But which made more sense—that Alex, a gorgeous, aristocratic Italian billionaire, would actually desire an ordinary girl like Rosalie? Or that she was simply nearby, and he was taking what was easily available, like a starving man would grab a handy bag of chips?
She looked away. “I’m not your type.”
“What’s my type?”
“Blonde,” she said. “Thin and beautiful and regal.”
“You just described Chiara,” Alex said flatly. “And I never wanted her. Not even on our wedding day. Kissing her was like kissing a flagpole in winter.”
Rosalie caught her breath. He really felt that way about someone so stylish, so effortlessly beautiful? “Then why did you marry her?”
“We both came from a similar background. I thought a marriage would work.” He paused. “And her family’s winery was next to mine.”
“You make it sound so cold-blooded. Like a business merger.”
“That’s what it was. There was very little desire in it, for either of us. She was in love with another man.”
“Why did she marry you, then?”
“Because her father had threatened to disinherit her if she threw her life away on some penniless musician. And if there was one thing that Chiara valued even more than her lover, it was having money.”
“And that’s what you think marriage is?” Rosalie recoiled. “You all sound so awful.”
“Yes,” he said.
She suddenly hated that her unborn baby had anything to do with any of them. “If I’d known—”
“If you’d known,” Alex agreed.
For a moment, Rosalie felt a bittersweet lump in her throat. “I wish I’d conceived this baby the old-fashioned way,” she said wistfully, looking at her belly. “I wish I’d waited for a husband I could trust and believe in.”
“You can believe in me,” Alex said. She looked up. “I promise you, Rosalie. I will always be there for our son. I will be the best father I can.”
She exhaled. She knew what such a promise meant to him.
“Thank you for that, at least.” She hesitated. “And if I someday find a man I want to marry?”
His dark eyes widened, then he gave a small smile. “All I ask is that he is worthy of my son. And of you.”
Rosalie was still thinking of those words much later that afternoon, when the Orient Express finally crossed the causeway into Venice.
The sun was setting, leaving the sky aflame with red and orange that reflected back from the lagoon, and the Grand Canal outside Santa Lucia station as they arrived.
Alex helped her down the steps from the train, lifting their satchels against his powerful shoulder. “My driver is waiting outside.”
Rosalie looked at his powerful frame in the expensively cut shirt and trousers. The hard lines of his jaw, dark with five o’clock shadow, his sculpted cheekbones, his black eyes that seemed at times as fathomless as night, containing all the mysteries of the universe. They all made up Alex. The greatest mystery of all.
He hadn’t wanted Chiara, as beautiful as she’d been. Was it actually possible...somehow...that he wanted Rosalie? Not just because she was handy, but because...
Because why? Why on earth would he want her?
She pondered the question silently as his driver, at the helm of a luxurious speedboat rather than a car, drove them through the canals back to Alex’s palazzo.
Why would a sexy billionaire like the Conte di Rialto want her, when no ordinary man ever had?
Although that wasn’t entirely true, she realized. A few boys in her rural high school had competed for her attention. Then there was Cody from the farm next door, whose awkwardly sweet proposal had set her parents’ hearts racing—and Rosalie fleeing to San Francisco. During her time in the big city, she’d been far too busy and too overwhelmed to be thinking of dating anyone, especially as she’d watched her roommates engage in one empty hookup after another. But Rosalie had to admit she had been asked out by customers and coworkers. Only she’d thought of those attempts as something to be evaded. The last thing she’d wanted to do was hurt anyone’s feelings. So she’d kept her head down, avoiding any man’s attention.
As the speedboat pulled up to the private dock behind the palazzo, Rosalie glanced at Alex from beneath her dark lashes. Could he actually want her? Was it possible?