Modern Romance April 2015 Books 1-8. Annie West

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       CHAPTER FOUR

      THE MAKEOVER, ALONG WITH the shopping and the ultra-grooming at a very fancy beauty salon, shook Lizzie to her very depths.

      She was transformed and she knew it and was surprised by how very much better it made her feel to see herself polished to glossiness, with that awful brown dye gone from the last few inches of her pale silvery hair. Every time she had seen that dye in the mirror it had reminded her of Andrew and the bad times, so it was a relief to be finally rid of it and stop wondering if he ironically had tried to change her into Esther, who had mud-brown hair of no great distinction. She regarded her long, glittery nails with positive girlish delight because she had never known such beauty tweaking could transform her work-roughened hands. The calluses were gone as well, her entire skin surface buffed and moisturised to perfection. There was no doubt about it: it made her feel like a new woman, a woman of greater assurance than she had been when she first slunk through the doors of the salon, feeling like a crime against femininity in her untouched, unpolished state.

      How would Cesare view her now?

      Her cheeks flushed at the thought. Why should that matter to her? What was his opinion worth? Presumably without the polishing he wouldn’t have wanted to be seen out with her in public and that was a lowering reflection, she acknowledged ruefully. She had been transformed and she appreciated it, best not to think too deeply beyond that, she decided wryly. And now all dressed up to the nines she felt more armoured to cope with the hen party ahead even if it was without the support of her sister.

      Sadly, Chrissie had an exam the next day and there was absolutely no way she could join Lizzie and Cesare’s sisters. Lizzie was disappointed. She liked Cesare’s friendly siblings very much but they were still strangers and somewhat more uncomfortably, strangers she had to keep a front up with. They thought it was a normal wedding with a bride and groom in love and happy. Unfortunately, living up to that false expectation was a strain even on a shopping and beauty trip.

      * * *

      ‘You mean, you really aren’t pregnant?’ Sofia, Cesare’s youngest half-sister, gasped as she watched Lizzie down a vodka cocktail with every sign of enjoyment. ‘Cesare told us you weren’t but we didn’t believe him.’

      ‘This conversation is not happening,’ Paola groaned in apology, the eldest of the trio of sisters, a teacher and married woman and rather more circumspect than her single, fun-loving sisters in what she chose to say. ‘I’m so sorry, Lizzie.’

      Lizzie smiled, masking her loneliness and chagrin. ‘It’s all right. I’m not offended. I know you’re surprised that your brother’s getting married in such a hurry—’

      ‘When we never thought he’d get married at all,’ his third half-sister Maurizia slotted in frankly.

      ‘Obviously he’s nuts about you!’ Sofia giggled. ‘That’s the only explanation that makes sense. When I sent him that photo of you all dressed up to go out tonight, he wasted no time telling me that he wanted you to stay at home and that he saw no reason for you to have a hen night.’

      Of course Cesare didn’t see any reason, Lizzie reflected ruefully, glugging her drink because she didn’t know what to say to his very accepting and loveable sisters or indeed to his pleasant stepmother, Ottavia, none of whom had a clue that the wedding wasn’t the real thing. She had guessed, however, that his father, Goffredo, was simply playing along with their pretence but she found that same pretence stressful and knew it was why she was drinking so much and living on her nerves. Luckily Cesare had not been required to put on much of an act, she conceded resentfully, as he had taken refuge in his city apartment, after marooning her in his unbelievably luxurious town house with his family, before flying off to New York on urgent business.

      Apparently it was the norm for Cesare to move out of his flashy and huge town house into his exclusive city apartment when his family arrived for a visit. Lizzie had found that strange but his family did not, joking that Cesare had always liked his own space and avoided anything that might take his main focus off business, which evidently involved socialising with his family as well. Lizzie thought that was sad but had kept her opinion tactfully to herself.

      He was so rich: in spite of the limo and the driver and the helicopter, she had had no idea how rich her future fake husband was. Lizzie was still in shock from travelling in a private jet and walking into a house the size of a palace with over ten en-suite bedrooms and innumerable staff. She had then done what she should have done a week earlier and had checked him out on the Internet, learning that he was the head of a business СКАЧАТЬ