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But she had dear Louisa, Simon’s tiny but sprightly grandmother, spoiling them all with her old-fashioned country hospitality and simple joy in kinfolk. She, Maeve, was twenty-five and needed to grow up and enjoy simple pleasures like Louisa did.
Once outside, she set off towards the town and the air was still refreshingly cool. Normally she would have walked around the lake but it was Sunday, and Simon liked the Sunday papers. Did they print newspapers on Christmas Day? Would the shop even be open? She hadn’t thought of that before she’d left but if it didn’t then that was okay.
It was easier not to think in the fresh air and distractions of walking with a watermelon-sized belly out front cleared the self-absorbtion.
Maeve saw the black, low-to-the-ground, old-fashioned utility as it turned into the main street and smiled. A hot rod like you saw at car shows with wide silver wheels and those long red bench seats in the front designed for drive-in movies. It growled down the road like something out of Happy Days, she thought to herself. The square lines and rumbling motor made it stand out from the more family-orientated vehicles she usually saw. Something about it piqued her curiosity.
She stared at the profile of the man driving and then her whole world tilted. Shock had her clutching her throat with her fingers and then their eyes met. Her heart suddenly thumped like the engine of the black beast and the utility swerved to the edge of the road and pulled up. The engine stopped and so did her breath—then her chest bumped and she swayed with the shock.
It was Maeve! The connection was instantaneous. Like the first time. But she was different. He blinked. Pregnant! Very pregnant!
Rayne was out of the car and beside her in seconds, saw the colour drain from her face, saw her eyes roll back. He reached her just as she began to crumple. Thank God. She slumped into his arms and he caught her urgently and lifted her back against his chest, felt and smelt the pure sweetness of her hair against his face as he turned, noticed the extra weight of her belly with a grimace as he struggled with the door catch without dropping her. Finally he eased her backwards onto the passenger seat and laid her head gently back along the seat.
He stared at the porcelain beauty of the woman he’d dreamed about throughout that long horrible time of incarceration.
Maeve.
Pregnant by someone else. The hollow bitterness of envy. The swell of fierce emotion and the wish it had been him. He patted her hands, patted her cheek, and slowly she stirred.
Unable to help the impossible dream, he began to count dates in his head. He frowned. Pushed away a sudden, piercing joy, worked out the dates again. But they’d both used contraception. It couldn’t be …
She groaned. Stirred more vigorously. Her glorious long eyelashes fluttered and she opened her eyes. They widened with recognition.
Then she gagged and he reached in and lifted her shoulders so she was sitting on the seat and could gag out the door. She didn’t look at him again. Just sat with her shoulders bowed and her head in her hands.
He reached past her to the glove box and removed a small packet of tissues. Nudged her fingers and put them into her hand. She took them, but even after she’d finished wiping her mouth she still didn’t look at him and he glanced around the street to see if anyone had noticed. Thank God for quiet Sunday mornings. Quiet Christmas morning, actually.
Well, that was unexpected. Something going right!
Seeing Maeve outside and alone. So unplanned. Looking down at her, he couldn’t believe she was here in front of him. His eyes were drawn to the fragile V of the nape of her neck, the black hair falling forward away from the smoothness of her ivory skin, and he realised his heart was thumping like a piston in his chest. Like he’d run a marathon. Like he’d seen a vision of the future that was so bright he was blinded. Fool.
It felt like a dream. A stupid, infantile, Christmas fantasy … In reality, though, the woman of his dreams had, in fact, fainted and then thrown up at the very sight of him! He needed to get a grip.
CHAPTER THREE
After faint …
‘WHERE DID YOU come from?’ Maeve opened her eyes. Barely raised her voice because her throat was closed with sudden tears. She kept her head down. Couldn’t believe she’d fainted and thrown up as a first impression. Well, he shouldn’t have appeared out of nowhere.
‘America. Earlier this week. You’re pregnant!’
Der. ‘Does Simon know?’
‘That you’re pregnant?’
She sighed. Her head felt it was going to explode. Not so much with the headache that shimmered behind her eyes but with the thoughts that were ricocheting around like marbles in her head. Just what she needed. A smart-alec answer when she had a million questions.
Awkwardly she sat straighter and shifted her bottom on the seat in an attempt to stand. Frustratingly she couldn’t get enough purchase until he put his hand down and took hers.
She looked at his brown, manly fingers so much larger than the thin white ones they enclosed. Rayne was here. She could feel the warmth from his skin on hers. Really here.
He squeezed her fingers and then pulled steadily so she floated from the car like a feather from a bottle. She’d forgotten how strong he was. How easily he could move her body around. ‘I assume you caught me when everything went black?’
‘Thank goodness.’ She looked up at the shudder in his voice. ‘Imagine if I hadn’t.’
She instantly dropped her other hand to her stomach and the baby moved as if to reassure her. Her shoulders drooped again with relief.
‘You’re pregnant,’ he said again.
Now she looked at him. Saw the rampant confusion in a face she’d never seen confusion in before. ‘I told you that. In the letters.’
His face shuttered. A long pause. ‘I didn’t open your letters.’
Maeve was dumbstruck, temporarily unable to speak. He hadn’t opened her letters? The hours she’d spent composing and crunching and rewriting and weeping over them before she’d posted them. Wow!
That explained the lack of reply, she thought with a spurt of temper, but it also created huge questions as to just how important she’d been to him. Obviously not very. Not even being locked away in prison had been enough to tempt him to open her letters. She felt the nausea rise again.
He’d refused to talk to Simon too and she knew her brother had been hurt about that. He had hoped for some reassurance from Rayne that somewhere there was an explanation.
The guy was lower than she thought. She needed to protect Simon from being upset a day after his happiest day. That was a real worry. Or a diversion for her mind.
She tried to compose herself, get her thoughts together …
‘I don’t think you should see Simon until I can warn him you’re back.’
Rayne straightened. Lifted his chin. ‘I’m not going to hide.’
‘It’s not about you.’ She could feel the unfairness expand in her. This was not how she dreamed their first meeting would be. Why couldn’t he have warned her he was coming? Given her a chance to have her defences sorted? Dressed nicely? Put her make-up on, for goodness’ sake? She’d just walked out of the house in her expander jeans and a swing top. And trainers. She groaned.
‘Are you okay?’
She looked up. Saw the broad shoulders, bulging muscles in his arms, that chest she’d dreamt of for three quarters of a year. He was here and she wanted to be scooped up and cradled against that chest but he wasn’t saying the right things. ‘You can’t see Simon yet. He’s just got engaged. He’s happy. I won’t let you do that. You’ve upset him enough.’
He’d upset her too, though upset was an understatement. Hurt badly. Devastated. But then you reappeared at the right moment, a tiny voice whispered. The exact right moment. Just in time.
She saw a flicker of pain cross his face and she closed her eyes. What was she doing? Why was she being like this? Was she trying to drive him away?
She needed to think. It overwhelmed her that Rayne was here. As if she’d conjured up him by her need this morning and now she didn’t know what she should think. And he hadn’t known she was pregnant!
Rayne was having all sorts of problems keeping his thoughts straight. He could see she was at a loss too. ‘Maeve!’
‘What?’
He needed to know. Couldn’t believe it but didn’t want to believe it was someone else. ‘Are you pregnant with my baby?’
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