Baby's On The Way!

CHAPTER SEVEN

LEO SAT LISTENING to the kettle coming to the boil, wondering whether he should wake Rachel. After a long walk down the beach yesterday afternoon, and a portion of fish and chips for dinner, she’d crashed almost as soon as they’d arrived back at the house. And had been asleep more than twelve hours. He wondered whether she’d been working too hard. Weren’t pregnant women meant to take things easy? Perhaps she’d been overdoing it. Should he say something?

But what right did he have to even ask her that? Did the fact that she was carrying his child give him a right to question what she was doing? He shook his head. There were still so many things they hadn’t discussed. But discussing meant deciding. And deciding meant getting it in writing, laminating and deviating only on the point of death.

He made a coffee and decided to leave her. She’d wake when she was ready. And maybe he could subtly ask her later whether she thought she should be taking things easier. He really needed to know more about pregnancy, about babies. He’d never given any thought to starting a family; it had always seemed a distant, uncertain thing. And he’d never imagined he’d be facing it with someone he barely knew. Perhaps he could ask his mum these questions. He’d have to tell her. And his dad, too.

He gave a shudder as he acknowledged what he’d been trying to ignore since he’d first found out about the baby. He’d have to see his family. His brother. He’d avoided him for years, had barely seen him since he’d left school. He knew that he was hurting his parents, that they despaired of ever seeing their family all together again. But what else could he do—sit down to a happy family dinner with him? The man who had made his life miserable—who had led the school bullies. So miserable that when he’d left school, escaped them, he’d sworn that he’d never again find himself in a situation he didn’t like without an escape route. Which was why the news that Rachel was pregnant had terrified him. Because if there was any situation more impossible to escape than this one, he didn’t want to know about it.

She would want to make a start on that plan this morning. Even when she’d been falling-over tired last night she’d mentioned wanting to do it. It was only the interruption of an enormous yawn that had made her listen to him and finally take herself off to bed—and a promise that they could talk about it today.

He only knew one thing for certain—no child of his would be subjected to the experience he’d had. He wanted a better life for him, or her.

What were the other headings in Rachel’s magnum opus? Finance? She obviously knew—or thought she knew—that he was well off. After all, he’d made the generous donation she’d not so subtly hinted at the night of the fundraiser. But that was family money, not his. He’d always been happy to send his trust-fund proceeds the way of those who really needed them—but had never used it for himself.

He’d seen the damage done when people inherited money without responsibility. Stick a load of those with an inflated sense of self-worth together, with insufficient supervision, and you had a recipe for disaster—and emotional torture in his case. If Rachel thought that she’d found herself a meal ticket she would be sadly disappointed. But he didn’t really think that was what she was interested in.

Creaking floorboards upstairs told him that she was awake. He gave a start, half pleased at the thought of seeing her, half dreading the discussion he knew would inevitably come. Remembering the hour she’d spent in the bathroom the night he’d stayed at her flat, he expected a little more grace before he had to face her, but then he heard her footsteps on the stairs.

For half a second, he wondered if he’d be treated to the sight of her in some sort of skimpy nightwear. The sight of her perfectly prim jeans and soft sweater reminded him she’d come here prepared for a business meeting. At least she wasn’t clutching her tablet. In fact, he couldn’t even see her phone on her. Though looking for it gave him a brilliant excuse for thoroughly checking out the pockets of her jeans.

‘Morning,’ he said, standing up from the table. Once he was on his feet, he wasn’t sure why he had done it, except that it seemed impossible not to react to her, not to want to get close. ‘Can I get you anything?’

He bit his tongue to stop the flood of questions filling his mouth. She had more colour in her cheeks than she had the previous afternoon, but he was still worried. As he reached her side, he rested a gentle hand on her shoulder, turning her to face him. ‘Did you sleep well?’ he asked, looking for any sign that she wasn’t completely recovered from yesterday. An overwhelming need to protect her swept over him, and the hand on her shoulder slipped to her waist, pulling her closer. Once her body was near enough that he felt her magnetic pull, all thoughts of protecting her flew out of his mind, and were replaced with something hotter, more urgent. He pulled the arm around her waist tight, and dipped his head. His eyes were already closing as his body remembered the feel of hers, as his lips tingled with remembered sensation.

And then he was cold, his body left bereft as Rachel turned and pulled away until his arms were empty.

‘I’ll make the coffee,’ she said, the shake in her voice at least showing that she wasn’t completely immune to him. ‘And I could murder some carbs. What is there for breakfast?’

He pulled his brain back to the real world, the one where they weren’t a lust-filled couple shacked up together for a fun weekend. To the world where an ill-thought-through night had led to a baby, a lifetime of commitment, and he was momentarily glad that her self-control had outwitted his libido. ‘Toast? Cereal?’ He tried to keep his voice level, to take her cue and pretend that his clumsy attempt at a kiss hadn’t happened. But he couldn’t forget it, couldn’t forget how it felt to be fractions of a second from bliss, and then left cold and wanting her.

She nodded, her body stiff, her smile a little forced. He threw bread into the toaster, dug around in the cupboard and put together a carb-loaded platter: muffins, crumpets, toast and cereal, anything to keep mind and body busy and away from her. They feasted on the breads, slathered in honey and jam, and conversation eventually started to flow between them almost as smooth.

He remembered the challenge he’d set himself that night. The way the sound of her laugh had so entranced him he was determined to make it happen again and again. The effect hadn’t worn off. Every smile and chuckle became a challenge to make it grow. He felt himself relax as she slouched a little more in her chair, as her words flowed easy and her smiles grew. Every chime of her laughter swelled a light in his chest, something primal and basic, something he couldn’t control, or make himself want to.

As they finished up with breakfast, he was tempted to hold his breath, to hold on to these moments of happiness, because something told him that this was borrowed contentment. That it wasn’t real. Maybe this was in her plan all along, softening him up before she started. No need to spook him by hitting him with talk about the plan the minute she was up. Instead she lulled him into a false sense of security, waiting until he entered a food coma until she made her move. With the prospect of having to make some sort of plan on the horizon, he couldn’t see what was real and what was his fear manifesting as paranoia.

She was fidgeting as they cleared the table, clearly getting more and more uncomfortable. There was tension in her shoulders and a tightness in her muscles that he didn’t like. And he knew the only thing that would get rid of it. She was still flailing after he’d ripped up her plan. Writing a new one would ease her worries, make her feel safe.

Of course he’d discovered one other way of finding the relaxed, happy, free Rachel. And he knew which of the two—drawing up a schedule for the rest of his life, or a long, languorous morning of lovemaking—he would prefer.

But he also knew which of the two Rachel needed today. So he swallowed the very tempting suggestion and did what he hoped was the right thing. ‘I think we should take a look at this plan.’ He ran his hands through his hair and left them at the back of his head. He supposed he was hoping for ‘oh, we don’t have to do that now,’ or, ‘maybe we could leave it for a bit’. Though of course what he actually got was a sigh of relief, a smile and darting glances at the stairs. ‘Grab whatever you need,’ he said, suddenly feeling distant and uncomfortable around her, with her need for control—and his fear of it—sitting between them like a threat. ‘I’ll make some more coffee.’

She hesitated at the bottom of the stairs. ‘Do you have any decaf?’

‘Sorry, I didn’t think.’

He leaned back against the kitchen counter as she went upstairs. Decaf? Another pregnancy thing, he assumed. Just one more part of this whole situation he was completely clueless about. Every good feeling he’d had when they’d shared breakfast had abandoned him, and even the house seemed darker and colder this side of the meal. Rachel re-emerged from the stairs a few moments later, clutching her bound-up papers, a notebook and her tablet.

‘Old-fashioned or new-fangled?’ she asked as she sat neatly at the table and set everything out in front of her. Death by fire or water? What did it matter?

But the smile had returned to her lips, her arms hung loosely at her sides, and she had lost the drawn, haunted look that told of a frightened woman.

‘You choose.’ He tried to keep the weighty, quavery feeling fluttering in his belly out of his voice. ‘You’re the expert here.’ He hoped it didn’t sound snarky. He didn’t mean it to. Didn’t mean to blame her for how uncomfortable he was. It didn’t make sense to be angry at her for the situation they found themselves in. It wasn’t her fault they were pregnant. It wasn’t her fault that the way she wanted to live her life was the opposite of his. They just had to find a way to make this work for both of them. All of them.

‘Old-fashioned, then.’ She opened the notebook out to a blank double spread and reached for her pen. He could tell she was itching to write her headings across the top of the page but seemed to be waiting for his okay to do so. ‘So...where do you want to start?’

He took a deep breath. She’d obviously spent a lot of time thinking about this. And to be honest her plan was probably as good as anything that they could come up with together. As he’d said—she was the expert here. But if he didn’t have his say now, then when would he? Would he find himself in ten years’ time on a path that she had chosen, and that he had never had any idea of where it was going? If he didn’t rein this in, if she couldn’t learn to live a little less rigidly, he’d find himself stifled and trapped. And if she couldn’t start compromising now, then he couldn’t see how this was ever going to work.

‘Perhaps we could start with the next few weeks,’ he said eventually, thinking that even he could manage with planning that far out, if he had to. ‘And anything that needs a specific date. Appointments, travel plans, that sort of thing.’

Rachel nodded and he could tell from the small smile on her face she already knew exactly how she expected the next few weeks to pan out. She probably had appointments lined up, time blocked out, and knew exactly where he should be and at what time. But she said none of this and instead waited for him to make a suggestion. At least she seemed willing to try as hard as he was to make this work.

‘Do you have any doctor’s appointments scheduled? I’m not really sure how this works but I’d like to be there if that’s what you want.’

‘I’ve an appointment with my GP in a few days. Probably won’t be much to tell at that stage, from what I’ve read. But generally they want to schedule the first scan at some point around twelve weeks.’

‘Twelve weeks?’ He raised a brow in question.

‘The twelfth week of the pregnancy. Not twelve weeks from now. Or, in fact, twelve weeks from when we...’ He smiled a little at her embarrassment. ‘The counting is weird,’ she continued, a light blush colouring her cheeks. ‘Right now I think I’m about nine weeks pregnant, even though it’s not that long since we... They count from the first day of your last...’

‘Are you going to finish a sentence today?’ He laughed at the sudden appearance of this bashfulness. ‘Or is there always going to be so much guesswork?’

‘I’m sorry. It seems stupid to be embarrassed talking about any of this when you’re the one, well, we’re the ones... Sorry.’

She laughed, too, and Leo relaxed into his chair as the tension in the air palpably lightened. What was it about her laugh that reached his spine and his heart?

‘I’m doing it again, aren’t I?’ He nodded. ‘They count from the first day of your last period, which means today is week nine of the pregnancy even though it’s not been that long since we...met. Which means they’ll want to schedule the scan for around three weeks’ time.’

‘I’d like to be there.’

‘Me, too.’ They both smiled, and he breathed a sigh of relief, glad that they’d found this common ground at last. Maybe they could do this. Maybe they could find a compromise to make them both happy. And if they did that, what next? What more could there be between them when they weren’t both terrified of what the other craved?

Rachel drew a column on the piece of paper and wrote the heading Appointments at the top; then clicked through the screen of her phone with one hand and wrote the date in the column with the other. She glanced up at him. ‘Do you want to make a note of the date?’

Or maybe they couldn’t. ‘What date? You haven’t got an appointment yet.’

‘No, but I’m sure they’ll make it that week. You could...’

‘Rachel, this is one of those times when you’re going to have to let me make a decision for myself. I’m perfectly capable of keeping in my head the fact that I will have to make some time approximately three weeks from now to attend the scan. It’s not something I’m likely to forget. Just because I’m not doing it your way doesn’t mean I’m doing something wrong.’