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“Another time, perhaps.” He’d ended the conversation by leaving the room. Now, he was on a plane, back to the States. He’d listened to her various messages and deleted them.
At one point, hearing the tears in her voice, he’d almost buckled and called her back, but this time, he had to take a stand or he was going to lose himself. He shouldn’t have allowed her to put him in that position in the first place.
He'd fallen in love with her and every reasonable and rational thought had fled. Even now, his heart was aching inside his chest. He was pining for her and had been looking forward to seeing her so much that he had hinged everything on it.
He would heal, he decided desperately. He’d pulled himself up by the boot strings and had made something of himself. He wasn’t going to allow anyone, not even her, to make light of it. He’d been begging her to tell her Dad about them and she kept refusing and making some form of excuse. He was done.
*****
“You look like hell.” Michael murmured as he handed her the trowel. “Why are we here digging in the dirt when you have maids to do that?”
“I love gardening. It relaxes me.” She was exhausted and felt like she was floating. She hadn’t heard back from Maxwell and even the calls to his office had been fielded. His assistant had told her he wasn’t available and promised to leave a message. He hadn’t returned her calls and she knew he was back in town.
“Your Dad went out?”
She nodded, sitting back on her heels as she surveyed the fresh dirt she’d just dug up. It was the patch of land she’d earmarked as her new project. She’d gone into it with gusto over the last few days and was keeping herself very busy.
Busy enough to try and sleep as soon as her head touched the pillow. However, it wasn’t working and she couldn’t believe he’d written her off just like that.
“He’s getting much better and Julian encouraged him to get out of the house. Hand me that bag of tomato seeds, please.”
“What about Maxwell?” He gave her the bag and bent down next to her. It was a lovely space with overhanging branches from an enormous oak tree, offering shade from the sun. It was the middle of May, and the weather was beautiful.
“What about him?” She busied herself spreading the seeds.
“You haven’t heard from him?”
“No.” Patting the dirt over the seeds, she watered them before taking another flower pot. “I don’t expect to. It’s over between us.”
“You’re not even going to try?” He persisted.
Refusing to meet his eyes, she continued to dig into the soil.
“Alessia?”
“I don’t want to talk about it.” She had to press her lips together to stop them from trembling.
“Honey-“
“No!” Jumping to her feet, she pulled off her gardening gloves and uncapped the bottle of water she’d brought out. “We tried and it didn’t work. Let’s just leave it at that.”
Rising, he took her arm and led her to the bench near the patch of roses.
“You’re in a bad way, darling. I don’t agree with you, you didn’t try. You allowed your fear of your Dad’s reaction to affect the relationship. Maxwell bent over backwards to accommodate you. He agreed to the secrecy. Can you imagine how he felt knowing he didn’t have the freedom to take you out? It’s like he wasn’t good enough.”
Tugging her hand away from his, she cupped the bottle feeling the moisture on her skin. “I just had to find the right time to tell him.”
“Yet that never happened.” He deduced.
“I was going to tell him when I was leaving for the trip.”
“And he got sick.”
“It was never the right time.” She fought the tears. “Now it’s too late.”
“Is it?”
“Yes.” She drew a shaky breath. “It’s better this way.”
