The Scorsolini Marriage Bargain

“Your morning appointment is waiting.”

“Ida…I have to go to New York.”

The older woman barely blinked. “I believe I can clear your schedule. If you could take care of your current appointment, I will have a maid pack for you while I begin clearing your schedule.”

“Just like that?”

“There are things you and the prince need to talk about,” Ida said kindly. “I’m assuming those things did not get said last night.”

Therese shook her head.

“That gives a trip to New York precedence over anything else in your schedule.”

“I hope Claudio feels that way.”

“Men, even brilliant men, are not always the brightest spark when it comes to relationships.”

“Even brilliant men, hmm?”

“Yes.” Ida sighed, the sound filled with exasperation. “Sometimes I think it’s the really bright ones that are dumbest when it comes to women.”

Therese laughed. She thought maybe Ida was right. Look at how stupid King Vincente was about Flavia.

“Just you remember, young lady…a marriage is not all about having children.”

Therese smiled disappeared. “My marriage is.”

“Don’t you believe it.”

She wished she shared the older woman’s assurance, but she couldn’t.

She landed in New York later that evening, her nerves stretched to screaming point. She’d spent the entire flight going over in her head what she was going to say to Claudio, but she couldn’t get past the first sally because every time she thought about him agreeing that their marriage should be dissolved, her throat clogged with tears.

She had asked security not to alert her husband to her intention to join him. For some reason, she felt the element of surprise might be on her side. She was informed he was at the hotel preparing for a dinner meeting when her plane landed. It seemed fortuitous and she hoped it boded well for the meeting to come.

Her eyes barely registered the opulence of the oversize suite when security let her inside. She was too busy trying to control her tortured emotions.

Claudio was tying his tie when she walked into the bedroom.

“Hello, caro.”

His big body jerked, blatant testament to how shocked he was by her presence. Then his head snapped up, his dark eyes zeroing in on her with physical intensity. “Therese, what are you doing here?”

“You said you’d like it if I was.”

“You are not here because of my phone call this morning.” His expression dared her to contradict him…to lie.

“No, I’m not. We need to talk.”

“Do we?”

“Yes,” she said, trying to ignore the fact that his expression was about as welcoming as an accountant faced with a tax auditor.

“I suppose you have something you have to confess that has weighed on your conscience long enough,” he said in a voice that dripped in ice.

She didn’t know what triggered his hostility, except maybe that she’d changed her schedule. Claudio didn’t like surprises and he had a worse one coming.

“You could put it that way.” She couldn’t even assure him it was nothing bad because it was.

In a marriage like theirs, it was a death knell and nothing less.

Claudio went back to what he was doing with cold precision. “It will have to wait. I have a dinner meeting.”

“Can you cancel it?”

“You mean like you obviously canceled all of your obligations so you could fly up here and have a conversation that surely could have waited the three days it would take me to get home?”

“Yes.” She didn’t care how he made it sound. That was exactly what she wanted.

“That’s not going to happen.”

“Would it really be so terrible?”

“Obviously you do not consider it so, but I do not appreciate my wife letting down her obligations and therefore me.”

“And are our duties the only thing that matter in our life together?”

“Duty must come first. At one time, I believe you understood this.”

“Is that why you married me?”

“You already know it was one of the primary reasons I decided you would suit me well as a wife. Your parents could not have raised you more suitably for the life of a princess if they had been royalty themselves.”

That reminder was as unwelcome as it was painful. For she better than anyone knew how carefully her parents had raised her. Her father with the hopes she would pursue a political career and her mother with the desire to live her life’s ambitions through her daughter. Neither had ever cared what dreams beat in Therese’s heart.

“My appreciation for duty was my main attraction to you…and of course the fact that I was physically compatible with you,” she said, long denied hurt coming out as bitterness.