She looked up with an intake of breath.
“I can’t,” the skinny pilot told him, looking startled. “The paparazzi are vultures. One whisper and it all gets out. He wants to be left in peace. I gave him my word.”
“Fine. Don’t tell her a thing,” Ermanno said. He cracked his knuckles. “Just fly her to wherever he is.”
“Well, I—” The pilot hesitated, looking from Ermanno to Lucy to Chloe. Then slowly he sighed. “All right, Princess. I cannot resist true love.”
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
THE World’s Most Eligible Bachelor Rejected! Handsome Prince Spurned Amid Accusations of Long-Ago Crime, the headline read.
“Serves him right,” said heartbroken former girlfriend Esmé Landon, the countess of Bedingford. “He’s dished it out for long enough—about time he had to take it!”
The day after he lost the love of his life, it was still sinking in. Maximo stared down at the tabloid in his hands, feeling a lump in his throat.
So this was what heartache felt like.
All these years he’d been a playboy, casually breaking hearts right and left, and he’d never known…
“You shouldn’t read that trash,” his aunt Silvana said sharply behind him in Italian.
“I’m not.” He crumpled the paper in his hands and tossed it in the fire. “It’s kindling.”
She nodded with an expressive snort and flare of nostril. “I will make you some lunch.”
“I’m not hungry. Go home, Silvana. You have your own life.”
“Of course I do,” she replied, tucking back her white hair, bright as snow against her smooth, youthful skin. “But I’ve canceled my afternoon date. You’re my priority today.”
He gaped at her. “A date?”
She gave him a smile that managed to be both impish—and serene. “Don’t worry about that.” She made a tsking sound as she searched the cabinets. “But this kitchen is empty! I’m going back to my house to make you a proper meal. I will send Amelia with some pasta.” She shook her umbrella at him threateningly. “And you’
d better eat it!”
He was in no mood to eat. “No. I mean it.”
But his aunt had already left. He sank down onto the rough wooden floor, staring at the fire. Outside, rain was pouring, and the whole cottage seemed to shiver beneath the weight of the storm.
He should have told Lucy the truth all along.
Now he’d lost her. Because he hadn’t been honest with her from the very beginning. He’d thought, if he tried hard enough, he could hold it all together without giving her the one thing that she kept demanding—the truth…
Maximo held his head in his hands. He’d always been so strong, but losing her had taken that. After twenty years, fate had finally found a way to make him pay for his crime of stealing Lucy from her rightful family.
He whirled around at a noise. “Zia, I told you, I’m not hungry—”
But it wasn’t his aunt.
Lucy stood in the doorway, soaking wet from the rain.
He leaped to his feet. He didn’t speak. He didn’t pause. He just went straight to her and pulled her into his arms. He held her tightly against his heart.
Then he kissed her.
“Maximo,” Lucy whispered as he pulled away. “I’m so sorry.”
“You’re sorry?” he said incredulously. “I’m the one who hurt you. I took you from your family. You asked me for the truth and I lied. I thought that if I spent the rest of my life making it up to you, it would be enough. You have to know how desperately I regret—”