Sandra Marton - The Princes' Brides - The Italian Prince's Pregnant Bride / The Greek Prince's Chosen Wife / The Spanish Prince's Virgin Bride

“Excellent. I’ll give instructions to forward the documents to you there. Goodbye, Your Highness.”

Click. End of conversation. Nicolo was holding a dead phone.

Black hadn’t inquired after Aimee. He hadn’t asked to speak to her.

Nicolo put the phone aside. As far as her grandfather was concerned, Aimee was a gambit in an intricate business maneuver.

At least the old man would not be able to use her anymore.

He looked at the front of the plane. At Aimee, at his wife, who sat so rigidly in her seat. What was she thinking? In less than two days, her world had turned upside down.

Her grandfather had all but told her that her only value was as a lure. She’d learned she was pregnant. She had been coerced into marriage.

And yet, she remained proud. Strong. Defiant.

Nicolo imagined going to her. Taking her in his arms. Telling her that everything would be all right, that she could trust him to take care of her, that he—that he—

That he what?

He had used her, too. He’d wanted the bank and now he had it.

Nicolo put back his seat, shut his eyes and did his damnedest not to think.

An hour out of New York, the attendant, a pleasant young woman who’d been with him for several years, appeared with a bottle of Dom Pérignon and a pair of flutes.

“I hope you don’t mind, sir,” she began, “but we all thought…” She fell silent, her eyebrows reaching for the sky as she took in the seating arrangements.

“Thank you,” Nicolo said quickly, “but my wife is exhausted and I didn’t want to disturb her. Perhaps we’ll have the champagne later.”

“Of course, sir.”

He smiled. Or hoped the way he curved his lips at least resembled a smile. Had he actually just explained himself to an employee? He didn’t explain himself to anyone, ever.

“If we change our minds,” he said, still straining to sound polite, “I’ll ring.”

The attendant knew a dismissal when she heard one. “Yes, sir,” she said, and started back toward the cockpit.

Aimee stopped her.

“Wait,” he heard her say.

The attendant leaned over the seat, listened, then smiled.

“That’s very kind of you, Principessa. Grazie.”

Nicolo waited a few minutes after the attendant left. Then he walked up the aisle and took the seat next to Aimee’s. Her face was turned to the window.

“Are you awake?”

The truth was he didn’t give a damn one way or the other. He was tired of her silence, her coldness, of the way she’d made him look foolish during the ceremony and again now.

It was time he made things clear.

She was his wife. She would treat him with respect at all times.

“Did you really think I could sleep?”

“Your behavior continues to be unacceptable.”

She looked at him then and the despair he saw in her eyes was like a knife to the heart.

That pain, knowing that she held him solely responsible for it, made him even more angry.

“Perhaps you didn’t hear me,” she said, as politely as she might speak to a servant. “I apologized.”

“Perhaps you whispered your apology,” he said coldly, “because I didn’t hear it.”

“I meant that I apologized to Barbara. The cabin attendant. It was sweet of her to bring champagne and I wanted her to know I hadn’t meant to be rude. You were right. There’s no reason for me to be discourteous to those who work for you.”

He could almost hear the part she left unsaid, that there was every reason to be discourteous to him.

In the name of all the saints!

All right. He had to calm himself. Not take every word, every intonation, as a personal affront. She was his wife; they had to find a way to make the best of things.

He would offer a conciliatory gesture.

“Well, that was generous of you.” He hesitated. “Would you like to join me for dinner?”

She turned her face to the window. “I’m not hungry.”

“It’s another three hours until—”

“I said, I’m not hungry.”

So much for conciliatory gestures. And that tone of voice! When had she begun using it? Did she know what an insult it was, to be spoken to that way?

She had surely grown up with servants and after watching how she’d just dealt with Barbara, he’d damned well bet she’d never treated an employee or a servant as she was treating him.

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