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Di CESARE PREGNANT MISTRESS - Chapter 41
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‘Are you okay Stephanie? It’s not too late to change your mind, you know.’
Stephanie glanced around the packed register office, filled with friends and family, and in every conceivable space vases of flowers, and gave her brother a rueful smile. ‘I think it is. Mum would kill me—and you too, for suggesting it. She’s fretting enough as it is because the registrar has been held up by the snow.’
Daniel Stewart grinned, but his voice was serious when he said, ‘She and Dad wouldn’t mind. They’re worried you’re rushing into this marriage. I mean, they like Alexander, and so do I. He seems a good bloke—not like that last git you married,’ he muttered caustically. ‘I know Alexander will take care of you and the baby. But you haven’t seemed happy since you set the date for the wedding, and we all want you to be sure you’re doing the right thing.’
‘I am,’ Stephanie replied steadily, with no hesitation in her voice to betray the doubts that had plagued her for the last six weeks. She was done with worrying, she decided, her eyes straying across the room to where Alexander—looking stunningly handsome in a dark grey suit and blue silk shirt—was chatting to her father. During the many sleepless nights she’d endured since she had told him she was carrying his child she had fought a bitter battle in her head—unwilling to marry a man who would never love her, but desperate to give her unborn baby a secure and stable upbringing with both its parents. And, inevitably, the needs of her baby came first.
When Alexander had first made his shocking announcement that his child would not be born illegitimate, she had been adamant that she would not marry him. She had wrenched free of his arms and hurtled along the corridor in a frantic bid to escape him. But a sharp pain had made her seek the bathrooms, and the discovery that she was bleeding had sent her stumbling back to him, sheer terror and despair in her eyes as she sobbed that she was losing their baby.
To give Alexander his due, he had taken charge of the situation with the decisive determination of a military chief, lifting her into his arms and carrying her into the lift, then bundling her into the car that was already waiting out front and whisking her off to a private hospital.
The consultant she’d seen had tried to reassure her that occasional spotting in the first few months of pregnancy was not unusual, and that as Stephanie had no more pain everything was probably fine. An ultrasound scan had confirmed that their baby was developing normally, but as memories of her miscarriage had flooded back, Stephanie’s tenuous hold on her emotions had given way and she’d wept—as much for the baby she had lost as the one she’d feared she was about to lose.
From that moment on Alexander had taken charge of her life. And, although she despised herself for her weakness, Stephanie had let him. She had not even argued when he’d insisted that she move into the apartment he had recently leased. The doctor had suggested bed-rest for a few days, and Alexander had taken the suggestion so seriously that he’d only allowed her out of bed so that he could carry her to the bathroom.
His concern had had a bittersweet poignancy that had made Stephanie cry still more—because she’d known that it was for their baby rather than her.
Living with him day by day, loving him as she did, had been hell on earth, and she wept each night after he bade her goodnight, burying her face in her pillows to muffle the sound of her crying.
The days leading up to the fifteen-week mark, when she had suffered her first miscarriage, had been the worst of her life. But when the date had passed, and her pregnancy continued normally, a sense of calm had settled over her, and for the first time she’d begun to look to the future and believe that she might carry this baby full-term.
Their child deserved to grow up in a secure family environment, Alexander had argued stubbornly, when she had once again voiced her doubts that marriage between them could not possibly work. She had never heard him sound so passionate. It had been clear that now he was over his shock Alexander wanted their baby as much as she did, and was utterly determined that his child would not be born out of wedlock.
‘Well, if this registrar doesn’t hurry up, you may not have the wedding today anyway.’ Daniel’s voice broke into her thoughts. ‘Alexander’s looking decidedly tense. Hold up—who’s just arrived?’ he murmured, glancing over to the door.
But it was not the registrar who had just entered the room, and Stephanie gave a shocked gasp at the sight of a familiar grey haired figure.
‘James!’
For a man who had recently had treatment for a life-threatening disease, James Grainger looked remarkably well, and Stephanie told him so when she flew across the room to greet him.
‘You’re so tanned—and you’ve gained a bit of weight, thank goodness. How are you?’
‘Pretty good.’ James smiled. ‘A month on St Lucia with my sister and her husband did me the world of good. I haven’t got the all-clear yet, but I’ve got my fingers crossed,’ he told her cheerfully. ‘Now, tell me, how did you pin this man down?’ he chuckled, and Stephanie quickly turned her head, her heart sinking when she met Alexander’s unfathomable gaze. ‘Congratulations, Alexander. You couldn’t have found yourself a more wonderful, generous-hearted young woman than Stephanie.’
‘I agree—I’m a lucky man,’ Alexander replied quietly.
Something in his tone made Stephanie glance at him, sure she would see the familiar mockery in his gaze, but instead he looked—she frowned—shattered, and for a few seconds the expression in his eyes made her heart stop. But then his lashes fell, and she had the distinct impression that he did not want to meet her gaze. Perhaps he believed she had invited James to their wedding and was angry with her, she thought heavily.