The Army Doc's Baby Secret

by Charlotte Hawkes

  ‘Bloody hell, Zane. Not one of the staff? I can’t lose another one who can’t bear to stay around here and see you with another woman.’

  ‘Once, that’s happened once.’

  ‘Twice.’ Zeke raised an eyebrow.

  ‘Fine, twice. But I always tell them no strings.’

  ‘And they always think they can change you into marriage and kids. Thing is, Zane, one day one of them will, and you won’t know what’s hit you.’

  ‘True.’ Zane eyed Tia speculatively. ‘But now I’ve seen you two together, and heard you talk about your kid non-stop practically all night, I’m beginning to see why you’ve never once been tempted by the fluttering girls who’ve thrown themselves at you over the past few years.’

  ‘The two are mutually exclusive,’ Zeke growled, only for his buddy to snort loudly.

  ‘Yeah, sure. Anyway, I’ll leave you to it.’

  And then, Zane was boldly making his excuses, citing an early start and swaggering out of the room, leaving Zeke to mull over his buddy’s revelations. Lost in his thoughts, he barely registered the evening drawing to a close until he found himself, finally, alone again with Tia.

  ‘I... I should get Seth and head for bed.’ She hovered across the room from him.

  He ought to encourage her to go.

  ‘If you’re happy to leave Seth a little longer, let me give you that tour.’

  She eyed him from under lowered lashes, as though she couldn’t decide whether she was going to accompany him or not.

  ‘He’s still with Mme Leroy. His sleep this afternoon meant he wasn’t ready for bed at the usual time,’ she murmured at length. ‘Perhaps it’s a good opportunity to find my way around the place. It is rather expansive.’

  Zeke resisted the urge to take her hand and lead her out. Just.

  He started with the rooms closest to where they were, forcing himself to impart a few of the interesting facts that Mme Leroy had insisted on telling him, enjoying the way she laughed, encouraged when she couldn’t curb her curiosity about the history of the place any longer and started to ask her own questions.

  They moved around the building, slowly warming up to each other again. The thaw that had begun over the last couple of days now accelerating. For a moment, here and there, he could swear they both forgot what had brought them here.

  How it had brought them here.

  Zeke led Tia out onto the terrace and the pool area.

  ‘I didn’t bring a swimsuit.’ Tia sounded dismayed.

  He bit his tongue before he could suggest she didn’t need to worry about wearing one. The very idea of it leaving him hard, and aching.

  ‘I can have someone bring you anything you need.’

  It wasn’t the right thing to say. A reminder of his money, his power. And the fact that she already didn’t trust him.

  The thaw slid between them in an instant.

  ‘Thank you.’

  It was so damn polite and civil. Like strangers rather than the old married couple they’d been the hour or so before. Tia had been right when she’d said they’d been like perpetual honeymooners during their marriage. They barely knew each other at all.

  He forced himself to resume the tour, to carry on walking through the house and working his way from ground floor to first floor, but the ease between them had gone. Until finally he was opening the door to his study and wondering why they were still fighting a lost cause.

  Maybe it would be better tomorrow.

  ‘This is where you work,’ she breathed, moving across the space to the huge picture windows in front of his desk. ‘You can see a lot from up on this floor.’

  ‘I can watch some of the training exercises without anyone feeling they’re being overseen.’

  ‘I imagine you’re quite off-putting.’

  ‘Mainly for the clients, not so much my men. They’re all ex-soldiers with years of experience.’

  ‘I imagine.’

  Again, that restrained stiffness.

  ‘Would you like a drink?’ He proffered a decanter of amber liquid, even though he rarely bothered to drink much these days.

  For a moment he thought she was going to decline, and then she dipped her head.

  ‘Why not?’

  He poured the drinks and then, in silence, they stood by the window and watched Seth—their son—at play with the other children, streaking around the garden and tugging balloons and streamers with them.

  ‘This is what you’re reading?’ she asked abruptly, breaking the silence. ‘First World War books?’

  ‘Autobiographies. From Europe and from the Pacific.’

  ‘I’ve read this one.’ She tapped the cover, her smile sad. ‘It’s quite moving.’

  It would break the fragile bridge if he told her he’d already read it so instead he dipped his head thoughtfully.

  ‘I’ll bear that in mind.’

  ‘No problem.’

  And there it was, that easiness back. So seamlessly.

  They were close, both propped against his desk as they watched the domestic scene unfolding before them. It was all too reminiscent of Tia’s consultation room back at the lifeboat house. And all he wanted to do was to indulge in a repeat performance.

  He didn’t dare move.

  ‘He has been asking about his father, you know,’ she said softly, almost towards the dark edges of the otherwise summer evening.

  He waited, but she didn’t seem to want to be any more forthcoming.

  ‘What have you told him?’ Zeke asked, when he couldn’t bear it any longer.

  Did Seth think he was dead? Or an absent father who didn’t care?

  He clenched his fists in anger.

  ‘I told him the truth,’ she murmured. ‘That is, as much of the truth as I could manage. I told him that his father was a dedicated, loyal, heroic soldier who had won medals for his bravery. But who had been injured in an accident whilst in a hostile country.’

  ‘So he thinks I’m dead.’

  A wave of nausea rushed up inside him before Zeke could stop it.

  ‘I don’t know,’ Tia answered honestly. ‘I never said you were, and neither did he. But I suppose he might think that.’

  ‘And when do I get to tell him who I am?’

  She turned her head to look at him. The tension between them locking them both into place.

  ‘I don’t know,’ she half whispered. ‘Give me chance to get my head around it all. Everything has happened so quickly these last few days.’

  He had meant to lean in closer in some wild attempt to intimidate her, but he really should have known better. Tia—his Tia—had never been the type to back down or cower. So, they sat there, his thigh cleaved to hers. Her head tilted, almost belligerently, up to his. Her arms crossed over her chest hinting at her impatience.

  And then he saw the faint pulse on one side of her slender neck. Fast, jerky, certainly not as in control as she’d had him believing.

  It sideswiped him, apparently knocking any last vestiges of sanity from his head. Before he even knew what he was doing, he had snaked an arm out to circle her all too familiar waist, and hauled her to him.

  ‘Zeke...?’

  Her hands braced against his chest, her eyes widening, her breath catching.

  ‘Is this what you came here for?’ he bit out, as much to deflect as anything else.

  How he loved the way her cheeks flushed—as though suffused with guilt. And the way she wanted him, just like back at the lifeboat station, soared through his body, lifting his spirits and soothing his earlier temper. Or, at least, transforming it into something else entirely.

  Desire.

  ‘You could have just told me you wanted me to kiss you again,’ he taunted. ‘To make you come apart the way I always make you. The way you did back in that consulting room of your
s.’

  ‘I never gave that afternoon a second thought.’

  It was a valiant attempt, but her voice was too breathy. And he knew her too well. A sensation suspiciously like triumph ripped through him. He bent his head to hers, so close the heat from their breath intertwined, and she shivered deliciously in his arms.

  ‘Liar,’ he whispered. ‘Tell me I never entered your thoughts.’

  For a long moment she didn’t move. He wasn’t even sure if she’d stopped breathing. Her eyes meeting his, darkening, revealing too many things he knew she didn’t want them to.

  ‘You came here for more than just Seth.’

  His gaze raked hers, hot and greedy and wanting. Then he leaned into her even closer.

  ‘You came to France for the same reason I invited you,’ he ground out. ‘Because, as dangerous and nonsensical as it seems to be, you and I can’t seem to stay away from each other.’

  Before she could answer, he bent his head, unable to hold himself back any longer from this burning need that threatened to overpower him, and claimed her mouth with his own.

  Part of him expected Tia to wrench herself away. Another part of him expected her to slap him. Not a single part of him anticipated her groaning and melting against him as if she really couldn’t help herself.

  In seconds, Zeke had moved their positions, bringing her around so that their bodies were against each other, his hands caressing her back. And she looped her arms around his neck and pulled herself in tighter, as though she could think of no objections.

  As though she thrilled to his touch.

  His Tia. His wife. His.

  He ran his hands down her back, teasing and flirting with the sweet curve of her bottom, pulling her into him so that her heat pressed against where he ached for her most, and it did nothing to help his self-control that all he could remember was the way she had tasted the other day in her office, that glorious scent of her sex, slick just for him, and the way she had come apart so perfectly against his mouth.

  ‘Tia,’ he groaned, nipping at the sensitive skin of her neck.

  His body howled at him to strip her naked, spread her out on his desk and thrust all the way home. To have her screaming his name as she had done every weekend they’d managed to snatch together during their marriage, when they’d barely been able to get out of bed most of the time.

  The sex between them had never been an issue.

  Belatedly, he realised that this was what she’d meant when she’d said they had barely known each other. They’d mistaken unashamed sex for being emotionally vulnerable. But right now, Zeke couldn’t bring himself to care. He just wanted to feel her around him, tight and wet, drawing him inside her until he filled her up.

  He hooked his fingers under the hem of her cashmere top and hauled it over her head, the sinfully sexy lace bra making his body constrict all the more painfully. And then he spun her around so that his length was nestled between her buttocks as he cupped her breasts with one hand and undid the zip of her trousers with the other.

  He heard her murmur of objection, muffled as she let her head fall back whilst he nuzzled the other side of her neck. Arching her back and pressing her breast into his aching palm.

  ‘So good,’ he muttered. ‘So damn perfect.’

  And then he slid his hand into her trousers and his fingers stroked her sex as though it were the most precious thing he’d ever touched.

  The jerk of her hips and her whimper of need was like a lick against his groaning body.

  And then just as suddenly as it had begun between them, Tia wrenched herself away. Refastening her trousers and straightening her cashmere top.

  Zeke knew what was coming. Was powerless to stop it.

  ‘This can’t happen again.’

  ‘You said that last time,’ he pointed out nonchalantly, as though her anger couldn’t faze him.

  ‘Well, this time, I mean it. We’re not kids any more, Zeke. We have responsibilities. I have a son.’

  ‘We have a son,’ he corrected quietly. Dangerously.

  ‘Indeed you do.’ Her eyes flashed just as lethally as she stalked around his study. ‘So you should damned well act like it. We’re here because you said you wanted to get to know your son. But stay away from me, for the rest of this trip.’

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  ‘WHAT DO YOU do first?’ Tia asked the young lad, her brain fighting to function.

  The sun was beating down on them, and with no shade it had already been a long morning of training exercises.

  It didn’t help that she’d hardly slept in the few nights since that encounter with Zeke. Her mind had been buzzing for days, her body even more so. The worst of it was that, despite everything she had said to him about responsibility, she had imagined going back down to his study and finishing what they had begun.

  ‘Do a blood sweep.’ The soldier’s voice dragged her back to reality even as he checked down his make-believe patient, moving slow enough to give her time to respond.

  ‘You find blood on his upper-right leg.’

  ‘Check the casualty for holes.’

  ‘You find a gunshot wound,’ Tia told him, trying to focus on what was going on around her rather than in her head.

  ‘Okay, I’m going to apply arterial pressure whilst I put a tourniquet around his leg...here.’

  ‘Good—’ she nodded ‘—but you need really solid pressure. Forget your hand, jam your knee right onto it or your casualty is going to bleed out. That’s better.’

  ‘How is he doing?’ Zeke muttered, coming to stand next to her.

  ‘Okay,’ she confirmed, ignoring the way her body pulled tight. As if her skin were too small for her all of a sudden.

  ‘Make sure that tourniquet is really tight. Look.’ Zeke moved over to kneel by the trainee, turning up the fabric of his lightweight trousers as he went.

  Yet she couldn’t help feeling that he had deliberately angled himself so that his body was between her and the bionic limb he was flexing by way of demonstration.

  ‘If my buddies hadn’t done that for me, I could easily have lost my whole leg.’

  She tried not to take it personally that he didn’t mention her part in saving his leg. Or that his voice seemed to be pitched deliberately low. She’d seen and heard him talk about his limb several times to plenty of people over the last few days, but she was sure she wasn’t imagining the shift in Zeke’s attitude when she was around.

  ‘Tourniquet applied.’ The man nodded. ‘Checking for other bullet holes.’

  ‘There are no more holes found,’ Tia confirmed.

  ‘Does he have radial pulses?’

  ‘He does have radial pulses.’ She nodded.

  ‘Okay, I’m calling it in.’

  Zeke joined her as she was writing up brief notes and, though it killed her, she leaned over to speak to him confidentially.

  ‘Although he found the gunshot entry point on his casualty’s leg, he forgot to turn him over and check for an exit point.’ How could Zeke remain so calm when their arms skimmed each other like that? ‘Also, he never checked for head injuries, or blood in the ears.’

  ‘Mark it down, we’ll know to go over it.’ Zeke shifted, brushing against her again. Almost more than she could stand.

  She took the opportunity to break contact as she circled the trainee and his stand-in casualty.

  ‘You find your casualty is having trouble breathing.’

  The trainee paused for a moment before suggesting that his patient was overheating.

  Quickly he began to strip his casualty down out of body armour and jacket until he was just in a coat.

  ‘Is that what you were looking for?’ Zeke murmured quietly.

  ‘Pretty much.’

  ‘Good. Fine, you seem to have it in hand here. I’ll check on the others and then meet you at the house
after lunch.’

  ‘Sure.’

  She made a mental note to try to avoid the house if Zeke was going to be there after lunch time.

  In her peripheral vision she could see him moving away, on to the next team, and concealed her sigh of relief.

  If the rest of her month here was going to be this strained then it was going to be hell. But she couldn’t give into temptation again, with Zeke.

  * * *

  Zeke stared at the piece of paper in his hand, a whole range of emotions tumbling through him, yet he couldn’t seem to grasp hold of a single one of them.

  He was still standing in the same spot minutes...weeks...years later, when Tia walked into the room. He heard her speak, somewhere in the recesses of his mind, knew she was flustered and apologetic, but nothing registered. Not until she stepped closer, her tone changing to one of curiosity.

  ‘What have you got?’

  ‘A picture.’

  ‘From me,’ the lilting, bodiless voice came from the vicinity of the huge brown moleskin office chair. Tia’s head jerked and he realised she hadn’t even known Seth was in the room, let alone colouring in at Zeke’s ornate desk as though it were his own personal colouring station. ‘I drew it for him.’

  ‘Oh.’

  ‘It’s a rhinoceros,’ Seth confirmed, wriggling off the chair. ‘I’ve done another one for Mme Leroy. Can I take it to her?’

  She swallowed. Steadied herself, her eyes raking over the picture.

  ‘Sure,’ she confirmed after a moment, watching their son leave the room before turning to Zeke, her voice low. ‘He loves animals.’

  Zeke watched the door close behind the little boy. Marvelled at this incredible person that he—they—had created.

  ‘He told me he wants to be a zoo vet, and travel to places like Africa or the Arctic?’ Zeke managed.

  ‘Animals have always interested him.’ Tia shrugged lightly but he didn’t miss the flash of pride in her eyes. ‘I don’t know if he’ll ever become a vet but I’m not about to discourage him. Ask him about the picture and he’ll no doubt tell you that it’s a popular misconception that the rhinos’ ancestor is the triceratops.’