Modern Romance Collection February 2025, #5-8

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER EIGHT

A NA WOKE AND STRETCHED . Her body ached in the most delicious of ways. She and Aston had made love for most of the afternoon before, exploring each other’s bodies, learning what it took to make each other sigh and moan. It gave her such a sense of power, to have seen him come apart because of her. Then they’d eaten a quick dinner, tumbled back into bed again and made love through the night.

Now Aston lay beside her, blissfully asleep. She knew that he usually woke early and trained. For what, she still wasn’t sure, as he avoided the question, but for now it didn’t matter. There was something satisfying about seeing him simply rest when usually he appeared to be a person who truly burned the candle at both ends.

She rolled over to check the time on her phone, but it wasn’t beside her bed where she usually kept it. It must have been in the lounge area. That was the thing about leaving with Aston—she hadn’t needed to obsessively check her daily alerts. It had stopped being a reflex because no one except her family knew where she was.

Her stomach grumbled, telling her it had to be well past breakfast. She got out of bed carefully so as not to wake him. Crept out of the room to her own en suite bathroom and looked in the mirror. Grazes from Aston’s stubble had marked her skin. She touched the areas, loving that he’d left them on her. They were marks she didn’t mind. They didn’t mar her. They were a reminder of the earth-shattering pleasure he’d given her.

She tidied her hair a little and threw on a silk gown, not yet wanting fully to clothe herself. She relished the sensation of the smooth fabric on her overheated skin, imagining it was his hands stroking her.

Perhaps she could get them both some breakfast? They could eat together, then spend the day in bed. She didn’t have anything on, nowhere to go. Ana grabbed her phone and made her way to the kitchen where she found some fruit and yoghurt. She loved Aston’s apartment. The honey-coloured herringbone parquetry. Ornate plaster ceilings. Tasteful furniture, a mix of antique with some modern touches. This place had a soul.

She opened the French doors to her favourite feature, a little balcony overlooking the Eiffel Tower, where she put down her bowl and sat. She couldn’t help holding up her hand in the warm morning light, turning it so the magnificent diamond she hadn’t taken from her finger flashed as it caught the sunshine.

She guessed it meant that she and Aston were now engaged. He hadn’t asked, but she’d sensed the finality of it all in the kiss at the auction, the moment he’d slid the ring onto her finger. Then they’d made love for most of the afternoon and night. What was that if not confirmation that the deal between them had been sealed? She didn’t need Aston to make a performance out of it and officially ask her to marry him in some romantic gesture.

Although, Aston could be romantic—the dinner on his yacht with the beautiful candles, flowers and string lights were proof... Her heart tightened at the memory, something like disappointment, but she had no right to that emotion when what they’d agreed was clear. Their relationship wasn’t about love or romance. It was a convenience, and that was enough. There was no point dwelling on any of it.

She took a spoonful of her yoghurt and checked her phone. As she did, she noticed the messages from her parents’ number, although she was sure it was their private secretary who’d sent it.

We requested discreet. However, we offer you congratulations on your presumed engagement. Please advise when the announcement is formalised.

How did they know? Her heart began to thump a sickening rhythm. There were no court circulars to talk about her comings and goings or engagements as a member of the royal family.

Then she saw a text from Cilla.

OMG Ana, is this true!?!?!

The text linked to an article and she opened it. Immediately wishing she hadn’t. It was a piece about the auction, mentioning the record price per carat for a fancy blue diamond. Who purchased it. Talk of a mystery woman. She shut the piece down and looked for more. The Internet was awash with it. Rumours about the mystery woman turned into rumours that it was her, before some entertainment sites formally named her as the recipient. An anonymous attendee at the auction had apparently confirmed it, and their kiss. The press wrote how they were waiting for an announcement from the palace. The tabloids had delved into the romance, fictional though it might have been. There was talk of Aston’s business in Halrovia, perhaps signalling the commencement of a love affair for the man who had once been a confirmed bachelor.

It was like a juggernaut bearing down on her. She’d lived the past days in relative anonymity, no one knowing where she was going or what she was doing. That had been a kind of bliss. Now there was speculation as to where they might be staying, identifying his apartment in the seventh arrondissement as the most likely place. Showing pictures of the previous real estate listings. Its last sale price before Aston bought it and was reported to have done an extensive renovation.

She dropped the spoon and it fell into her breakfast with a clatter, spattering yoghurt on the table and on her. She couldn’t breathe. She didn’t know what to do. Could anyone see her out here? The street was lined with trees. She tried looking through them at the properties opposite. Were they homes available for rental? Was anyone watching? Waiting, for her? Ana peered over the balcony to the road below. There was a man across the street, standing looking at the building. He wore a hat pulled low but something about the shape of the body, the way he held himself, seemed familiar.

She pulled back, gasping for air. It wasn’t possible, was it? Could Count Hakkinen have found her here? With the news reports, everybody would know where she now lived. It was only a few hours’ flight from Halrovia to Paris. She didn’t know what to do, where to go. Panic gripped her as she struggled for each breath. Ana stood, trembling, her legs barely holding her as she ran into the apartment...

Hitting a strong, solid wall of male flesh as she did.

‘Whoa!’ Aston said, chuckling as he caught Ana just inside the door to the terrace. ‘I’m happy to see you too.’

He could say that with honesty. The afternoon and night had been more than he could have dreamed—though he’d known how their passion would burn together from the first night they’d met, so it shouldn’t have come as any surprise. This morning he’d slept in, and had been a little disappointed not to find Ana in bed with him, because he’d woken with the inevitable erection and, even though he had planned a few hours of training, thought they might spend the most of another day in bed together. However, this greeting would do nicely...

Except as he held her he noticed her trembling, as if she was freezing. He placed his hands on her shoulders and looked down at her. Her face was deathly pale, her eyes wide. It was a look familiar to him from those final, terrible moments with Michel when he’d paled, gripped Aston’s hand and said, ‘I think I’m going to die... Live for me...’ and then crashed.

The look on Ana’s face was fear.

Would you keep me safe?

Are you in danger?

All of him stiffened, on high alert. He’d asked that on his yacht, but Ana hadn’t really answered. He’d told her he cared for what was his. What had he missed?

‘ Ma chèrie , what’s wrong?’

‘I can’t...’

Her breaths came in heaving gulps. He led her inside to the sofa, sat down and took her with him. He simply wrapped her in his arms and held her.

‘Tell me. Take your time. Nothing can harm you here.’

He stroked his hand over the fine silk of her robe and cradled her till the tremors that racked her body eased and she was ready to speak. To let him know what was wrong.

‘It’s everywhere.’ Her voice was the barest whisper. ‘We’re everywhere —the ring...us...where you live.’

Ah.

He wasn’t sure why that stung, the thought she was upset that their engagement, such as it was, had been picked up by the press. He checked his phone. The stories weren’t unexpected. Where he lived was no secret. There was a text from the private secretary to her parents, admonishing him for not keeping things discreet. Asking for their official announcement, which he was happy to ask his own team to draft.

‘It was to be expected. Nothing remains secret for too long. They were going to find out soon enough.’

‘I thought I had time.’

Her voice sounded shrill, panicked. He released her and took her chin, tilting up her face so he could see her. Ana’s eyes were full of tears. He didn’t have much time for sentiment or feeling, but his heart cracked, seeing her like this. He’d skirted around the situation for too long. Usually Aston knew when to keep his cards close and when to play them. Right now, they needed to be in play.

‘Why are you afraid?’

‘No one believes me.’

‘I will.’

He waited, and a story simply came tumbling out of her about a man she believed had been sending her fan mail that made her skin crawl. How she thought he’d begun to follow her. Then about a night in Monaco...

‘I was with friends. I’d been sure I’d caught glimpses of him earlier in the night. Then I saw him, in the casino. He smiled at me. It was knowing . I had to go. I asked a driver to take me away and my friend followed to make sure I was okay. All I’d wanted was to have fun, to live a little...’

She told him about an unfamiliar driver, a potent combination of alcohol, prescription medication and speed. An accident which had hurt her friend Carla badly, and had hurt Ana too. She talked about her crushing guilt, the way she’d been treated by the press, her family.

The anger ignited and began to burn in his gut like acid at how afraid she sounded, at how her parents didn’t believe her. How the man she blamed for it all was going to be granted a medal for bravery for pulling her out of the car when, in truth, the accident had been due to the terror he’d caused her and no one but her sister had supported her.

‘And I heard his voice as he was trying to pull me from the car: “you’ll scar, and no one but me will love you now.”’

Aston had never considered himself a violent man but, right now, it was all he could do not to break something, anything within reach. Though that wouldn’t help Ana. She needed his calm, his control.

‘Now he knows where I am. I—I think he was downstairs, watching. Or maybe I imagined it.’

Aston gently placed Ana on the sofa next to him. Stood, and strode to the terrace. Her breakfast sat spoiling in the sun, yoghurt splattered on the table-top. He looked out over the street but couldn’t see anyone. That didn’t mean someone wasn’t there...

‘There’s no one...’ he said as he came back inside. Ana’s face began to crumple, tears welling in her eyes. She needed to know that he wasn’t someone who’d ignore her very real fears. ‘Goddess, I believe you.’

He had influence and power, so the fix was easy enough. Aston called his security firm in her presence so she could hear what he was doing. He told them the situation, and then called the building’s owners to updated them on his arrangements. The place was secure, but more would never go amiss. Within the half hour, there would be residential security in the building, and if he and Ana left the premises, close personal security would guard them. It had been laughably simple. How her family, a royal family, hadn’t done the same was inconceivable.

Finally, he contacted the building’s concierge to give him some warning and to ensure that nothing which hadn’t been vetted by his security was to come to their apartment.

‘Monsieur Lane, there’s a delivery of flowers here for Her Highness—red roses.’ Aston stiffened, turned and gave a reassuring smile to Ana before leaving the room so she couldn’t hear him.

‘Is there a message?’

‘Oui.’

‘Read it, please.’

‘It says...“it isn’t over until the wedding ring’s on the finger”.’

A volcanic heat began simmering in his gut. Aston gripped his mobile so hard, he feared he would crack it.

‘Who are they from?’

‘The card doesn’t say, monsieur .’

Aston asked for the flowers to be left for his security detail to deal with. Perhaps they’d provide some evidence as to who’d sent them, perhaps not. For now, he needed to take care of Ana. He went back into the lounge area, where she huddled on the sofa, looking small and pale, her arms wrapped round her middle.

She looked up at him, eyes brimming with unshed tears. ‘Your address...’

He knew what she feared, and her fears were clearly justified. Aston sat back down on the sofa and took her into his arms again. ‘I have more than one place to stay around the world, and many friends. The man doesn’t have the resources I do. He’ll never touch you.’

She seemed to relax a little at that, softening in his arms. He appreciated her trust, and would honour it.

‘With the news today, there’s no doubt my parents will want to meet you. The timing couldn’t be better. I’ve recently purchased a property in épernay that’s known only to my lawyer. We can travel there by helicopter and no one will have any idea where we’re going. We’ll have some time before the inevitable invitation from my parents. Their chateau is only a short drive from my farmhouse, so we won’t be in a car for long. Security will always be with us.’

‘Thank you. I don’t know what to say.’

He tightened his arms round her. ‘ Ma chèrie , you don’t need to say anything.’

Aston was confident nothing could touch her, or him. It was her fear he needed to assuage, to soothe. No wonder she’d seemed so worn down, a different woman from the one he’d met at the Spring Ball, because her life had in all ways changed.

‘For now, we have plans for the day.’ She tensed a fraction in his arms. By the end of this, she wouldn’t. She’d be confident in him, his abilities. ‘You need food. You need coffee. Then I’ll take you back to bed and hold you till you believe that I’ll do what I promised you in the maze. I will keep you safe. Because I care for what’s mine.’

Aston stood with Ana in his arms. As he carried her to the bedroom once more, he ignored the training he should be doing to prepare for the mountain he’d promised to climb.

Aston picked up the dossier of material gathered by the security firm he employed. They’d been thorough, and they’d not taken long to get the information he’d paid them handsomely for. Whilst the Halrovian royal family had tried to prevent reporting about Ana’s accident and its aftermath, pictures still existed for those who knew and had the determination to find them. The bile rose to his throat at the voyeurism, at how people had seen fit to take photographs rather than help. Only one person had approached the crumpled car, trying to remove Ana from it, but this man was no rescuer. Aston clenched his fists, his jaw: Count Hakkinen, Ana’s tormentor. The thought of his hands on her lit him up with near-incandescent fury.

He breathed through the anger, not stopping to question why he was being affected this way. She’d kept photographs of some of the anonymous letters sent to her. Whilst he could understand why they might have been dismissed, there was a sense of malevolence about them that he would never have ignored. From her report and timelines, his security team believed that the man’s behaviour had been escalating. Sadly, the flowers sent to their apartment hadn’t yielded any clues. There were no fingerprints and the message was typewritten. But he had enough. He’d put a stop to Hakkinen’s harassment of Ana and, if it didn’t stop, he would crush the man like a cockroach.

Ana suspected her parents had fancied him as a suitor for her sister, Priscilla. Aston knew men like Count Hakkinen and could identify them a mile off: rich, with an inflated sense of entitlement. Believing he was owed a princess, so taking the one who remained unattached. The one who would likely have scars. Such arrogance, audacity...

Aston hadn’t forgotten the words Ana had heard in her ear the night she’d been injured. No wonder she’d seemed changed, with no one believing her, with the guilt. She’d have been plagued by self-doubt, wondering what was real and what was imagined. He believed her, and Hakkinen would pay. The count was down on his luck, a well-hushed-up financial scandal having significantly reduced his social capital, meaning he’d been cut loose by most of his contacts. Did he seek to recover his position through a princess? Never .

Yet something in the back of Aston’s brain prickled, almost like guilt. Wasn’t he using Ana in his own way, to ensure his inheritance? Perhaps, but unlike this man, who only saw fit to torment her, Aston would look after her, encourage her interests, worship her body.

He was nothing like Count Hakkinen. That man might be an aristocrat, but he was craven and dishonest. Aston’s security had easily discovered how far the rot went. His house of cards would take laughably little to bring down should he not do exactly what Aston demanded. The man might think himself better than anyone else, with his title and tenuous links to the royal family through his father. It was nothing compared to Aston’s reach and influence.

He checked his watch. Ana was now safely ensconced in his épernay farmhouse, well-guarded by personal protection officers. Today she was occupied in back-to-back meetings with her staff, and also with his accountants, to discuss her charity interests. She’d been excited about those things, and this had given him the perfect opportunity to take a helicopter flight to Paris, under the guise of conducting business, to meet with the Count.

Aston never again wanted to witness the fear he’d seen in Ana’s eyes. He hadn’t wanted to tell her of this meeting, either, in case that fear returned. Only when he was sure Hakkinen had been dealt with would he provide her with the reassurance she needed. Aston had promised to keep her safe, and he would. He always kept his promises.

The journey to the hotel where the count was staying didn’t take long from Aston’s office in La Défense. The man had no idea that Aston would be calling today but, from reports he’d had from the security operative watching him, Count Hakkinen was a man of routine, and at this time of the day he’d sit in the hotel’s café and eat breakfast. This morning, Aston hoped he would make that meal curdle in Hakkinen’s stomach.

On arrival, Aston was happy to see the hotel had a faded elegance—the type of place an aristocrat down on their luck might stay. His security operative nodded to him on the street as he entered the tired-looking café with its pretensions to grandeur. He spied the man he was looking for immediately, having seen enough photographs in the dossier still sitting on the desk in his office. Hakkinen’s gaze rose to Aston over his coffee cup, eyes widening as he put down the cup and stood. To challenge? To run? Aston had no idea, but he was prepared for anything. This man was a nobody, as Aston would soon show him.

Hakkinen held his ground but the tells were there. The way he fidgeted with the cuff of his cheap looking ready-made shirt. The convulse of a swallow. Still, he attempted a business-like smile. Aston saw right through him, and could almost smell the fear lingering in the air.

‘Monsieur Lane. To what do I owe the pleasure?’

‘There’s no pleasure to be found here, Hakkinen. Sit .’

The man’s face reddened. His jaw hardened. Aston stood there, unmoving. Waiting. Hoping that the man would try something, because his loss in any challenge would be swift and assured. But, in the end, Count Hakkinen sat. He was a coward and Aston knew he would always prevail.

Aston waited a few moments, staring the count down, then unbuttoned his jacket and took a seat, lounging in the chair as if he didn’t give a damn. In many ways, he didn’t—not about the man sitting opposite him at least.

‘Leave my fiancée alone. Your pretensions that you could have any chance with Her Highness end today.’

Hakkinen’s face reddened. ‘I’m not doing anything to your fiancée.’

Liar.

‘You might have fooled some, but you’ll never fool me,’ Aston snarled through gritted teeth. ‘“It isn’t over till the wedding ring’s on the finger”? You’re right, it hasn’t even begun where you’re concerned if you don’t leave France immediately.’

If Aston wasn’t mistaken, he saw an avaricious gleam in the count’s eyes.

‘There are things you don’t know about Her Exalted Highness,’ Hakkinen said with a sneer. ‘She’s not as perfect as she pretends. How would you like all of the information the palace tried to hush up about that night released to the press? The driver of the car—’

‘Was someone she had no control over. Her Highness doesn’t have to pretend to be anything around me. There’s nothing you could say that will make me think less about her.’ That was a certainty. Aston gave a cold, hard laugh. ‘But everything I know about you, on the other hand...’

‘You have nothing on me.’ Yet the count seemed to pale, fidgeting with his coffee cup.

‘Want to bet the meagre remains of your fortune and failing reputation on that?’

A harried-looking waiter came to the table and asked Aston if he would like anything.

‘Un café,’ Aston said, pinning Hakkinen with a cold glare. ‘On Count Hakkinen’s bill. Now, where were we? Yes. I was asking whether you were a betting man. But I’m short on time, so let me lay my own cards on the table.’

Aston’s coffee arrived. He pushed it away. He’d never had any intention of drinking it but took perverse pleasure in the knowledge Hakkinen was paying for the beverage, even if it was only a few euros.

‘The only story the press will be interested in is the one I’ll provide them should you not do everything I say—a full investigation of certain irregular charity transactions. You talk about a hush-up? I have evidence about the repayments you made to cover up the discrepancies. Then there are your debts. I know where the cracks are in your business, all your weaknesses. If you don’t leave my fiancée alone, there will be a takeover and I will ensure it’s hostile. You’ll be left with nothing. Completely ruined, financially and socially.’

Aston had never believed a person’s face could turn truly white, but he witnessed Hakkinen’s do so in that moment. It gave him a brutal satisfaction—not only the pallor of the count’s skin but the way his hands trembled, the sweat beading on his upper lip.

‘You think you can do that to me?’ the man asked, voice a bare whisper.

‘I don’t think, I know . I have an informative dossier all about you. A few words in the right ears and your fall from grace will be so complete there will be no rising from it. You’re no Lazarus.’

Aston stood, and loomed over the table, lowering his voice to inject cold menace. Hakkinen shrank back in his chair.

‘I’m a fair man and will give you one chance. But, if I hear even a rumour that you’re in the same country as my fiancée ever again, I will end you.’

Aston took the time to button his jacket, turned and stalked from the café, sending a quick text to his driver as he did. Positive Hakkinen had heard the message he’d delivered, loud and clear. He checked his watch as his car pulled up at the hotel, sliding into the rear seat. His pulse beat hard and fast. In less than an hour, he’d be back at the farmhouse. He could go for a training run to burn off the sickening remains of his fury, then arrange another meeting with his fellow expedition members to plan for the Everest climb. No, not could —he would do all of those things and more, even though right now the weight of them exhausted him.

Yet all he craved, more than any promise he had ever made to the living or dead, was to make love to Ana.