“I’m sorry,” Rose said quietly. “I’ve touched a nerve, haven’t I?”
Stephani looked into her eyes. “I love him,” she confessed. “I have for years, when it was completely wrong to do so. Now both of us are free, and there are feelings there, Rose. There are. But not love. Not for him. I thought I could be okay with whatever he would give me, but I’m not. I’ll never be Ceci, and I’ll always second to Marazur. Oh, I know the duty and responsibility thing, and I’m not unreasonable. I’ve lived here and worked here long enough. Still, look at you and Diego. You made it work. Together. We don’t have that. And I don’t think we ever will.” She hesitated, then added, “It’s not about what the country demands of him. It’s how he views his life that’s the problem. Ceci was it for him, and his feelings for me aren’t strong enough to bump me into the number-one position. I’ll never be his grand passion, and it’s time I accepted it.”
Rose didn’t answer. She just gave Stephani a sad smile.
Steph sighed, but then lifted her chin and met Rose’s eyes. “You got your fairy tale. It just isn’t in the cards for me.”
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
Raoul stared at Stephani, unsure he’d heard her right. “You seriously want to leave here and go to Africa?”
“You make it sound as if it’s the moon. It’s not. I asked Diego if I could help him with the new phase in his project, and he said yes. It’s only for six months. Sofia can handle things here, and hire an assistant to work with her. With me handling the project administration on site, it’ll cut Diego’s assistant’s workload by about a third. Quite manageable.”
A knot formed in his chest. “You’ve got this all f
igured out,” he replied, his voice cold with fear. Leaving? He knew he’d handled things badly between them, but leaving? Impossible. She was Stephani. He relied on her. He couldn’t have got through the last few weeks without her running the office.
“I do, yes,” she said quietly. She uncrossed and then crossed her legs again, the only indication she was nervous. “I need to go, Raoul. I need a new challenge. Something different. And maybe I can help change the world a little bit while I’m at it. This is a good thing.”
Good for her, but not for him. She’d been his right hand for so long he didn’t know how he’d manage without her. “I’ve taken you for granted,” he replied, folding his hands on top of his desk. “I’m sorry, Steph. You’ve been here so long, I think I always just thought of you being here forever.”
She flinched a little at his words, and he realized what a poor choice they were. “What I mean to say is—”
“I know what you meant,” she interrupted. “But I can’t stay. Not now. I need to put some space between us, Raoul. This will be good for me.”
“But I need you.” It hurt him to say it. He didn’t like being needy. He was the one who held things together, not the other way around. But the idea of her leaving Marazur filled him with an inexplicable fear. He had to convince her to stay. “I know I’ve taken you for granted. You’ve never asked for a raise, for anything, really. Let me make this up to you.”
Her pink cheeks turned a deep red, and her eyes flashed. “Do you seriously think this is about a raise?” Her fingers clenched into fists so tight that her knuckles turned white and she let out a flurry of what he could only assume was Greek cursing. “Taken for granted? What planet are you on, Raoul? How can you sit there and pretend that what happened between us wasn’t important? You’re acting as if it didn’t happen at all!” She bit down on her lip, but before he could reply, she continued. “I gave myself to you. You told me that our week away was a chance for us to see how we felt without being in the public eye. The morning we left, I knew you were going to try to let me down easy. I’m not stupid. And your refusal to speak of it since our return says all I need to know. I wanted to be there for you. To help you. And when you froze me out, I did the only thing I could to make it better. I worked. But it hurt that you shut me out so completely. After what we shared, did you really expect me to stick around?”
She took several deep breaths while guilt crawled over him.
“You’re right,” he finally answered, feeling slightly sick. “I was a total coward. I didn’t want to hurt you. I didn’t know how to say what I wanted to say, so I said nothing at all.”
“But you hurt me anyway. Do you get that I loved you? That our week away I kept telling myself not to get my hopes up but I couldn’t help it, because being with you was so . . . so . . .”
She looked away.
He’d felt it, too. And that was what had scared him.
“It was for me too. It’s just . . . I’m not ready, Steph.”
“Then you should have said so, instead of acting like nothing happened. That I didn’t matter.”
His head snapped up as he met her gaze. “You do matter! Of course you do!”
“How would I know?”
Tears had formed at the corners of her eyes now, and he felt panic mix with the guilt. He wasn’t sure what he’d do if she cried. All the emotions of the past few weeks pummeled him. His feelings for her, his fear, his conflicting vision of the future, the sobering incident of his father’s heart attack, and what that meant for him personally . . . Now this. She was right. He hadn’t offered her one thank you, one bit of extra praise for taking up the slack. He’d been so stuck in his own head he’d ignored the one person who was always, always there.
He pushed out his chair and paced to one end of his office, and then back again, running his hand over his hair. “Do you know how much I feel pulled in every possible direction? Everyone wants something from me! And there’s no way I can make everyone happy. What the hell am I supposed to do?”
She stood and faced off against him. “You were always so quick to judge your brother, but maybe you could try taking a page out of Diego’s book. You could put your happiness first, and realize that the rest will fall into place. But I don’t know if you can ever do that, Raoul. You’re too afraid. And until you can face that fear . . .”
She swiped at her tears. “I can’t sit around and wait for something that might never happen. I deserve better. I deserve to put my happiness first, too. So I’m either going to Africa to help Diego and Rose or I’m putting in my notice and leaving.”
His stomach dropped to his feet. He’d always admired her stubborn streak but not this time. “Leave? Where would you go?”
Silence fell in the office. She lifted her chin and God, she was beautiful. That warrior look was one of the reasons he admired her so much. She was a woman who got things done. Who committed and saw it through. He knew that her words weren’t idle threats. If she said she’d leave, she’d do it.