Page 48 of Modern Romance June 2025 5-8

But then he whispered into her hair, his arms wrapping tight around her, ‘You are my wife, myduquesa, my love, Cerys.’

Her heart crested at the astonished wonder in his tone, the sure steady feel of his heart beating against her back.

‘I never want to let you go again,’ he said, his voice thick with emotion.

‘Ditto,el Duque,’ she murmured, her heart soaring as his rich chuckle of appreciation reverberated in her soul.

EPILOGUE

Ten months later

‘Feliz cumpleaños, Ana!’

A cheer went up around the courtyard, which was decked out in a cascade of fairy lights. The birthday girl beamed at Cerys as she accepted the congratulations of the friends she had made at the local high school in the past six months. Ever since Cerys had insisted her sister-in-law come home for good from her latest boarding school to live permanently with her and Santiago at thecastillo.

Santiago’s arms wrapped around Cerys’s midriff and he pulled her back against his chest to nuzzle her ear. ‘You spoil my sister, Cerys,’ he whispered, but she could hear the amusement in his voice and knew he was joking.

It had been a little awkward at first, having Ana home—especially as Santiago seemed incapable of keeping his hands off her for more than a few hours at a time. But it had been the right thing to do, she decided as she watched Ana blow out the candles on the huge cake María and her team had been working on for days.

Ana deserved a home too, and it had been nothing short of wonderful watching Santiago finally start to bond with his sister. And watching Ana grow into a much more mature and sensible young woman—give or take the odd outrageous attempt to provoke him.

Plus they still had enough privacy—thecastillohad six hundred rooms, and they lived in the villa on the edge of the vineyards. Not only that, but they also had to do a lot of travelling, to Madrid and Barcelona, for her new job as thecastillo’s hospitality manager, as well as for Santiago’s work.

She knew her husband had created the position to appease her—when she’d started making noises again, a few weeks after their honeymoon was over, about working for a living. But she also knew she’d pleased him with how much she’d loved doing it. And how much she had managed to achieve, which had actually surprised her a lot more than it had ended up surprising Santiago, who had turned out to be her biggest cheerleader.

She’d been nervous as hell that first day, not sure her extensive skills as a barista, a barmaid and a waitress really qualified her to manage anything. The good news was, at first it had only been her running the new programme which she had developed herself. She’d been able to reassure herself that if her ideas were dumb and she failed, at least no one would be made to pay for her mistakes but her.

She now had a staff of six people, and the new luxury wine-tasting banquets, which finished off the tours the vineyard had been doing for years, had not only boosted that area of the business but had also garnered some fabulous reviews and were now a thriving success. The fact that she adored her job didn’t hurt either, and the chance to contribute something to the family and the man who had given her so much.

‘She deserves to be spoilt, she’s been invaluable as a hostess this month,’ she shot back.

She’d hired Ana to host some of the new summer banquets they had added to the schedule as soon as she’d finished her final exams at the local high school. And while Santiago had frowned a little at the thought of his sister working for him, Ana had loved it—and quickly proved herself to be reliable and hard-working. And her confidence had soared every time Santiago showed her he trusted her and praised her work, which Cerys had encouraged him to do at every available opportunity.

She had adored arranging the surprise party, knowing that Ana would love the chance to celebrate her eighteenth birthday with her schoolfriends and the colleagues she’d made at the bodega. But as she watched the girl rush through the crowd to hand the first slice of cake to the bodega manager Joaquín—who was brooding silently from his place on the sidelines—she was glad Santiago was too busy nuzzling her neck to notice the bright light of infatuation in his sister’s eyes. She supposed she’d have to have a sisterly chat with Ana about that.

But she didn’t want to come on too strong.

Because,wow, she knew exactly what that giddy rush of first love felt like when Santiago’s hands settled over her belly, and her heart did a backflip.

After all, she was still totally infatuated with Ana’s brother.

She sighed and covered Santiago’s hands with hers, stupidly happy, but also nervous.

The DJ she’d hired began to play a recent pop track Cerys knew Ana loved, while the disco lights on the temporary dancefloor set up under the trees began to throb in time with the heady tune. The teenagers began to cheer again, pairing off to dance.

‘Is this our chance to slip away?’ Santiago murmured against her ear, his hands still caressing her belly in that slow, seductive way he had that made all her pheromones throb in time with the music’s bass beat.

Cerys grinned, even as the anxious little knots in her belly tweaked.

Once they were alone tonight she would have to tell him about the test she had taken that morning. The test no one but María knew anything about—and only because she’d had to ask the housekeeper to procure it for her while she’d been busy in the last week organising Ana’s party, as well as developing a new banqueting roster for the autumn.

The test she had been sure, before she took it, she wanted to be negative.

It was too soon, they hadn’t discussed children, she wasn’t even sure how the heck it had happened, given that she had been on the pill. But there had been that one incident two months ago when she had forgotten to renew her prescription. She’d only missed a couple of days though, and Dr Mendoza had reassured her she would be very unlikely to conceive, so she hadn’t even mentioned the lapse to Santiago…

But when she’d taken the test that morning—just as a precaution, because she’d been feeling so tired lately and had even been sick one evening, after work—and the extra red cross had appeared, her somersaulting heart had told a very different story.

Apparently, she was overjoyed. But when she glanced over her shoulder now, to press a hand to her husband’s cheek and whisper, ‘Absolutely, María said she’d keep an eye on things…’ all her nerves about her news reappeared…

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