A Ring for Vincenzo's Heir

Except she hadn’t had to resist him at all lately. At least not personally.

He hadn’t touched Scarlett in bed since their baby was born. It had been two months now since they’d last made love. At first, healing from the birth and exhausted from waking up with their baby, sex had been the last thing on Scarlett’s mind. But now her body was starting to feel normal again, though she hadn’t quite lost all the baby weight, and her breasts were still very full. Did he not find her attractive anymore?

She tried to ignore the feelings of rejection. She focused on the baby, who was growing chubby and starting to babble and coo. She made friends with her neighbors and started private Italian lessons with Mrs. Spinoza, a kindly widow who lived down the street. But it hurt.

Then one day while she was despondently surfing the internet, she had an idea about how to bring them close again.

According to what she read, men’s needs were simple. Food. Home. Sex.

All she had to do was turn herself into the perfect wife.

Step one. Food. A man’s heart was through his stomach, according to what she read online. So Scarlett learned how to cook. She started with boiling water, but within a week, she’d graduated to simple, fresh pasta dishes, which Wilhelmina tasted and pronounced, with some surprise, to be “delicious.”

Vin didn’t notice, of course. He generally got home late at night and would eat whatever wrapped dinner plate he found in the fridge, by the light of his computer at the dining table at midnight, usually long after Scarlett had gone to bed. But she learned new skills when he wasn’t looking.

Step two. Home. A man’s house was his castle. Make it warm and comfortable, and he’d never want to leave it. She looked around their newly remodeled, redecorated home. Check.

Step three. Sex.

For Scarlett, this was the hardest thing of all.

But on Christmas Eve morning, she woke up knowing that it was now or never. Today was the day.

She felt like Vin had barely talked to her in weeks. He always made an effort to play with the baby right before work, but all Scarlett seemed to get from him were cold lectures when she evaded her security detail or told her assigned bodyguard, Larson, he didn’t need to follow her. Which was exactly what she was getting this morning, too.

“Stop it.” Vin glowered at her, coldly handsome in his suit and tie. “I specifically assigned Larson to keep you safe. Don’t make it so hard for him to do his job.”

Still wearing her nightshirt and white fluffy robe, Scarlett rolled her eyes. “You seriously think I’m going to be attacked on the streets of Rome in broad daylight while I’m pushing the stroller to Mrs. Spinoza’s apartment? It’s silly! How am I supposed to practice my Italian with Larson glaring at her through his sunglasses? He makes her so nervous she stutters!”

“I mean it, Scarlett,” Vin replied. “Either do what I tell you and let him do his job, or...”

“Or what?”

His jaw was tight. “I can’t answer for the consequences.”

Then he coldly left the villa, briefcase in hand. Without so much as a goodbye kiss!

She prayed her outrageous plan would solve everything. Otherwise, she was about to make a horrible fool of herself. But she had to take the chance. As her father had always said, if you want things to change, change yourself.

The moment Vin left the villa for work, Scarlett got to work, too. The enormous tree was delivered to the great hall, along with boxes of beautiful decorations. She sent the last members of the household staff on surprise vacation, leaving Scarlett and the baby alone in the villa, with her bodyguard, Larson, at the tiny gatehouse across their private cobblestoned drive.

Holding Nico on her hip, Scarlett decorated the tree herself, talking happily to her baby, singing him Christmas songs, including one in Italian. Later, she started a roaring fire in the enormous fireplace and prepared a dinner she thought Vin would love. Leaving the sauce simmering on the stove as evening started to fall, she gave her sleepy baby his dinner and bath, changed him into his footsie pajamas and tucked him into the nursery.

After Nico was safely asleep, she went into her luxurious master bathroom and started a bath. She groomed herself as carefully as a bride on her wedding night—the wedding night they’d never actually had, since she’d gone into labor on her wedding day—and moisturized her body with lotion to make her skin soft as silk. She brushed out her long red hair until it gleamed.