Phantom Marriage

CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

BY THE TIME Friday morning came, Veronica really started to worry about her missing period. It was no use. She couldn’t help it. She knew the odds of her being pregnant were very small, but not impossible. Her stomach somersaulted at the thought.

Because what if she was pregnant? Lord, what a disaster!

Logic told her she was panicking for nothing, but logic didn’t always figure in life. She kept telling herself that she didn’t feel pregnant. There was no light-headedness, or being sick in the mornings, or swollen nipples. Of course, all those symptoms usually came later, not after just one week.

Sighing, she arose and dressed, still not having fulfilled her bucket list of activities for Capri. This morning she planned to go on the chairlift up the mountain, then later in the afternoon she would take a trip out to the Blue Grotto. Sandwiched in between she would walk, walk and walk some more. If nothing else, all the walking should make her sleep tonight. She didn’t want to lie there worrying about having Leonardo’s baby growing inside her body.

It would have been a marvellous day, Veronica thought as she finally trudged up the steps to the villa just after six, if that last horrific thought hadn’t plagued her mind every five minutes. Not that having a baby was horrific. It was having Leonardo’s baby that horrified her. Because the stupid man would offer to marry her. And the last man on earth she wanted to be married to was a playboy—hardly a recipe for happiness for ever. Okay, so she was in love with the man. Stupidly. Hopelessly. And, yes, if there was to be a child, she would be severely tempted to say yes if he proposed. After all, she had personal experience of growing up without a father and she wouldn’t wish that on any child.

And in truth Leonardo would probably be a good father. But he would be a hopeless husband. And undoubtedly unfaithful. That was something she could not bear, not after her experience with Jerome. If and when she married, she wanted her husband to be so besotted with her that he would not even look at another woman.

Veronica retrieved the key from the geranium pot, let herself in, dumped her hat and bag on the lounge then walked over to the kitchen area. There, she put on some water for coffee before heading for the bathroom, where a visit to the toilet showed nothing of note.

Naturally.

Cursing under her breath, she flushed the toilet, washed her hands and went back to make herself the coffee. Cradling the mug in her hands, she wandered out to the terrace in the hope of finding some peace with the soothing water view. She didn’t. For the first time since coming here, she found no pleasure whatsoever in gazing out at the Mediterranean. Her mind was too full of worry to find pleasure in anything. She was severely tempted to ring her mother and talk things out with her. They were very close, and rarely kept their problems from each other. Not only that, her mother was much less emotional than she was, and not given to dramatising situations or making mountains out of molehills.

The intelligent part of Veronica’s brain told her that the odds of her being pregnant were very low. But she needed someone else to reassure her that she was panicking unnecessarily. So, as she sat there sipping her coffee, she worked out what time it was in Australia. All you had to do, she’d discovered after putting the question into her father’s computer, was take off two hours from the current time, then change the a.m. to p.m. and vice versa. By eight tonight, it would be six in the morning in Australia, the time her mother usually rose come rain, hail or shine.

It was just after seven here now, and Veronica decided to get herself something to eat. By the time she picked up the phone an hour later, a nervous tension was gripping her stomach. She didn’t want to worry her mother with what was possibly a non-existent problem but she desperately needed her advice.

‘Veronica?’ her mother answered. ‘I didn’t expect to hear from you. What’s up?’

Trust her mother to twig straight away that there was something wrong.

‘Nothing, I hope.’

‘That sounds ominous.’

‘Sorry, I’m not trying to alarm you. I just want to run something by you. Mum, you know how I’m always very regular. With my period, I mean.’

‘Yes…’ her mother said warily.

Veronica sighed. ‘Well, I’m late.’

‘Ah.’

‘Yes, ah. I don’t think I’m pregnant, but it is possible if ovulation was delayed.’

‘Are you telling me you had unprotected sex with a playboy?’

She sounded aghast. And highly disapproving.

Veronica steeled herself. ‘Yes. I’m afraid so.’

‘Oh, for pity’s sake! How come? I would have thought this Leonardo Fabrizzi would be more careful than that.’

‘The first time, it just sort of happened. I mean…we both got carried away.’

‘That doesn’t sound like you.’

‘It’s not. But I did. Then when Leonardo came to his senses he asked me if an unwanted pregnancy was on the cards. I told him it wasn’t. At the time I assumed I’d already ovulated. The trouble was he assumed I was on the pill.’

‘And you let him think it.’

‘Yes.’