‘I love you.’ He groaned the words against her mouth and she pulled away, her blue eyes wary and more than a little frightened.
‘Stop saying that.’
‘It’s the truth. And you love me, too.’
Perhaps if he said the words often enough, eventually she’d find the courage to say them herself.
She slid off his lap and he saw the confusion in her eyes. ‘Andreas…’
‘Trust me, Libby.’
‘Let’s go to the beach.’
Andreas suppressed a sigh, wondering what it would take to break through the wall of self-protection that she’d built around herself.
They spent the days swimming and talking and making love, and the time passed too quickly for Libby. She could have stayed there for ever, locked in the tiny world they’d created, safe from outside influences.
There was something magical about the villa and the bay.
Something unreal.
It felt so far away from their real lives.
It was as if anything could happen here, but once they returned home life would just return to normal.
She was lying on a sun lounger with her eyes closed, trying to catch up on some lost sleep, when she felt the familiar tug in her stomach.
Her heart lurched.
Not wanting to believe the messages that her body was sending, she rushed to her room to discover that her period had started.
She’d been so wrapped up in the emotional high of being with Andreas that she’d temporarily forgotten that she might be pregnant.
Swamped by a feeling of desolation that she couldn’t comprehend, she went to the bathroom and burst into tears, sobbing against the tiled wall until her head started to ache.
She tried to analyse why she was crying but her head was pounding too hard to allow her access to her thoughts.
Surely she should have been relieved that she wasn’t pregnant?
Why did she feel so utterly devastated?
She didn’t even know that Andreas had followed her until she felt herself gathered against his hard chest.
For several minutes she just sobbed without speaking and then she took the tissue he handed her and blew her nose hard.
‘Why are you crying?’
She shook her head and scrunched the tissue into a ball, too upset to speak.
‘Libby.’ His tone was urgent and he put her away from him and cupped her face in his hands, forcing her to look at him. ‘Tell me.’
‘It’s nothing,’ she hiccoughed. ‘It’s my problem, not yours.’
His face darkened and his fingers bit into her scalp. ‘If this is what I think it is, then it’s very much my problem, too. Only actually I don’t see it as a problem.’
She closed her eyes and shook her head. He’d misunderstood, and who could blame him? ‘Just drop it Andreas—please…’
She needed some time on her own. Time to pull herself together. She was being ridiculous.