Page 238 of Modern Romance January 2025 5-8

SHEHADALWAYSloved their mornings.

‘Morning,’ he said, stroking her spine, and she turned and smiled right into his eyes.

And even if she was unsure of what lay ahead, waking to Dante would always be perfect.

‘You look like a panda,’ he told her.

‘I’m sure that I do.’

They just lay together and stared, and she didn’t quite know what to say.

It was Dante who spoke. ‘I didn’t think to ask you to the ball, because for me the ball is a duty. Yesterday it was the furthest thing from my mind.’ He sat up in the bed. ‘I’ll get coffee.’

‘Tea for me.’

‘Tea?’ He frowned. ‘Do you want some breakfast?’

‘No, thanks.’ Susie grimaced at the very thought, then saw him frown again. ‘Too much champagne,’ she said.

Dante nodded and picked up a towel. She lay back in his sumptuous bed, wondering how she could bear to leave, and how she could possibly stay.

Susie knew she was running away—but she didn’t want to see the disappointment in his eyes. She wanted him to find out from a distance...

Tea? Dante raided his cupboards, but there was no tea to be had.

Then he went into the dining room to collect a certain box, and saw the champagne that had been cooling there floating in a bucket of water.

Susie hadn’t even had a sip of champagne last night.

And she hadn’t yet said yes to an apprenticeship at Pearla’s, when it was everything she wanted.

Dante wasn’t a top attorney for nothing.

She was pregnant.

He waited for the punch in his guts, only it never came. But he did sit down at the dining room table for some time.

He rather guessed she didn’t want to have the baby here. If he was her attorney, he’d advise her to be on a flight back to England straight away.

Susie was possibly leaving. With his baby. But instead of being angry he didn’t blame her.

Had she known when he’d told her about what had happened with Rosa?

Dante put his head in his hands, thinking of their row after the wedding and all he’d said...

A baby.

Why was he just sitting there when he should be pacing?

Why wasn’t he panicking that it was too soon or pounding up the stairs?

A baby...

He kept going back to that...picturing something he’d never imagined for himself. A daughter or a son...

After so much pain and grief, the thought of Susie having his baby felt like a rusty knife being pulled from his chest.

But before all that he had to know Susie’s thoughts.