filip had not gotten around to learning italian as much as one should with your girlfriend being from italy. he gulped, he could only imagine the words she was speaking. he watched her move and the tears and the words brought tears to his eyes, he knew this would be hard but not like this. seeing her cry always made him want to ripe his heart out of his chest.
but then filip shook his head. “valentine is not your master, he only your employer and not even him the king of italy. you are able to put in a two weeks as any other person with a job,” filip pointed out, his voice breaking from his own unshed tears. “and you know money has never mattered to my father, we aren’t like other royal families, we are simple.” he paused for a moment not truly sure on how to make her see. his father came from a long line of kings, and his mother had been a lower noblewomen at court, they did not have billions of dollars like other royal families.”
“should I tell you he and I went ring shopping?” he finally asked the girl. “I do not know any other way to make you believe me, miłość. do you wish to see the ring, and the vows I so long ago wrote?” he had added a little more each year they dated as he had always been a quiet man with few words to say.
but he shook his head to her. “princes marry the ones they love, or at least I want to,” he pointed out.
How little there was that Filip knew about her job, but that had been intentional. She’d kept her mother’s secret exactly that, a secret, tucked away from the rest of the world, held close to her heart so no one, not Filip, not even Valentine knew about it.
His words hurt her, her chest longed and ached to put this fighting aside and run into his arms, her head resting on his shoulder, her lungs breathing in his cologne. But she knew that she couldn’t, it wasn’t possible in their situation, they needed to stay broken up. And the easiest way to do that was to fight him in every possible way.
“Did you ever think for two seconds that I actually like my job?” She would’ve placed money saying that Filip probably had, but it was a solid foundation to build her argument atop. “Because I do. I really do. How many people can say that a large part of their job is to be friends with the Grand Duchess of Russia? None, except for me.” Ari took a step backwards, placing a foot more distance between her and the man she used to be with.
“And furthermore, not only do I genuinely love my job. I love my family. I love my country. I love every part of my life at the moment. Marrying you would mean giving that up. I would have to move to Poland and quit my job. I’m sorry Filip. But even if we had a choice as to who you were going to marry, that’s not the option I would choose.” Her voice shook, threatening to crack before Ari locked her gaze with Filip, biting her lip and steadying her voice.
“I don’t choose you Filip. I choose Italy. Always.”