Monte Carlo Affairs: The Millionaire's Indecent Proposal. Emilie Rose

her bargain with Franco she’d soon have a home. But it would be empty.

      She’d never fall in love.

      Never experience the hope, joy and anticipation of having a child with someone she loved—all of the emotions written clearly on Candace’s face.

      Stacy would live alone. Die alone. And the world would be no different because of her time in it.

      Sadness settled over her like a cold, wet blanket. Every lesson she’d learned to this point had made her afraid to let anyone get too close. But she’d found the courage to make friends. Could she also find the courage to allow a man into her life and into her heart?

      Not a powerbroker like Franco. But maybe someone tamer. Someone less wealthy. Someone she could trust.

      If such a man even existed.

      Eight

      Stacy had shared intimacies with Franco that made her blush, and yet she still knew very little about him beyond the physical. She hoped a night in his family home would fill in a few of the blanks.

      “Do you always buy your women?” she asked to fill the silence during the hours-long Sunday-afternoon car ride to Avignon.

      Franco’s jaw hardened and he shot her a chilly glance. “I have never offered a woman money for sex before you.”

      If that was supposed to make her feel special, it failed. “Good, because it seems a little like … prostitution.”