‘Can we get out of here?’
He frowned. She didn’t blame him for being confused. Still, he nodded and stood up too.
‘I’ll find someone and pay.’ He glanced around for a waiter, signalled to him, then turned back.
She couldn’t bear the way he was looking at her.
‘I’ll wait outside,’ she muttered, turning swiftly and doing all she could not to run for the door.
The cold night air made her bury her head in her jumper. In her haste she’d forgotten her coat, and it was freezing out here. She stopped, half turning back to the restaurant, knowing she would have to go in but unable to bring herself to do so. No—better to find their sleigh and grab one of the blankets from there.
Before she could go any further the door to the restaurant opened and Ben appeared. He jogged over to her, wrapping her in her coat so solicitously that she batted away his hands before tears overwhelmed her.
‘Don’t, Ben, please. I don’t deserve your kindness.’
‘You’re wrong.’
His certainty only made her feel worse.
‘Please—just let me say this.’
He hesitated for a long moment before taking a reluctant step backwards, as if to give her space. Oddly, it made her feel alone. She stared down at the slush-covered cobbles, unable to meet his eye. Then, somewhere deep inside herself, she found the edge of her forgotten resolve and dragged her gaze up to his. She owed him that.
‘The night we... Our wedding night,’ she corrected hastily. ‘Oh...there’s no easy way to say this. There was a baby. Our baby.’
CHAPTER ELEVEN
BEN STARED AT her for several long moments.
Their baby?
His chest started to constrict acutely. Where was she...he...? Why hadn’t Thea told him before?
His head fought to catch up with the words she’d used. ‘There was a baby?’ he asked urgently.
Thea nodded, and her head bounced madly around as though it wasn’t even her own, as if it had been let loose on some kind of out-of-control spring.
‘You...terminated?’
The words made him feel nauseous, even though his head, trying frantically to keep up with his racing heart, was desperately trying to caution him. He was in no place to judge Thea, or to censure her. But why hadn’t she told him? He could have supported her, made sure she knew all her options before making that momentous decision.
‘No!’ She jerked her head up.
Everything seemed to stop for him.
No? No, what?
‘But you didn’t have it?’
He heard the catch in his voice, berated himself for it. But he was powerless against it.
The look she darted at him was evidence that Thea was frenziedly trying to work out what he was thinking. He opened his mouth but no words came out.
‘I lost it.’ She stopped abruptly. That just made it seem as if she’d been careless. She cleared her throat and met his eye again. ‘I miscarried.’
Her voice cracked but her emotion, the look in her eyes, told him all the things she couldn’t say.
‘When?’ he asked, struggling to keep his voice from betraying any emotion for fear of upsetting her further. Inside he was in turmoil. ‘How far along were you?’