was if they spent any time together at all. What if he just intended to work all through the honeymoon?
Helena shook away the thought. She had to look on the bright side or she was going to go mad. So what if her husband had better things to do on their honeymoon than spend time with her? That just gave her more opportunities to go exploring, to see more of the country, maybe go back to that pretty jewellery shop she’d found with Thea in the nearest town. She could treat herself to something pretty then have lunch in that little trattoria. Maybe flirt with a nice Italian man... The thought stopped abruptly.
She couldn’t do that any more, could she? Not now she was married. And especially not once she signed Flynn’s blasted paperwork with its ironclad fidelity clause. Not that she had any particular plans to go out and pick up a guy or anything. It wasn’t really her style, was it? But she did like men, had several close male friends and enjoyed the warm buzz she got from flirting with them, just a little, even knowing that they would never do anything about it.
But that was off the table now. Flynn would probably have private detectives following her around, photographing her having lunch and researching every man she ever spoke to. And if he didn’t, his father certainly would.
Yeah, she really hadn’t thought this whole thing through.
A door opened just down the corridor and she heard her father’s laugh as he and Ezekiel emerged from their conference, dragging their cases behind them.
‘All ready?’ Flynn asked the men. ‘The car for the airport is here.’
Ezekiel nodded and one of the villa staff darted forward to take their cases out to the car. Flynn followed with Isabella’s. Helena stood awkwardly, waiting for whatever happened next. The moment they left, everything would change again and she was beginning to fear that her bright attitude wasn’t going to last a full two weeks.
‘Well, have a good journey home, all of you,’ she said. ‘And we’ll see you in London in a fortnight, I guess.’
Isabella nodded and leant in to kiss the air beside Helena’s cheeks. ‘We’ll have the house all ready for you both. Then you and I can sit down and discuss your social calendar.’
Social calendar? ‘Great.’
Ezekiel nodded his own farewell then walked out of the front door with his wife, leaving Helena alone with Thomas.
‘You’ve got two weeks here, Helena,’ he said, studying her face with serious eyes. Helena’s breath caught in her throat. She and Thea had always known that their father was easy-going and affable—but only to a point. When he turned serious, they knew it really mattered. ‘Use them wisely. You’ve made your choice and you need to stick with it now. So make this work.’
He didn’t really need to add the or else, Helena supposed. She knew well enough what happened when she disappointed her father.
‘And if you speak to your sister,’ he added, pausing by the door, ‘tell her we need to discuss her future. Sooner rather than later.’
Helena nodded stiffly. She didn’t envy her sister that conversation.
But then, Thea probably wouldn’t envy Helena two weeks in Tuscany trying to ‘make things work’ with a husband who didn’t want her, either.
Well, if all Flynn wanted was a paperwork wife, Helena could give him that. Watching as he waved to their parents’ departing car from the front step, Helena made a decision. If this was all business anyway, she’d let Flynn get on with his—while she focused on her own life. She’d cleared her calendar for the month around the wedding, knowing things would be manic enough without adding any new projects for her burgeoning interior design business into the mix. But here she was with time on her hands, her laptop and freakishly fast Internet access, given their location. It was the perfect chance to get on with the new website she’d been planning for months.
Time for her to get on with her own future for a while.
* * *
Their married life had slipped into a routine surprisingly quickly, Flynn realised a few days later. Every morning he woke, went for a run, returned to the villa to shower and dress, then sat down for breakfast. Helena usually joined him then and they made polite, if sparse, conversation over the English papers he’d arranged to have delivered.
Then Flynn would settle into his father’s study to work while Helena did...whatever it was she did all day. Sometimes they’d see each other for lunch, sometimes not. Dinner they usually took together in the dining room, and Helena always turned in for bed first.
There had been no repeat of her wedding night offer, something for which Flynn was profoundly grateful as Henry had been held up in London and wasn’t able to get out to Tuscany until the end of the week. As much as he wanted the paperwork sorted before he allowed himself to really invest in the marriage, he knew his own limitations. No man had willpower strong enough to resist Helena in that negligee night upon night, whatever the stakes.
Still, he thought as he took his morning run on the fourth day, he didn’t want the distance between them to grow so much as to be insurmountable, either. Once Henry arrived he needed Helena on side, ready to work with him, ready to make this marriage real.
With an extra burst of energy he took the last stretch up the drive to the villa at a sprint, the thought of a calendar entry he’d barely registered the day before spurring him on.
Back in his room, he checked his phone as he caught his breath again. He smiled. Right there, scheduled neatly in his personal calendar by his PA, who’d been put in charge of all the honeymoon plans, was exactly the right way to make things up to Helena. A romantic tour of a Tuscan vineyard, complete with wine-tasting, lunch and perhaps a drive through the countryside. Perfect for the honeymooning couple.
It would mean taking the whole day off to do it properly. If he’d been with Thea, as planned, they’d have spent half a day there then both headed home to catch up with emails, he imagined. But Helena, he suspected, required a different hand. After four days of distance, this needed to be all or nothing.
And Flynn was going all in.
* * *
Helena ignored the first three knocks on her door. She’d stayed up late after dinner working again on the new website and had planned to catch up on her sleep with a well-earned lie-in—especially as it meant she stood a better chance of avoiding her husband at breakfast. The endless awkward pauses and stilted conversations over the dining tables were becoming more than she could bear. Would it be like this in London? She hoped not.
But the fourth knock she couldn’t ignore, especially as the door opened seconds after it.
‘Helena...you’re not up?’ Flynn closed the door behind him and stared at her, a frown line deepening between his eyebrows.
‘It’s only nine-thirty.’ Helena shuffled into a sitting position, glad that she’d slept in her comfortable shorts and T-shirt instead of the ridiculous negligee. ‘We’re supposed to be on our honeymoon. I’m maintaining the happy couple illusion.’
‘The car’s picking us up in half an hour. You might want to get up.’ Flynn crossed to the bathroom while Helena just blinked at him in confusion. ‘I’ll get the shower running. Give it a chance to warm up for you.’
‘I
