His father wasn’t the listening type; he just bulldozed through their conversations with the mindset that James would continue to defy him and never bothered to wonder why James showed no interest in the family business.
“It’s because he built that company on my mother’s grave,” he said fiercely. “If she hadn’t died, he wouldn’t have moved to Alma and tapped in to the offshore drilling that was just starting up. I can’t ever forget that.”
“Is someone asking you to forget?” she probed quietly. “Maybe there’s room to take a longer view of this. If your father hadn’t moved to Alma, you wouldn’t have discovered that you loved football, right?”
“That doesn’t make it okay.” The admission reverberated in the still house and she lifted her head to look at him, eyebrows raised in question. “I love football but only because it saved me. It got me out of Alma at an early age and gave me the opportunity to be oceans away. I can’t be on the same small island as my father. Not for long.”
When had this turned into confession time? He’d never said that out loud before. Bella had somehow pulled it out of him.
“I’m sorry,” she said quietly and snuggled back into his arms, exactly where he wanted her.
“I’m sorry you’ve got the same issues with your father. But there’s always gossip in a small town. We’re going to be dealing with a scandal over the press release once someone catches on to us shacking up in this love nest. But I support whatever decision you make as far as the timing,” he told her sincerely, though he’d be heavily in favor of waiting.
He wasn’t royalty though. She had a slew of obligations he knew nothing about; he could hardly envision a worse life than one where you had to think about duty to crown and country.
“I think that’s the most romantic thing you’ve ever said to me.” Her voice cracked on the last word.
Puzzled, he tipped her chin up, and a tear tracked down her cheek. “Which part? When I called this jumble of a house a love nest or described our relationship as shacking up?”
She laughed through another couple of tears, thoroughly confounding him. Just when he thought he finally got her, she did something he couldn’t fathom.
“Neither. The part where you said you support me, no matter what. It makes me warm, right here.” She patted her stomach.
He almost rolled his eyes. That was laying it on a bit thick, wasn’t it? “I do support you, but that’s what peop—lovers...people in a rela—” God, he couldn’t even get his tongue to find the right word to explain the status of what they were doing here.
Maybe because he didn’t know what they were doing here.
“Yeah,” she said happily, though what she was agreeing to, he had no idea. “That’s what you do. I get that. You’ve always done exactly the right thing, from the very beginning. ”
He scowled. “I don’t do that.”
He didn’t. He was the guy who buckled when it mattered most. The guy whose team had been counting on him and he’d let them down. The guy who ran from conflict instead of dealing with it. Hadn’t she been listening to anything he’d said about why he played football?
His character had been tarnished further with the hooker incident. James Rowling was the last person anyone should count on. Especially when it came to support. Or “being there” for someone emotionally.
“You do.” Her clear blue eyes locked with his and she wouldn’t let him look away. “You look in the mirror and see the mistakes your father has insisted you’ve made. I look at you and see an amazing man. You did hard physical labor all day in a house that means nothing to you. Because I asked you to. You’re here. That means a lot to me. I need a rock in my life.”
She had him all twisted up in her head as the hero of this story. She couldn’t be more wrong—he was a rock, all right. A rolling stone headed for the horizon.
It suddenly sounded lonely and unappetizing. “I can’t be anyone’s rock. I don’t know how.”
That had come out wrong. He intended to be firm and resolute, but instead sounded far too harsh.
“Oh, sweetie. There’s no instruction manual. You’re already doing it.” She shook her head and feathered a thumb over his jaw in a caress that felt more intimate than the sex they’d had last night. “You’re letting someone else cloud your view of yourself. Don’t let your father define who you are.”
He started to protest and then her words really sank in. Had he subconsciously been doing that—letting his father have that much power over him?
Maybe he’d never realized it because he’d refused to admit the rift between him and his father might be partially his own fault. James had always been too busy running to pay attention. Even now, his thoughts were on Liverpool and the potential opportunity to play in the top league. But more importantly, Liverpool wasn’t in Alma—where the woman who had him so wrongly cast in her head as the hero lived. He was thinking about leaving. Maybe he was already halfway out the door.
Which then begged the question—what if he buckled under pressure because he always took off when the going got tough?
* * *
The new bed was supremely superior to the floor.
Bella and James christened it that night and slept entwined until morning. It was the best night of sleep she’d ever had in her life.
But dawn brought a dose of reality. She hadn’t been back to the Playa del Onda house in almost forty-eight hours. The quick text message to Gabriel to explain her absence as a “getaway with a friend” hadn’t stopped her father from calling four times and leaving four terse voice mail messages. She hadn’t answered. On purpose.
With the addition of running water and electricity, the farmhouse took on a warmth she enjoyed. In fact, she’d rather stay here forever than go back to the beach house. But she had to deal with her father eventually. If this matter of the engagement announcement was simply a test of her father’s resolve versus her own, she wouldn’t care very much about the scandal of being with James.
But it wasn’t just about two Montoros squaring off against each other. It was a matter of national alliances and a fledgling monarchy. She didn’t have any intention of marrying Will, but until the Montoros issued a public retraction of the engagement story, the possibility of another scandal was very real. This one might be far worse for Gabriel on the heels of the one Rafe had caused. And hiding away with James hadn’t changed that. She had to take care of it. Soon.
“Good morning,” James murmured and reached out to stroke hair from her face as he lay facing her on the adjacent pillow. “This is my favorite look on you.”
“Bedhead?” She smiled despite the somberness of her thoughts.
“Well loved.” He grinned back. “I liked it yesterday morning, too.”
Speaking of which... “How long do you think we can reasonably hole up here without someone snapping a picture of us together?”
He shrugged one shoulder. “Forever.” When she arched a brow, he grinned. “I can fantasize about that, can’t I? As long as I keep jetting off when people show up, what’s the hurry?”
Her conscience pricked at her. James was leaving the timing of forcing the issue to her, but a scandal could be damaging to him as well. It was selfish enough to refuse to marry Will, but she wasn’t really hurting him as long as they were up front about it. A scandal that broke before the retraction could very well hurt James and she couldn’t stand that.
“I think I need to talk