‘This is the Temple Suite,’ Aurora told her audience. ‘And I’m sure you will soon see why.’
She pushed open the heavy wooden door and as they took one step inside they all gasped—except for Aurora and Nico.
Even the sun had joined the party, and it seemed to split apart the stones of the old temple ruins in this most stunning view. It actually brought tears to Aurora’s eyes as she stood and looked out.
‘I had seen the temple ruins from every angle I thought possible,’ Aurora explained. ‘I grew up in Silibri and they were my playground. But some weeks ago I put on a hard hat and was shown the view from here. I admit I cried when I saw the temple from this height and distance. I believe this was the view that the monastery was built to capture. It is a slice of heaven, is it not?’
And it was—except that Nico was watching Aurora, and the way her eyes shone with tears. He could feel her love for this incredible space.
He wished—oh, how he wished—they were here alone.
They would be tonight.
She led them through the suite and onto the huge balcony and was grateful for the gentle breeze to cool her warm cheeks. Yes, she had trained herself not to blush around Nico, but it seemed she could not train herself out of desiring him. The easiest thing in the world, Aurora thought, would be to say yes to Nico.
‘Dinner on this balcony would be amazing,’ Nico said, as if reading her thoughts.
‘Absolutely, it would be,’ Aurora agreed.
‘I don’t think anyone would close the drapes on this.’
Please don’t, her heart said in response to his words. Please don’t banter with me and take me back to that day in Rome. Please don’t seduce me in this room that I love so much when I know you will only break my heart later…my heart that is trying so hard to mend itself.
As the crowd moved off, Nico held back and waited for her attention.
‘About ten?’ he checked.
Aurora swallowed but gave no response.
‘You have the key?’
No, she wanted to say, you have the key. The permanent key. And you turn it, and you open me, and then you close me again. And I cannot be placed on lockdown for even one day more.
No, she was not yet ready to tell him about the baby.
‘I’d better get on,’ she told him.
It had been a rewarding though exhausting day.
Aurora had slipped away in the evening, as Nico wined and dined his guests, though he himself barely ate a thing.
Tonight—after this—he would sit on that balcony and he would wine and dine Aurora. And with the temple ruins as their backdrop, he would say what he had come to say.
Nico escaped the celebrations just after ten.
So certain of her love was he that at first it didn’t faze him that Aurora was not there.
He ordered champagne and a spritzer. He ordered the freshest pasta, with a light basil and tomato sauce, and for dessert her favourite—Tiramisu. And he asked for the tray to be decorated with wild flowers, picked just before sunset.
All the things he knew she loved.
And he waited.
And then he texted her.
And then he drank the champagne as he called her cell phone but got no answer.
The flowers and the food came, but the meal he had chosen with her in mind went cold beneath the cloches.
Nico put on the television in his room with its most stunning view—just to check the news and be sure that wildfire had not ravaged the village again, nor had there been an accident on the winding roads. For surely Aurora would come if she could…
He woke on the plush sofa to the sound of her laughter and a rare hangover.
The sound of her low, throaty laugh had him looking around the vast suite—and then staring, bemused, at the television.
Aurora looked amazing, with her hair freshly styled, wearing more make-up than usual, and in that gorgeous Persian Orange uniform.
‘The Temple Suite,’ she said to the interviewer, ‘is more than luxury. It is a place where you can retreat, where you can heal, where you can rest and ponder your life choices.’
And it was then that he saw, tucked into the wilting wild flowers, a letter addressed to him. It was clear as he read it that Aurora had intended him to receive it last night.
Nico,
I have told Vincenzo that you want me to do the breakfast television interview. I’ve lied, but better that than be your plaything again.
The concierge can arrange an intimate massage in your suite or, if you do not want Pino knowing your business, you can call Rubina’s and ask Madame to send someone to help you create another unsatisfactory memory of your time in Silibri.
Sorry to disappoint, but my pride got in the way.
Aurora x
And then she laughed again.
At least the Aurora on breakfast television did.
‘WHAT IS THIS?’
Back in Rome, Nico wasn’t certain he had read things right and was immediately on the phone.
Aurora had resigned.
Aurora Eloise Messina. Now aged twenty-five. With a passion for the hotel like no other and a hunger to succeed, had left.
It made no sense.
He knew full well that she was furious with him. And after the stunt she had pulled Nico had been furious too and had stayed well back.
But his anger was fading now—so much so that whenever he re-read that note he almost smiled.
‘Why did she resign?’ he asked.
‘She was headhunted.’
Vincenzo sounded taken aback that the rather absent owner of the business was immediately on the phone to him the moment the email went out.
‘By whom?’
‘Aurora
