Reluctantly, Annabelle handed him her digital camera. The camera seemed tiny in his large hands as he looked slowly through the digital images she’d taken of the village, and the ranch before that.
Watching him, she licked her dry lips. She adored these new pictures. The photographs she’d taken over the past few days seemed rich and vibrant, full of life, even to her artist’s critical eye.
But would he scorn them as he had her last pictures? Would he call them frozen and dead?
Trembling, she peeked over his shoulder as Stefano went through picture after picture.
And Annabelle suddenly noticed something she’d never seen before. Her eyes went wide with shock.
No wonder she loved these pictures. There was Stefano in the village, bending on one knee as he talked to the children. Stefano tilting his head back, giving advice to the young stablehands at Santo Castillo. Stefano standing alone in the paddock at sunset, training a yearling. Even her pictures of the wild, vast landscape somehow had his blurry elbow on the edge of the frame. Every single picture had Stefano in it. She’d even taken one of him last night, at a private moment in his bed. She’d wanted to capture the tenderness and passion of his dark eyes, and so she’d taken a picture of him as the red-and-orange sunset from the window cast a halo over his dark head, like fire.
Stefano was in all her pictures now. He was in her soul. In her heart. Annabelle gave a strangled, silent gasp. She was in love with him. She’d tried desperately to fight it. She hadn’t wanted to love him. For days, she’d denied her feelings, even to herself, because she knew loving him would destroy her.
But her photographs didn’t lie.
Stefano had become the center of her whole world. The only man for her.
She loved him.
The bartender came over with their two drinks, and stared at her openly. She tried not to notice his knowing smirk before he left. He clearly thought she was Stefano’s newest easy woman, here today and gone tomorrow.
Which was exactly what Annabelle was. She blinked, hard.
With a quick sip of his beer, Stefano continued to turn through the digital images.
Ignoring her own drink, Annabelle stared at him, fighting back tears.
Would he notice he was in every picture? Would he understand what it meant?
Please, God, she prayed. Don’t let him notice. If he did, her humiliation would be complete.
Finally, he looked up at her, and his dark eyes glowed.
“These pictures are perfect, full of passion and life,” he said with a smile, handing back the camera. “I see your love and appreciation for my ranch in every image. Well done,” he added softly.
Not just her love for Santo Castillo. She swallowed, her cheeks feeling hot. “Thank you.”
They show my love for you. All for you. Her breath caught in her throat as she waited in agony for him to say something more, anything.
Annabelle, why am I in every picture?
Annabelle—surely you have not been stupid enough to fall in love with me?
Stefano cleared his throat.
“There were some good pictures of Mrs. Gutierrez and the boys. Perhaps you could make copies and send them to the boys’ parents.”
She blinked. “Sure.”
His brow furrowed as he looked down at her, his dark eyes warm and tender.
“Everything all right?”
“Yes,” Annabelle whispered over the lump in her throat. But it wasn’t all right. It would never be all right again.
He threw some money on the table to pay the bill and rose from his chair. “Let’s head home.”
On the drive back to the ranch, Annabelle stared out the window at the sunset shimmering in the west. The light turned the undulating green hills into silken ribbons of scarlet and coral and magenta.