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.Would not.Which begged another question.How best to break the news to his family that, at a time when so much else was uncertain, he was bringing to the mix a bride who was a stranger to them and to the culture and customs which bound their lives?CHAPTER FIVEDINNER was over, the movie finished, the lights dimmed.Cushioned in luxurious leather beside a window in the Magnifica section of the Alitalia 767 jet, Cassandra raised her footrest and adjusted her seat to a reclining position.Next to her, her brand-new husband lifted his glance from the report he was studying just long enough to ask, “Comfortable?”“Mmm-hmm.” She tucked the fleecy airline blanket more securely around her legs.“Think you’ll be able to get some rest?”She nodded and closed her eyes.But sleep, the one thing she never seemed able to get enough of since she’d become pregnant, eluded her.Instead, the events of the last six days raced in living color through her mind like a movie reel come unspooled….“What did he do to get you to change your mind?” Trish had wondered, when Cassandra returned from her lunch with Benedict and said she’d accepted his proposal.“Bowled me over with sweet reason, mostly.”“How about dazzled you with his smile? Seduced you with his long-lashed, bedroom eyes?”“That, too.” She’d lifted her lapel, buried her nose again in the damp, sweet-smelling violets.“He can be very convincing when he puts his mind to it.”And very efficient.Leaving her with no time for second thoughts, he’d swung into action.Within seventy-two hours, they’d purchased their marriage license, booked a time for the ceremony to take place at the County Clerk’s office, reserved their flight to Italy, and consulted by phone with her obstetrician who, upon hearing of their travel plans, immediately ordered a sonogram, “just to be on the safe side.”“A week or two of rest and relaxation is just what she needs,” the doctor affirmed, when they met with him the next afternoon.“However, although the findings of the ultrasound are inconclusive at this stage, the cervix remains a matter of slight concern.We’ll reassess the situation when you return but, for the time being, I recommend you refrain from marital relations.Not the kind of news a couple wants to take away with them on a honeymoon, I know, but when a high-risk pregnancy is at stake….”“This is the first I’ve heard about there being any kind of risk attached to the pregnancy,” Benedict had said, shooting an accusatory look Cassandra’s way.“Explain, if you will, Doctor, the possible difficulties my wife will be facing.”Later, over dinner at Pier 39, she’d again suggested they postpone the wedding until such time as they could enjoy a normal honeymoon.“Absolutely not,” Benedict ruled.“Marriage is about more than just sex, Cassandra, and in our case, about a lot more than just you and me.The safety of our baby takes precedence over all else.”His stoic acceptance of the doctor’s ruling, added to the brisk, almost businesslike manner with which he treated her thereafter, rendered Trish’s parting gift of a diaphanous negligee somewhat pointless, Cassie thought, conscious of the unfamiliar weight of the heavy gold ring on her finger.That it signified marriage was as foreign a concept as the fact that the man sitting next to her was her husband.No matter how many times she told herself, I am now, for better or worse, Mrs.Benedict Constantino, the reality didn’t sink in.Even yesterday’s wedding possessed the elements of a dream fraught with a touch of nightmare.“I don’t even know his birthday!” she’d wailed to Trish.“I don’t know his middle name, or what size shirt he wears.I don’t know if he likes pajamas or sleeps naked, drives a Mercedes or a pickup truck!”Trish, ever practical, had said, “Check out the marriage license for his birth date and middle name.As for what he drives, you’ve only got to look at the man to know it’s a Ferrari or a Porsche, and you’ll find out soon enough what he wears in bed.Quit fretting about minor details, Cass, and put your shoes on.Ian’s bringing the car round, and we don’t want to keep the groom or City Hall waiting.”“I can’t leave yet,” she’d protested, swamped in a rush of panic at what she was about to do.“I think I’m going to be sick again.”“It’ll have to wait until after the ceremony,” Trish had decreed unsympathetically.“You’ll smear your lip gloss and make your mascara run if you throw up now.”But the nausea had persisted.Was with her still, caused not by the pregnancy, or the sudden swooping dip of the aircraft as it hit a patch of turbulence, but by the nervous shock of realizing she’d thrown in her lot with a virtual stranger.How long before the panic subsided, before being addressed as Signora Constantino stopped taking her by surprise? And how long before Benedict became the man who’d wooed her so persuasively that, within twenty-four hours of his learning she was carrying his child, she’d agreed to marry him?Beside her, she heard the rustle of papers, the snap of his briefcase closing, the sibilant whisper of the soft leather seat as his body made itself comfortable for the night.His elbow nudged hers, remained there, warm and solid.She felt, rather than heard his breathing become slow and relaxed.Alert for a sign that he’d fallen asleep, she waited five minutes…ten.The man in the row behind snored loudly enough to be heard over the drone of the jet engines, but not Benedict.If he slept, and she thought from the utter stillness of his body that he must, it was with the same unruffled competence that he did everything else.At last, cautiously, she turned her head, and opened her eyes.Yes, he was sleeping, sprawled elegantly in his seat with his hands clasped loosely in his lap, which left her free to examine at leisure the strong, clean lines of his profile.He looked just as he had the previous morning, when they exchanged their wedding vows: a study in charcoal and bronze, iron-jawed and unsmiling.Thoroughly masculine, thoroughly composed.No untoward dreams would disturb his rest.They wouldn’t dare!His lashes, thick and luxuriant enough to make a woman weep with envy, smudged dark against his high cheekbones.His hair, usually tamed to within an inch of its life, lay slightly rumpled across his brow.And his mouth…?She studied the patrician curve of his lips and her throat went dry.But a flush of heat settled between her legs as if that part of her body had stolen all her moisture to ease its sudden ache
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