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Crowned: An Ordinary Girl
by
Natasha Oakley
Harlequin Romance®
“Sorry I’m late.” He spoke into her ear.
Ally jerked her head around, assailed by the familiar scent clinging to his skin.
“Gino—”
She’d never been so happy to see anyone in her life.
“I’ve missed you, bellissima,” he whispered against her lips before capturing her mouth.
He drew her close, like a lover who’d been anticipating this moment and could no longer hold back.
Ally had been so caught off guard her mouth opened to the urgent pressure of his, and she found herself kissing him back in a slow, languorous giving and taking she’d never experienced in her life.
The background laughter of the crowd faded. All Ally was aware of was the throbbing of her heart against his solid male chest.
Rebecca Winters
The Bride of Montefalco
Rebecca Winters, whose family of four children has now swelled to include three beautiful grandchildren, lives in Salt Lake City, Utah, in the land of the Rocky Mountains. With canyons and high Alpine meadows full of wildflowers, she never runs out of places to explore, and they—along with her favorite vacation spots in Europe—often end up as backgrounds for her Harlequin Romance® novels. Writing is her passion, along with her family and church. Rebecca loves to hear from her readers. If you wish to e-mail her, please visit her Web site at www.rebeccawinters-author.com
Don’t miss
Matrimony with His Majesty
by Rebecca Winters
Coming in April in Harlequin Romance®!
CONTENTS
CHAPTER ONE
CHAPTER TWO
CHAPTER THREE
CHAPTER FOUR
CHAPTER FIVE
CHAPTER SIX
CHAPTER SEVEN
CHAPTER EIGHT
CHAPTER NINE
CHAPTER TEN
EPILOGUE
CHAPTER ONE
“LIEUTENANT DAVIS?”
The Portland police detective looked up from his computer.
“I’m glad you got here so fast, Mrs. Parker.”
“Your message indicated it was urgent.”
“It is,” he said in a solemn tone. “Come in and sit down.”
Ally took a chair opposite his desk.
“I take it there’s been a new development in the case.”
“Major.” He nodded. “The woman who died in the car accident with your husband four months ago has finally been identified through dental records and a DNA match-up.”
Though Ally had buried her husband two months ago, she’d needed this day to come if she were ever to find closure. Yet at the same time she’d been dreading it because it meant getting painful facts instead of wallowing in useless conjecture.
“Who was she?”
“A thirty-four-year-old married female from Italy named Donata Di Montefalco.”
Finally the woman had a name and a background.
“The Italian authorities have informed me she was the wife of the Duc Di Montefalco, a very wealthy, prominent aristocrat from a town of the same name near Rome. According to the police investigating the case, her husband has had his own people searching for her all these months.”
“Naturally,” Ally whispered. Had he been in love with his wife? Or had his marriage been unraveling like Ally’s?
Though the detective had never said the words, she knew he suspected her husband of having been unfaithful. So had Ally who’d known her marriage was breaking down but hadn’t wanted to believe it.
Jim had changed so much from the seemingly devoted family man she’d first married, she’d slowly fallen out of love with him though she wasn’t able to pinpoint the exact moment it happened.
During the latter part of their two and half year marriage she’d seen signs that something was wrong. The long absenses from home because of his work, the lack of passion in his lovemaking when he did come home, his disinterest in her life when he made brief, unsatisfactory phone calls home, his desire to put off starting a family until he was making more money.
Despite the fact that there was still no definitive proof of an affair, this news gave added credence to her suspicions.
A fresh stab of pain assailed her. She needed to get out of his office to grieve in private.
Though she’d already had two months to absorb the fact that he hadn’t died alone, a part of her had hoped the other woman would have been middle-aged. Possibly an older woman he’d given a lift to because of the storm. But this latest information put that myth to rest. It increased her turmoil that she hadn’t loved him as much as she should have, otherwise why hadn’t she confronted him before it was too late?
“Thank you for calling me in, Lieutenant.” Any second now and she was going to lose control. Living in denial was the worst thing she could have done. Her guilt worsened to recognize she hadn’t fought harder to recapture the love that had brought them together in the first place.
“I appreciate what you’ve done to help me.”
She got up to leave. He walked her to the door of his office.
“I’m sorry I had to call you in and remind you of your loss all over again. But I promised to let you know when I had any more information.
“Here’s hoping that in the months to come, you’ll be able to put this behind you and move on.”
Move on? a voice inside her cried hysterically. How did you do that when your husband had died at the lowest ebb in your marriage?
How did you function when your dreams for a happy life with him were permanently shattered?
The detective eyed her with compassion. “Would you like me to walk you out to your car?”
“No thank you,” she murmured. “I’ll be all right.”
She hurried out of his office and down the hall to the front door of the police station.
Dear God—how was it possible things had ended like this? Nothing was resolved. If anything, she was riddled with new questions.
Her thoughts darted to the woman’s husband. He would have only just learned his wife’s body had been found and identified. Besides months of suffering since her disappearance and now this loss, he had to be wondering about Jim’s importance in Donata’s life.
Wherever the Duc Di Montefalco was at this moment, Ally knew he was in hell.
She could relate…
“Uncle Gino? How come we’re going to stay at your farm for a while?
Rudolfo Giannino Fioretto Di Montefalco, known only to his family and a few close friends as Gino, eyed his eleven-year-old niece through the rearview mirror. The girl sat next to Marcello, Gino’s elder brother.
“Because it’s summer. I thought you and your father would enjoy getting out in nature instead of being cooped up in the palazzo.”
“But what if Mama comes back and we’re not there?”
Gino braced himself. The dreaded moment had come.
He pulled up to the side of the farmhouse. In the dying rays of the sun, the cypress trees formed spokes across the yellowed exterior.
He turned in his seat to make certain Sofia was holding her father’s hand. Since Marcello had been stricken with Alzheimer’s and could no longer talk, it was one of the ways she could express her love and hope to feel his in return.
“I have something to tell you, sweetheart.”
A full minute passed. In that amount of time the color had drained from his niece’s face. “What is it?” she asked in a tremulous voice. The strain of going months without knowing anything about her mother had robbed Sofia of any joie de vivre.
“Sofia, I have some bad news. Your mama, she was in a car accident, and…she died.”
Four months ago in fact, but Gino had only been informed of her death last night. Today he’d been making preparations for Sofia’s move to the country with Marcello.
The details surrounding the tragedy were something neither she nor the trusted staff both at the palazzo and the farmhouse needed to know about.
His gaze took in Sofia’s pain-filled expression. When his news computed, he heard the sobs of an already heartbroken girl who buried her dark brown head against her father’s shoulder.
Marcello looked down at her, not comprehending, not able to comfort his daughter.
Gino felt her sobs from the front seat. Tears welled in his throat. Now that Donata’s body had been found and identified, the nightmare of her disappearance was over. But another one had just begun…
His motherless, already introverted niece was going to need more love and understanding than ever.
As for Gino, once he’d arranged with the priest for a private memorial service away from prying eyes so Sofia could say goodbye to her mother in private, he needed to increase security to protect his family from the press.
Carlo Santi, the region’s top police inspector and one of their family’s best friends was doing his best to stop information from the police department leaking to the various newspapers and media in Rome and elsewhere. But there were those rabid, insatiable vultures from the tabloids who invaded without mercy, always lurking to find something juicy on Gino and his family. It was the price they paid for their title and wealth.
If it weren’t for Carlo running interference for him all these months, the situation could have gotten uglier much sooner.
With the sudden debilitating onset of Marcello’s disease two years ago, Donata’s selfish streak had created havoc in his brother’s marriage, and had damaged their daughter irreparably. In Gino’s opinion, Donata had to have been one of the world’s most insensitive, neglectful wives and mothers on record.
He’d fought hard to protect his brother and niece from the worst of her flaws.
As a result he’d been forced to guard the family secrets with a certain ruthlessness that Donata enjoyed publicizing to anyone who would listen. Her indiscriminate venting had made its way to the press, casting a pall over all their lives, Gino’s in particular. Through innuendo she’d made him out to be the grasping, jealous brother-in-law who wanted her and the title for himself.
The only thing Donata hadn’t ever considered was her own death.
Once the media got wind of the accident that took her life, everything Gino had done to keep family matters private was about to become a public scandal. The fact that an American man close to Donata’s age had been driving the car when they’d been killed provided the kind of fodder to cause a paparazzi frenzy. This kind of story would sell millions of papers with far reaching consequences for Sofia. His niece could be destroyed by the facts, let alone the malicious rumors surrounding them.
Aside from physically removing the two in the back seat to a protected place away from media invasion, there didn’t seem to be a thing in hell he could do about unscrupulous journalists digging up old lies on him in order to sell more newspapers. Since his teens, battling the press had been the story of his life. Now it was about to be the story of Sofia’s, but not if he could help it!
The orchestra conductor put down his baton. “Take a ten minute break. Then we’ll pick up the Brahms at bar 20.”
Thankful for the respite, Ally placed her violin on the seat and filed out of the music hall behind the other members of the string section.
She walked down the corridor where she could be alone and reached in her purse for her cell phone.
She was expecting a call back from her doctor. After the meeting with the detective yesterday, she’d developed a migraine that still hadn’t gone away. To her dismay there was no message from the doctor. Maybe he’d tried her house phone and had left one.
Sure enough when she retrieved her messages, she learned his nurse had called in a prescription for the pain. If she could just get some relief…
Right now nothing seemed real. The hurt of her failed marriage and the circumstances surrounding Jim’s death had gone too deep.
There was one more message, but she’d wait until she got home because the throbbing at the base of her skull refused to let up.
“Ally?” Carol called to her. “Are you all right?”
“I-it’s a migraine giving me grief. Do me a favor and tell the maestro I had to go home, but I’ll be here in the morning for rehearsal.”
The Portland Philharmonic Orchestra’s end of May concert was the day after tomorrow.
“I will. Don’t worry about your violin. I’ll take it home with me and bring it back tomorrow.”
“You’re an angel.”
After getting a drink from the fountain, Ally found the strength to leave the building and head for her car.
Once she’d stopped at the pharmacy where she’d taken one of her pills on the spot, she drove straight home and went to bed with an ice bag across her forehead.
An hour passed before she started to feel a little better. But there was no pill to stop the questions that wouldn’t leave her alone.
For one thing, she wanted to see the place where Jim had died. Her mother hadn’t thought it a good idea because visiting the scene of the accident would be too painful.
But Ally couldn’t be in any more pain than she was right now. She needed to look at the bridge where Jim’s car had skidded on ice into the river. It had happened during a blizzard outside St. Moritz, Switzerland.
She also felt a compulsion to see Donata’s family home, maybe even commiserate with the Duc on the phone after she arrived in Montefalco. He wouldn’t be human if he didn’t have questions, too. Maybe talking together would help both of them cope a little better with the tragedy.
Filled with a sense of purpose she hadn’t felt in months, she reached for her cell to phone the airlines. Using her credit card she booked a flight out of Portland for the next day. She would fly to Switzerland, then Italy.
By midafternoon she felt well enough to drive to the bank for traveler’s checks. The decision to do something concrete about her situation was probably more therapeutic than taking pills because she found the energy to get packed and arrange for her neighbor to bring in her mail while she was gone.
Once she’d showered, she took another pill and went to bed. When she awakened the next morning she felt considerably better.
With her car safely parked in the garage, all she had left to do was phone for a taxi. While she waited for it to come, Ally listened to the message that had been on her home phone since yesterday morning.
“Hey, Jim! This is Troy at the Golden Arm Gym. Since new management is taking over, we’ve been cleaning out the lockers. I found something pretty valuable of yours. I don’t have a phone number or address on you, so I’ve been calling all the J., Jim or James Parkers in the city trying to find you. Call me back either way so I can cross you off the list. If you’re that Jim, drop by within twenty-four hours or it’ll be gone.”
Ally had buried her husband two months ago. Just hearing someone ask to speak to him today of all days sent a chill through her body. This call was like a ghost from the past.
Since Jim had never joined a gym, she phoned the number to let them know.
“Golden Arm Gym.”
“Is Troy there?”
“Speaking.”
“You’re the person who called my house yesterday morning. I’m Mrs. James Parker, but I’m afraid you have the wrong Jim Parker.”
“Okay. The Jim I’m looking for works in Europe a lot, and he doesn’t have a wife. Thanks for letting me know.”
He clicked off, but Ally’s fingers tightened around the receiver. Much as she wanted to dismiss his words, she couldn’t. Too often in her marriage she’d ignored little signs because she hadn’t wanted to believe anything could be wrong.
But those days were over. She was no longer the naïve idealist he’d married.
Once the taxi arrived, she instructed the driver to stop by the gym. It was on the other side of Portland near the freeway leading to the airport. There was no time to lose.
The driver waited while she hurried inside the gym.
When she entered, there were several people already working out. The trainer at the counter flashed her a look of male interest.
“Hi!”
“Hello. Are you Troy?
“That’s right.”
“I’m Mrs. Parker, the woman you spoke to this morning.”
He squinted at her. “I thought you told me I had the wrong person.”
“Something you said forced me to reconsider. Did this Jim tell you what kind of work he did in Europe?”
“Yeah. He sells ski wear. In fact we worked out a deal. I gave him free workouts in exchange for his top of the line ski equipment.”
She took a fortifying breath. “Then that was my husband.”
He blinked. “What do you mean ‘was’?”
“Jim died four months ago.”
“You’re kidding. So that’s why I haven’t seen him around. What happened?”
“He died in a car accident.”
Had there been other women before Donata, and she’d happened to be the unlucky one who’d gone off the bridge with him?
“I’m sorry, Mrs. Parker. Maybe I misunderstood about him not being married.”
She shook her head. “No. I’m quite sure you didn’t. When did he join this club?”
“About a year ago.”
A whole year?
Struggling to remain composed, she pulled the wallet from her purse. Inside was a little photo holder. She showed him the one of Jim.
The other man stared at it, then nodded. “Just a sec and I’ll get what he left here.”
Half a minute later he came out of his office with an unfamiliar looking silver laptop. The power cord had been taped to it.
He tore the attached slip in half. “Sign here.”
Ally complied, trying her best not to tremble.
“Thank you for the call, Troy. I’m anxious to keep anything that belonged to my husband.”
“Of course. I’m glad you came when you did, otherwise we’d have sold it. I really am sorry about your husband.”
“So am I,” she muttered in a dull voice.
She’d known nothing about the purchase of this laptop. Jim’s company had supplied him with the one he’d always used to do business.
The only reason for this computer to exist meant he’d had something to hide.
She would have to take it to Europe with her. She didn’t have time to go back home. After she returned to the States, she’d look inside. If she discovered painful secrets, hopefully by then she’d be better able to handle them.
After going out to the cab, she packed the laptop in her suitcase then told the driver to step on it.
As she sat back in the seat, she shuddered to realize that her husband had been working out in a gym for eight months, and she’d had no knowledge of his activities. He must have stopped by either coming or going to Switzerland on business.
It was one thing to recognize that the two of them had drifted apart, but quite another to realize he’d been living a separate and secret life. How humiliating to be confronted by the truth in front of Troy, a total stranger to her.
Oh, Jim. What happened to the man I married? Did I ever really know you?
Ally was beginning to wonder…
With the aid of the staff, Gino helped his grieving Sofia and her father into the limo outside the local parish church. They’d just buried Donata in the adjacent cemetery. It had all been carried out in secret while word of her death had finally been announced by the media.
One day when the furor had died down, he would have her remains removed and buried on the grounds of the Montefalco estate in the family plot.
“I’ll join you at the farm in a few minutes, sweetheart.”
Sofia’s face was ravaged by fresh tears. “Don’t take too long.”
“I promise. I just want to say goodbye to a few people and thank the priest.”
She nodded before the farmhouse caretaker Paolo drove the car away.
Vastly relieved this part was over, he turned swiftly to Carlo whom he’d asked to wait until they could talk in private.
“The onslaught has started in earnest, Carlo.”
“What’s going on?”
“One of the security guards at the palazzo just left a message that a woman claiming to be Mrs. James Parker tried to get in to see Marcello a few minutes ago. It’s another ploy on the part of the paparazzi to ruin my family.”
The other man pursed his lips. “I must say I’m surprised they’d be audacious enough to impersonate the wife of the deceased.”
Gino grimaced. “Nothing surprises me anymore. She came in a taxi. As a precaution, the guard wrote down the license plate number.”
Carlo’s brows lifted. “Want me to track her down and have her vetted?”
Gino was way ahead of him.
“If you could locate her, I’d like to do the interrogating for a change.”
“What’s your plan?”
“How long could she be held at the jail?”
“Only twelve hours. If you can’t make the charges stick, then we’d have to release her.”
Gino’s eyes glittered. “Don’t worry about that. She’s going to wish she’d never ventured into my territory.”
Carlo pulled out his pocket notepad. “Give me the plate number. I’ll alert the desk sergeant at the jail to cooperate with you.”
“As usual, I’m indebted to you.”
“Our families have been close for years. I’m not about to see you and Sofia destroyed.”
Those words meant more to Gino than his friend would ever know.
“Grazie, Carlo.”
There was a jarring knock on the bedroom door.
“Signora Parker?”
Ally had only been in bed an hour and groaned in disbelief. Her long connecting flights from Oregon to Switzerland, then Rome, had been bad enough. But it was the horrendous day she’d spent on a hot, overcrowded train to reach the hilltop town of Montefalco that had done her in.
To compound her troubles, every hotel in the town had been booked months in advance for some festival. If her taxi driver hadn’t taken pity on her and brought her to his sister’s house to sleep, she would have been forced to return to Rome for the night. Perish the thought!
The rapping grew louder.
“Signora!”
Ally couldn’t work out what was happening.
“Just a moment!”
She sat up, unconsciously running a hand through her short, blond curls. They made her look younger than her twenty-eight years.
Grabbing her robe lying across the end of the bed, she slipped it on, then hurried over to the door and opened it.
The elderly woman looked tired. Ally thought she sounded out of breath.
“Quickly! You must get dressed! A car from the Palazzo Di Montefalco has come for you.”
Ally’s green eyes widened. “But that’s impossible!”
Earlier in the day she’d been turned away from the palace gates by armed guards. No one knew where she’d gone after she’d gotten back in the taxi.
“You have to be a very important person for the Duc Di Montefalco himself to send for you. Hurry! You must not keep the driver waiting,”
“I’ll be out as soon as I can. Thank you.”
Unless one of the guards had followed the taxi here, Ally was mystified as to how he’d known where to find her.
But that didn’t matter now. In a few minutes she was finally going to meet with the man she’d flown thousands of miles to see. After her futile attempts to reach him by phone from Rome before boarding the train, and then the fiasco that took place earlier in front of the palace, she’d almost given up hope.