LITMIR.BIZ

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another woman, then you say I see you as nothing but a sex toy…or as good as.” He shook his head as if to clear it. “This is crazy. I am not ashamed of you.”

      “But you don’t want anyone to know about me.”

      “For your own sake.” He swore again and tunneled his long brown fingers through his hair. “You know how invasive the paparazzi can be. The minute they got wind of my relationship with you, you would be watched your every waking moment. You would not be able to go to a public restroom without having a reporter ready to take your picture from under the stall next to your own.”

      “It wouldn’t be that bad. I’m not big news.”

      “But I am. I have lived my whole life the son of one of the relatively few royal couples in history to have divorced. I had no privacy in my marriage. Bianca had to travel everywhere with bodyguards not only for her personal security, but to protect her from the intrusive press. I have told you this.”

      Danette said nothing. The logical part of her brain knew he spoke the truth, but she could not make herself admit it. Even if her mind told her that he was determined to keep their relationship private because he valued it so much, her heart said that a relationship that had to be hidden wasn’t valuable enough.

      The way he’d been dancing with the blonde certainly made it look like he valued her.

      He sighed. “I developed a playboy facade after Bianca’s death to protect myself and the woman I truly wanted to be with. You know this. We have discussed it before.”

      She did know it. She had even seen it as something deeply personal they had in common. After all, hadn’t she developed an outgoing, flirtatious image to hide the very private person she was beneath the facade? She’d seen his playboy reputation the same way once he explained it to her. Only that photo implied the persona was the man.

      It made a mockery of the love she’d discovered she felt for him. Love wasn’t supposed to be like this. It wasn’t supposed to hurt so much. It was supposed to make life beautiful, to empower the lover…but all she ever got from it was pain and a horrible sense of insecurity.

      “How many women have you truly wanted to be with since Bianca?” she demanded, feeling waspish and hurt and unable to hold back the ugly question.

      “That is none of your business.”

      “Apparently most of your life is none of my business.”

      “That is not true.”

      “You don’t share it with me.”

      “That is a lie.” He looked like he wanted to shake her. “You get more of my time than anyone else. Did I not work twenty-hour days while I was gone so that I could fly back to you after the birthday party rather than returning to our shipping office in Hong Kong?”

      He rubbed his eyes, his face drawn with exhaustion and reflecting disappointment. “We spend practically every evening together doing more than sharing our bodies and you know this, tesoro mio. We have been to the theater, out to dinner many times…we have put puzzles together because it is something you enjoy doing and you have taught me to play odd American card games. The only part of myself I do not share with you is the public spotlight. I understood that was not something you craved. Was I wrong? Do you wish to be known as the latest lover for a Scorsolini prince?”

      His sarcasm didn’t even faze her. “If it means I don’t have to see pictures of you plastered against another woman, yes.”

      He shook his head. “We were dancing. That is all. It meant nothing. You must know this.”

      “All I know is that you two looked like you were getting ready to make a hasty exit from the party and find someplace private to continue dancing.”

      “You are jealous.” He shook his head. “There is no need.”

      “I’m hurt!”

      “Only because you do not trust me.”

      “How can I?”

      “I told you that for as long as we are together, our relationship would be exclusive. I gave you my word. You have known me for a year, intimately for half as long. When have you ever known me to break it?”

      “I don’t like being your dirty little secret.”

      “What we share is not dirty, and you are a secret because our relationship is so special to me that I do not want to lose it,” he gritted out between clenched teeth.

      She averted her face, refusing to answer, and the silence stretched between them. She sensed his movement, but was still shocked when one of his hands brushed the hair back from her temple and then slipped down to cup her chin. He gently turned her face until their gazes met.

      “I am very sorry if the pictures hurt you.”

      She knew he considered this a major climb-down, and to give him credit, for him it was. He had started the conversation off with a refusal to have a scene and was now apologizing. He was too darn perfect to have to apologize much and too powerful to be forced into giving one even when he was wrong in most cases, but it didn’t make her feel any better.

      What difference did an apology make when it wasn’t accompanied by the assurance the offense would not happen again?

      Seeing the picture had hurt her. A lot. She felt like her heart was being ripped into shreds even now.

      “Just tell me one thing,” she said. “How would you feel if our positions were reversed? What if you were the one looking on at me flirting with other men?”

      His jaw clenched as if the thought was not a pleasant one, but then he visibly relaxed his tense facial muscles. “In order to keep our relationship private, I must act naturally at public social functions. It would be entirely un-natural for me to ignore a roomful of women. Speculation would be rife if I was to do so and the paparazzi would soon begin looking for my secret liaison or making assumptions about my masculine urges, or worse.”

      “That’s not an answer to my question.”

      He was a master at redirection, which made him a force to reckon with in the business world and not much more user-friendly in a relationship. But she’d been with him six months and worked for him six months before that. She knew most of his techniques by now and wasn’t about to be swayed by them.

      “It is all the answer you need. This is not about tit for tat. My behavior was necessary.”

      “And if I behaved similarly out of necessity it would not bother you?”

      “The occasion does not arise.”

      “Are you sure about that?” She paused, giving him a moment to let the question prick at his arrogant certainty. “Just because I’m not gossip-column worthy doesn’t mean I never flirt with other men.”

      “And do you?” he asked with an indulgence that said more clearly than anything else could how little he worried about the possibility.

      “I haven’t, because I considered myself taken, but I realize now that I shouldn’t have.”

      CHAPTER TWO

      “YOUare taken,” Marcello said forcefully, no indulgence in evidence any longer.

      “Not if you aren’t, I’m not.”

      He let out a breath of obvious frustration. “It is not a matter of not considering myself in a relationship…it is merely that were I to ignore the overtures of other women completely, it would lead to too much speculation.”

      “Whereas my loyalty does not?”

      “It is not a matter of loyalty,” he denied, anger starting to curl around the edges of his forced patience.

      “Yes, it is.”

      “I told you, it is a matter of expediency.”

      “And

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