viewed from the main building.’

‘Why is that?’ a reporter asked.

‘For private functions,’ Aurora said. ‘It looks incredible when lit at night, and with the calibre of guests we expect to host we would not want to risk them being photographed.’

‘Can a couple book just this area just for themselves?’

‘Of course,’ Nico answered, when Aurora could not.

She could feel the sun beating on her head, and Nico’s eyes on her, and the air felt so thick she could barely drag it in.

Oh, how she wanted to discard the jacket and skirt! To peel off her clothes and take his hand as he led her into the cool, inviting water.

‘Let’s head inside,’ Aurora said, and deliberately avoided his eyes. ‘This was once the oratory, where the monks would gather to pray and meditate,’ she explained as they came in from the glittering pool into the huge, cool, dark building. ‘The new stone is from the same quarry as the original monastery, and this whole wall…’ she touched it lovingly ‘…is original. Now it’s going to be a place for meditation and spa treatments. A place to hide from the world and restore oneself in peace and tranquillity.’

It was truly stunning. All those painstaking hours and millions of euros had been worth it, Nico knew.

Even his father had known. During their last visit, on the last morning of his life, Geo had admitted that he would have sold it to developers.

‘But I like what you have done,’ he had told Nico. And today Nico held on to those words as Aurora walked them around.

He could never palm this hotel off on his managers or sell it.

Yes, he had said that on the day of his father’s funeral, and for a while he had thought he would, but as the grief had settled Nico knew he could never just hand it over.

It was his life’s work.

‘Now…’ Aurora smiled as she led them up some stone stairs and across a long cloister. ‘I shall take you into my favourite suite.’

‘The Honeymoon Suite?’ one of the crowd joked.

‘No,’ Aurora replied.

How could that be her favourite when she would never know a honeymoon? The truth was she avoided the Honeymoon Suite as best she could.

‘This is the Temple Suite,’ Aurora told her audience. ‘And I’m sure you will soon see why.’

She pushed open the heavy wooden door and as they took one step inside they all gasped—except for Aurora and Nico.

Even the sun had joined the party, and it seemed to split apart the stones of the old temple ruins in this most stunning view. It actually brought tears to Aurora’s eyes as she stood and looked out.

‘I had seen the temple ruins from every angle I thought possible,’ Aurora explained. ‘I grew up in Silibri and they were my playground. But some weeks ago I put on a hard hat and was shown the view from here. I admit I cried when I saw the temple from this height and distance. I believe this was the view that the monastery was built to capture. It is a slice of heaven, is it not?’

And it was—except that Nico was watching Aurora, and the way her eyes shone with tears. He could feel her love for this incredible space.

He wished—oh, how he wished—they were here alone.

They would be tonight.

She led them through the suite and onto the huge balcony and was grateful for the gentle breeze to cool her warm cheeks. Yes, she had trained herself not to blush around Nico, but it seemed she could not train herself out of desiring him. The easiest thing in the world, Aurora thought, would be to say yes to Nico.

‘Dinner on this balcony would be amazing,’ Nico said, as if reading her thoughts.

‘Absolutely, it would be,’ Aurora agreed.

‘I don’t think anyone would close the drapes on this.’

Please don’t, her heart said in response to his words. Please don’t banter with me and take me back to that day in Rome. Please don’t seduce me in this room that I love so much when I know you will only break my heart later…my heart that is trying so hard to mend itself.

As the crowd moved off, Nico held back and waited for her attention.

‘About ten?’ he checked.

Aurora swallowed but gave no response.

‘You have the key?’

No, she wanted to say, you have the key. The permanent key. And you turn it, and you open me, and then you close me again. And I cannot be placed on lockdown for even one day more.

No, she was not yet ready to tell him about the baby.

‘I’d better get on,’ she told him.

It had been a rewarding though exhausting day.

Aurora had slipped away in the evening, as Nico wined and dined his guests, though he himself barely ate a thing.

Tonight—after this—he would sit on that balcony and he would wine and dine Aurora. And with the temple ruins as their backdrop, he would say what he had come to say.

Nico escaped the celebrations just after ten.

So certain of her love was he that at first it didn’t faze him that Aurora was not there.

He ordered champagne and a spritzer. He ordered the freshest pasta, with a light basil and tomato sauce, and for dessert her favourite—Tiramisu. And he asked for the tray to be decorated with wild flowers, picked just before sunset.

All the things he knew she loved.

And he waited.

And then he texted her.

And then he drank the champagne as he called her cell phone but got no answer.

The flowers and the food came, but the meal he had chosen with her in mind went cold beneath the cloches.

Nico put on the television in his room with its most stunning view—just to check the news and be sure that wildfire had not ravaged the village again, nor had there been an accident on the winding roads. For surely Aurora would come if she could…

He woke on the plush sofa to the sound of her laughter and a rare hangover.

The sound of her low, throaty laugh had him looking around the vast suite—and then staring, bemused, at the television.

Aurora looked amazing, with her hair freshly styled, wearing more make-up than usual, and in that gorgeous Persian Orange uniform.

‘The Temple Suite,’ she said to the interviewer, ‘is more than luxury. It is a place where you can retreat, where you can heal, where you can rest and ponder your life choices.’

And it was then that he saw, tucked into the wilting wild flowers, a letter addressed to him. It was clear as he read it that Aurora had intended him to receive it last night.

Nico,

I have told Vincenzo that you want me to do the breakfast television interview. I’ve lied, but better that than be your plaything again.

The concierge can arrange an intimate massage in your suite or, if you do not want Pino knowing your business, you can call Rubina’s and ask Madame to send someone to help you create another unsatisfactory memory of your time in Silibri.

Sorry to disappoint, but my pride got in the way.

Aurora x

And then she laughed again.

At least the Aurora on breakfast television did.