‘I can’t have children.’ There, she’d blurted it out, quickly ripped that plaster off the wound.
She felt him slip his jacket round her and she realised she was shivering. She continued to look at the pavement. On Great Portland Street I sat down and wept – that almost had the right poetic ring to it.
‘I know,’ Will said quietly. ‘I’ve known for ages. I guessed that’s why your marriage must have broken up and then I saw Nick at a gig and he told me. I know, and it doesn’t make any difference. I love you. I don’t even want children, why did you ever think I did? I’ve got loads of nieces and nephews and I’ve got an adopted child in Africa.’
Still Carmen stared at the ground. ‘You only say that because you’re thirty-five. I bet when you turn forty, when all your friends have got children, you’ll be desperate for them and then you’ll start resenting me, and then finally leave me or I’ll leave you because I can’t bear to see you so unhappy.’
‘Oh, and you know everything, do you, Carmen? Well, do you know that you have made me happier than anyone else, ever, that the days I don’t see you are the days that don’t feel as bright? That you make it all mean something?’
‘I can’t do it again, Will, really can’t. I can’t open myself up only to be rejected.’ She was crying now. Why did the most wonderful thing in the world, Will telling her he loved her, seem like the saddest?
Will wiped away the tears with his thumb, so, so gently. ‘Then you won’t be living, Carmen, you’ll just be existing. I promise you that I will never reject you because you can’t have children. Maybe,’ and here his tone became lighter, ‘because of your mutton tendencies and your relentless teasing of me, and because you so far have refused to tell me you love me.’
He had his arms round her now and had pulled her close to him. He was so warm against her.
‘I want to be with you, and maybe one day if things change and we did both want children we could adopt. Anything’s possible; you’ve just got to be open.’
Finally Carmen looked at him. Something gave inside her and she did the bravest thing she had done in a very long time. ‘I do love you, Will.’
She gazed into those blue eyes and he said, ‘We’re even, then.’
For a while they just held each other until Will said, ‘Now please, can we go back to the restaurant? I’m freezing. And look, it’s snowing!’ All around them tiny snowflakes were swirling down.
Downstairs in Rico’s they were met with cheers and applause from the diners and from their friends. ‘What’s going on?’ Will asked, bemused by the attention.
‘Mamma Mia was watching you on her CCTV screens and reporting to us what you were doing,’ Marcus told them. ‘It was very exciting, and also disturbing as I know it was a terrible invasion of your privacy, but we take it she’s finally said it.’
Will nodded.
‘About bloody time, Carmen.’ Marcus’s tone was teasing but his brown eyes were warm.
Mamma Mia came over and enfolded both Will and Carmen in a hug. ‘Oh my darlings, you are the perfect couple. How would you feel about having your wedding reception here, and I could make you a wonderful cake?’
Carmen and Will just looked at each other, knowing that where Mamma Mia was concerned resistance was futile.
Table of Contents
Cover
Title
Contents
Copyright
Dedication
Also By Rebecca Farnworth
Acknowledgements
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
A Funny Thing About Love Page 29
