LITMIR.BIZ

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blinked rapidly at the half-egg shape under Evangeline’s red silk dress. He coughed out a dull laugh. ‘Got a pillow under there?’

      ‘No pillow. I’m having a baby.’ Evangeline bowed her head, cupped her belly and smiled. ‘Actually, two. I’m having twins.’

      Cooper pulled in his chin as if he were trying to digest the news. Or maybe he was counting backwards too. A fine sheen broke across his gelled back brow. ‘That happened quickly.’

      ‘Robert and I met the week after we broke up.’ Evangeline shrugged an apology. ‘Yes, it was very quick.’

      Evangeline’s unspoken words hung in the thick air.

      It wasn’t me who couldn’t fall pregnant, Cooper. It was you.

      After an awkward silence, in which the other woman held her stomach, Cooper knocked back his punch and Sophie withered in her shoes, Evangeline glanced over her shoulder.

      ‘He’s around somewhere. My fiancé,’ she explained, looking back with a weak smile. ‘You’ll have to meet him.’

      Cooper’s smile was practised, but his eyes hinted that he’d been struck hard.

      ‘Another time,’ he said. ‘We really ought to go.’ He drew Sophie closer. ‘Sophie needs her rest.’

      Sophie did a double-take. Had she understood Cooper correctly? Had he just let his ex know that she was pregnant too? She hadn’t even told her parents yet.

      While Sophie got her bearings, Evangeline’s fine eyebrows arched in astonishment, then delight. She looked as if she didn’t know if it was safe to smile. ‘That sounds like an announcement. Am I reading too much into that?’

      Lifting his chin, Cooper eased back his caped shoulders. ‘Triplets run in Sophie’s family.’

      Sophie almost spluttered. Then she almost slapped his face. How dare he use her like this. Divulge something so private and important merely to bolster his wounded sense of masculinity and show up his former girlfriend.

      Ears burning with indignation, Sophie found Evangeline’s eyes and pushed out through gritted teeth, ‘We’re keeping it quiet at the moment.’

      Evangeline nodded her understanding even as she threw out her arms and drew Sophie in. ‘I’m so happy for you both.’ She stretched on silk slippered tiptoe to place a no-hard-feelings kiss on Cooper’s cheek. Her eyes smiled her good wishes. ‘Obviously I just wasn’t the right one.’

      Sophie and Cooper said their goodbyes and left five minutes later. Cooper was uncommonly quiet on the drive home. That was fine, because if Sophie had opened her mouth, she’d have torn him to shreds. Did he have any idea how it felt to have your feelings dismissed like that? He constantly told her he wanted this to work, yet how could it when Cooper’s point of view and concerns were the only ones that counted? She was so upset with him she wanted to cry.

      When they entered his house, Sophie began to stride off without a goodnight. But Cooper held her back with a gloved hand on her forearm.

      She spun back to see him drag the cravat from around his throat. ‘Tomorrow I’ll move your things down to the guest room on this floor.’

      Sophie studied the shadows in his usually clear blue eyes. Why did he want her to move? And what gave him the right to demand like that? She thrust back her shoulders. ‘I’ll stay where I am.’

      ‘This is non-negotiable!’ His expression cut from stone, he glanced up at the stairs spiralling towards the mezzanine floor. ‘Those stairs are dangerous. I won’t take any chances.’

      Sophie’s laugh was devoid of humour. ‘Don’t I get a say in what’s dangerous and what’s not? Don’t I get a say in anything at all?’ She wrenched her arm from his hold. ‘How dare you tell your ex-lover that I’m pregnant?’

      His gaze ran over her like a belligerent hot press. ‘You can’t hide from this situation for ever, Sophie. I have as much right to share the news as you do.’

      ‘Without even consulting me first? That was nothing more than grandstanding at my expense.’

      He looked down to rip off his gloves. ‘We won’t discuss it now.’

      She knotted her arms over her waist. ‘Now who’s hiding from the situation?’

      His gaze pierced hers, and the pulse in his jaw kicked off again. ‘We were discussing where you’ll sleep from now on.’

      ‘How does my own bed at my own place sound?’ She shook her head, tears of frustration filling her eyes. ‘You’ve tried to push me around since I told you about the baby, but now you’ve gone too far.’

      He moved forward till he towered over her. His voice lowered, more gravel than steel. ‘I’ll go as far as I need. Some things are too important for compromise, and my child’s safety is one of them. You’re staying here, and you’re moving downstairs.’

      Bully. ‘No. I. Won’t.’

      Exhaling, he rushed a hand through his dark hair, then gave her a warning look. ‘I won’t argue with you, Sophie. In the morning you’ll see that I’m right—about everything.’

      He moved off towards an archway that led to the adjoining private theatre/TV room, but turned back to set a kiss on her forehead before disappearing.

      Trembling, hating his kiss but wanting it too, Sophie let out a long exhausted breath. She knew he could be over-protective, domineering. But seeing Evangeline had brought those qualities out tenfold, and she knew the deepest reason why.

      It wasn’t me. It was you.

      When she and Cooper had fallen pregnant so easily, he’d assumed that Evangeline’s difficulty in conceiving must be hers. But with his ex falling pregnant as quickly as Sophie had, the question of fertility—and infertility—had been tossed into the air again.

      Turning slowly, Sophie eyed the varnished timber, took several deep breaths, and then, lifting her peignoir skirt, ascended each stair carefully.

      Cooper had made it clear he wanted a family more than anything. It didn’t take a mind-reader to know that now he must wonder …

      Had the difficulty between he and Evangeline lain with him? Was this time—this baby—a fluke? No doubt he would get a specialist’s opinion, but Sophie doubted he would get it next week.

      Cooper had a light side, but ultimately he was a man who possessed determination. He’d funnel all his energies into making certain this baby was born safe and healthy. Incorporated into that objective would be his resolve to continue to keep this child under his watchful eye and protection.

      From the top of the stairs, Sophie gazed down at the soft flicker of the television dancing across the timber floor below.

      A part of her couldn’t help but sympathise with Cooper. Tonight had been a shock. But, damn it all, even if he did have a point about the stairs, it didn’t mean he had the right to bring down the law and expect her to jump.

      Removing her drop earrings, she headed for her room.

      Tonight she would let him unwind.

      Tomorrow she needed to decide whether it was time to call this charade off.

      CHAPTER NINE

      SOPHIE woke the next morning feeling awful. She’d barely managed any sleep. Her mind had been a tumult of revolving conversations from the previous night. Most particularly those final moments with Cooper.

      Dragging her feet, she showered, dressed in a baggy jumper and jeans, and for the hundredth time contemplated how best to handle the scene that would no doubt confront her this morning. She was not prepared to bow to Cooper’s demands. She’d been crazy to accept this challenge in the first place. Never again would she be made to feel as if her opinion didn’t

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