The Billionaire’s Prodigal Wife (Mackenna and Alessandro)

The sound of Romeo scratching at the bathroom door roused her daydreams. She had leaned against the shower wall, her glass now more water than wine, her throat raw and her eyes bloodshot. A knock on her door followed by Nuncio asking if she was still alive made her realize she'd been in too long.

"I'm fine. Why are you still here?" She yelled through the door.

"Because I am worried one of those crazy reporters will break into your apartment. Deadbolt or not, this building is not secure, and I am concerned for your safety."

"Tell your boss to go back to Italy and take them with him," she offered unhelpfully as she wrapped up in her robe, shivering as the cool air hit her skin. She pulled her book up into her arms and opened the door to find him standing there with his arms folded. "I fell asleep in the shower, I didn't drown. I'm fine." She walked past him toward her bedroom.

"Mackenna, you did not eat." Nuncio called out to her.

"I'm not hungry," she responded frustrated at the invasion of her privacy. "Can you please just go back to wherever it is you're staying."

"I don't think you understand, I am here because it is unsafe for you to remain here alone. You have your choice of me or another security agent but one of us is staying in this apartment with you until the throng of reporters outside is gone. The alternative is to move to a more secure location."

She grimaced as she realized his meaning, "I'm not going to the hotel. They won't leave until your employer vacates the country. He needs to go away."

"Well according to him, he's not going anywhere." Nuncio informed her.

Mackenna cursed under her breath and slammed her bedroom door behind her, flinging herself dramatically on her bed. She noted Nuncio had closed the blinds of their basement apartment. It would be too easy for someone to get a photo of her in here. She rolled onto her belly and pulled her pillow into her face and screamed into it. She grabbed her phone and sent a text message to Savannah warning her of their in the early hours of the morning.

She could hear Nuncio talking on his phone again and she rolled her eyes as she heard him say something about the fact she had gone to bed without food.

Tattle-tale," she rolled her eyes as she pushed herself off the bed. Sli pping into a pair of shorts and a tank top before throwing her robe back over it to keep the chill off, she decided she was tired of bossy men in her life. Grabbing her empty wine glass, her book and the last of her dignity, she marched back to the kitchen. She ignored Nuncio's surprised stare as she poured another glass of wine before plunking a slice of bread into the toaster.

Keeping her back to him, she stared out the tiny kitchen window into the back yard before noting someone sat in the darkness in the alley. A flash of a camera caught her eye. She gave them a wave before drawing the curtains to a close. "Hey

Nuncio, someone with a camera is in the alley."

"I will notify my team outside. They will take care of this. Just keep the curtains closed." He stepped into the kitchen. "You need to eat more than toast," he chastised. "Nuncio, I can accept you're not leaving but you need to stop telling me what to do. If I wanted an overbearing jerk telling me what to do, I'd invite my husband over."

She didn't meet his gaze as she took her book and strode past him toward the oversized chair in the living room, "and he is the very last person I want to see.

Her phone buzzed as Savannah responded to her message with a series of emojis clearly demonstrating her displeasure. She gave a wicked grin at the subsequent message where Savannah mentioned where Nuncio should put the vegetable emojis she had shared and replied quickly before looking up to see Nuncio watching her intently. "Now what?"

"You are pale, thin and you do not eat."

"I'm in mourning," she held his gaze.

He gave a rueful glance and rifled his fingers through his hair. "Mackenna, I'm sorry I let you go that day. If I had done my job...

guilty for losing track of hen "Nuncio, none of this is your fault. There is only one person to blame and he's sitting in a jail cell in Italy right now."

"Perhaps but," he started to speak again.

"We're not talking about this again because if I have to start assigning blame, I'm going to have an exceedingly difficult time looking in the mirror and I'm not prepared to do that. Please just stop with the pity and the misguided sense of concern. I am fine. I will be fine."

A knock on the door made her jump.

"It is fine. I ordered food. I asked my security to bring it down. You need to eat something more than a slice of toast and a lot of wine." Nuncio offered gently. "I ordered pasta carbonara for you with some garlic cheesy bread."

"Sounds like you asked someone for food recommendations," she wanted to be angry but had nothing left to give.

She sat with her book on her lap staring into the light of her lamp. She heard Nuncio arguing with whoever from his team was bringing the food down to the basement apartment and considered for a moment perhaps the press had intercepted the delivery person because he sounded furious.

Then she heard the other man's voice and felt her stomach drop to her feet. The man was relentless, and she was too tired. She remained in her seat as Nuncio gave his employer an earful, telling him Mackenna needed rest and care and did not need to be disrupted by an impatient man, She suddenly liked Nuncio very much. He was taking the job of protecting her very seriously.

"Just let me see her for myself and ensure she eats and then I will leave," Alessandro spoke brusquely pushing himself past his security.

She turned her head back toward the lamp, seeing his reflection stepping into her tiny living room in a small, framed photo of her grandparents on the side table.

She turned the photo. Nuncio stayed close to him, obviously irritated with his boss.

Carlos was also standing beside Nuncio, and he also looked irritated.

"You need to eat."

plate. "There I ate, go away."

He dropped the bag of food on her lap. "Eat the pasta."

"If I eat the pasta, will you leave?" She was trying not to cry now, willing to do anything to encourage him to leave her in her misery.

"Yes," he promised taking a seat on the sofa across from her, his hands folded between his knees and staring intently at her.

She ignored his gaze, rifled through the bag, and pulled the folded foam container out. The smell of the garlic and bacon wafting towards her nose and her stomach turned in protest She took a plastic fork wrapped in a napkin and unrolled it. She reached for the wine glass and chugged the lást of her wine as if it were a cheap beer. Nuncio looked displeased as he took her wine glass from her. She hoped he took it to the kitchen for a refill.

She wound the linguine around the fork and forced the bite into her mouth, chewing rapidly, keeping her eyes averted. She broke a piece of the cheesy bread off and shoved it into her mouth. "Slow down and chew your food Mackenna, unless you're anxious for me to do give you the kiss of life when you choke," he taunted quietly.

She immediately slowed her movements and shuffled in her chair, hating even with all to have happened, his words caused her body to react to him. Damn him and damn her body for wanting him even now. She took a breath and looked back out the window before wiping another tear off her face.

"Mackenna, why do you cry?" he whispered quietly, "I only want to know you are healthy and eating."

She didn't answer him, instead twirling the fork through the pasta and forcing herself to take another bite. The sooner she finished the dish, the sooner he would go, and she could go to bed, and she could say she had gotten through one more day.

He reached out to put his hand on her knee and she jumped away. She gripped

landed on the floor. Looking back at the photo on the table she avoided his face while he read the cover. The book was one recommended to her by a grief counsellor at the hospital, about the loss of a pregnancy. She was nearly three quarters through the book. It wasn't helping much.

She could see from the corner of her eyes he was holding the book in his hands tightly but not moving and she simply stuffed more pasta into her mouth. She owed him no explanation for what she read, and she certainly wasn't up to discussing the issue with him at present.

Nuncio came back into the room with a glass of water and set it on the coffee table. "You've eaten more than I thought you would."

"Am I done?" she knew she behaved as a petulant child, but she couldn't stop. "I am satisfied, Alessandro are you satisfied?" he questioned his boss with a frosty edge to his tone. Alessandro nodded before setting the book down on the table. Wordlessly he walked to the door and let himself out, Carlo quick on his heels.

"Can I go to bed now?" she felt the tears she had been struggling to keep at bay spilling over as she avoided Nuncio's sympathetic gaze.

"Mackenna, I promise you; I did not know he was coming here. I would have warned you. My job is to protect you and right now, he is not behaving rationally where you are concerned." Nuncio's voice was apologetic.

"1

Right now, he's not behaving rationally?" she questioned the turn of phrase. The man has never behaved rationally where I'm concerned. Not ever. He's a raving lunatic who has disrupted my life from the minute he nearly ran me over with his damn car seven ago." She wiped furious tears off her cheeks.

"What is it with me and cars

anyway? My parents died in a car

crash, my life got flipped upside down by him with his stupid car way back then and now my grandparents and my baby were stolen from me in another damn car accident. I swear to God I must have a curse involving motor vehicles on me. Somewhere there is someone playing with a voodoo doll and toy cars manipulating my life for the worst, I'm certain of it."

She was moving to the trash can in the kitchen with the remnants of the food she had picked at.

Tears streaming, she furiously tried to put the food in the bin, and it spilled all over the side and onto the floor. She gave up then, sliding onto the floor in a crumpled heap, sobbing uncontrollably. Seeing Alessandro again, having him invade her space and act like all he cared about was her when she knew damn well all

Dulce needed to do was snap her fingers and he'd be back to her, was too much. She felt the sobs rack her ribs as she struggled to breathe against the pain she was feeling.

She felt Nuncio sit down on the floor

beside her wrapping his arm over her shoulder and allowing her to use his thick chest as a beating drum while she flailed against the pain she felt. Eventually, when the tears, started to subside and she was the pain,

barely sniffling, numbel.fo

she felt him lift her and carry to her room. He laid her on her bed and put a blanket over her before leaving her in her room, closing the door gently behind him.