Page 28 of Pregnant in the Italian's Palazzo

‘Little bit is good for the baby,’ Nysio’s father assured her, his hands shaking slightly as he filled the glass to the brim. They weren’t at all what she expected, considering thepalazzoshe’d just come from. But it seemed the quiet island life suited them. Arturo’s nurse arrived a short while later and she heard Nysio ask if the staff had sent their things to his master suite.

‘Wait just a minute.’ She hurried after him. ‘I understand that this big family reunion is all about you and I’m totally here to support you in that. But since when are we sharing a room again?’

Nysio had the decency to look chagrined. ‘My father presumed that we’re engaged and had the master suite made up for us.’

Aria paused and stared up at him, feeling her chest flutter with discomfort. His father assumed she was his fiancée. And he hadn’t corrected it?‘Welcome to the family,’his mother had said to her.Oh, my God.Once they got safely behind a closed door and away from prying ears she was going to kill this man.

He conveniently climbed the sprawling stone staircase two at a time, leaving her to huff and puff her way up in his wake as she fumed. Aria looked out of a narrow medieval-style window on the stairway and saw colourful market stalls being erected along the winding streets in the distance.

But that bubble of excitement was quickly popped when Nysio took one look at her lightly fanning herself in the pleasant breeze and growled. Literally growled.

‘Merda.You’re too hot.’

‘Thank you, I try.’ She stepped around his glowering form and moved to inspect a giant painting on the wall. Her view was torn away as Nysio turned her to face him, placing his hand on her forehead.

‘None of your jokes. I read in one of the books that getting overheated can be bad for you and the baby.’

‘I’m not in danger of getting overheated. It’s late autumn.’ Aria pushed his hand away gently, feeling her chest flutter a little at his concern. ‘So you’re...reading pregnancy books?’

‘Of course,’ he said simply. ‘I now know what to expect now that we are expecting. At least, up as far as the second trimester. I haven’t quite braved the birthing chapter yet.’

Aria realised she had been completely avoiding looking into the details of what lay ahead of her. Maybe she should download some of those books on audio...was she already being a bad parent by not doing her homework? She brooded, her mood taking even more of a downturn as she trundled along in his wake. If he noticed, he said nothing but the moment they had entered his wing he set about opening doors and producing a glass of cool lemonade from somewhere.

His eyes, however, remained steadily focused upon her. But as he watched her, she felt his gaze shift momentarily from practical and assessing to something else that she found infinitely harder to compose herself before. She was relieved when he disappeared to talk to his head of staff so she took her time testing out the gigantic four-poster bed in the centre of the room. Her feet ached and her body felt heavy, the beginnings of a headache forming in her temples.

She looked down, realising she had once again been cradling her gently curved but not yet especially different abdomen. She was barely even seven weeks pregnant, after all, she wouldn’t be seeing any rounded bumps for months yet. But this time she didn’t correct herself and allowed her hand to rest there, closing her eyes as she imagined what lay ahead. She opened her eyes to find Nysio in the doorway, his eyes trained on the spot where her hand rested.

She straightened instantly, embarrassed at being caught in her private moment. But his gaze trailed over her with a look that seemed perilously close to tender and she felt a lump form in her throat. Suddenly, the thought of growing huge with his child while he possibly paraded other women around his huge palace just seemed a little cruel. Maybe she should tell him that. She shoulddefinitelytell him that.

Boundaries were important in this situation, after all. For the baby, when they came to visit, she corrected herself. She looked up and for a split second she saw nothing but raw sensual hunger, filled with echoes of moments she’d tried to forget. They had only spent a few stolen nights together and yet she felt this undercurrent of need crackling to the surface with each moment they spent alone.

Something hot and needy thrummed to life within her but she tamped it back down with a brisk clearing of her throat. She could have sworn that Nysio smiled for a split second, a small sigh escaping his firm lips.

‘So...your parents think that we’re engaged.’ She pinned him with her most serious gaze, refusing to be distracted by her own body’s reaction to him.

‘My father has enough to deal with without being upset by our untraditional situation. My mother has already been told that you rejected my proposal.’

‘You didn’t propose, Nysio. You...demanded. There is a difference.’

He shook his head, a low laugh escaping his lips. ‘If you thought that was a demand...you have a lot to learn about me.’

‘You’re only proving my point. We know so little about one another.’ She moved towards the windows, staring out at the sea crashing into waves in the distance below. ‘Coming here won’t change anything, not when we are both so different.’

She felt him move behind her, felt his presence inches from her back, begging her to sink into his strength and rest.

‘You see our differences as an obstacle, whereas I see them as the very fire that drew us together. We could have a wonderful marriage,dolcezza.’

‘Marriage is about more than sex, Nysio.’

‘You seem to have a great many opinions on the institution. Is your resistance truly about us, Aria, or is it about that spoilt man-child who broke your heart?’

‘I don’t want to talk about him again,’ she said swiftly, turning from him to stare out at the waves as they crashed into the cliffs directly below her window. ‘I’m here to support you, to spend time with you until my week here is up.’

‘You think it’s fair that I’m being held accountable for the wrongs of someone else and now our child—’

‘Our child doesn’t need their parents to be married.Youneed it. As you made evidently clear today when you didn’t challenge the assumption that I was your fiancée just to avoid an uncomfortable conversation.’

‘What matters to me is that my child is born into a home with both of their parents. Yes, it’s also about tradition and image, but marriage is the most clear-cut way to obtain that.’

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