Page 60 of Modern Romance October 2025 5-8

She got to her feet and he rose beside her, close enough that she had to tilt her head to meet his eyes.

‘Don’t forget this.’

Stella looked down at the small notebook in his hand. Seafoam green with embossed silver letters that said Nautilus. Stupidly, she flinched at the reminder of what she’d left behind. Her father’s premier hotel where she’d worked for the last year.

‘Thank you.’ Her fingers closed around the notebook but he didn’t let it go immediately.

‘I’ve heard of it. In Sicily, isn’t it?’

She nodded. ‘On the beach.’

‘You enjoyed your time there?’

Still he held one corner of the notebook and she looked up to see his gaze fixed on her. It wasn’t just his sculpted features that made him attractive. It was the arresting combination of golden olive skin, dark as night hair and eyes like bright pewter.

Was he an actor? He was certainly used to women staring. First the little boy’s mother, now her. Hurriedly Stella retreated a step and the notebook fell to the floor.

‘Clumsy of me. Sorry.’ He scooped it up and handed it to her with an apologetic smile.

‘No, no, not at all. It was my fault. Thank you.’

She closed her eyes. Was she babbling? She never babbled!

‘So perhaps not a good stay at the Nautilus?’

Her eyes snapped open and she read something in his, something more than idle curiosity, that made her survey him more closely.

If she didn’t know better she’d think he was pumping her for information, as so many had tried to before, thinking Alfredo Barbieri’s daughter had more hair than wit. As if she’d spill her father’s plans for the asking.

But then any public praise she received from her father was more likely to be about the way she looked rather than her business acumen. No wonder people often thought her a cosseted trust-fund baby, living off her family’s wealth.

As if! The irony never failed to amaze her.

She dropped her gaze to the notebook in the man’s open palm. Her fingers tingled at the idea of touching him again, but she steeled herself as her fingertips scraped his warm flesh. That little ripple of awareness was back but she pretended not to notice.

Stella shoved the notebook into her bag. ‘Actually, it’s a lovely hotel in a spectacular position. I can particularly recommend the seafood restaurant.’

‘That sounds like an advertisement. You don’t have shares in the place, do you?’

Her head shot up. No, she didn’t have shares. By rights she should havesomestake in the family company, but her father had been slow awarding her any of the inheritance he’d shared with her half-brothers.

And now he demanded she marry—marry!—before he’d consider even letting her run a hotel.

The stranger put up his hands as if in surrender. ‘It was a joke.’

His expression was easy, unshuttered. She’d grown used to second-guessing her father’s thoughts, trying to glean his intentions when he kept so much to himself. Except when he was in a rage. Even her half-brothers and their wives were adept at hiding their real opinions behind expressions of polite interest or amusement.

Was that why she found it so hard to take this stranger’s smile at face value? Was that niggle of warning because she’d conditioned herself not to expect honesty?

How tired she was of that! How wonderful it would be to trust and take people at face value.

‘Sorry. I’m a bit distracted.’

‘Nothing bad, I hope.’

She shook her head, amazed at the sudden urge to unburden herself to a stranger. Probably because she had no other confidant she could trust.

‘Nevertheless, I think a remedy is in order.’