Her Pregnancy Surprise: His Pregnancy Bargain / The Pregnancy Secret / Their Pregnancy Bombshell

‘Oh, my God!’

Up to this point her back had been turned to it, but now she could see that the wall was covered, entirely covered from ceiling to floor in photos. Black-and-white prints that overlaid each other in a gigantic collage.

Even to her uneducated eye it was obvious that she wasn’t looking at snapshots. The subject matter was diverse. They ranged from stormy seascapes and wild mountain scenery to pictures of old wrinkled men sitting around a chessboard, pipes in hands, and women with babies on their backs and water-pots on their heads, to children with even older faces searching rubbish dumps for food.

Faces frozen in time or starkly beautiful places, the pictures all had a quality, not just great lighting or inspired subject matter, but an indefinable something that made the observer stand and stare. Megan did. Despite the urgency of her errand she stood for a long time just looking.

If Luc had taken these himself he was not only very well travelled, but incredibly talented.

She finally managed to tear herself away, her mind still filled with the images she had seen and Megan had to open several doors before discovering the bathroom. Was Luc’s mind as organised as his storage space? Unlike his bedroom, the bathroom was neither spartan nor rustic.

Megan looked around curiously and liked what she saw. It was tiled in pale cream stone tiles, which reflected the light flooding in through the roof windows. The bath, a freestanding decadent French slipper job that could have held half a football team. The bathroom in her flat could have fitted into the state-of-the-art shower cubicle.

‘So this hasn’t started well,’ she admitted to her reflection in the mirror. ‘That means things can only get better.’ With the best will in the world Megan couldn’t inject an authentic note of optimism into her voice.

When she went back downstairs Luc was in the kitchen area at the opposite end of the room. He had taken off his outdoor clothes, including the heavy sweater he had been wearing. He stood there in the dark moleskins that clung to the long line of his well-developed thighs. The rolled up sleeves of his pale blue shirt revealed the subtle sinewed strength of his forearms and the even tone of his dark skin.

Would there ever come a day when she would be able to look at him and not be paralysed with lust? Megan forced herself to release the air trapped in her tight chest.

He didn’t look up even though he must have heard her come down.

Perhaps he was hoping that she’d go away if he pretended she wasn’t there?

She watched as, very much at home in the kitchen, he rattled around in a competent manner in a cupboard, then walked over to a sink and filled a kettle. Even doing something mundane he was always a pleasure to watch and she was glad of anything that delayed the moment she would have to reveal why she was here.

She shifted her weight from one foot to the other and her elbow caught against the wall. She winced as pain shot up her arm. She rubbed it and realised that Luc was watching her.

‘Find what you needed?’

She nodded and he returned to his task. ‘Did you take the photos upstairs?’ She did feel a need to break the lengthening silence, but she was also genuinely curious.

‘Yes, did you like them?’

She nodded and then realised he wasn’t looking at her. ‘Very much, you’re very talented.’ Multi-talented, it would seem. ‘Did you train?’ He could easily have made his living out of them. It must have been hard to make the choice between writing and becoming a professional photographer.

‘No, I’ve always taken photos. When I was making a living doing something that bored me rigid it was the only thing that kept me sane.’

‘Why were you doing it if you hated it?’

Luc, who was taking a carton of milk from the big American-style fridge, had his back to her.

‘I had my own business, and I was doing it for the same reason most people do jobs they don’t like.’ He turned, his mocking gaze sweeping across her face. ‘Money.’

‘And did you make a lot?’

‘Yes, I made a lot of money.’ His long, curling lashes lifted from the slashing curve of his cheekbones. ‘And then,’ he added, pinning her with a mocking stare, ‘I lost it.’ He had sold everything he had to pay off the creditors and clients that his partner had stolen from. ‘All of it and then some.’

Aware that she wasn’t supposed to know about his business, she said, ‘That must have been terrible.’

‘I thought so at the time.’

‘I don’t think I could do that,’ she mused.

‘Do what? Lose money?’

‘Do something I hated just for money.’ The look she directed towards him was tinged with reproach. ‘Especially if I was as talented as you are.’ With no talent for anything artistic, she had always envied people who were.

His expressive mouth twisted in a derisive smile. ‘You could, believe me you could. Job satisfaction is nice, but so,’ he added drily, ‘is eating. I like to eat, most people do, and relatively few have the luxury of being able to pick and choose what they do. It’s easy to turn up your aristocratic little nose when you’ve never had to worry about money. You’ve always had the cushion of Daddy’s millions.’

A mortified flush travelled over Megan’s fair skin. She swallowed hard. His scalding derision was well deserved. She was deeply ashamed that she had sounded like a spoilt little rich girl.

Actually her strict parents had never overindulged her. They had gone out of their way to teach her the value of money, but Luc was right, she reflected with a repentant shake of her head—she didn’t know what it was to worry about money. Compared to many, her life had been easy.

‘You’re right, that was a really stupid thing to say.’ She heaved a sigh. How many women who had found themselves in her present situation had not had the luxury of choice?

It was a sobering thought. Sadly money did make a difference. ‘I do appreciate that I’m incredibly lucky, you know,’ she told him huskily.

The cynical sneer faded from Luc’s face as he stood there for a moment, recognising the unmistakable glow of genuine penitence shining in her blue eyes. The line above the bridge of his masterful nose deepened.

Megan got the impression that for some reason her response had surprised him…disappointed him even…as though he wanted her to do something he could disapprove of. She almost instantly dismissed this fanciful idea.

‘The photos really are very good, you know. Have you ever though of exhibiting any?’ she wanted to know.

‘Have you been talking to Malcolm?’

Megan froze guiltily. ‘No, yes…well, he didn’t want to tell me you were here. Why do you ask?’

‘Oh, I thought maybe he had sent you here as his advocate.’

She shook her head. Her instincts told her to drop the subject but her curiosity wouldn’t let her. ‘Advocate for what?’ she asked.

‘Oh…’ he shrugged carelessly…’his latest money-making project. Ever since Malcolm saw my gallery upstairs he’s been nagging me to publish a book of them.’

‘And you don’t want to?’ It sounded like a great idea to her. ‘If Uncle Malcolm says there’s a market for that sort of thing, I’m sure he’s right,’ she ventured tentatively.

Her earnest defence of her uncle brought an amused, ‘Are you sure he hasn’t got to you?’

‘No, he hasn’t, but if he had I’d have told him the best way to get you to agree was to let you think it was your brilliant idea to begin with.’

He looked at her, startled for a moment, then the stern lines of his face melted into a grin.

Megan grinned back. ‘I did a psychology module in my first year at uni,’ she explained.

Her laughing eyes meshed with his, the moment of harmony didn’t last long. At almost the exact moment that Megan recognised the atmosphere had changed, that the air between them throbbed with unspoken and dangerous things, Luc stopped laughing. Megan touched her tongue to the perspiration beading her upper lip and the pupils of Luc’s eyes dramatically dilated. She saw him swallow before his dark head angled away from her.

‘Tea or a beer?’ he asked, not looking up.

‘Tea.’ If he could act as though nothing had happened so could she. Maybe she was the one who had started reading sex into everything because she was obsessed—not Luc.

‘Do you mind if I sit down?’ She didn’t wait for his response; if she didn’t sit down soon she would fall. Her knees were shaking. She presumed it was a reaction to the confrontation—she hated confrontations. It couldn’t be good for the baby for her to feel this terrible. In an unconsciously protective gesture her hands went to her still-flat belly.

She sank into the soft chair and tried to think calm thoughts…it was an ambitious plan. Her brain was firing off questions one after the other in rapid succession; there was no let-up from the anxiety-inducing bombardment. How would Luc react? Was he going to be angry? Shocked, obviously—heaven knew she had been! Was he even going to believe her?

When Luc approached, mugs of tea in hand, Megan saw his bare feet. Her stomach muscles fluttered. How could she, how could anybody find bare feet erotic? Now hands, yes. Luc had the most beautiful hands, expressive hands with long, sensitive fingers…This time the tightening of her stomach muscles was vicious.

Catching the direction of her fixed gaze, Luc offered a curt explanation of, ‘Under-floor heating,’ before he nudged an open laptop to one side and set a mug of hot tea on the rustic oak coffee table.

Megan ran her fingers across the oiled surface of the wood. The cottage was filled with natural materials and textures and it was all very tactile and sensual. But nothing she had seen in the cottage made her want to reach out and touch more than the man who took a seat opposite her.

Megan nodded her thanks as her fingers closed around the hot, steaming mug, and pretended she was looking at the flickering images of the screen saver while she was actually greedily observing him fold his long length with fluid grace into a Kelim-covered sofa opposite her. Something in her stomach twisted painfully as she looked at him.

The feeling didn’t go away when she stopped looking.

Luc glanced at his watch.

The pointed gesture brought a resentful sparkle to her eyes. This was about the single most momentous moment in her life and he didn’t even bother disguising he couldn’t wait to see the back of her. Deep down she knew it was irrational to feel angry. Luc didn’t have the faintest idea why she was here—not that anything excused this boorish display of bad manners.

‘I’m so sorry if I’m keeping you from something more important,’ she drawled sarcastically.

‘Only a couple of thousand words.’ Luc, who hadn’t been able to write a word since he’d arrived at the cottage, lied. He leaned forward and rested his chin on the platform of his interlocked fingers.

Megan shivered as his silvered appraisal moved over her.

‘You’ve lost weight,’ he judged with a disapproving frown.

‘A little,’ she admitted.

‘It doesn’t suit you.’

Megan let the brutal observation pass; she recognised a perfect opening when she heard it. Then again, he wasn’t in the best of moods—perhaps she should wait. Wait until when you give birth…? Tell him, Megan, now…now…the voice in her head prompted urgently.

As she opened her mouth her heart was beating so fast she could hardly breathe.

‘Don’t worry, I’ll be putting the pounds on again soon,’ she said, fixing her eyes firmly on her hands clasped neatly in her lap.

There was a silence, which got longer until, frustrated to the point of screaming, Megan lifted her gaze to his.

‘You were supposed to ask why!’

‘Why what?’

‘Why will I be putting on weight…?’ she prompted.

A flicker of amusement momentarily lightened the wariness in his eyes. ‘Why will you be putting on weight, Megan?’ he asked obligingly.

‘I will be putting on weight because that’s what people do when they’re pregnant, which I am…pregnant, that is.’

There, it was out! She ought to be feeling a sense of release, but what she was actually feeling was sick…very sick. She pressed a hand to her mouth and waited, her eyes half closed, for the waves of nausea to pass.

When the imminent danger of throwing up had passed, she swallowed and opened her anxious eyes. Luc hadn’t moved a muscle since she had blurted out her news. She gave a frustrated sigh. Whatever he was feeling, she wasn’t going to see it here—a granite rock face would have been easier to read than those strong symmetrical contours. It was actually his total lack of response, his eerie stillness, that revealed he had even heard what she had said.

‘With your baby…obviously.’ She coloured. Maybe it wasn’t obvious at all to him?

It was possible that he thought she acted with equal wanton abandon with every man that took her fancy…

On the brink of making a disastrous confession, Megan bit her tongue. Luc didn’t need to hear how special he was, and the fact that she had never felt that way with any other man was something that ought to be kept on a need-to-know basis, and he definitely didn’t need to know!

‘Don’t worry, I’m not here to make a scene,’ she told him, gruffly earnest. ‘I just thought that you had the right to know. And,’ she added, ‘it’s not the sort of thing that’s easy to say in a letter. Actually it’s not the sort of thing that’s easy to say full stop,’ she added in a dry undertone. Belatedly she realised this comment might have come over as a little light on empathy. ‘Or hear,’ she tacked on generously.

Luc’s vibrant complexion had acquired a grey tinge as he lost the last shred of his habitual cool. She’d been prepared for shaken, but Megan got seriously alarmed when he suddenly buried his face in his hands. His classical profile was hidden from her view, but she could hear the laboured sound of his breathing from where she was sitting.

After a few moments his head lifted and she was relieved to see his colour was improved. ‘A baby…?’

She nodded, sympathetic to his traumatised condition.

He shook his head from side to side in the hope the action might kick-start his numb brain.

‘So you weren’t taking the pill…?’ He saw the pain flare in her eyes and thought, Good move Luc, let her think you’re blaming her, you insensitive bastard.

‘I’m afraid I didn’t think…I should…’

‘Neither of us thought, Megan.’ His expressionless voice cut into her disjointed stream of self-recriminations.

Megan lapsed into unhappy silence. Through the mesh of her lashes she watched his chest lift as he sucked in a deep breath.

‘I’m sorry, you must be—’

‘I’m not asking for anything from you,’ she interrupted quickly. She saw some emotion, indefinable but strong, flare briefly in his eyes before she ploughed heavily on. ‘I appreciate this is my responsibility. Of course, if you want to have some input, that is fine.’

CHAPTER TWELVE

‘INPUT…’ Luc repeated, looking at Megan as though she had run mad.

She exhaled a small gusty sigh of relief as she managed to wrench her fascinated eyes from the muscle in his lean cheek that was clenching and unclenching. ‘And if you don’t that’s equally fine,’ she told him with an upbeat smile. ‘There’s no pressure.’

‘Are you trying to be funny?’

‘I’m trying to be positive,’ she rebutted. Considering she was attempting to make this easy for him, he didn’t seem wildly appreciative.

His narrowed eyes scanned her face. ‘So you’ve decided to have this baby.’

‘You sound surprised?’

His brows lifted. ‘Well, what about your career?’

‘What about my career?’ Angrily, she pretended not to see where he was going with this.

‘I thought that was the most important thing in your life. The thing you’re prepared to sacrifice a personal life for.’

‘It is part of my life, and it is important, but my priorities have changed…’ Her expression grew defensive. ‘I’m allowed to change my mind.’

‘It could change again…?’

Megan’s heart gave a sickening thud. This was what she had been dreading him suggesting. She shook her head and ran her tongue over her dry lips. ‘No, I’ve thought this thing through quite carefully,’ she insisted. ‘I’m sorry,’ she said, feeling the prickle of hot tears behind her eyelids. ‘I can see how you’d like this to go away, but I want this baby.’

An expression of revulsion crossed his face. ‘Are you suggesting I would pressure you into having a termination?’

As this was exactly what she had assumed he was talking about, she just stared back at him mutely. His white-lipped fury gave lie to her assumption that he was taking this reasonably calmly under the circumstances.

Luc wasn’t calm, unless you considered volcanoes about to erupt calm!

‘I misunderstood,’ she admitted with a shrug. Misunderstanding or not, there was a point that needed making here. ‘Accidental or not, you’re the baby’s father…I can’t prove it, of course—’

‘For God’s sake, woman, of course it’s my baby. Do you think I imagine you make a habit of having unprotected sex any more than I do?’ he demanded impatiently. The furrow between his brows deepened as their eyes locked. ‘My God,’ he breathed. ‘You did think that, didn’t you?’

Megan shook her head, then nodded, then grabbed two handfuls of hair and grimaced as she rocked forward and back again. ‘I don’t know what I thought,’ she admitted huskily.

The anger faded from Luc’s face as he looked at the dejected, dispirited set of her hunched shoulders. ‘It must have been a confusing few weeks for you. It might make things a little easier to have someone to talk this out with…?’

The soft suggestion brought her head up with a snap. ‘Get any idea I came here to ask your advice right out of your head. I already know what I’m going to do,’ she ground out.

‘So basically what you’re saying is you’re going to do exactly what you want to, no matter what I say.’ His eyes, like molten silver, locked onto hers.

‘In a nutshell.’

Luc took a deep sustaining breath and told himself he didn’t have the right to be angry. What else could she have said? He’d backed her into a corner.

He even agreed with her, in the abstract, her body…her baby…her decision, but this wasn’t an abstract baby. This wasn’t just any baby. It was his baby…A few minutes ago he’d been aghast to hear what she had come to tell him, with bewildering speed his attitude had undergone a dramatic change. It amazed Luc how the idea of having a child could grow on a man.

‘So if you’ve thought this out, tell me, how are you going to cope with a baby and a demanding job?’

‘As luck would have it the firm I work for is relocating to a site nine miles from home so I’m going back,’ she explained. ‘It’s a good place to bring up a child. I should know; I was brought up there.’

‘And you’re expecting your mother to bring up your child for you…Have you considered that having a young baby foisted on her at her age might not be what she wants? What’s so funny?’ he wanted to know when her lips twitched.

Megan shook her head, she judged that he had had enough shocks for one day. Besides, this wasn’t her news to share. ‘Actually,’ she explained, ‘Mum is moving to Paris.’

The quiver of laughter in her voice made his strong features clench in disapproval. ‘Planning to give birth at your desk and be back at it the next day?’

‘I’m planning on taking maternity leave,’ she contradicted, ‘and afterwards…’ her shoulders lifted ‘…the firm has no problem with job-sharing.’ She’d been thinking on the way down that this might be the way to go. The balance between work and home was going to be hard to get right, but she was determined to strike a balance that she could live with.

Luc gave a thin smile, he didn’t bother to hide his scepticism as he snorted, ‘Job-sharing! Is the real Megan in there—?’ He stretched his hand out, intending to touch the side of her head.

Megan, who knew exactly what the casual contact would do to her, flinched away before he made contact. She saw his jaw tighten and repressed a groan. Well, she told herself, if he thought she couldn’t bear to have him touch her, so much the better. If he knew how much she craved his touch it would only complicate things even more—it wouldn’t do her pride much good either.

‘What do you mean?’ As if she didn’t know.

‘Well, you have to admit job-sharing doesn’t sound like you.’

‘You don’t know me.’ Neither do I, these days. ‘And why do you assume that I’m going to be a disaster as a mother?’ she asked sharply. She might not have felt this angry if his dig hadn’t magnified her own fear that she would be inadequate for the daunting task of parenting.

‘Why do you assume that I’d be relieved to offload my responsibilities to this baby?’ he countered.

Protesting that it wasn’t the same thing at all would have laid her open to a legitimate accusation of sexism. Instead Megan shook her head and insisted, ‘I didn’t.’ Then added weakly, ‘Not exactly.’

‘I just don’t believe you sometimes. You think I’d let my child grow up not knowing who the hell I was!’

He shook his dark head and she thought, God, he’s furious.

‘As for all that rubbish about you being responsible, like they say it takes two…and I was most definitely there. Or had you forgotten?’

His response was the first indication she had had so far that he wanted anything to do with the baby and Megan wasn’t sure how she felt about it. What was he talking about anyway? Gifts and cards on birthdays and Christmas? Every other weekend and alternate summer holidays?

The image of a future where Luc turned up with his latest girlfriend in tow to take their child to the zoo filled her with horror.

‘I wish I could forget!’

A raw silence fell between them.

A cautious light entered her eyes as she looked across at him from under the protective shade of her lashes. She was almost sure he didn’t even know that he was grinding one clenched fist into the other open palm. It was very much the action of someone who was struggling to suppress strong emotions. She could see every sinew, every taut muscle of his lean body screaming with tension.

‘I’m going to be a father.’ He said it as it had just begun to sink in.

There was a blank look of incomprehension on his lean, devastatingly handsome features in the moment before he leapt to his feet in one lithe motion.

‘Luc…?’ He appeared not to hear her tentative voice as, with one fist clenched to his forehead in an attitude of deep thought, the other thrust in the pocket of his snug-fitting trousers, he began to pace from one end of the room to the other.

It was impossible, even in her present distraught frame of mind, not to look at him and experience a shivery frisson of sensation in the pit of her stomach while hearing the words lithe and luscious in her head.

‘If you need time to think about this, I understand…’ Coming here had been a mistake, a major mistake.

‘Shut up, I’m thinking.’

Megan’s eyes narrowed at his tone. ‘I’m being understanding,’ she told him wrathfully.

He looked over his shoulder and for a moment the intensity of his expression melted into a delicious grin. ‘Be understanding quietly, chérie,’ he instructed, pressing a finger to his lips.

Even without the grin the endearment would have got to her; with it she melted like butter on a hot knife.

He continued to pace for a few more minutes before moving back to the sofa. He sat on the edge, his body curving towards her so that their knees were almost touching. His body language created an illusion of intimacy that made it difficult for Megan to think straight. She had a horrible notion that her feelings were written in letters a mile high across her forehead as she gazed back at him, but she couldn’t do a thing about it.