“Quite a lot, yes.”
“And what does that mean for me?”
He hadn’t given it much thought. “Well, I suppose it means you’ll have some quiet days and nights. I can’t take you with me. Not while you’re pregnant.” As for after the baby came, he’d watched his sisters take their children on the road and it required as much preparation as launching a satellite. Definitely not worth the effort for anything less than ten days.
A mask of cool tolerance slid over Lauren’s features. Her smile was tight. “Not the sort of marriage I would have chosen for myself, having lived in one just like it, but it’s not about me, is it? As you said, time to put away romantic notions. This is something we did for the baby.”
That was the second time she’d made their marriage sound like something she’d done out of practicality. It chafed even more this time. That was not the only reason they had married. Was it? Reflexively, he rolled her under him, spreading her legs with the pressure of his thighs so she could feel how quickly his body readied itself for hers.
He could feel her dampness, watched a flush of anticipation bloom under the surprise that transformed her face and heard the catch in her breath.
“I keep reminding myself you’re pregnant and I shouldn’t make too many demands, but do you want me again, Lauren?”
It was a deliberately worded question, one she might have answered if he hadn’t leaned down to fill his hands and mouth with velvet mounds and firm, jutting nipples. The cry he wrung from her was thin and far away, reassuring him how quickly she succumbed to the same passion that held him in thrall.#p#分页标题#e#
He wanted to thrust into her and stamp her as his for all time, but held back, making his point in a much subtler, more enduring way, playing with her nipples until she was rocking her wet center against his shaft. Then and only then did he shift so he could kiss her while removing himself from the temptation of burying himself in her, using his hand to caress her and bring her to the brink, not letting her tip as he steadily built the intensity for both of them.
She arched her breasts into his crisp chest hair, teasing him with their damp, hard tips, while her hands roamed mindlessly over him, scratching at his buttocks and urging him to take her.
Holding back nearly killed him. His skin was incinerating by the time he slid into her. Delicate inner shivering began around his erection almost immediately and he held them both still, waiting for it to pass, mercilessly smothering her groan of protest with his hard kiss.
Finally he began the serious task of claiming her flesh and senses, pushing them to the brink of mindless intensity with slow, deep thrusts. When waves of shuddering pleasure racked her, he finally abandoned control. He thrust fast and the eruption was so fierce he shouted with ragged ecstasy, body twitching in rapture.
Then he sank onto her, weak with relief as she clung to him, shaking with joy.
“Tu sei mia,” he said. You’re mine.
But later, when they were eating spaghetti by the pool in their robes, he wondered if it was true. No romantic notions. Would she ever really be his?
* * *
The honeymoon lasted until New Year. Aside from a few mornings when Paolo went into his office in Milan, they were almost constantly together. They shopped for the children, sent gifts to her mother and step-nieces and nephews, and spent time with his family. There were only two awkward hiccups.
The first happened immediately after they returned from Sicily. Champagne was opened the moment they arrived at his mother’s for a big family dinner. When someone handed her a glass, Lauren was caught off guard enough to hesitate before taking it, her mind teetering through the implications of refusing against taking a few sips that probably wouldn’t hurt the baby.
“Thanks, but we’re expecting,” Paolo said smoothly, his arm curling warmly across her back. “Celebrating, but not with drink.”
Into the startled silence, Vittorio drawled, “Only one day home from his honeymoon. Works fast, doesn’t he?”
The blunt reminder of their indiscretion in Charleston made Lauren’s heart drop, but quick as a whip, Paolo said, “Pressure’s off me now. When are you going to marry and produce?”
“I keep asking him that,” Paolo’s aunt, Vittorio’s mother, exclaimed as she came forward to offer Lauren a kiss. “Vito doesn’t have your sense of duty, Paolo.”
Paolo bent to hug her, smirking privately as a din of echoed badgering was aimed at Vittorio. Vittorio ruefully muttered, “Bastardo,” at Paolo before embracing Lauren.
“Keep him in line, would you?” he urged her.