His Rules: Ludlow Nights - Book1 (A Ludlow Nights Romance) (22 page)

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Authors: CC MacKenzie

BOOK: His Rules: Ludlow Nights - Book1 (A Ludlow Nights Romance)

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Chapter Twenty Four

Since he was a man blessed with two sisters and a mother, a woman's tears didn't bother Olivier.

On the one hand he was beyond happy that she'd told him she loved him. On the other, it was obvious Anastacia was distraught at the very idea of bringing love into her life. A man might expect smiles and kisses and caresses when a woman told him she loved him. Olivier knew he was experiencing an incredibly special moment in his life and he wanted to make the most of it. He also knew that the road ahead with Anastacia would not be plain sailing. The girl was a difficult and complex puzzle. She was fiercely independent, strong and focused. She'd also triumphed after a childhood that would have broken many others. Tonight her emotions, for good reason, ran too high. She'd discovered she had a father and a family. A family that might bring complications into her well-ordered little world. Olivier realized it was up to him to help her face the new reality of her life with hope and with courage. He loved her too much to do anything else. However, he also knew that Anastacia had had a bad experience with love. Even if she was determined to keep that experience to herself. She didn't quite trust him enough to share that experience. Not yet. But she'd opened her heart enough to let him slip inside. So for now, Olivier would take what he could get.

"Why do I feel as if I'm balancing on a tightrope? One wrong step and I'll fall to my death?" she sobbed into his neck. She shifted and stared up into his face. The pouty mouth made him want to kiss her. "Why is love so hard? Why isn't love easy?"

The ache in his ribs was not heartache, Olivier told himself. Love sprang up as he stared into her beautiful face, those curls black as night tumbling around the delicate bones, delicate skin. And that love, fiercely possessive, rose so fast it took his breath away. Would he ever get used to feeling like this every time he so much as looked at her? Her blue eyes were huge as she stared into his.

Now his hand rose to play with her hair.

"I told you that life with you is not easy. A man might expect a woman who has just said she loves him to kiss him, but not you."

"I've spoilt it for you, haven't I?"

To stop his smile, his teeth bit down hard on his bottom lip.

"I can think of many ways you can make it up to me."

At his words, Anastacia dropped her head on his chest and inhaled. She could smell soap, the just washed scent of his shirt and something else that was pure man. For some reason, it made her feel acutely female.

"When word gets out about my father, and especially that I'm in a serious relationship with you, I'm worried about the press attention," she whispered.

She smiled when his chest moved as he laughed.

"Ignore it."

Her head lifted.

Her eyes met his.

"How can I ignore it when I hate it?"

"Hate is a strong word."

"I hate having my picture used in the press, all the speculation in that crap newspaper."

"The one that called you a gorgeous, dark-haired angel with violet eyes?"

"See this face? Is it laughing?"

"It is not a big deal,
piccolino
. It comes with the territory," he said.

"They need to keep their nose out of my business."

He leaned back to study her face.

"Of all the people in the world, you would be the first to tell me that because I am in the public eye that makes me fair game."

Anastacia couldn't help but pout at that comment, which was a fair one. Hadn't she said something similar when they'd talked about the advertising campaign?

"Excuse me,
you
are the one in the public eye, not me.
You
are the football star, that's your job, not mine," she argued. "I am a private citizen and a private person and I have a basic human right to have my privacy protected."

"More rules?"

"It's got nothing to do with rules, it's got to do with fair play."

"Unfortunately for you, being my girlfriend makes you a target." Rather than tossing him a bad tempered come-back, Anastacia heaved a heavy sigh. "At least they got one thing correct," he summed up. "I think of you exactly like a dark-haired angel, with a touch of the devil."

She placed a lazy kiss on his glorious mouth.

"The thing is, I don't like sharing you. I don't like sharing what we have with... judgemental assholes on social media and the press."

His eyes went gentle as his dimple popped.

"That,
cara mia
, is the sweetest thing you have ever said to me."

The tone of his voice had her heart beating fast along with a new feeling of love growing in her. "I hate feeling as if I'm being stalked, everything we do, where we go, on social media. I hate losing that private part of me."

Olivier shrugged with a feigned indifference as a crazy idea made his heart race.

"Romance makes the world go round. So do births, deaths and... marriage, when it involves people in the public eye."

"Once the Ferranti Boutique hotels campaign gets underway, it's only going to get worse. Because you're hot at the moment, and I'm not just talking about football, the more interest there will be in you and in us as a couple. I'm not looking forward to it."

"You think I am hot?"

She wound her hands around his neck and kissed him.

"Of course you're hot. You know you're hot."

"I could always walk away from the campaign. You did not want me in it in the first place," he reminded her.

"Don't be stupid."

He kissed her, a whisper of lips against lips.

And took the plunge.

"I know one answer to your problem."

"You do?"

"
Si
. We get married."

Stunned blue eyes, as if she'd been coshed over the head with a blunt instrument, stared with what appeared to be mounting disbelief into his.

Silence.

"You cannot be serious."

Not ready, he realized, and could have kicked himself.

But it was too late for wishing the words unsaid.

"Think about it. Social media sites would back off. People blissfully in love are boring."

"
Think
about it? You're saying we should marry because we don't want to be talked about on the internet? I've never heard anything more ridiculous in my entire life."

"I do not care. I am not the one making it an issue. I have come up with a solution."

"A solution? So you want to marry me to
appease
me?"

He couldn't help it, he rolled his eyes.

"How can a beautiful and intelligent woman be so stupid? If I devoted my whole life to appeasing you it would end in abject failure. I want to marry you, in fact I
will
marry you, because I love and adore you. It will happen anyway so you had better get used to the idea."

Wide blue eyes searched his.

And all the while his heart went crazy in his chest.

Irritation with him rose in those big eyes. "But... but, what if I'm not ready to get married?"

She hadn't said an outright no.

Olivier took strength from it, even though he was making a hell of a mess of his first (and last he vowed) marriage proposal.

"Tough." His brows rose, watching her with the same irritation bubbling in his throat. "I am ready, more than ready, to marry you."

"I don't care," she shot back. "I'm not ready and might never be ready. So what are you going to do about that?"

"At the moment, not a damn thing."

She pushed off his knee and stood in front of him like a warrior readying for battle.

"Let me just say that that was the most
pitiful
attempt at a marriage proposal I have ever heard. No woman in her right mind would ever agree to be
told
she was going to marry a man. What the hell is wrong with you?"

Olivier wished he knew.

Maybe he was losing his mind.

He stood on legs that weren't quite steady.

Then he dropped to his knees and took her trembling hands in his.

He stared up into eyes wide with shock and something like terror.

He knew the feeling and took a deep breath.

"With every breath I take, I love you. Each and every day I promise to do everything within my power to make you happy. I love you so damned much. Please, Anastacia, will you marry me?"

Shitty, shit, shit.

Eyes brimming over, Anastacia gazed down into dark eyes filled with love, for her. With need, for her. And found herself saying,

"Yes. Yes, I'll marry you."

She dropped to her knees, too, and their kiss was so sweet and filled with a mutual promise.

He was about to speak, but she pressed a finger to his mouth.

She knew she owed him nothing but the truth.

"But not yet..."

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