LITMIR.BIZ

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and contemplating the mess she’d made of all this.

      He’d refused her offer of company, saying the dog had spent long enough in the car, and to be honest she was glad he’d gone without her because it had all become really awkward and uncomfortable, and if it hadn’t mattered so much she would have packed up the dog and her luggage and left.

      But then he’d said ‘yet’.

      Don’t do anything yet.

      She dropped her head back against the wall of the cabin behind her and closed her eyes and wondered what he’d really meant by ‘yet’.

      She had no idea.

      None that she dared to contemplate, anyway, in case a ray of hope sneaked back in and she had to face having it dashed all over again, but he’d had a strange look about him, and then he’d stalked off.

      Run away?

      ‘No! Stop it! Stop thinking about it. He didn’t mean anything, it was just a turn of phrase.’

      Maybe …

      She opened her eyes and looked up at the house, trying to distract herself. It was set up slightly above the level of the garden, possibly because of the threat of flooding before the sea wall had been built, but the result was that even from the ground floor there were lovely views out to sea across the mouth of the estuary and across the marshes behind, and from the bedrooms the views would be even better.

      She wondered where she’d be sleeping. He hadn’t shown her to her room yet, but it wasn’t a big house so she wouldn’t be far away from him, and she felt suddenly, ridiculously uneasy about being alone in the house with him for the night.

      Crazy. There was nothing to feel uneasy about. He’d stayed with them loads of times, and he’d stayed the night after Joe’s funeral, too, refusing to leave her until he was sure she was all right.

      And anyway, what was he going to do, jump her bones? Hardly, James just wasn’t like that. He’d never so much as looked at her sideways, never mind made her feel uncomfortable like some of Joe’s other friends had.

      If he had, there was no way she would have broached the sperm donor subject. Way too intimate. It had been hard enough as it was, and maybe that was why she felt uneasy. The whole subject was necessarily very personal and intimate, and she’d gone wading in there without any warning and shocked his socks off.

      It dawned on her belatedly that she hadn’t even asked if there was anyone else who might have been a consideration in this, but that was so stupid. He was a fit, healthy and presumably sexual active man who was entitled to have a relationship with anyone he chose. She’d just assumed he wasn’t in a relationship, assumed that just because he’d never mentioned anyone, there wasn’t anyone.

      OK, so he probably wasn’t getting married to her, whoever she might be, but that didn’t stop him having a lover. Several, if he chose. Did he bring them back here?

      She realised she was staring up at the house and wondering which was his bedroom, wondering where in the house he made love to the femme du jour, and it stopped her in her tracks.

      What was she doing, even thinking about his private life? Why the hell was she here at all? How had she had the nerve to ask him to do this?

      But he’d said ‘yet’ …

      She sighed and stopped staring up at the house. Thinking about James and sex in the same breath was so not the way forward, not if she wanted to keep this clinical and uninvolved. And she did. She had to, because it was complicated enough. She looked around her instead, her eye drawn again to the cabin behind her. It was painted in a lovely muted grey-green, set up slightly on stilts so it was raised above the level of the garden like the house, with steps up to the doors.

      She wondered what he used it for. It might be a store room, but it seemed far too good to use as a glory-hole. That would be such a waste.

      Home gym? Possibly, although he didn’t have the sort of muscles that came from working out. He looked like more of a runner, or maybe a tennis player. Not that she’d studied his body, she thought, frowning at herself. Why would she? But she’d noticed, of course she had.

      She dragged herself back to the subject. Hobbies room? She wasn’t aware that he had any. James had never mentioned it, and she realised that for all she’d known him for years, she hardly knew him. Not really. Not deep down. She’d met him nine years ago, worked with him for a year as his SHO, seen him umpteen times since then while she’d been with Joe, but he didn’t give a lot away, at least not to her. Never had.

      Maybe that was how she’d felt able to come down here and ask him this? Although if she’d known more about how he ticked she could have engineered her argument to target his weak spot. Or had she inadvertently done that? His reaction had been instant and unmistakeable. He’d recoiled from the idea as if it was unthinkable, but then he’d begun to relent—hadn’t he?

      She wasn’t sure. It would have helped if Joe had paved the way, but he hadn’t, and so she’d had to go in cold and blunder about in what was obviously a very sensitive area. Pushing his buttons, as he’d put it. And he’d said no, so she’d upset him for nothing.

      Except he hadn’t given her a flat-out no in the end, had he? He’d said don’t do anything yet. Whatever yet meant.

      She sighed. Back to that again.

      He didn’t really need another trip to the supermarket. They could have managed. He’d just needed space to think, to work out what, if anything, he could do to stop Connie from making the biggest mistake of her life.

      Or his.

      He swore softly under his breath, swung the car into a parking space and did a quick raid of the bacon and sausage aisle to replace all the breakfast ingredients Saffy had pinched, then he drove back home, lecturing himself every inch of the way on how his responsibility to Connie did not mean he had to do this.

      He just had to stop her doing something utterly crazy. The very thought of her with a total stranger made him gag, but he wasn’t much more thrilled by the idea of her conceiving a child from a nameless donor courtesy of a turkey baster.

      Hell, it could be anybody! They could have some inherited disease, some genetic disorder that would be passed on to a child—a predisposition to cancer, heart disease, all manner of things. Rationally, of course, he knew that no reputable clinic would use unscreened donors, and the checks were rigorous. Very rigorous. He knew that, but even so …

      What would Joe have thought about it? If he’d refused, what would Joe and Connie have done next? Asked another friend? Gone to a clinic?

      It was irrelevant, he told himself again. That was then, this was now, this was Connie on her own, fulfilling a lost dream. God knows what her motives were, but he was pretty sure she hadn’t examined them in enough detail or thought through the ramifications. Somehow or other he had to talk her out of it, or at the very least try. He owed it to Joe. He’d promised to take care of her, and he would, because he kept his promises, and he’d keep this one if it killed him.

      Assuming she’d let him, because her biological clock was obviously ticking so loud it was deafening her to reason. And as for his crazy reaction, that absurd urge to give her his baby—and without the benefit of any damn turkey baster—

      Swearing viciously under his breath, he pulled up in a slew of gravel, and immediately he could hear Saffy yipping and scrabbling at the gate.

      ‘Do you reckon she can smell the shopping?’ Connie asked, smiling tentatively at him over the top, and he laughed briefly and turned his attention to the shopping bags, wondering yet again how on earth he was in this position. Why she hadn’t warned him over the phone, said something, anything, some little hint so he hadn’t been quite so unprepared when she’d just come out with it, though quite how she would have warned him—

      ‘Probably,’ he said drily. ‘I think I’d better put this lot away in the fridge pronto.

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