Page 30 of His Secretly Pregnant Cinderella

CHAPTER FOUR

WHENTHEDOCTORARRIVED, Constantine knew that he should let the man see to his business, but he could not help himself. He wished to be in the room. He wished to be there to hear everything. And he told himself it was a necessity. A responsibility. One that his parents had left to him. Along with the innumerable other responsibilities that fell in his lap.

The business, everything else.

But he just wanted to be there. That was the truth of it.

When he led the man up to the room, along with the nurse, and the ultrasound equipment, and knocked, it took a while for him to get a response.

And then when he did, desire was a living, growling beast inside of him. And he could not hide his reaction. Not even in front of the doctor.

Because when Morgan answered the door, she was bright red and scrubbed clean, as if she had been in a warm bath. And she was wearing nothing but a white robe.

When she saw him, her eyes widened. “Oh.”

“The doctor’s here,” he said.

“All right.” She blinked. “I see.”

“Do not worry, child,” the doctor said. “I have a great amount of experience with this. I was Delia’s doctor when she had her children.”

Which of course betrayed the doctor’s advanced age. But, Constantine had thought that it was appropriate. To make sure that the heir of Alex had the exact same amount of preferential treatment as Alex had had. As Constantine himself had had.

“Oh. I see. Well...”

“We will begin with some simple questions.”

Dr. Papasifakis had a gentle bedside manner, and as they all eased their way into the room, he could see that when Morgan looked at the doctor, she began to relax slightly.

“Go ahead and sit,” Dr. Papasifakis said.

She did, in the lush, magenta chair in the corner, that was cast in gold like everything else in the ridiculous room.

And somehow, Morgan looked like a fairy in the surroundings. And it did not look ridiculous. He gritted his teeth and turned his attention to the doctor.

“And when was the date of your last menstrual cycle?”

Morgan gave it, and Constantine did his best to ignore the answers that she gave.

He let the dates, including the projected due date that the doctor mentioned, blur in his mind. He thought of Alex. Of all he was missing. That he was standing here when his brother should be. That he was doing all he could to honor his brother, to protect his legacy going forward.

It had to be that.

And then the doctor instructed her to lie down on the bed for the ultrasound.

“Could you...? Constantine...?”

“I will turn away,” he said.

“I...”

“It is...” He bit back the scathing comment he was going to make about how he had already seen the whole of her, so there was no use being modest now. Nobody needed to know. And even as his body was gripped with the desire to see her, he turned away, while the doctor and the nurse readied her for the scan.

He heard the preparations, but he did not allow himself to look, instead he focused on one of the butterflies on the wall. A delicate, lavender colored paper creation. It was fragile, like Morgan. And far more intricate than he had ever truly noticed before. He did not spend a great deal of time in this room, or rather any. And so he had not realized how much detail had gone into each and every thing. Amazing, how you could see something hundreds of times, and never truly understand what it was you were looking at.

He thought again of Morgan, and his stomach went tight.

“Here we are,” the doctor said, as a strange watery sound filled the room. Followed by a steady beat. “We have the heartbeat. And a boy.”

---