Page 168 of Modern Romance September 2025 1-4

The truth was, it had been easy to stay at the castello and in her job because shelikedboth things. She excelled at handling Diego’s business ventures and all his other holdings. She had a head for numbers, she knew how to deal with people and organization was something she got great satisfaction out of.

The life she’d been livingdidsuit her. She had simply let it take up too much real estate. She had simply let it take over any self-reflection. She had focused on tasks rather than feelings. Even the way she’d been reading her father’s journal, in small chunks, as if she could pretend he was still alive, still with her every night. As if, once she reached the end, he’d really be gone, so she avoided that eventuality.

But he was alreadyreallygone. The rate at which she read his journals changed nothing. It just allowed her to pretend she could put off that final grief, when the truth was that it was always here. Would always be here.

She had to do things in spite of the grief. Find joy and life beyond trying to live out her father’s wishes.

She finished off her pastry, watching with a small, satisfied smile as snow began to fall. She gave herself a few minutes to enjoy the soft, picturesque perfection, then decided she should head back before the roads got bad.

She drove with renewed determination. She would go through with the Christmas Ball because it was a fine tradition and good for the castello. Because it would be good for Diego.Andbecause shelikedevent planning.

Perhaps, if it was a success, she would focus more on that than meeting Deigo’s every beck and call. She would still be happy to work for him, but he was going to have to start working for himself.

In the new year, they would both have to take some new steps, whether he wanted to or not.

Stepping into the future rather than hiding in the past.

She was humming “O Holy Night” as she walked back into the foyer of the castello. She stopped short when Diego surged forward, looking furious.

“Where have you been?” he demanded, a strange, frustrated energy pumping off him.

She unwound her scarf, hung it carefully on the peg. “Well, I went and looked at some nativities. Just as I told you I was going to.”

His thunderous expression was almost amusing. She had not been fooling herself. Sheknewthis man. Maybe he didn’t know or understand her back—not yet—but that did not strip away her understanding of him.

Anger and ice hid all the more complex emotions, and seeing that in the context of what she knew about the Follieros, she suspected he’d developed those coping mechanisms at a young age.

“I came down,” he muttered.

“Did you?” she asked, trying not to grin, trying not to be warmed from the inside out, or worse, apologetic. “At what time?”

His scowl was truly a thing of beauty. “I do not recall.”

Which meant he’d come down very late expecting her to be waiting for him like a puppy. And shehadwaited for a time. Should she have waited longer? Should she have…

No. That wouldn’t be her. That wouldn’t bethem. He was going to have to make some of the choices. He was going to have to start taking responsibility for himself and his own actions. She could give him some grace. He was new to that after all. But she wasn’t going to allow him to coast along any longer.

“You have lessons to learn yet, but I am happy to teach them to you.” She lifted onto her toes, brushed her mouth across his in a casual show of affection. But she liked it, and she was doing things she liked.

She tried to walk past him, but he grabbed her arm, pulled her back. “What is the meaning of this?”

“The meaning of what?”

“This? The humming? The kissing? The… You are not behaving the way you should.”

“The way I should or the way you want me to?” she returned. She didn’t try to escape his grasp. She liked his hands on her, in whatever ways he saw fit. And if that was a failing, she’d deal with it at another time.

When he said nothing to that, she didn’t fight his grasp but instead leaned into it, so it was more of an embrace than anything else. “Why did you come down?”

He frowned at her, eyebrows drawing together. “What do you mean?”

“You did not want to come see the nativities. You did not want to be around me. You wanted to sit in a dark room and hate yourself for some archaic feeling aboutmyvirginity. Yet you came down thinking I would be waiting for you and that you would go anyway. Why?”

He shook his head, and she didn’t know if he was denying her interpretation or just answering.

Still, she was getting to know him, understand him. If she stayed here, eventually he would be compelled to answer. Because he was not as cut off or as formidable as he wanted to be. At least when it came to her.

“I was not going to go, but I did not want you waiting for me,” he ground out.