Page 209 of Modern Romance October 2025 5-8

Ever.

Nonetheless, Dante’s words had seemed to be spilling out of him, almost against his will, and she was as mesmerised by the picture he painted as he seemed to be by the memory of Jamie and the feelings she’d evoked in him.

Something else had been perfectly clear to Charlotte, too.

The fact that when he’d described the women he’d gone to school with, the women he’d implied were a dime a dozen because he knew so many of them, Charlotte knew he saw her as one of them. Just like he’d enumerated. She was outwardly confident, composed, put together. Never in need of saving by anyone, ever.

Even now, when he’d stepped in to do her a favour, it was on her terms. Her rules. And her choice. She’dchosenhim first, but if he’d stuck to his guns on the whole turning her down thing, she’d have found someone else and married them instead. In other words, she was happy to rely on someone for help, so long as that someone knew that they were temporary and dispensable.

But the idea of Dante as a fixer, a saviour, took hold in her mind, and other parts of his personality started to make more and more sense. Suddenly, she could see him as someone who would want to swoop in and make someone’s life better, who wouldn’t be able to sit with injustice and unfairness. Was that the reason he’d had a change of heart regarding this marriage? She could have sworn he’d been jealous, but maybe that was ultimately irrelevant? Because not only was he fixing something for Charlotte, but also for his grandmother.

It all made complete sense. It was suddenly so logical and obvious as to why he had agreed to this.

But understanding him like this, seeing this side of him, represented a danger she feared it was too late to back away from. For the last six months, she’d been absolutely convinced that they were, as she’d said to him, chalk and cheese. She’d told herself, again and again, that their values and aspirations were completely different. That he was superficial and shallow, driven only by a capitalistic desire to earn more and more money.

But what if she’d been wrong about him? What if beneath that arrogant, self-assured exterior was a man who had a heart and who wanted to do the right thing by the people he cared about?

And why did understanding that about him leave her with an ache in the pit of her stomach, long after he’d left the cabin?

Chapter Eight

‘Shoot. Can yougive me a minute?’ she asked, after reaching into her handbag and pulling out her cell phone. There were missed calls from Jane, and a text asking Charlotte to call her.

From the now open door to the airplane, Dante looked back at Charlotte, who was standing midway down the aisle.

His eyes roamed her face, a frown tweaking his lips. ‘Of course. Is there a problem?’

She glanced back down at her phone and the text from Jane asking for Charlotte to call her. ‘I hope not,’ she said, then lifted a finger in the air. ‘I won’t be long.’

‘I’ll wait in the car. Take your time.’

She sunk back into one of the sumptuous leather seats, the plane engines having finally whirred to a stop and fallen silent.

Jane answered quickly. ‘Finally!’ she said down the line. ‘I’ve been waiting for you to ring.’

‘Sorry, I was on a flight.’

‘To where?’

Charlotte bit into her lip and some warning light in her mind told her not to go into it now. Jane wouldn’t approve of what Charlotte was doing. Oh, she knew Charlotte intended to get married, obviously, but not to Dante.

Not that Jane didn’t like Dante. But the fact that he and Charlotte had been sleeping together and how messy it all had the potential to be would make Jane want to swoop in and warn her away from some guy who’d been happy to have a sex-only relationship and was suddenly going to become her husband. And Jane wouldn’t have been wrong.

‘That...doesn’t matter,’ Lottie said, wishing her voice had sounded a little less frantic. But the enormity of what she was trying to do suddenly hit her like a tonne of bricks. Not just marrying Dante and somehow keeping everything between them as easy and unemotional as they both wanted—needed—it to be, but also the corporate coup she was attempting to mount.

‘Is everything okay?’

‘Fine. What’s up?’

‘I—,’ Jane’s voice faltered and concern for Jane immediately eclipsed everything else Charlotte might have felt.

‘Is it Zeus?’ She demanded swiftly. ‘Are you okay?’

‘I’m...yes. Of course. Why?’

Lottie sighed gratefully. ‘I’ve just—I’ve been worrying that maybe I sent you on a quest to the lion’s den. I couldn’t live with myself if he hurt you too Jane.’ God knew it was the truth, from the depths of her heart. What Jane had been through had traumatised her. Charlotte didn’t want to add to that.

‘He’s not going to hurt me,’ Jane said, with valour and determination in her words.