'William and you…?' Zac pressed softly, his face making it clear he was thinking the worst from her sudden silence.
'Being friends.' Even to her own ears it sounded like an afterthought, and her own patheticness made her voice tremble with a mixture of rage and injured pride as she said, 'It is your suspicious mind that has made up the rest William is one of the nicest men I know, and certainly the most honourable. He's kind and generous—'
'Spare me a list of his virtues, Victoria, please,' Zac grated with hateful sarcasm. 'I'm amazed this paragon hasn't got wings already. And whilst we're talking about suspicious minds, might I remind you you are in no position to cast the first stone?'
'You're saying I've got a suspicious mind?' Her voice had risen to a shrill shriek that made Zac wince. 'After you—' She couldn't go on, she was too angry, and it was a few gasping breaths later before she managed to say, 'I'm not discussing this any more, there's absolutely no point, but I can't believe you just said that.'
'One rule for you and one rule for me?' Zac suggested icily. It was adding salt to the wound.
'I'm going to lie down.' Victoria drew herself up, her voice fairly coherent, which was a miracle in itself considering how she was feeling. 'I'm…I'm feeling worse.' Worse? She felt ghastly.
'Whereas I, of course, am feeling great?' came the sarcastic rejoinder. And then, when she didn't venture a comment, he asked, 'Do you want the number of my hotel?'
'No.'
Victoria shut the door on his outraged face and just made it to the bathroom before she deposited the contents of her stomach into William's bright blue basin.
CHAPTER THREE
'And you haven't told him you're pregnant?'
It was a full week later and Victoria was back in England, the crowded restaurant where she and William were having lunch packed to bursting with the elite of London's high-fliers.
'No, I told you. He was only in Tunisia overnight, and when he came back in the evening we just fought again. It…it was awful.' Victoria wanted to cry but she knew she couldn't—not in the middle of Radstone's where her lettuce leaves and chicken must be costing William a small fortune. 'I told him I was coming back to England and…and that I'd be renting a place.' She hadn't told William the fall story—William, like Zac, had a healthy amount of fierce male pride, and she doubted he would appreciate being labelled the third part of a triangle.
It seemed she was less adept at hiding the truth than she had thought. 'I take it he objected to you staying at Mimosa?' William asked wryly with a lift of his dark eyebrows. 'And even more my flat, no doubt. Well, I can understand that of course.'
'But why?' Victoria objected plaintively. 'I told him we were old friends, and that our relationship was purely platonic, but he didn't believe me. He…said that there was no such thing as a platonic friendship between a man and a woman.'
'He was right,' William agreed with a remarkable lack of heat.
It wasn't what Victoria had expected, and her face said so.
'Look, Blue-eyes—' it was the nickname he had given her when she was eight years old and had stuck ever since '—you're absolutely gorgeous, and I fancy you like mad, but I've always known you see me as a big brother and nothing more. So…' He shrugged easily, his nonchalance hiding a pain which had plagued him for years and had taken more self-will than he had known he possessed to come to terms with. 'That's okay. I'd rather be in your life as a friend than out of it altogether.' He shrugged slowly.
'Oh, William.' She stared at him, her soft heart immediately flooded with guilt. 'You've never said… I didn't know.'
'Of course you didn't, and it's no big deal,' he insisted easily. No big deal? She still had the power to floor him with one look from those big blue eyes. 'I'm here for you, always, okay? And all the crazy, angry husbands in the world wouldn't make me change my mind. My home is your home, Blue-eyes, whenever you need it. No strings, no bother. Now—' he smiled at her as the moment became charged with emotion '—eat your lunch. You're eating for two, remember, so you'd better pack away a double dessert to make up for the lack of nutrition in that thing.' He poked his fork at her salad with manly distaste.
'William…' Victoria wriggled helplessly, her eyes tragic.
'Eat, woman.' And this time his smile was genuine. 'It's not the end of the world. I'm not going to die from unrequited love or anything like that. You know me—tough as old boots.'
'I feel awful,' Victoria murmured softly.
'Well, don't.' And suddenly it was the old William, the William she knew—or thought she had known, she corrected silently. 'I'm not exactly short of female company as you well know.' He gave a leery wink to make her laugh, and Victoria obliged, although it was forced. Poor William. Poor, poor William.
She just hadn't dreamt William felt like that about her, she told herself in
amazement Not in a hundred years. In fact she was beginning to think that the whole mate population was a species apart. Why hadn't he said something? She glanced at him now as he tucked into an enormous fillet steak with every appearance of enjoyment, to all intents and purposes perfectly relaxed.
Could she have ever felt that certain spark with William? He was certainly good-looking, with his wavy dark hair and brown eyes with little flecks of green, straight nose and smiling mouth. He was tall too, not as tall as Zac's six feet four, but William was a good six inches taller than her and lean and fit with it But he was right. She lowered her eyes to her plate and pecked at her salad. She did look on him as a brother. Loved him as a brother actually… But there was nothing romantic there.
'How long does this morning sickness go on?' William asked suddenly, and she glanced up to see a look of concern in his gentle eyes. 'You're getting as thin as a rake.'
'A few more weeks yet, I think.' She sighed wearily. 'And I only wish it was morning sickness. With me it's every hour of the day and night sickness, and then a bit I was even sick in the middle of the night when I got up to go to the loo. And that's another inconvenient something no one tells you about—my bladder has developed a life of its own,' she finished plaintively.
'Poor old love.' But he was laughing and she couldn't help a rueful grin back, which swiftly faded when he said, his tone serious now, 'You do know you're going to have to tell him sooner or later? It's his child too, Blue-eyes. You can't keep something like that from a man. This idea of disappearing is a non-starter.'