AllFreeNovel
Share Us
She held her breath as Marco crouched down beside her, struggling to lift her head and fight off the swimming sensation within it. She would have given a lot for him not to have seen her like this, not to have witnessed her humiliating loss of consciousness.
‘There's no need to fuss. I'm fine.' she repeated, sounding as steady as she could.
‘Don't listen to her. Marco. She isn't all right at all. She's hardly eating and when she does, she's sick.'
'Jemma!' Emily warned sharply.
‘Jemma is hardly breaking the Official Secrets Act.' Marco defended her assistant dryly. ‘After all she hasn't told me anything I can't see for myself. And, besides, there's no reason why I shouldn't know, is there?'
None, except her pride and her aching heart. Emily admitted inwardly. And of course, those wouldn't matter to Marco, ‘I don't know what you are doing here. Your Highness’, she addressed him deliberately underlining his title.
He couldn't just walk away and leave her like this Marco decided. So what was he going to do? His return flight was already scheduled for later this evening. Emily wasn't his responsibility. She was an adult. There was no good cause for him to involve himself here. But another voice deep inside him told him it was too late for such arguments. He had already made his decision.
‘I came to see you because I've got a business proposition to put to you.' he told Emily levelly. He could see her eyes widening with confusion and disbelief. She was lifting her hand to her head, as though she couldn't take in what he was saying. Seeing her look so thin and unwell touched an unfamiliar chord inside him which he crushed down the instant he felt it.
Emily's head was aching painfully. She was finding it hard enough to grasp that Marco was actually here, never mind anything else. Her thoughts were in complete disarray. She couldn't really comprehend what he was saying. It was difficult enough for her to focus simply on stopping her heart from spinning and shaking her body with the force of its frantic beats, without having to think logically and calmly as well. It had upset her far more than she wanted to admit that the sight of him should have affected her to such an extent that she had collapsed.
Worryingly even now her senses were still clinging possessively to the memory of being held in his arms as he had caught her. Part of her the sensible part, she told herself firmly, wanted to put as much distance between them as she could, to protect herself from making it even more obvious just how intensely aware of him she was. Whilst the other part longed to be as intimately close to him as it was possible to be: body to body, skin to skin, mouth to mouth—heart to heart.
‘A business proposition?’ she repeated uncertainly. What exactly does that mean Marco? I'm an interior designer.’
‘Exactly.’ Marco agreed, and a very good one.’
Marco was praising her? Flattering her? Why? she wondered suspiciously. It was totally out of character for him to behave like this.
Since it could be a while before I formally take over from my grandfather, instead of moving into the palace and being cooped up in a suite of rooms there. Marco told her. ‘I’ve moved into a villa I inherited from my parents. It’s in the old part of the town and it’s badly in need of modernisation. I want a designer who knows what she's doing and. just as important, one who knows my taste.'
‘It took several seconds for the full meaning of what he was saying to sink in. But once it had. Emily could hardly conceal her disbelief.
‘Are you saying that you want to commission me to be that designer?’ she asked Marco faintly.
‘Yes why not?’ Marco confirmed.
‘Why not?: Emily stared at him as her heart lurched crazily into her ribs. ‘Marco, we were lovers, and now our relationship is over. You must see that I can’t just let you commission me as your designer as though everything that took place between us never happened.’
‘Of course not. Emily. You never let me explain properly to you why I didn't tell you about Niroli or my role there.’ Out of the corner of her eye, Emily could see Jemma discreetly edging out of the room to go into the stock room, closing the door after her to give them some privacy.
Emily waited, feeling helpless and weak. She was her own worst enemy, she knew that. She shouldn't even be thinking of listening to him instead of sitting here desperate for every second she could spend with him.
‘As a boy I had a very difficult relationship with my grandfather. I suppose I was something of a black sheep in his eyes. I resented the way he treated my father, who was too gentle to stand up to him and I swore that I would never let him control me the way he did my parents. I came to London determined to prove to him and to myself that I could be a success without the power of the Royal House of Niroli. It was for that reason that I came here and stayed incognito, and no other’
