‘Okay. You’re good. No, better than good. Not, as you point out, that I’m any kind of judge.’
Rafe stuck his spoon into some of the dessert. It was a trifle of sorts. Sophie played with hers. ‘Try some,’ he said. He heaped some on his spoon and stretched across, with Sophie pausing only fractionally before she leant towards him and lowered her eyes to eat what was being offered.
Okay. So what if she had no idea how women gave men the ‘come hither’ look? She could try. Tonight she had come crashing into her own desires. They had pushed their way through her self-protection mechanism and there was no way she could ignore them. She wanted him and to hell with common sense and doing the logical thing for her future peace of mind. One way or the other, she knew that she would never have that again. Either she allowed him to walk away thinking the worst of her, thinking that she was tied, gagged and bound by her rigid principles and incapable of shaking them, or else she started enjoying what was in front of her and walked away when she sensed that she was beginning to bore him. How long that would take, she had no idea. A week? A month? Six months? His track record spoke for itself, but she wasn’t going to let that deter her. Not now.
She opened her eyes to find him inches away from her, staring straight back.
Both hands were firmly propped on the table, and she could feel herself trembling.
She deliberately took her time licking the spoon, willing him to follow the lead being laid down. He didn’t.
She wondered if perhaps her seductive gesture hadn’t been quite up to scratch. Had she ended up looking ridiculous?
Worse, and it was hard to imagine a worse scenario, maybe he had been so turned off by her incomprehensible behaviour that it didn’t matter whether she licked a spoon slowly or quickly or even stood on the table and did a striptease, he was no longer interested.
The thoughts flashed through her head at the speed of light. She was looking down at herself and seeing him laughing at her, with her gauche, inept imitation of a vamp…seeing him feeling a range of responses from disgust to boredom, with desire not featuring on the menu, because she had blown it.
Her instincts told her to politely resume her seat, say something complimentary about the trifle, ask him a few sensible questions about getting a photographer in to take a few pictures of him for her article, pretend that they were still just two civilised adults who had had a very brief fling and had now put the memory of it behind them.
Or she could just go hell for leather and kiss him.
She reached up and placed her hand behind his neck, and her mind went blank. No more analysing what he might be thinking or feeling and no more wondering whether she was doing the right thing or the wrong thing.
She pulled him towards her and kissed him. His mouth still had the sweet taste of the trifle she had just eaten. She half expected him to pull away, but he didn’t, although he might have just been stunned into a lack of immediate response. She couldn’t tell because her eyes were now firmly shut against any unfortunate reactions.
Then he was returning that kiss, his mouth moving over hers, hungrily demanding.
Lord only knew where the spoon was. Probably leaving an indelible stain somewhere on the white linen tablecloth, which Sophie was sure had all been part of that special effort laid on by their mothers.
Of course, sooner or later they both had to surface for air, and Sophie hoped that no questions would be asked. No such luck. Still awkwardly inclined across the width of the table, Rafe was the first to draw back and she reluctantly opened her eyes.
‘Care to tell me what’s going on here?’ he asked thickly.
Sophie looked down, then back up at him, squaring her chin.
‘I can’t fight any more.’
‘I didn’t realise that we had been fighting.’ It occurred to him that this was not a comfortable position in which to be conducting this conversation. He was too tall, and it required a certain amount of dexterity to avoid the array of glasses on the table, but he was loathe to let her go.
‘Not with you,’ Sophie admitted, bracing herself to reveal the truth, well or a bit of it, at any rate. ‘I wasn’t talking about fighting with you. I was talking about fighting with myself. It’s what I’ve been doing ever since…ever since…we made love. As relationship material goes,’ she continued truthfully, ‘you’re not the stuff of any girl’s dreams. At least not any girl with her head screwed on the right way. But I…I realise that…you know what I want to say…’
‘Do I?’ Rafe realised that he was thoroughly enjoying himself. ‘I’m not sure that I do. Perhaps you could spell it out for me?’
Sophie took a deep breath. Saying what she had to say while maintaining eye-to-eye contact was an almost impossible task, but she did it. She kept her eyes firmly locked with his.
‘I want you,’ she said in a rush. ‘Crazy, but there you have it.’
‘I’m not sure I like the crazy part…’ Rafe allowed a few seconds to tick past. ‘But I like the rest of it.’ He kissed her gently and very, very thoroughly until she was moaning softly under her breath, her mouth blindly seeking his out when he eventually drew back.
‘Maybe we could take our coffee into more…agreeable surroundings,’ he suggested, and Sophie found that she was nodding eagerly.
‘We should thank…well, everyone, for the lovely meal,’ she suggested.
‘Oh, I’m sure they would understand if we disappeared without that formality,’ Rafe murmured, moving towards the door and waiting for her. The coffee was forgotten on the sideboard, a signal to Annie that they wouldn’t want to be disturbed. And if that wasn’t enough, well, then, these old houses, as he had discovered, were well endowed with locks.
CHAPTER TEN
SOPHIE stared out of the window of the office. Not much of a view, but the sun was still trying to make the most of things. Behind her, her successful article on RAFE LORO—THE MAN BEHIND THE REPUTATION was framed, a testimony to her first successful assignment. Every morning, when she walked to her desk, there it was, bringing a smile to her face. When she worked, she could feel him behind her, warm and encouraging. He was abroad at the moment but he would be returning to England the following evening and she would meet him, listen to how his visit to the US had gone and, under normal circumstances, share a meal, exchange news, both of them tacitly deferring the time when words would give way to the inevitable gloriously fulfilling meeting of bodies on his giant-sized bed with which she had become very familiar.
Under normal circumstances.
Her undoing had been to think that what they had qualified as normal. She had told herself so many times at the beginning that it was never going to be the sort of relationship that went anywhere, that she should envisage the end before it was staring her in the face, that with a man like Rafe it was all about appreciating the moment and never expecting it to go anywhere.
But the weeks had rolled by and she had settled into a false sense of security. She had learnt never to talk about a future or plan anything at all. That way, when it was over she could at least be mentally prepared, or as mentally prepared as she could be given that with each passing day she had fallen deeper and deeper in love with him.
That was something she kept well hidden from him. There weren’t many situations Rafe couldn’t handle, but a woman declaring her love ranked up there at the top of the list.
And she didn’t want to lose him. Not yet. Not when there was still a tomorrow for them. She would know, she told herself repeatedly, when he was beginning to tire of her. She would be able to sense it and would take the necessary action, make the first move.
Maybe, she occasionally told herself, she wouldn’t wait until then. Maybe she would cut it off if only to spare Claudia and Grace the eventual disappointment, because if she had become more and more emotionally wrapped up with him over time, then so too had their aspirations for the fairy-tale ending.
They had visited four times in the space of two months and each time had seen an es
calation in their hopes for a white wedding, even though Sophie had laughingly changed the subject every single time her mother had raised it.
But there just never seemed a right time to end it. He would shut that door behind him, switch on the lights in his apartment and she would melt. Her lips would find his, her arms would wind around his neck and her body would yield to his, quivering to his every touch as hotly and crazily as it had done from that very first time.
Fate had a nasty way of making sure that happiness never outstayed its welcome.
She bided her time at the office, doing what she needed to until it was time to go back to her flat, but it wasn’t easy.
Worse was the following day. Rafe had sent her a text just before he left America, one of his sexy text messages that always made her look over her shoulder to make sure that no one was hovering behind her. She was to meet him at his apartment, preferably wearing her birthday suit but, failing that, as little as possible.
The thought of doing any such thing now made her feel sick. She glanced down at her handbag where the end of her dream was burning a hole in the bag. One light, virtually non-existent period five weeks ago, and then nothing at all. She hadn’t even twigged at first because they had been scrupulous in their precautions. Her brain had only begun to crank into gear that morning, working out that, yes, there had been that one time, that very first time, when they had used nothing. After they had returned from Cornwall, she had gone to her doctor and had asked for whatever the lowest dosage pill was. So she had gained a slight amount of weight. That, she had read, could be attributed to her contraception, and, besides, hadn’t Rafe told her that the few extra pounds added to her sexiness?
Even buying the pregnancy-testing kit hadn’t sent her stomach into too much of a panicked overdrive because, really, the fact that her periods had been inconsistent was far more likely to be caused by starting on a new pill.
She had slipped the little device into her handbag and had forgotten all about it. Until a couple of hours ago when her world had come grinding to a halt.
She waited until she was the last in the office and then made her way home. Rafe was expecting her later, much later, ten o’clock. Normally, she would have gone to his apartment earlier, let herself in using the key he had had made for her weeks back, when he had decided that arranging to meet was ridiculous when what he wanted was to get back to his place and find her there, waiting for him. She might have rifled his fridge for something to eat, then watched television, enjoying the slow uncurling of excitement as the hour of his return got closer.
Instead, she had used the toilet, then walked around her flat for three hours, pausing every fifteen minutes to look at that little stick. Somewhere along the line, she had a bath and changed into jeans and a jumper. She switched on the television for noise, but she couldn’t focus, couldn’t think of anything but what she would say to Rafe. Tell him? She had to. She didn’t live in a vacuum. There was no way that she could run away and hide, or disappear off the face of the earth, and even if she could have she didn’t think she could leave without giving him the chance to know that he was going to be a father.
At nine-fifteen, she wearily got a taxi to his house and waited in the sitting room, half praying that he would be late, that she would have time to fall asleep and put off the dreadful moment, half hoping that he showed up early so that she could say what she had to say and get it over with.
She didn’t want to dwell on his reaction, but she couldn’t avoid it.
Hadn’t he made a passing remark once about women who trapped men into marriage by getting pregnant? On the back of some programme they had watched together? She was sure of it. And she had agreed with him!
She was weak with nerves when she finally heard the sound of his key in the door.
She had left the overhead lights off, choosing to switch on the two standing lights instead, all the better to conceal the expression on his face when she broke the news.
She heard his footsteps heading towards the sitting room, imagining him expecting…what? The look of pleasure on her face as she saw him? The parted lips and shining eyes as she welcomed him back? Certainly he wouldn’t have expected to find her curled into the chair by the fireplace, legs tucked under her, dressed in the opposite of as little as possible.
He paused in the doorway, quickly taking in the scene presented in front of him, then he strolled slowly towards her, thankfully leaving the overhead lights switched off.
When he was standing over her, he smiled, that slow, lazy smile that always sent her senses spinning into orbit, and for the space of a few seconds she was very tempted to enjoy just one last night together before she broke the news.
‘I’ve brought you back something.’ He reached into his jacket pocket and extracted a navy blue box, which Sophie dutifully took. A little china pig. She had told him that she collected china pigs and he had laughed at that, but ever since, wherever he went, he always somehow managed to bring her back one to add to her growing collection.
‘Thank you,’ she said, opening and shutting the box and then sticking it on the table next to her.
‘What’s wrong?’
‘There’s something I have to tell you.’
‘Should I pour myself a stiff drink first?’ But he was still smiling, although there was curiosity in his eyes now.
Several might do the trick, Sophie thought. ‘No. Just sit down. My neck’s hurting looking up at you.’
He frowned and then dragged a footstool over to her chair and squatted on it. ‘What’s the matter?’
‘First of all, I just want to tell you that I won’t be marrying you.’ He opened his mouth to say something and Sophie held one hand up to stop him before he could speak. ‘I’ve had fun, Rafe—’
‘Had?’
‘Please. Don’t interrupt. Please.’ Her eyes slid away from his. She couldn’t bear the intensity of his stare. ‘It’s important that we get one or two things straight. Well, that I do. We both knew that this wasn’t going to last for ever…the only way things last for ever is if two people get married, and I don’t want to marry you.’ The lie made her mouth taste sour, but it was a lie that had to be told.
‘I don’t know what the hell has caused this, Sophie—’
‘Nothing’s caused it. Time’s caused it.’
‘When I spoke to you yesterday you were fine, looking forward to seeing me…’
She could see his mind ticking, trying to work out what was going on, meticulously piecing together the facts at his disposal.
‘Something’s happened and you’re going to tell me what.’ He stood up, pushing the stool from under him, and began prowling the room, as if there was too much energy inside him for him to sit still. ‘It must be to do with Grace. Or Claudia. Or both. Have they said anything to you? Warned you off me? No, that doesn’t make sense. Why would they do that? They’ve been as happy as little sand-boys thinking that we were going out together. Unless one of them has had second thoughts? Is that it?’
‘No, Rafe.’
‘What, then?’ He removed his jacket and pitched it on the sofa so that he could continue his restless prowl, rolling up the sleeves of his shirt in the process. ‘Is there someone else?’ He stopped dead and stared at her. In the absence of any other scenarios, his brain had seized upon this one and was trying it on for size.
‘Rafe…’
‘Is there?’
Before she could open her mouth, he had closed the space between them so that he could lean over her, crowding her into the chair.
‘No!’ She inserted that before he could launch into a string of accusations about a piece of fiction. ‘Of course there isn’t anyone else! When would I have time for that?’
‘What, then? Why don’t you stop beating about the bush and just tell me what the hell is going on here?’
‘Rafe, I’m pregnant.’
The three words dropped like a bombshell into still water. She held her breath, waiting for detonation. None
came. He turned away from her and walked towards the sofa so that he could sit down. Even then, for a few hideous seconds, he didn’t look at her, just stared in front of him, his face wiped clean of any emotion.
Shock, horror, rage…she didn’t know what was building up inside him.
‘You’re pregnant,’ he finally said, turning to face her.
‘I know it’s a shock. I only…well, did the test today, found out…it was that first time…an accident…who would have thought that just that once would have…would have…?’ She plucked anxiously at the hem of her jumper, staring down at the tips of her bare toes. She had kicked off her shoes earlier on. ‘I never meant for it to happen, Rafe, you have to believe me. Which is why I told you that I wouldn’t marry you…’
‘Because you’re carrying my baby?’ He gave a short, dry burst of laughter. ‘Funny reason. You don’t have a choice, though, Sophie.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘I mean that no baby of mine will be born illegitimate. I mean that, whether you want to or not, you will marry me.’
‘D-don’t be silly,’ Sophie stammered. Yes, somewhere at the back of her mind, she had faced this possibility, that he would ask her to marry him. She had faced it and had rejected it out of hand because to marry someone for all the wrong reasons was to condemn that marriage to failure. A few months ago, she would have been distraught at the idea of bringing a baby into the world as a single mother, but he had given her strength and confidence in herself, enough for her to know that, however hard the going was, she would be able to cope on her own. And it would be a damn sight better than to see him trapped in a loveless marriage, blaming her for laying the trap, probably finding pleasure outside and justifying his infidelity because of the situation to which he had been forced to bend. A bird with clipped wings, and she would become the one with the knife in her hands. No! Every bit of her revolted against the prospect.
‘No, Rafe, I won’t.’ She took a deep breath and looked at him steadily. ‘A marriage without love is no marriage, and any child growing up with two parents who don’t love each other, would end up a very unhappy child. Not to mention how we would fare. No, better for us to part company—and, of course, you would be able to see him or her whenever you wanted. I would never try and stop that.’
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