He pulled up in front of the apartment block forty-five minutes later, his shirt sticking to his back in spite of the state-of-the-art air-conditioning in his car.
He knew Elaine was probably right. He had to get himself under some sort of control before he talked to Carli. She was already fragile without him coming to tear strips off her for deserting him at the hospital.
Did she hate him so much?
His stomach gave a painful clench.
Yes, she did. Why else would she disappear without telling him of her whereabouts?
He went to the front door and scanned the names on the residents’ list. She was on the tenth floor and he pressed his finger to the call button.
No answer.
He ground his teeth for a moment and then pressed the button again, this time leaving his finger on it even though the buzzing noise was grating to say the least.
‘Who is it?’ Carli’s voice came through faintly after forty-five excruciating seconds.
‘It’s me.’
There was a tiny pause.
‘Go away. I don’t want to see you.’
‘We have things to discuss. We can do it through this scratchy little intercom where all the neighbours coming past will hear us or I can come up. Your choice.’
She didn’t answer for such a long time he thought she’d left the intercom off the hook. He was about to press the button once more when her voice came through again.
‘I’ll come down. We can go to the park to talk. I want to be on neutral ground.’
‘All right, have it your way. But at least let me into the building. I feel like a stalker out here.’
The doors pinged open and he stepped through and waited in front of the lifts, staring at the numbers to see which one would carry her down to him.
He followed the right-hand lift’s journey to the ground floor and as its doors sprang open he stepped forward, only to stop suddenly when an elderly lady with a shopping cart gave him the evil eye as she came shuffling out.
‘Who are you?’ she asked. ‘How did you get in here?’
He opened his mouth to tell her when Carli’s voice spoke from behind him. ‘It’s all right, Miss Mickleton. He is my…guest.’
Xavier swung around. ‘How did you get down? Is there another lift?’
She shook her head. ‘I took the stairs.’
‘Ten floors?’
‘Going down is a whole lot easier than going up.’
His mouth dropped open. ‘You climb up ten flights of stairs?’
‘I didn’t used to but ever since the lift jammed that night…’ Her cheeks grew a delicate shade of pink. ‘Besides, I like the exercise.’
‘Oh, for God’s sake, Carli! You can’t possibly think you’ll still be able to do that in a few weeks’ let alone a few months’ time?’
She gave him a warning look and he turned to see the elderly neighbour standing listening to every word.
He turned back to Carli and muttered in an undertone, ‘Come on—let’s get out of here. She’s giving me the creeps.’
‘I heard that, young man!’ Miss Mickleton said.
‘You’ll hear a whole lot more if you stay around long enough,’ he ground out and pressed the button to release the exit.
‘You were extremely rude to her,’ Carli said once they were outside, walking towards the park.
‘She asked for it.’
‘She’s a lonely old lady with no family,’ she said. ‘You had no right to insult her.’
‘I’m not here to discuss your neighbours and their little hang-ups, I’m here to talk about us. We have a situation to resolve. And if another woman, young, old or middle-aged, gives me a serve I won’t be answerable to the consequences.’
‘Great to know I’m not the only woman who gives you a hard time.’ She couldn’t help a tiny smile as she glanced up at his brooding expression. ‘Who else has rattled your chain?’
‘That prison-guard chick at the hospital for a start,’ he bit out. ‘And then my secretary forgot where her next paycheck is coming from by offering me advice I neither wanted nor needed, as well as asking some pretty invasive questions, so I’m afraid by the time I got to the granny at your place I was in a filthy temper. I was expecting you in the lift, not some old crow with a beaky nose and a prying eye.’
‘Poor you; my heart bleeds.’
‘Why did you do a runner on me anyway?’ He stopped walking to look down at her.
‘I didn’t feel up to another argument with you. I decided it would be easier to let the dust settle for a bit till we’d both cooled down. Anyway,’ she gave him a suspicious look from beneath her eyelashes, ‘how did you know where to find me? I’m not listed in the phone book.’
He let out his breath and continued walking, slowing his pace to match hers. ‘On the odd rare occasion my secretary demonstrates she is actually worth the amount of money I pay her.’
Carli felt another smile tugging at her mouth at his dry statement. She was beginning to think he’d finally found the perfect secretary, someone who stood up to him instead of being intimidated by his threats and stormy moods.
‘How long have you lived in that apartment?’ he asked after another few paces.
‘I bought it with the divorce settlement,’ she told him. ‘I’ve lived here ever since.’
‘Alone?’
‘From time to time.’
He swung his gaze back down to hers. ‘Male or female?’
‘Now who’s asking the invasive questions?’ She gave him an ironic look.
He frowned and resumed walking in silence until they came to a small park, waiting until they’d both sat down on a bench to speak.
‘Carli…’ He took one of her hands and gave it a quick squeeze. ‘I really want you to come and live with me.’
‘No.’ She removed her hand from the warmth of his.
‘I promise I won’t touch you.’
‘I don’t believe you.’
He didn’t like to tell her he didn’t believe himself! God, he was hard now thinking of her sitting so close with his child growing in her womb. He would have to be strong for she oozed sensuality from every inch of her body. Even the way she looked at him turned his thermostat up to boiling point.
‘What’s your biggest objection?’ he asked. ‘Is it just a general feeling or something specific?’
‘How can you ask me that?’ She glared at him crossly. ‘We wouldn’t even be in this situation if you hadn’t been so specific in your intentions.’
‘I did not mean to make love that day. I swear it.’
‘Try again, Mr Knightly; the lie detector just caught you out.’
‘Well…’ he gave her one of his carefully rationed smiles ‘…I must confess when I got stuck in that lift with you I was getting a little hot and bothered.’
‘You didn’t show it.’
‘I could hardly unzip my trousers with that security camera above our heads taping everything.’
She frowned at him, her colour suddenly high. God, she hadn’t even thought about security cameras. She’d been too busy fighting her attraction to him.
‘If it hadn’t been for the camera I was going to suggest it in the lift as a way to kill time but kind of figured it mightn’t go down so well if we landed in the basement as a result. But then on reflection, if we’d died—think of what a way to go.’
Carli felt the betraying heat pool between her thighs at his words and, crossing her legs primly, turned her body away from the tempting warmth of his.
‘So you waited until we were all alone,’ she said with a touch of bitterness. ‘How very considerate of you.’
‘Look, it won’t happen again. I know you don’t believe me but I will keep my hands to myself in future.’
‘You don’t know how to walk past a woman without touching her.’
‘I didn’t touch Granny back there and I wouldn’t touch the ward clerk with a sterile mop, and as for my secretary she’s almost old enough to be
my mother.’
‘Which leaves only me.’
‘I can be celibate.’
‘That’s like asking a lion to be a vegetarian.’
‘Come on, Carli, give me a break. I don’t want to miss out on seeing my baby grow inside you. I want to feel its first movements and I want to see your body go through the changes. Don’t shut me out.’
She bit her lip in uncertainty.
He would miss out on an awful lot if he didn’t to see her for weeks if not months on end. He was the baby’s father after all. Surely he had some sort of right? In her work as a legal-aid lawyer in the poorer suburbs of Sydney, she’d dealt with enough non-custodial fathers to know how painful it was for them to only see their children fortnightly, if at all.
Besides that, her fainting spells had seriously frightened her. What if she were to fall down the stairs and injure the baby? Ten flights of stairs were hard enough now—what was she going to be like in a few more weeks? She knew she should just bite the bullet and get back in the lift as if the breakdown at the conference hotel hadn’t happened but…
‘Can I think about it and get back to you?’ she asked, buying some time.
‘I’ll give you a week.’
‘Two.’
‘Ten days.’
She let her breath out in a sigh of defeat. ‘All right, ten days. I’ll give you my answer then.’
He seemed satisfied with this answer and after a short conversation on neutral topics he walked her back home.
‘I’ll come up in the lift with you,’ he said at the door.
‘No…I can manage the stairs.’
‘And risk harming my child? No way. If you won’t take the lift I’ll carry you up.’
‘All right.’ She took a deep breath and approached the lift. ‘I’ll go up in the lift.’
‘Atta girl!’ He grinned as she pressed the button.
‘You can leave now.’ She gave him an irritated look.
‘You must think I’m more of a jerk than I realised,’ he observed. ‘I know very well as soon as my back is turned you are going to slip out of the lift and go up the stairs. ‘No.’ He folded his arms across the broad expanse of his chest. ‘I think I’ll wait until I see all the pretty numbers up there indicating your safe arrival at your door.’
‘You are really a very annoying man.’ She stabbed at the button once more. ‘Did I ever tell you that before?’
‘Only about one thousand and ninety-odd times—once a day during the three years of our marriage—would be a good estimate, don’t you agree?’
The lift opened and she stepped in. ‘Go back to your cave, Xavier. You sure as hell don’t belong in mine.’
The doors closed on his teasing smile but it took her all of nine and a half floors to cool down.
It was then that she realised what he’d done. He’d deliberately taken her mind off her worries about the lift and it had worked. She hadn’t thought about the lift at all.
She’d thought about him instead…
Xavier stared at the appointment card that came with the morning’s post a few days later.
‘What’s this?’ he asked his secretary, who was hovering about the filing cabinet.
‘It’s an ultrasound appointment. Your ex-wife sent it in case you wanted to see the baby.’
He dropped the card on his desk and looked at her. ‘How did you know about the baby?’
She pointed to the teddy-bear ears she could see poking out of the top of a well-known toy store carrier bag. ‘Clues, Mr Knightly,’ she imitated his court-room sombre tones with stunning accuracy, ‘clues which are pertinent to the case.’
‘I can see I’m not giving you enough work to do around here,’ he scowled.
‘How far along is she?’
‘Four months.’
‘A winter baby, then.’
‘I’m not sure of the due date,’ he confessed, clicking his pen absently. ‘Some time in June, I imagine.’
‘So the conference that you said was a complete and utter waste of time turned out to be productive after all?’ Elaine gave him a cheeky grin.
He threw her a filthy look and she laughed.
‘Don’t worry, Xavier, I think you’ll make a great father.’
‘I didn’t do so well as a husband; God knows how I’ll mess up parenting.’
‘Is it impertinent of me to ask what went wrong in your marriage?’ Elaine said.
He tossed the pen aside and pushed his chair back as he got to his feet, giving her another glowering look in the process. ‘Yes, it is.’
‘Have you told your family yet?’
‘I’m working up the courage.’
‘Good luck.’
‘Yeah…’ He raked his hand through his hair. ‘Luck’s exactly what I need right now.’
Carli looked up from the magazine she was reading in the doctor’s waiting room to see Xavier approach.
‘Hi.’ He brushed her cheek with one finger. ‘How are you?’
‘Fine.’ She could feel the skin of her cheek still tingling from his touch long after he had sat down beside her, his long legs stretched out in front of him almost cutting the waiting room in half.
She stared across at his legs so close to hers and couldn’t stop an inward shiver of reaction as she recalled how it had felt to have them between hers, his hard male body exploding with release in that fiery moment when all control had broken loose.
The trouble was she had no self-control where Xavier was concerned.
He’d been her first and only lover, taking her to bed on their second date without a single protest from her in spite of all her mother had taught her about the untrustworthy physical motives of men. She’d fallen for him almost as soon as she’d met him at her friend Eliza’s wedding. He had been the best man and she had been the bridesmaid, and from the very first moment they were introduced, sparks of attraction had crackled like electricity volts charging along a metal wire. She’d seen his dark blue eyes begin to undress her on the spot and her spine had begun to tingle with anticipation. She’d boldly returned his look, doing her own bit of undressing until the heat coming her way had threatened to consume her right there on the spot. When he’d kissed her in the reception-centre car park later that evening her senses had gone into overload. Nothing in her limited experience had prepared her for the commanding pressure of his arrogantly possessive kiss, the bold, searching thrust of his tongue, or the sensuous slide of his hands as they shaped her and brought her to the hard ridge of his desire pulsing between his legs…
‘Thanks for asking me to come,’ Xavier said, turning in his seat to look at her.
For a moment Carli was completely thrown. She stared at him, her cheeks already heating up from the inside, and she seriously wondered if he’d been able to read her mind.
‘Th…thanks for—er—coming,’ she said, shifting her gaze.
Out of the corner of her eye she saw him check his watch before he reached to pick up a magazine off the table beside him.
‘I’m sorry I’m a bit late,’ he said, turning a page. ‘I had a meeting with a client that went over time.’
‘Difficult case?’ she asked, chancing a glance his way.
He seemed to pause before he answered, his eyes going back to the magazine he was holding in his hands. ‘Small kids and a couple of properties. It’s going to get dirty, I can tell.’
‘Whose side are you on, the wife’s or the husband’s?’
Again he seemed to hesitate, the rustle of the pages being turned seeming to make the silence stretch even further before he answered, ‘The husband’s.’
She turned back to her own magazine. ‘I’m sure you’ll do what’s best for all involved.’
Xavier recognised the element in her tone which suggested she thought no such thing and deep down he couldn’t help feeling annoyed by it. Her bitterness towards him ran deep and he knew once she found out about the Dangars’ divorce it would only make things a whole lot worse.
�
��I always try to be fair.’
She closed the magazine and looked at him again. ‘Would you be so fair if it was the wife you were representing?’
‘If I thought it was appropriate. Sometimes ex-wives can be brutal in their demands. I do what I can to redress the balance but it doesn’t always work out to everyone’s satisfaction.’
Carli was saved the necessity of a reply as her name was called.
‘Carla Gresham?’
She got to her feet and privately wondered how long it had been since she’d thought of herself as the sophisticated Carla.
Had she ceased to exist?
Was Carli back?
The Carli who loved Xavier with all the strength of her being?
The vulnerable Carli who’d been so hurt five years ago and still hadn’t quite yet recovered…
The doctor explained the procedure to them both and once Carli was positioned on the table she spread some conductor gel over the slight mound of her belly and began rolling the probe back and forth while looking at the monitor beside the table.
‘Do you want to know the sex?’ Dr Green asked, looking at the screen.
‘Yes.’
‘No.’
Xavier backed down. ‘All right—no.’
The doctor turned and smiled. ‘It’s not always one hundred per cent certain at this stage; I’ve been known to get it wrong, but not often. But if you like surprises it’s nice to wait until the day of birth.’
She moved the probe a few more times and showed them the tiny heart beat and the curve of the developing spine, the tiny hands and feet and the head which seemed too big for the little body.
‘All is as it should be at this stage,’ Dr Green assured them. ‘How are the iron tablets going?’
‘I haven’t fainted since those first couple of times.’
‘Good.’ She pressed the print-out button and handed them each a copy. ‘I’ll see you again in a few weeks but in the meantime take care of yourself. My receptionist will arrange a time for you and give you some details of a parenting class you can attend if you are interested.’
Back In Her Husband's Bed (Bedded By Blackmail) Page 4
