Now, Valentina’s was, too. Because of him.

He’d known that once she’d agreed to be with him, at some point the press would want to know more about her. But he hadn’t thought it would come this soon.

Or be anywhere near this ugly.

Finally, Valentina spoke, her voice hoarse with the barely restrained fury that was choking them all. “I knew it would be hard. I knew this would happen, even though it all seemed like everything was starting to go so well, and things were so easy and perfect this morning with the three of us having breakfast together. I knew better, knew I didn’t want—”

She stopped abruptly in the middle of her sentence and both he and Tatiana held their breath as she put down the paper. When Valentina finally looked up at him, Smith was struck by the way the beautiful green and brown of her eyes were in sharp relief to her starkly pale face.

And then, she reached for him, her hands even colder than they’d been that night when they’d boarded his yacht to head to Alcatraz. His heart stopped beating in his chest as he waited for her to tell him she was done. That she couldn’t do this. That it was over.

She took a deep breath. And then another. Finally, she said, “I meant it when I said I’d try. I’m not looking forward to more of this, but it’s one thing to say I want to try. It’s another to know that I can keep trying when everything’s not perfect and sunshine and rainbows.”

Relief swamped him as he immediately dragged her into his arms and held her so tightly that only later would he realize he could have bruised her ribs. Her words meant even more with Tatiana there to witness them. Because, finally, she wasn’t trying to hide them anymore.

Was it possible, Smith wondered, that the fake story might end up being a blessing, rather than a curse?

* * *

Smith soon found out that he’d never been so wrong about anything in his life. The paparazzi lying in wait for the three of them on the sidewalk outside of Valentina and Tatiana’s house were anything but a blessing.

Already late heading to set, having ignored the last five texts that had come in from his Assistant Director, as the flashes went off in their faces while the paparazzi got big money shots of the three of them, a half-dozen images flashed before Smith.

Valentina with fire in her eyes as she faced him down in a way few other people ever had when she warned him to stay away from her sister.

The sweet joy—and longing—on her face when she’d congratulated Marcus and Nicola on their engagement.

Holding her in his arms in front of the fire while they talked about their families, and the pain of losing a parent.

The shocking heat of their first kiss in his office, and then again at Alcatraz, out on the rocks beneath a full moon.

Her tears falling as they filmed another emotional scene from his movie.

And then, the way she’d bravely faced him and told him she wanted to try, that she was willing to see if they could make things work despite his career and her aversion to ever having to be in the spotlight with him.

Smith had fifteen years of experience at dealing calmly with this kind of situation. A week before, he might have bragged that he could have taught a class on it to new actors. Hell, just minutes ago he’d been telling Valentina that they should just look at it as being similar to the kind of make-believe they created with their movies and stories.

But as he tried to shield Valentina from the paparazzi, as he told them again and again to stop and they didn’t, and as he heard one of the photographers tell another, “Talk about living the dream by banging two hot sisters,” all he could think was, She’s going to leave me now. She’s going to leave me now. She’s going to leave me now, until the words blurred together inside his head into something that resembled the hard shape of a fist.

Smith’s fist crashed hard into one of the cameras first, before crashing even harder into the jaw of the man holding the camera.

Chapter Twenty-six

Oh God, Valentina thought as she sat in the passenger seat of Smith’s car with Tatiana in the backseat, I don’t want this life. I’ve never wanted this life.

Smith gunned the engine and flew down the street, away from the paparazzi who were still taking pictures. Valentina’s mind felt at once totally full, yet completely empty. She didn’t know what to think, didn’t know how to deal with the strange sense of satisfaction over watching him defend her and her sister that was combined with her fear that he’d get hurt in the scuffle. Not to mention the fallout that was sure to come from his complete loss of control.

In the backseat, Tatiana had immediately called the film’s head publicist so that they could get started on damage control. But Valentina couldn’t even begin to concentrate on what her sister was saying.

She couldn’t look away from Smith, from the way his knuckles were bruised and bloody where he’d come in contact with the edge of a camera...and then the bones of another man’s jaw. His own jaw was clenched tight, and she could feel the fury, the frustration, pouring off him.

“Are you okay?”

Her voice sounded strange to her own ears—strange enough that when Smith didn’t answer, she thought maybe she hadn’t actually said the words aloud.

She tried again. “Your hand. It’s bleeding. Are you okay?” But this time, even though she was sure she’d said it out loud, he still didn’t answer. “Smith?”

He hit the brakes hard at a red light and when he turned to her, what she saw in his eyes had her breath catching in her throat.

“You’re right,” he said, his voice even deeper than usual. And raw. So raw.

Whatever it was she was right about, she didn’t want him to say it. She just wanted everything to—

“I’m no good for you. My life is no good for you.”

Oh God. She’d already thought things were bad, but this—this—was a thousand times worse.

Smith had been sure from the start. Sure that he wanted her. Sure that she wanted him. And he’d been unfailingly sure that they could figure out how to make things work when all signs pointed in the opposite direction.

She was so stunned and so deeply wounded by his declaration that she felt frozen in stone, only her sister’s hand on her shoulder thawing a tiny part of her.

How badly she wished she could tell him he was wrong, and that she could handle this life. But how could she when she’d been caught in what felt like an impossible web? One made out of her beliefs that she was not, in fact, capable of dealing with the spotlight—along with intertwining threads of a ravenously hungry media and paparazzi who would always be intent on shining that light over whomever Smith chose to be with.