“Yes.”
She kept her movement slow even as sweat broke out across his brow.
“Por favor, querida...”
She tilted his head back again so she could look into his eyes. Spanish came with his passion. “Por favor, querido,” she repeated back. “Creas a me?”
Her Spanish really wasn’t good.
He grinned a little through pain as she held him on the cusp of climax and wouldn’t let him cross over.
“I’m trying to believe,” he said in English.
She pressed against his shoulders until he lay back, and she went with him. “I wouldn’t lie to you.”
He nodded, his hands to her hips to grip her, his body shaking.
“Do you trust me?”
A nod was all he could muster, but his eyes still looked worried. Scared.
Her own body slowed down faster than his did, and it became less difficult to be still with him, though she made sure to rotate her hips frequently enough to keep him at that exhausting edge.
“Do you think I would make the right decision in those iffy situations?”
He nodded again, his fingers biting into her hips as he groaned, still trying hard to do what she wanted.
“Then all you have to do is tell me when you get those bad feelings and we’ll figure a way out.”
“Te necesito.”
“Say yes.” She stroked his damp hair back from his face. “I’m not ready to give up on you.”
He shook his head, not managing words again. He looked away from her until she leaned over him, close enough that their warm, moist breath mingled even in the fast, furious breathing ripped from them.
“You’re a good man, Dante. You’re worthy of us, of your family, of your siblings already. You can love your brothers’ wives as your sisters and not risk committing additional sins for them. Do you believe me?”
His hands finally left her hips and slid up her back so he could pull her tight against him, and she felt the urgency to finish fading in him, but he still couldn’t get close enough to her.
“Voy a creer lo que me dices que crea,” he whimpered against her throat.
“I don’t know what that means,” she whispered, finger-combing his hair again.
“I’ll believe what you tell me to believe.” He took control then and rolled her onto her back until he was settled against her and able to look her in the eye. “I’ll work on it. I won’t fail you. I won’t fail you or the baby...however many we have. I keep my promises, Lise.”
He settled into the rhythm she’d been withholding from them both, and soon she felt tears on her cheeks at the moment of climax.
Warmth once again seemed to settle into her bones, comforting and protected.
“Tell me what to believe,” he asked again, and leaned up to look at her.
The ache that had set up in her breast eased, and she couldn’t resist playing with him. “You should believe that beach weddings are the very best.”
Dante tilted his head, but slowly grinned at her. “I should?”
“Mmm-hmm,” she said, tugging his mouth back to hers for a soft, loving little smooch.
Sweetness flowed between them, and he looked her in the eye again. “Anything else?”
“That women who have massive round bellies are beautiful, and that you’ll love the way I look even if my breasts swell up until I look like one of those photos of plastic surgery gone awry.”
“That one’s easy.” He smiled finally, tiredly, then rolled with her again until she was stretched out on his chest and his arms came around her, nothing overtly sexual in the touches, just the touch of a man who couldn’t believe his fortune. “Anything else?”
“That I love you and know you’re a good man. I wouldn’t stay with you, no matter how much I love you, if I thought you would be a danger to our baby. Do you believe me?” Her voice cracked. It was the last, the playful humor of moments before gone.
“Always.”
And she knew it was true. Even without looking at him. Even without feeling it except when he let his guard down in moments of passion, it swam up at her like truth and she knew it.
Even if it took him the rest of his life to accept her estimation of his goodness and worth, she’d stay beside him, always reminding him.
And probably arguing about random inconsequential things.
Everyone needed a hobby.
* * * * *
EXCLUSIVE EXTRACT
Secret royal prince Dr Elias Santini is stunned when he rushes to an emergency delivery. The patient is Beth Foster…and she’s having his baby!
Read on for a sneak preview of
THEIR SECRET ROYAL BABY
by Carol Marinelli
‘How pregnant is she?’ Elias asked.
‘Twenty-nine weeks. Her waters broke as we got her onto the gurney. Elias, this baby is coming and very rapidly.’
They had reached the cubicle and Elias took a steadying breath.
‘What’s her name?’
Before Mandy could tell Elias he was already stepping into the cubicle.
And before Mandy said the name, he knew it.
‘Beth.’
She was sitting up, wearing a hospital gown, and there was a blanket over her. Her stunning red hair was worn up tonight but it was starting to uncoil and was dark with sweat. Her gorgeous almond-shaped eyes were for now screwed closed and she wore drop earrings in rose gold and the stones were rubies.
They were the same earrings she had worn the night they had met.
He could remember vividly stepping into her villa and turning the light on and watching the woman he had seen only in moonlight come into delicious colour—the deep red of her hair, the pale pink of her lips and eyes that were a pure ocean blue.
Now Valerie had her arm around Beth’s shoulders and was telling her to try not to push.
For Elias there was a moment of uncertainty.
Could Mandy find someone else perhaps? Could he swap with Roger?
Almost immediately he realised there was no choice. From what Mandy had told him this baby was close to being born.
His baby?
Don’t miss THEIR SECRET ROYAL BABY by Carol Marinelli
Available March 2017
PRE-ORDER YOUR COPY TODAY
www.millsandboon.co.uk
Copyright ©2017 by Carol Marinelli
Also available in March from Mills & Boon Modern Romance is Carol Marinelli’s 100th book, THE INNOCENT’S SECRET BABY
ISBN: 978-1-474-05131-6
DANTE’S SHOCK PROPOSAL
© 2017 Amalie Berlin
Published in Great Britain 2017
by Mills & Boon, an imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers 1 London Bridge Street, London, SE1 9GF
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