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“It’s beautiful,” she said softly. “And I am honored to wear it.”
Draco rose to his feet. “Anna,” he murmured, “bella Anna.”
She went into his arms and he kissed her, kissed her until the world floated away. They never heard Isabella come in, never heard her hurried departure.
But when Izzy quietly shut the apartment door, she was smiling.
They were married two weeks later in the little church Anna’s mother had always loved, on a street that was either part of Little Italy or Greenwich Village, depending on who you asked.
Sofia Orsini was thrilled with her new son-in-law, but she raised her eyebrows when he came to her at the party that followed in the observatory at the Orsini mansion and said he had a wedding gift for her.
It was the deed to the Sicilian land that sheltered the ruins of the castle that had belonged to his ancestors.
“Now it will belong to two families,” he said.
Sofia shook her head and gently gave the document back to him. She said she had no idea what he was talking about, but that it was good to know her Anna had married a man who loved Sicily.
He shook hands with each of Anna’s brothers, all of whom had been his best men—“Just try and talk me out of it,” he’d told the wedding planner, who had not been foolish enough to try—and laughed with them in a way that told Anna they shared something, but none of them would tell her what it was.
He kissed his sisters-in-law, who had been Anna’s bridesmaids, kissed the nephews and nieces he’d so suddenly acquired, and reserved a special hug for Anna’s maid of honor.
“Isabella,” he said, “Anna says you are the dearest sister a woman could possibly have.”
“You next, kid,” Rafe said to Izzy as he swept her away and danced her around the room.
“Right,” Izzy said brightly, and thought, Not me, not now, not ever in a million billion years.
And, finally, he walked up to Cesare.
“Anna thinks she despises you,” he said softly, “but the truth, signore, is that she loves you because you are her father.” He looked the don straight in the eye. “And you made up all that nonsense about your wife’s family and my land.”
The don permitted himself a small smile.
“I may have had my facts confused. Anything is possible.” He paused. “By the way,” he continued, as if what he were about to say was unimportant, “I knew your father. He was not the best of men but then, neither am I.”
Draco waited. Then he said, “And?”
The don smiled. “And, I suspect your father would be proud of the man you have become.”
At last it was time for Anna and Draco to say goodbye and leave on their honeymoon.
They were flying to Venice, on his private plane. It was big and luxurious; the center aisle had been garlanded with white roses.
Draco carried his bride down that aisle to the private bedroom in the rear of the plane and kicked the door shut after him.
“This is how it all began, cara,” he said softly. “A plane. And you. And me.”
Anna smiled as he set her slowly on her feet. She was wearing stilettos, of course. Still, she had to rise on tiptoe to kiss him, and then to put her lips to his ear and whisper something hot and wicked.
His eyes grew very, very dark. Slowly he shrugged off his jacket. Undid his tie. Unbuttoned his shirt.
“Anna,” he said in a voice that was pure sex.
Anna laughed and wound her arms around his neck.
“Draco,” she whispered. “What took you so long?”
