by Metsy Hingle
Then he would lose his family, Steven told himself. Because for him there could be only one choice—Maria. She was his past. She was his present. And without her, he had no future. Picking up the afghan from the floor where she had kicked it off, Steven draped the throw over her. Unable to resist, he leaned down and pressed a kiss to her lips.
Maria’s lashes fluttered. She opened her eyes, stared up at him out of brown eyes soft and dreamy with sleep. “Steven?”
“Yes,” he whispered. “I didn’t mean to wake you. Go back to sleep.”
“You’re real, then? Not a dream?”
He smiled, smoothed the hair away from her brow. “I’m real.”
She reached up, touched his face as though to assure herself he was indeed flesh and blood. “I was dreaming about you…about us.”
He turned his face into her palm, kissed it. “I hope it was a good dream.”
“It was,” she said, a smile curving her lips. “We were at Nicholas and Gail’s wedding. Only it wasn’t their wedding, it was ours.”
“I like the sound of your dream.”
“But it was only a dream,” she said, the smile fading. “It wasn’t real.”
“It can be real. I want it to be real,” he told her. “I love you.”
“And I love you. Oh—” she gasped.
“What is it?” he asked, the blood in his veins chilling as she clutched her stomach and took several sharp breaths. “What’s wrong?”
She whooshed out another breath, then pushed up on her elbows so that she was half-sitting, half-reclining. “It’s the baby. Our son or daughter decided to practice field goal kicks again.”
“Field goal…” He shifted his gaze from her face to her belly and back again. To his surprise, she was grinning. “I don’t understand. Are you all right? Is something wrong with the baby?”
“We’re both fine.”
“But you cried out… You were in pain,” he argued.
“Just for a minute. Our baby packs quite a kick.”
“Is that normal?” he asked, immediately concerned. He’d never spent any time around babies, or pregnant women for that matter. What he knew about both wouldn’t fill a thimble.
“It’s normal at this stage in the pregnancy.”
Steven swallowed as he digested that information, awed by the evidence of the tiny life that they had created—a life that was now growing inside Maria. “Does it hurt very much?”
“Only for a second or two. It’s more uncomfortable than anything. And surprising,” she added while she smoothed a hand over her stomach. “I think our baby’s impatient to be born.”
“You’re not…” He swallowed back the panic that was climbing in his throat and tried again. “You’re not about to go into labor or anything, are you?”
Maria laughed. “No,” she assured him and laughed even harder. “At least I hope not anytime soon.”
Especially not when the nearest doctor was miles and miles away, he thought, worry settling over him again.
“Relax, Steven. The baby isn’t due for another two months.”
“But you said yourself, he or she is impatient to be born. What if—”
“Steven, the baby’s just active. It doesn’t mean I’m ready to have it. It just means— Oh, there it goes again,” she said and grabbed his hand. She pressed it to her belly. “Can you feel it?”
Suddenly the baby kicked. Steven started. “I felt it,” he said, awed by the sensation. When it kicked again, he broke out into a grin. “There it is again. Did you feel it?”
“Yes, I felt it,” she said and gave him an indulgent smile.
“Dumb question, huh?” he countered, laughing at his own foolishness. “Of course, you felt it.” But he couldn’t help it, he had felt his son or daughter moving in Maria’s womb for the first time.
“It is pretty amazing, isn’t it?”
“You’re the one who’s amazing.”
Her smile slipped a notch. “Not all that amazing. Neither one of us were planning on a baby and I got pregnant.”
“I was there, remember?” He tipped up her chin, forced her to look at him. “We may not have planned it, but I’m happy about the baby, Maria. Are you?”
“Yes. I want this baby. I really do. I just wish…I just wish things could have been different.”
“What? That it’s father wasn’t a Conti?” he asked, the accusation out before he could stop himself. Irritated with himself for lashing out as he had, he looked away. “I’m sorry,” he muttered.
Maria touched his shoulder. “Look at me, Steven.”
He turned toward her, prepared to see the rejection in her eyes. Instead there was only tenderness. “I’m glad you’re my baby’s father. When I said I wished things could be different, I meant the problems between our families.”
“They’re not our problems,” he told her, relief flooding through him. Relief and hope. He caught her hands, held them in his and stared into her eyes. “The feud between our families has nothing to do with us. We won’t let it.”
“But it does and it will,” she insisted.
“Maria—”
“I’m afraid, Steven. I’m afraid of the Conti curse. Of what might happen to our baby.”
“I won’t let anything happen to you or our baby,” he promised. “What can I do to make you believe me?”
“I believe you’d do everything possible to protect us, but there are some things that not even you can control.”
“Maria,” he began, frustrated that he couldn’t make her see that the curse was nothing more than a foolish superstition.
She pressed a finger to his lips. “Let’s not argue.”
“All right,” he murmured against her fingertips.
When she struggled to get up, Steven took her hand and helped her to her feet. “Thanks,” she said. “The bigger I get, the harder it is getting up and down. I probably look like a beached whale.”
“I think you look beautiful.”
“You’re either being kind or you need glasses.”
“I’m being honest. I don’t think I’ve ever seen anyone more beautiful than you are at this moment.”
She flushed. “Thank you.”
“I’m the one who’s grateful,” he told her. And he was. Grateful that he’d found Maria and that she was going to have his child.
“Let’s see if you’re still grateful after I fix us dinner. My culinary talents are limited to cookies and gelato.”
“Then why don’t I make dinner?”
“You can cook?” Maria asked, a combination of surprise and skepticism in her tone.
Steven scoffed. “My family owns one of the best Italian restaurants in Boston. Of course I can cook. Any special requests?”
“Surprise me.”
Eight
Steven surprised her by serving a superb chicken marinara with penne pasta, a green salad and some of Magdalene’s homemade bread that he’d taken from the freezer, warmed and slathered with garlic butter. Suddenly it dawned on her that in the year that she’d known Steven, the two of them had never shared an intimate meal together that had been prepared by one of them. Oh, they’d eaten together, but it had always been something delivered by hotel room service or served in some out-of-the-way restaurant where they wouldn’t run into anyone they knew.
“Penny for your thoughts,” Steven said as he handed her the sauce pan to dry.
“I was thinking that I’ve shared more home-cooked meals with you here in Montana than I did all of this past year in Boston.”
“Not by my choice,” he reminded her.
It was true. Steven had pleaded with her time and again to spend the evening with him at his apartment or to allow him to spend it at her place. And always she’d refused, fearful that someone might see them together at his apartment and unwilling to risk her family seeing him at hers. “You know why I insisted on keeping our relationship a secret,” she said defensively.
“Yes, I knew. But I never agreed with it. An
yway, there’s no point in worrying about someone finding out our secret now. They’re all going to know soon enough. And the longer we put off telling them, the more difficult it’s going to be.” He dried his hands and hung up the dish towel. “We have nothing to be ashamed of, Maria. Nothing.”
“I’m not ashamed.” And she wasn’t. She was simply scared—scared of disappointing and hurting her family, of letting them down. Scared of disappointing Steven. Scared that she would put her baby in danger.
He turned to her, held her shoulders. “Then say that you’ll marry me and we’ll go to see our families together and tell them about the baby.”
“Meow.” Sophia rubbed up against her ankles, then began to wind her body around Steven’s legs, meowing all the while.
Seizing on the interruption, Maria said, “I need to feed Sophia.”
Steven’s mouth hardened, but he released her without pressing her for an answer. “I’ll feed her for you,” he said.
“Thanks.”
“It’d probably be a good idea to get a weather update,” he suggested.
“I’ll check the radio in the den.”
He nodded. “As soon as I feed Sophia, I’ll fix us some hot chocolate.”
“That sounds great.”
“Your timing sucks,” he muttered to the cat as he walked over to the counter and took the leftover cut-up chicken he’d set aside earlier and dumped it into her dish.
Smiling at this soft side of Steven, Maria exited the kitchen and headed for the den. She flipped on the radio and after listening to an update about closing roads and expectations of more snow, she switched it off and popped Faith Hill’s newest release into the CD player. As Faith began to sing about love and heartache, Maria walked over to the window. Pushing the drapes aside, she stared out into the darkness at a world blanketed in white. Isolated as they were, it was so easy to forget about Boston, about her and Steven’s families, about the problems they would soon have to face. So far removed from everything and everyone, she could almost pretend they were a normal couple in love and expecting a baby, that they could share a life together just as Steven claimed.
“Anything new on the weather?”
Releasing the drape, Maria turned around and watched as Steven entered the room carrying a tray. “Just more snow and some road closures. It was depressing, so I put on some music.”
“Ready for that hot chocolate?” he asked, setting the tray onto the floor in front of the fireplace. He knelt down beside it.
“Don’t you think the couch would be more comfortable?”
“Probably,” he said as he reached over, grabbed the throw pillows from the love seat and tossed them down onto the floor next to the tray. “But I doubt that the skewers will reach that far.”
“The skewers?” she repeated even as she sat down onto the floor across from him.
“For the marshmallows.” He held up a long wooden stick with a marshmallow on the end of it. “Evidently you were never a Boy Scout.”
Maria laughed. “No. And I wasn’t a Girl Scout either.”
“Then you’ve obviously missed out on one of the rituals of childhood.”
“Is that so?” she countered, enjoying the easy banter.
“Absolutely. But not to worry, I’ll teach you. I’m a master when it comes to roasting marshmallows.”
“My, my. Aren’t you the humble one?” she teased.
“Humility is overrated,” he told her. “Now pay attention. Observe the angle of the wrist,” he instructed as he held the marshmallow over the fire.
“Looks pretty simple to me.”
Giving her a dismissive look, he rotated the skewer slowly, allowing the flames to lick at the white puff until it turned a pale golden brown. After he removed it from the fire, he blew on the marshmallow a second or two, then held it up to her lips. “Prepare to be seduced.”
She was seduced. Not just by the warm, sweet, gooey marshmallow but by Steven as he fed her the tasty treats. “Enough,” she said laughing after he had fed her several of the roasted marshmallows. “I swear if I eat another bite, I’ll explode. As it is, I’m not sure I’ll be able to get up I’m so fat.”
“You look fine to me.”
“You’ve got to be kidding. I look like I’ve swallowed a basketball. Maybe you’d better schedule an eye exam when you get back to Boston.”
“There’s not a thing wrong with my eyes. I’ve always thought you were beautiful. But there’s a glow, a radiance about you now that makes you even more beautiful than ever,” he said.
“Thank you,” she murmured, not sure what to say.
“No need to thank me. It’s the truth.” Removing another marshmallow from the skewer, he ate half of it and offered the remainder to her.
Maria opened her mouth, allowed him to feed her the other piece. Her teeth grazed the pad of his finger and she swallowed hard as his eyes darkened to smoke. “No more,” she told him, looking away.
“You’ve got a little bit of marshmallow right here,” he told her, indicating the corner of her mouth.
Maria licked at it with her tongue, felt her pulse jump as Steven watched her with an intensity that was palpable.
“Hang on a second,” he said, his voice a deep rumble. Leaning closer, he flicked his finger near the edge of her mouth and then brought it to his lips.
Suddenly heat that had nothing to do with the fire spilled through Maria, igniting desire in her and awakening a need that had remained dormant for months. Once her pregnancy started to show, she’d been too shocked and worried to allow herself to be with him for fear he would find out her secret. Since she’d fled to Montana, she hadn’t wanted to remember what it was like to make love with him. But she remembered now. And the memory set off an ache inside her that made her cheeks heat and her palms dampen. Afraid she would do or say something foolish, she reached for her cup of chocolate. She drank deeply and tried to get a handle on her emotions and the desire that Steven had set off inside her.
“Maria, look at me.”
When she did as he’d asked, he removed the cup from her fingers and set it aside. Then everything seemed to move in slow motion as he took her face in his hands and began to lower his head. She registered the gleam in his blue eyes, the dark shadow along his jaw, the slight parting of his lips. And at the touch of his mouth, she trembled and closed her eyes.
He kissed her. Gently. Softly. Slowly. He kissed her as though they had all the time in the world. As though there was no outside world or families or problems, only them.
“You taste like chocolate,” he whispered, sliding his tongue along the seam of her lips. “And marshmallows. Sweet. So sweet,” he continued, seducing her with his mouth, making love to her with kiss after kiss. Her head was filled with his scent, with his taste, with his touch.
He lifted his head a fraction, angled it and kissed her again. And with each kiss, all the reasons she’d given herself why she couldn’t be with Steven began to fade. As though in a dream, she fell under the spell of Steven’s kisses, like a swimmer going under for the third time.
You should stop.
She heard the voice whispering in her head and ignored it. She didn’t want to stop. She wanted Steven to go on kissing her. He’d never kissed her like this before. Never with such exquisite patience. In the past, their time together had been filled with stolen moments and there was always a sense of urgency to their lovemaking. But not now. Now there were only slow, tender kisses that went on and on and on, until the ache inside her sharpened into hurt.
Pulling her mouth free, she sucked in a breath and stared up at him. “Touch me,” she pleaded. “I want to feel your hands on me.”
Steven’s eyes flashed, went even darker. And for a moment Maria felt a thrill of feminine power. But then his hand was on her breast. And she could no longer think. She could scarcely breathe as he squeezed and kneaded her sensitive flesh. When he lowered his head and closed his mouth over her sweater, Maria gasped. The moist heat of his mouth su
ckling her through the fabric was erotic and only fed the desire already running rampant inside her.
“I want to see you,” he whispered, his voice raw, his eyes filled with a savage hunger that made her pulse leap.
Fearing her voice would fail her, she nodded. As though in a dream, she watched him through half-slitted lids as he pushed up her sweater. The firelight shimmered off his dark hair and she slid her fingers through it. When he unclasped the hook at the front of her bra, his fingertips brushed her midriff. Sucking in a breath, Maria waited. Then what seemed an eternity later, his tongue circled her nipple. She gasped. Closing her eyes, she arched her back.
Steven took her into his mouth. Taking his time, he suckled, kissed, laved first one breast, then the other. With each touch of his lips, each stroke of his tongue, liquid heat pooled between her thighs. And finally when he closed his teeth around her nipple, gave it a gentle nip, Maria bit down on her lower lip to keep from crying out.
As though he sensed her need, Steven slid his hand down her hip, along the length of her skirt and beneath it. Then he smoothed his way back up the inside of her leg. When he reached the edge of her panties, his voice was ragged as he asked, “Do you want me to stop? God knows I don’t want to, but I will if it’s what you want.”
“No,” she managed to get the word out from a throat dry with need. “I don’t want you to stop.”
He made some sound deep in his throat and then he kissed her again. And as he kissed her, his hand found its way beneath the edge of her panties and he eased first one finger, then another inside her. He began to stroke her. Slowly moving in and out, in and out. And all the while he kept kissing her. More of those same painstakingly slow kisses that were driving her crazy. He slid his fingers inside, nearly withdrew, then entered her again.
Maria tore her mouth free, clutched his shoulders as she felt herself near flash point. “Steven,” she cried out as he entered her again, stroked that sensitive spot over and over until finally she exploded. She bucked beneath his hand, cried out again and then shattered into a thousand points of light.
Steven held her close, drinking in Maria’s cries as another orgasm ripped through her. Her response had his own desire spiking. When she went limp in his arms seconds later, he eased her back down onto the cushions. He kissed her gently. And after smoothing down her skirt, he tucked her against him, contented himself to simply hold her. Even though the ache in his groin would probably keep him awake for a good part of the night, he found some satisfaction in knowing that he had given her the sexual release.
