Royally Romanced (20 page)

“Don’t, then. Listen to me.”

She fought a quivering lip but nodded.

“Renata, I am sorry.”

She made a hurry-it-up motion with her hand. He already said that and she still didn’t believe him.

“I know you are hurt and I would give anything to prevent that. The magazine article, part of it is true. I was in the hospital after that chili dog and I thought it was a heart attack.”

“Why? You’re so young.”

“My father, I told you how he and my mother died in a car accident in Vinciguerra when I was just starting at the university.”

“Yes.” She hoped he wasn’t aiming for sympathy, cuz she was fresh out.

“My parents had gone away for a quiet weekend at the house in the country and were driving back to the city when my father had a massive heart attack. He dropped dead at the wheel. They were on a hilly road and the auto went over the edge of a ravine, landing about thirty meters down.”

Renata whipped her head around in shock. He was as pale as his tan would let him be and his lips were bracketed in white lines. Oh, yes, he was telling her the truth now. “How terrible.”

“My mother was of course alive at the time of impact and had severe internal and head injuries. Although they flew her to the trauma center immediately, they could do nothing for her and she died five days later.”

Renata’s eyes began to sting.

“So you see, that is how Stefania came to live with me. She was inconsolable in Vinciguerra and screamed for our mamma every night. My grandmother was afraid she would have a nervous breakdown so she sent Stevie to me in New York for a change of scenery. We were always close and I was the only one who could calm her.”

Renata sniffled. Damn him, she did not want to feel one iota of sympathy for the man.

“When I thought I was having a heart attack, I thought of Stefania, of course. But I also thought of you.”

“Me?”

“Yes, you. The woman I had only met that afternoon, the woman who was so kind to my sister, the woman who had made me crazy with her red lips and red hair and soft skin. I thought of you when I thought I was dying, and I bitterly regretted that I hadn’t met you five years ago.”

“Really?” Now her stinging eyes had decided to move directly to watery.

“Ten years ago. Forever ago.” He dropped to his knees on the rocky ground and grabbed her hands. “Renata,
mia bella,
I don’t want any more regrets. I have been entirely stupid but I am a poor, broken man without you.” He took a deep breath. “I love you.
Ti amo,
” he repeated in Italian in case she hadn’t gotten it the first time.

“Oh, Giorgio.” She bit her lip.

“Tell me you feel the same,” he pleaded, and he was not a man who pleaded. He mistook her hesitation for denial and his shoulders slumped. “I will not bother you any longer. If you do not want to take the train, I will have Paolo take you back to Genoa and get you a first-class ticket back to New York.”

“Great, so I can sob my way back to the Big Apple like I was crying on the train? How considerate of you, Giorgio. First you tell me you love me, and then you want to get rid of me.”

His head snapped up. “I do not want to be rid of you.” He took a good look at her face. “It is your turn to tell the truth about how you feel, Renata. Don’t be a sissy.”

“A sissy? You think I’m a sissy because I haven’t told you how much I love you?”

“You haven’t,” he goaded her. “I thought New Yorkers always spoke their minds. How much do you love me?”

“A ton. I fell in love with you days ago but was afraid—” Her lips turned downward as his turned up. Man, he’d tricked her not only into admitting she loved him but that she was scared about it. “I mean, I was…oh, all right, I love you, too, Giorgio. Now what the hell are we going to do?”

“We do what people in love do.” His face split into a grin and he launched himself from his knees to wrap his arms around her. She shrieked as tomato pulp and fish guts smeared her clothing. “My shirt!” Her shriek was cut off by his kiss. It was a familiar kiss, but different, deeper, knowing the love behind it.

He finally lifted his head. “Now we are a matched set. I’ll take you shopping for a new shirt anywhere you like.”

“Oh, that’s right—you’re a prince. I forgot.”

“Thank you for forgetting. For you, I am plain George di Leone, hapless brother of the bride.”

“And don’t forget, my love slave.” She giggled, giddy.

“And you will be my princess.”

She laughed. “Every Italian girl in New York is already a princess.”

“No, Renata.” Back to his knees again before she could blink. “Will you marry me and be my bride?”

She gaped at him. He was honest-to-God proposing to her? “Marry you?”

“
Si,
marry me. The prince and princess duties can be dull, but I apologize in advance. In important matters such as love, I am the same as any other man longing for his girl.”

“Oh, no you’re not. You are the sexiest, most wonderful man I’ve ever met. You’re kind to your sister, loyal to your friends and I can’t believe I met you.” She impatiently swiped tears off her cheeks. She’d just cried in misery, now she was crying in joy? Her eyes were pink and her nose was red.

Fortunately Giorgio didn’t care as he cupped her jaw in both hands, cradling her face as if she were a precious work of art. “I have been single for a long time and never met anyone like you. It is difficult for people to see beyond the trappings of my position and obligations to see the man. I always thought I would have plenty of time before I took my father’s responsibilities, but that was not to be.”

Renata caressed his hand, knowing the hole their deaths had left in his life.

“But I am not telling you this for pity. I want you to know that you will always be first for me—like my mother was for my father.”

She didn’t know what to say. The downside was immense. Become princess of Vinciguerra? Leave New York and her business and her family? “Giorgio, that’s crazy. How long have we known each other? A week, that’s how long. What will people think?”

He shook his head before she finished her protest. “Who cares? I am a grown man who knows his own mind. And don’t tell me you care what other people think. I know you better than that.” He kissed her nose and sat back, wrapping his arm around her waist.

She stared at him. Her life as a princess in Vinciguerra was almost unimaginable. But her life with Giorgio would be to wake up with him every morning, to kiss him every night, to watch his dark hair gradually lighten to gray, his green eyes undimmed by age.

A man she loved, who loved her back.

Oh, that would be enough upside for any woman.

His fingers tightened on her knee as he waited for her answer, tension radiating from him. She covered his hand with hers.

“Yes, Giorgio, I will marry you. I have no clue about this princess stuff but I do know about loving you and wanting to be with you forever.” They’d work out the details later.

He crushed her into his tomatoed chest again, but his lips immediately distracted her, until her heart overflowed. She began to laugh at the wild improbability that her tough New York heart had been so easily turned to mush by a chivalrous Vinciguerran prince.

He lifted his mouth from hers and grinned, resting his forehead on hers. “We have a very interested audience.”

Renata blinked slowly and turned her head toward the train. They sure did. Every single passenger was goggling at them from the windows, and her seatmate even stood on the metal steps for a better view. She gave a small sigh, but what did she expect, making out with a prince at the side of the railway?

“Ah, hello.” She figured, what the hell, and sat up straight, giving them a wave to rival the Queen of England. “
Grazie!
Thank you for coming. You’ve been great! Read all about it in the next issue of
Today’s Paparazzi!
”

Giorgio muffled a snort. “You are picking up on this very quickly.”

The conductor approached them cautiously and Giorgio made quick arrangements to remove her suitcase. “For you will not go to Genoa today. I will come back to New York with you and meet your family, like a proper Vinciguerran man meets the family of his wife-to-be.”

Hmm. Renata waited for the anticipated figure of Edvard Munch’s
The Scream
to run across her mental landscape. Nope, the Italian birds were still chirping, the bright sun was still shining, and she had agreed to marry Giorgio Something Something Something di Leone. She didn’t remember all his names. No more “Galaxy’s Most Eligible Bachelor” for him. Maybe they could invite Mandy and Chase from Texas to their wedding. That would knock their socks off.

The train slowly pulled away, the passengers waving like crazy while some of the younger ones took their photos with their phones. Ah, well, welcome to life in the fishbowl.

She linked her arm with Giorgio’s and carefully picked her way down the trail leading to where Paolo and the captain had anchored the boat. He was rock-steady, on the path and in her life. “You know, Giorgio, if we’re going to have this big royal foo-foo wedding at some point, I’m going to have to remember your full name. I’d hate to look like a jerk on international television.”

“Giorgio Alphonso Giuseppe Franco Martelli di Leone,” he said slowly for her to catch all of his names.

“Good Lord, no wonder your friends call you George.”

“Si.”
He laughed. “But you may call me anything you like, especially if it is ‘my love,’
‘amore mio,’
‘my heart,’
‘mio cuore.’
”

She stopped. “And what will you call me?”

“The most wonderful woman in the world,” he promptly answered. “The woman who has made my every dream come true, even when I did not know what I was dreaming for.”

“Oh, Giorgio.” She threw her arms around his waist and rested her head against his chest, her eyes filling again.

He set her suitcase down. “I know, I know. My heart is full, also.”

“Just for a minute. Then we need to get down the hill so we can get out of these terrible clothes.” The odor of tomatoes and anchovies was getting very strong.

He laughed, his chest rumbling under her ear. “Ah, I knew we were of like minds. You are a woman after my own heart.”

She laughed and he joined in, her lighter giggles mixing with his warm masculine tones ringing through the countryside like a clear, strong bell announcing his joy. It was the finest, happiest sound she had ever heard, and joy welled in her, too.

A day of joy to start the rest of their joyful life together.

“I
HAVE TO HAND IT TO YOU
,
George. How many men can go shopping for a wedding dress and wind up picking out a bride?” Frank’s tone was admiring, after more than mild disbelief when Giorgio had called him from New York to announce his own engagement.

His face stretched into yet another love-struck grin. It was a good thing Frank couldn’t see what had to be the most cow-eyed expression ever. “Not many, I suppose.”

“You know, I went to the bridal salon when my sister got married.” Frank definitely sounded disgruntled. “And do you know who was there? Women old enough to be my mother—my grandmother, even. Oh, and a couple flower girls who couldn’t have been older than eight. But you, you find an Italian girl who looks like a redheaded Sophia Loren from that picture you emailed me. Where is the justice in the world?”

“There is none, Frank. I am amazed she’s agreed to marry me.”

“Me, too.”

“Hey, you don’t have to agree so quickly.”

“Oh, knock off the false modesty, George. You know you’re a great guy and I’m just kidding you. Tell me when the wedding is so I can dry-clean the formal wear.”

“After Stefania’s wedding. She deserves all the focus on her.” Renata was definitely happy to leave the “big foo-foo royal wedding” to her sister-in-law to be.

“Don’t get between a bride and her perfect day, eh? Good plan.” Frank cleared his throat. “I heard from Jack. Not to rain on your parade, but he did pick up some bizarre ailment and they flew him to the hospital in Bangkok.”

Giorgio winced. “Is he going to be all right?”

“Yes, yes,” Frank soothed him. “Lost a few kilos he couldn’t afford to lose but he claims he’s much better.”

“Frank, why doesn’t he accept that professorship in tropical medicine they offered him at the Pasteur Institute last year?”

“Me, I do not understand it, either. I don’t have the travel bug and all the bugs that come with it. But if I had a fiancée like his, I would move to Antarctica.”

“And study tropical medicine there?” Giorgio asked dryly.

“It
is
very far south, George. Ah, poor Jack—he would rather get dysentery than be on the same continent as that awful Nadine.”

Giorgio snorted but couldn’t disagree. “Nothing is set in stone. Until I see them standing at the altar of that chapel on the family estate, I have to believe he may change his mind.”

“But you won’t!” Frank said gleefully. “Renata has caught you, line, sinker and hook. Bring her to meet me so I can see how the mighty have fallen.”

Giorgio perked up his ears as several locks opened. They were in New York, after all, even if it was at a nice flat on the Upper West Side they’d chosen together.

Renata’s family had been shocked to learn she was engaged, much less to a prince from a place they’d never even heard of. Her brothers had made him show them the official website of Vinciguerra before they believed it was a real country. He’d even had a hard time convincing them he wasn’t a Eurotrash con man until he pulled up his online bio and official photo.

Her mother had quickly broken down into happy tears after that, and her grandmother had the unsettling habit of leering at him and then giving Renata a knowing wink.

Renata’s Aunt Barbara and her friend Flick were going to run the bridal salon once Renata joined him full-time in Vinciguerra. She would design from a workshop in the palazzo and send them her creations. He couldn’t wait for her to marry him and move there. His palazzo had all sorts of interesting nooks and crannies they could explore together. Naked.

“Giorgio, I’m home,” the sweetest voice in the world called.

“Gotta go, Frank. Renata’s back from work.” He was already shutting down his laptop.

“Two’s company, three’s a crowd. I know when I’m not wanted—”

He laughed and hung up.

Renata appeared from the foyer, a sexy pout on her face—and a white box in her hands. “Look, Giorgio, my new shoes got wet. That stupid weather forecast never said anything about rain.”

“I will buy you a thousand pairs if you come here and kiss me.”

“Bribery, sex and shoes. I could get used to this.” She sauntered over to him, purposely swaying her hips from side to side. Bright red toenails peeped out from the black high-heeled sandals. Today she wore one of his white dress shirts knotted at the waist over skintight dark denim capri pants.
Molto
sexy. She looked like a fifties starlet with one thing on her mind.

Lucky for him, he was of a like mind. “Come here.”

“Wait a second, Giorgio.” She shoved the white box at him. “This is for you.”

He accepted it and lifted the lid. “What?” He inhaled the sweet fragrance in awe and pleasure. “No, these can’t be.” He picked up a delicate lemon cookie dusted in powdered sugar.

“Try it,” she urged. “Stefania sent me your mother’s recipe and my mom and grandma have been teaching me how to bake her cookies for you.”

Giorgio was stunned. “You learned how to bake these—for me?”

“Of course. Don’t just look at it, eat it.”

He popped it into his mouth and springtime burst on his tongue, sunshine on a gloomy day. Just like Renata.

Yes, his mother’s recipe, with a dash of Renata thrown in. How lucky a man he was to be loved by such women. His mother, his grandmother, his sister and now his fiancée. “I love you, Renata.”

“And I love you, too.” Renata puckered her lips into a luscious red pout. “Kiss me, so I know this is all real and not some crazy romantic comedy.”

“Your wish is my command.” He stood and pulled her into his arms.

She laughed and twined her arms around his neck. “Oh, Giorgio. I love you so much.”

His heart flipped again, but this time it only made him smile instead of worry. He wordlessly scooped her up, wet shoes and all, and carried her off to bed where he proceeded to show her just how much he loved her, too.