She had always hoped that she would be lucky enough to have children and having Stephano’s baby would…
Reality suddenly hit her—this was more than a missed period. She was having a baby! Stephano’s baby!
The thought started a strange fluttering inside her stomach. How was she going to tell him?
***
More than a month later, Natalie was still waiting for the right moment. Berating herself for being a coward, she bent nearer to the mirror after their evening shower and quickly applied her night cream, rushing to get under the sheets and away from Stephano’s often too-perceptive gaze.
“Natalie?” Stephano had stopped in the middle of towel drying his hair and was looking at her quizzically.
“Yes,” she answered, her breath quickening. She straightened hastily, realizing that the position would have emphasized her fuller breasts and the slight rounding of her stomach.
“Are you pregnant, cara?”
She had worried that he’d question the baby’s paternity. After all he had ensured that he’d used protection after the first slip, but there had been no mistaking the eager anticipation in his voice as he asked the question.
“I think so.” Natalie hadn’t yet done a test to confirm it, but her certainty grew with each day. Although she knew it was splitting hairs, she would have felt dishonest to have done the test and kept the knowledge that she was pregnant from him.
“You are having my child.” Natalie gasped as he moved to swiftly swing her up in his arms and carry her to the bed.
“I think so,” she repeated hastily, not wanting to get his hopes up. “I haven’t done a test yet.”
“I think you are.” He cupped her breasts and gently molded their firm contours as if gauging their size now in comparison to when he’d first touched them. Natalie held her breath as he glanced slowly down her body and up again. “Your body has changed.”
“Maybe I’m just getting fat,” she suggested, trying to lighten the intensity of the moment.
“I’m pleased, tesoro.” Stephano held her gaze, his face unsmiling.
“Are you?” She couldn’t help her uncertainty creeping into the question.
“I am,” he confirmed and then smiled. We’ll get married.”
He bent his head and covered her lips with his, deliberately stifling her objection before she could voice it.
“You’re supposed to ask me, not tell me!” she protested when he finally let her breathe.
“I didn’t want you to say no, mi bella.” He said it playfully, but his eyes told her that he meant it.
Sometimes it was scary the way he was able to read her like a book. It would have been romantic if he had gone down on one knee and asked her, but if he had done, she might have been foolish enough to say, “no”. She wouldn’t have refused because it wasn’t what she’d dreamed of even before she’d realized she was pregnant, but because she would have doubted that he loved her as much as he said he did and worried that he was only asking because of the baby.
Perhaps it was time to let life take her where it wanted to, she decided as she wrapped her arms around his neck and pulled his head closer to kiss him back.
Epilogue
Natalie hadn’t expected Stephano to insist that the wedding take place as quickly as could be arranged and begin to set things in motion with head-spinning speed.
They found a large three-bedroom house in Kensington, convenient for travel to the office and close enough, Stephano said, for his mother to come over regularly to see her grandchild when he or she was born, but far enough away for her to not come over every day to bring him food and ensure that he, Natalie and her prospective grandchild were receiving the proper nutrition.
The second reception room was an ideal entertainment space with a games room big enough to hold a pool table and a Samsung SyncMaster 70” LCD flat panel display TV, perfect for hanging around and watching sport when either Stephano’s father, his friends or her brother came for a visit.
Natalie loved the bed Stephano insisted on: an Eastern King Sleigh bed made of carved solid English oak and measuring a whopping 6’6” x 6’6” from The Big Bed Company. They had even bigger beds for sale, but he’d said though he needed to be able to stretch out comfortably he didn’t want to be at one end of the bed and her at the other. She had chosen the bed linen and accessories from the same company, mostly 1000-thread Egyptian cotton in pastel shades.
She had always admired his style but hadn’t realized that Stephano’s wardrobe was almost as extensive as hers. As well as his bespoke business suits and shirts, he had several items of clothing made by Ozwald Boateng, who many credited as being responsible for introducing Savile Row tailoring to the new generation of men. Thankfully, the master bedroom’s double walk-in wardrobes was big enough to hold everything including Natalie’s shoe collection which had grown in the weeks she’d been dating Stephano. She’d bought mostly sensible shoes in the last years, though she’d a few pairs with modest heels for special occasions. Dating a man of Stephano’s height had allowed her to slip on 4”, even 5” heels and not worry about towering over him. They would have to be put away until the baby was born, but it had been divine to indulge one of her fantasies.