The Unexpected Baby

‘No.’ Angry emotion darkened his eyes. ‘I don’t want to hear what happened, listen to you trying to justify yourself. It sickens me.’

She couldn’t reach him, she recognised hopelessly. Even if she went down on her knees and begged him to hear her out it would make no difference.

Trying to control the frustration that churned inside her, the pain of it all, she said flatly, ‘If that’s the way you want it. If you want to be this stubborn you can never have really loved me. And I’m not going to plead with you. But I warn you, I’m not prepared to pretend we’re a loving couple when we’re not. I refuse to go back to Netherhaye with you and live my life that way. So Catherine has to be told, sooner or later.’

His eyes glittered sharply. ‘Later. Very much later. And you know damned well why! Or are you so wrapped up in what you want you don’t

care about anyone else?’

The rasped barb found its target. Her heart twisted painfully inside her. Of course she didn’t want to cause Catherine any further emotional suffering, and it was an indictment of his so-called former love for her that he would so easily believe her capable of doing anything of the sort.

She closed her eyes, hiding the despised weak glitter of tears, and Jed said coldly, ‘While she’s here you’ll act the part of a besotted wife. You managed it in bed this morning, so carrying on the act in the light of day shouldn’t give you too much of a problem.’

Her eyelids batted open at that, revealing sea-blue glittery diamonds. How dared he? She hadn’t consciously instigated that close embrace, and, initially at least, he’d loved every second. Wanted her—

As he wanted her now! She recognised the slight flare of his nostrils, the tightening of his jaw, the slow burn of colour across his prominent cheekbones, the drift of narrowed scorching eyes over her as-good-asnaked body. Something curled, dark and sharp, inside her. He might not love her now, but he sure as hell still desired her, she thought in bitter triumph. Something that elemental would take a long time dying.

‘It’s all yours.’ He scooped up the clothes he’d brought in with him. ‘I’ll dress in the bedroom.’ He brushed past, colour still darkening his face. He couldn’t get away from her fast enough, she thought, untying her belt He might hate himself for wanting her but there was nothing he could do about it.

It must have been an unconscious desire to pay him back for the pain and humiliation he’d dished out that had been behind her decision to dress the way she had. Elena walked out of the living room onto the patio, where Jed and Catherine were eating breakfast, and saw fury darken his eyes and pull his mouth into a straight, hard line, and was wickedly glad she’d clothed herself in tiny lemon-yellow silk shorts and a matching cropped halter-necked top.

‘You look like a ray of morning sunshine!’ Catherine beamed, clearly having forgotten and forgiven Elena’s abrupt departure the evening before.

‘Thank you.’ She returned the older woman’s smile wholeheartedly. For the duration of Catherine’s stay she would play it Jed’s way—with an added twist of her own! A game she would play for all she was worth, because it would be a way of showing him, and, more importantly, herself, that she was far from beaten.

She pulled a chair out from the table and sat, angling herself towards her husband, her long, shapely legs stretched out. Triumphantly she watched a muscle jerk at the side of his tough jaw as his unwilling eyes travelled the lightly tanned length of them, fastened for a millisecond on the juncture of her thighs, swept up over her naked midriff, then lingered on her breasts, lovingly cradled in sexy sheer lemon silk.

She felt her nipples peak beneath his sultry eyes, and knew he’d noticed when he abruptly pushed himself to his feet and disappeared in the direction of the kitchen, telling them tersely, ‘I’ll make fresh coffee.’

‘My, I never thought I’d see the day when Jed got all domesticated! You’re obviously very good for him!’

Not so you’d notice, Elena thought drily as Catherine laid down her cutlery and patted her round tummy. ‘He insisted on making me scrambled eggs, even though everyone knows I should go on a crash diet What are you having?’

‘Just juice.’ She poured some from the frosted glass jug and lay back in the sun, trying to look relaxed. Thankfully, this morning’s session of feeling nauseous had only lasted a few minutes, and she’d managed to keep a glass of water down. At her mother-in-law’s mock frown she added, ‘I don’t eat much in the morning, but, boy, do I make up for it at lunchtime!’

She buried her nose in her glass to hide the sudden onslaught of misgivings. Some time in the not too distant future Catherine would have to be told about the pregnancy. Was Jed aiming to pass Sam’s child off as his own, forestalling the type of scandal he would hate? If so, he was in for an unpleasant surprise, because if there was no hope of saving their marriage she was sticking to her intention of making a clean break, the timing of which was dependent on how long it took Catherine to get back on an even keel.

Jed walked out with the fresh coffee, speaking to his mother. ‘Would you like to stay here and rest up while Elena and I go down to the village for provisions?’

Elena accepted the fresh coffee he poured her and knew what he was up to. Suddenly he wasn’t so sure about his own ability to act the part of a loving bridegroom in front of his parent, and in any case he probably wanted privacy to read her another riot act.

‘Don’t be silly, darling,’ she drawled, before her mother-in-law could reply. ‘Catherine hasn’t come all this way to sit on her own on my patio. Why don’t we go down to Cadiz, shop, have lunch, sit by the sea?’ She turned her wide smile on her mother-in-law. ‘You’d like that?’

‘Oh, it sounds lovely, dear! Cadiz—so romantic—Francis Drake and Trafalgar—and wasn’t it there that the King of Spain got his beard singed?’

‘Out in the bay.’ Elena smiled. ‘If you extend your stay, and I hope you will, we could cross it on the ferry—the locals call it the vapor—and visit Puerto de Santa María. It’s well worth the effort.’

Catherine beamed. Elena could see the earlier flicker of uncertainty wiped from her face. She had invited herself here, and Jed’s suggestion that she spend the morning alone must have made her feel like an intruder. Jed wasn’t normally insensitive where his bereaved mother was concerned. His suggestion that they leave her behind clearly showed that she was getting to him.

Elena turned a sultry smile on her stony-faced husband. ‘Then that’s settled, darling.’ She watched his eyes go black as she lounged back in her chair, stretching her arms above her head provocatively. She hid a smile. If he accused her of flaunting herself, he’d be right. It was the only way she could think of to get her own back!

‘Then perhaps you should get ready to leave?’ He’d turned his back on her, staring out across the rumpled mountains. His voice was as smooth as cream, with an underlying strand of steel only she could detect

She got lazily to her feet to obey his order. She could afford to be magnanimous; she was winning, wasn’t she? Yes, the hard line of his shoulders was rigid beneath the fluid folds of the grey-green shirt he wore tucked into the waistband of his narrow-fitting stone-coloured trousers. She was really getting to him!

Swinging round to Catherine, she advised, ‘Wear flatties; there’ll be quite a lot of walking. And a shady hat. If you haven’t brought one with you I can lend you one of mine.’

She wandered back to her room, not letting herself think beyond the trip to the capital of the province. If she was to get through the rest of Catherine’s stay without going to pieces, she couldn’t afford to think.