Kitabı oku: «The Bachelor's Baby», sayfa 2

‘I…um…’ He couldn’t speak. Couldn’t find his voice to say the words. This couldn’t be happening.

‘Jake’s staying,’ Mike said, helping him out. ‘But I think right now he has something he needs to do. Why don’t we go and put Ben to bed, hmm?’

Her forehead creased as she latched on to the sudden inexplicable tension, her gaze switching between Mike and Jake and then it clicked. For a moment she had trouble keeping her lower lip from hitting the floor until, with a supreme effort at self-control, she said, ‘Good plan.’

Jake pushed open the gate, paused. The garden had moved on while he’d been away. The bluebells had faded and now lilac, thick with blossom, scented the air and a blackbird was singing from a high perch in an apple tree.

A small black cat blinked sleepy yellow eyes at him from a patch of catnip. And from the rear of the cottage he could hear Amy’s voice raised in a lilting song that might have been a lullaby.

He refused to succumb to such seductive enchantment. He wasn’t enchanted. He was mad, mad as hell, and Amy was about to hear all about it. He found her wielding a spade with an easy competence that suggested long practice; her gardening skills were clearly not confined to picking flowers.

She was wearing thick cord trousers and heavy boots that contrasted with the femininity of a broad-brimmed straw hat that shaded her face. And a man’s shirt. What man?

She stopped, rubbed her sleeve across her face, leaving her cheek streaked with dirt, and he forgot about the shirt as anxiety squeezed the breath from his lungs. Should she be working like this? Digging?

‘Should you be doing that?’ he demanded harshly.

‘If I want homegrown beans on my table, then yes,’ she replied easily, no trace of surprise in her voice. ‘But if you’re volunteering, be my guest.’ She pushed the spade into the soil, stepped back and turned to look at him. He needed, wanted to see into her eyes; the hat threw shade across her face, keeping her thoughts hidden. But her voice caught at him, drawing him closer.

Jake’s voice was hard, angry. Amy had heard him open the gate, walk around the cottage, and had recognised footsteps last heard racing away from her.

She’d forced herself to carry on working, leaving him to speak first, even though she longed to leap up, fling herself into his arms and pull him inside the house so that she could show him just how pleased she was to see him, hoping he was feeling the same hot surge of excitement, desire. She felt raw, unbridled pleasure that he’d returned.

For a moment he took a step closer, as if he felt it too, but then he stopped. The sun was low at his back and his face was shadowed so that she couldn’t see his expression. Which was perhaps a good thing, if it matched his voice.

‘I thought you were still in America,’ she said, when the silence grew too long.

‘I was. Now I’m back. Should you be doing that?’ he repeated. ‘In your condition.’

Her condition? She felt the heat rise to her cheeks. He couldn’t know. There was no way on earth he could know. Yet his voice, his repeated question, suggested that somehow he did, and when she didn’t answer he turned abruptly and walked towards the rear door of the cottage, pushed it open, ducking under the low lintel as he went inside. Amy abandoned the bean trench for the second time that afternoon and, pulling off her gardening gloves, followed him.

He wasn’t in the mud room or the kitchen. ‘Jake? Where are you?’ she called, dropping her gloves, kicking off her earth-caked boots. A creak from the floor above her betrayed his whereabouts. What on earth…? ‘Jake, what are doing? What do you want?’

Upstairs, in the bathroom, Jake gripped the basin. This couldn’t be happening to him. It couldn’t be true. Fatherhood had no part in his life plan. He didn’t want this. No way. Never.

Except that it was. The evidence was apparently there, right there, before his eyes.

His hand was shaking as he reached for the piece of plastic with its telltale line of blue. He gripped it hard, wrapping it in his fist, wanting to break it, smash it, make it go away. Such a small thing. So insignificant. So easy to overlook.

He wouldn’t have known what it was but for Willow. If he’d called in to see Amy…

If!

Who did he think he was fooling? He hadn’t been able to wait to see her! All the teddies in the world couldn’t hide the truth of that. He’d have come here and made hot, sweet love with her, then they’d have shared a shower, and with the evidence right in front of him he still wouldn’t have known.

How long would she have waited to tell him? Until it was too late to do anything about it. ‘…not a woman to make a mistake, so it must have been planned…’ was what Willow had said to Mike.

His hands bunched into fists and he banged them down on the white porcelain sink. How much had she planned? All of it? Even that dramatic last-minute entry at the christening?

She’d known he would be there, singled him out, enchanting him with her green eyes and seductive voice. And he didn’t doubt for a minute she knew, understood exactly what effect she would have on any susceptible man.

Oh, yes. It had been planned, and, libido rampant, he’d fallen for it. Right down to that last magical embrace when her kiss had trawled him in, tempting him beyond thought…

What a fool! What an idiot!

What on earth had possessed him? He was a man with ‘precaution’ stamped on his brain. Mike had as good as warned him. ‘Take care,’ he’d said. He hadn’t added, ‘She’ll bewitch you.’ Not that it would have made any difference.

Jake had thought himself invulnerable to even the most meticulously planned guerilla attack on his heart. It had been tried before and his heart was totally immune to sentiments beyond his experience, beyond his understanding. Which was why he’d so cavalierly ignored the danger signals, Mike’s warning.

So now what?

Did she believe that he would marry her because she was carrying his child? Had she picked out a millionaire daddy for her baby? Well, she’d picked the wrong man for those games.

‘Jake?’

He turned as softly, oh, so softly, her voice caressed him, teased him, stole into every corner of his mind.

Take care.

Mike was right. Even now it was taking every ounce of self-control to stop himself from reaching out for her, from taking her into his arms, telling her that it would be all right.

He knew better.

He wasn’t like Mike, who’d grown up in a warm, caring family and had learned to play happy families at his mother’s knee. He’d warned Amy, told her that he didn’t do commitment, and the sooner she understood that it would take more than a blue line on a stick of plastic to suck him into her tender trap, the better.

‘Jake?’ she repeated, the soft inflection inviting an explanation.

‘Amy?’ he responded, his voice lifting in ironic mimicry. And opened his hand so that she would know exactly what he meant. ‘Now, I’ll ask you again. Should you be digging in your condition?’

‘I’m pregnant, Jake,’ she said quietly, refusing to respond to the aggression in his voice. ‘Not an invalid.’

‘And you intend going through with it?’ he demanded.

She regarded him steadily, sorrowfully, her eyes all too visible now, all too easy to read, and he dearly wished the words unsaid. Unthought.

‘This is my baby, Jake. She might only be this big—’ and she held her finger and thumb with scarcely a space between them ‘—but she’s my little girl.’ Then she turned and walked out of the bathroom.

Jake frowned, followed her down the stairs. ‘You can tell that it’s a girl? Already?’ he demanded.

She shook her head impatiently. ‘Go away, Jake. This is nothing to do with you.’

‘Nothing…’ His breath caught in his throat. ‘Are you saying this is not my baby?’ he demanded. If she was, the sick feeling that had been sitting like a stone in his stomach since Willow erupted into the kitchen with her news should have evaporated. It hadn’t. It had shifted, changed, deepened. ‘Well? Are you?’

‘No, Jake, I’m not saying that. She’s your baby. Our baby. What I’m saying is that you needn’t…’

‘What? I needn’t what?’

‘Worry about us.’ Her hand hovered briefly at her waist, so that he would know which ‘us’ she was referring to, before she let it drop to her side. ‘I don’t need you to hold my hand. We don’t need you. If it bothers you, just go away, forget you ever came here. Forget you ever met me.’

He stared at her. Was she serious? ‘That’s what you want?’ She didn’t answer him and he suddenly realised what was going on. She wanted a baby with a daddy rich enough to ensure that it lacked for nothing. She didn’t want the trouble of a man about the house. ‘I’ll be hearing from your lawyers, is that it?’ he asked, keeping his own voice flat and expressionless.

‘Lawyers?’ She shook her head, as if he was slow-witted or something. ‘I don’t want your money, Jake. I have money. I run a successful business…’

Yeah, sure. He wasn’t that slow. ‘You can’t run a business with a baby on your hip.’

‘Watch me.’ Then she made the slightest of gestures, apparently dismissing him and his concerns. ‘Or not. As you please. You said you don’t do commitment, Jake. I heard you, and you can believe me when I promise that you’re not committed to me or my baby. Financially or emotionally.’ There was a crispness in her voice that suggested she was losing patience. ‘And you needn’t worry about what Mike and Willow will think. I’ll speak to them. They know me; they’ll understand.’

‘Will they? I’m damned if I do.’

‘No? Well, I’m sorry, Jake, I’m afraid I can’t put it any plainer.’

And she crossed to the door, opened it as if she was setting free some small frightened creature that she was pushing out into the world for its own good.

Standing on the threshold, his thoughts in a turmoil, he realised that he didn’t want to go. He just didn’t know how to stay. And if he did stay it would give Amaryllis Jones entirely the wrong idea about his determination not to get caught up in the emotional rollercoaster she had boarded.

Bad idea.

Instead he headed for the gate while he still remembered how, determined not to look back once he’d got there. If she was bluffing, well, he was calling her.

The door clicked shut before he’d gone half a dozen steps and he swung round, taken by surprise.

Dammit, she meant it! She really meant it!

Well, that was just fine. So did he. Now they both knew where they stood.

CHAPTER TWO

SECOND MONTH. The tendency to put on weight begins. Morning sickness may begin to bother you now, although it won’t necessarily be in the mornings. It’s time to visit your doctor and maybe get a scan.

‘YOUR dates suggest you shouldn’t plan anything strenuous for the second half of December.’ The doctor crossed to the sink to wash her hands.

‘You mean I’ll have to put the two weeks’ skiing in Klosters on hold?’ Amy asked, grinning stupidly. First intuition, then chemistry, and now medical science had confirmed that she was pregnant and she was grinning for Britain. Until she realised how snug her waistband had become. ‘Uh, should I be putting on weight already, Sally?’

‘I’m afraid so. You’ve had the fun; it’s downhill all the way from here.’

‘Downhill? I thought I was supposed to glow.’

‘You will, my dear. You will. It’s nature’s compensation for the morning sickness, the heartburn, the loss of visual contact with your feet—’

‘Okay, okay,’ Amy said quickly. ‘That’ll do. I get the picture.’

‘Do you?’ Dr Sally Maitland turned and looked at her thoughtfully. ‘Pregnancy is the easy bit. I’d be happier if I thought this wasn’t going to be parenthood for one,’ she said. ‘That your baby’s father…’ she paused momentarily, but when no name was forthcoming carried on ‘…is planning on sticking around to see through what he started.’

That was the trouble with having a doctor who’d known you since she’d put you in your mother’s arms. She didn’t feel the need to be in the least bit tactful. As for the question…

It was a week since Jake had walked out of her cottage, called a cab on his mobile as he’d walked back to Mike and Willow’s place and high-tailed it back to London with a face like thunder. She’d had the details from Willow, who’d raced over, full of remorse at her unintentional blunder.

‘He’s had a bit of shock,’ she’d said, in an attempt to excuse his reaction to the news. ‘It’s all my fault, blurting it out like that to Mike. I am so sorry.’

‘Don’t worry about it, Willow. He’d have had to know sooner or later.’

‘Later might have been better. When you’d had a chance to get to really know Jake. Find out what makes him tick beyond an insatiable capacity for work and a gift for making money.’ She shrugged. ‘No one else has a clue. Just that this kind of stuff is difficult for him. I believe he had a rough childhood, although he never talks about it. I get the impression that his mother abandoned him and commitment—’

‘It’s all right, Willow. Really.’

‘We’re still friends?’

‘The best. I would have told you about the baby, but I wanted to tell Jake first. You saved me an awkward moment.’

‘I doubt that,’ she said. Then, ‘Give him time to get his head round it. He’ll be back.’

‘Maybe.’ She wasn’t counting on it. Willow hadn’t been there. Hadn’t heard the way he’d asked if she was ‘going through with it.’

‘Deep down he’s a really caring man, Amy. He still helps out the woman who fostered him with her shop. I mean really helps. He could pay someone to do it, but he goes down there, makes sure she’s coping, does her accounts. I’ve even seen him stacking shelves. Okay, so he lives for his work,’ Willow admitted. ‘Seven days a week, fifty-two weeks a year, but he found time to give us a hand when Mike and I were working on a charity project for deprived kids. He’s never slow to put his hand in his pocket—’

‘I’m not a charity case.’

‘No, of course not. Well, give him time.’

But how much time? Amy wondered. He had something less than eight months, which seemed for ever right now, but the clock was running.

‘Amy?’ She snapped back to the present. To the doctor, who was waiting for some response from her. ‘Is the father going to be sticking around?’

‘What? Oh. I don’t know.’ Which was something of a first for her. It was her ability to read people, feel their moods, understand their uncertainties that had made Mike look at her sideways more than once. This time she seemed to have got it all wrong. ‘I just don’t know.’

‘Right. Well, in that case we’d better get down to practicalities.’ Sally picked up the phone. ‘Let’s see how soon we can get a scan…’

Forget you ever met me.

He’d tried. For three weeks he’d been trying. Absolutely determined to wipe Amy Jones from his memory, he’d thrown himself into work. Work had always been the answer to the emptiness, and there was plenty of that to distract him now that the American deal had finally gone through.

Unfortunately, this time it wasn’t working.

Amy might have told him to go away, forget about her and her baby, and she’d certainly sounded as if she’d meant it.

But it wasn’t that easy. This was his worst nightmare, the kind that brought him awake sweating and shivering in the middle of the night. Forgetting was going to take a lot of effort. Absolute concentration.

For that he needed to wipe away all sense of unfinished business. Of concern. At least the rewards of hard work provided the means to assuage the guilt that was gnawing at him, that would continue to gnaw at him while he worried about how she would cope. Well, he could deal with that.

He regarded the cheque he had written with a certain amount of satisfaction. He might suffer from emotional attachment deficit but he had no doubt that Amy could provide enough emotion for two; he’d had the most vivid experience of her ability to connect, to enfold, to touch. Just the touch of her fingertips on his face had been…

‘They’re waiting for you in the boardroom, Jake.’ His secretary’s disembodied voice on the intercom dragged him back from the heat of his memories. He should have known. Anyone who could give that much would always be a threat to his detachment. His peace of mind. And she would expect something in return. All he had was money.

‘I’ll be right there, Maggie,’ he said. And he signed the cheque. Amy could do the warm, emotional stuff and he would pay the bills. Between them, the baby wouldn’t lack for anything.

He stuffed the cheque in an envelope, addressed it and tossed it into his out tray. Now he could get on with the one thing he understood—making money—and forget all about Amy Jones.

He’d been in the meeting for less than ten minutes when the envelope lying in his out tray began to niggle at him, distracting him. He should have enclosed a note…he should have said something. That he was sorry. That he—

‘Jake?’

No. That would put a crack in his armour, a way in, and he refused to be haunted by this woman. He would end it now. ‘Carry on without me,’ he said, rising to his feet. ‘I have to do something. It’ll just take a minute.’

Back in his office he picked up the envelope. Maybe he should take it down there. Maybe he should…

Dear God, what was it about Amy Jones? It was as if she’d invaded his mind, addled his wits. ‘Call a courier, Maggie. I want this delivered right away,’ he said, dropping it on his secretary’s desk. Then he glanced at his watch. ‘No, wait.’ He’d written the address of the cottage, but she’d be at her shop for the rest of the day. ‘Ring Willow Armstrong at the Melchester Chronicle and ask her for Miss Jones’s business address. Send it there.’

‘No problem.’

No. No problem. Not now.

‘Any problems, Vicki?’ Amy dropped her bag on her desk, along with her shopping.

‘Nothing I couldn’t handle. How did it go? Could you see the baby?’ Vicki grinned. ‘And have you bought up the entire stock of that baby boutique in the shopping mall?’ she asked, taking the bags, putting them on the desk and riffling through them.

Amy laughed. ‘Everything’s perfect. The baby is this big,’ she said, holding her thumb and finger half an inch apart. Vicki, still deep in the bags, picked out the tiniest pair of powderpuff-pink baby bootees.

‘Oh, bless!’

‘I know. I just went in to look but you know how it is.’ Vicki emptied the bags, cooing over the precious little things until Amy made an effort to come back down to earth and called a halt, packing them away. That’s when she saw the courier envelope. ‘Vicki, what’s this?’

‘Oh, gosh. I’m sorry. That arrived just before you got back.’

Amy picked up the big square card envelope, looked at the name of the sender and with fingers that were suddenly shaking she tore it open, took out the thick white envelope inside.

She knew what it contained even before she opened it, but it was still a shock. Her joyful mood, the sweet pleasure of buying tiny clothes for the baby growing inside her evaporated like a dawn mist in August and she said a word that made Vicki blink.

‘Bad news?’ she asked. ‘What is it? The VAT man on the warpath? Death-watch beetle in the attic?’

‘Worse. It’s from my baby’s father.’ And she ripped the contents of the envelope in two. It felt so good that she kept on doing it until the cheque was reduced to confetti. Then she picked up a fresh envelope, and after copying the sender’s address from the courier slip, she scooped the shredded cheque into it. She sealed it and stamped it and tossed it in her out tray.

‘Tea,’ Vicki said, slowly. ‘Camomile tea.’ And she handed Amy a small phial of mandarin oil. ‘And, in the meantime, I suggest you should rub a little of this on your pulse points. It’ll make you feel better.’

She didn’t want to feel better. She wanted to scream. She wanted to smash something. How dared he send her a cheque? She wanted it out of her sight. Out of her shop.

‘I’ll be fine, Vicki,’ she said, with controlled venom.

‘Just as soon as that—’ she pointed to the envelope ‘—that thing…is out of my sight. Forget the tea. Take it to the post office now and send it by recorded delivery. I want to be absolutely certain that he got it.’

‘Um, maybe you should wait ten minutes. Think about it. It’s what you always tell me—’

‘No.’ She was trusting her instincts on this one. Calm thought was not the appropriate reaction. The feeling was too strong to bottle up, keep a lid on. She needed Jake to know exactly how she felt. ‘Just do as I ask, Vicki. Please. Straight away.’

‘Look, if you feel that strongly about it I could ask the courier to take it back with him. He was due for his lunchbreak, so I suggested the café across the courtyard.’ And she blushed. ‘I was going to join him if you got back in time.’

‘Oh, Vicki!’

‘We all have our weaknesses,’ she said. ‘Yours is for pink bootees. Mine is for black leather.’

‘I’m not in the mood to encourage young love,’ Amy warned. Then she shook her head. ‘All right. Use the courier. But don’t blame me if he breaks your heart. And it has to be signed for by Jacob Hallam. No one else. If I’m going to spend a fortune making a statement, I want to be sure I’m getting my money’s worth.’

‘You will,’ she said. And grinned. ‘Just you leave it to me.’

Jake frowned at the note his secretary passed to him. ‘Can’t you deal with it?’

‘Sorry. It has to be signed for by the addressee.’

‘Okay. Let’s take five, gentlemen.’ He got up and followed Maggie into Reception, where the courier was waiting. ‘You’ve got something for me?’

‘If you’re Mr Jacob Hallam?’

‘Yes.’

‘Then I’ve got this, if you could sign for it.’ He offered a pen.

Jake took it, signed for an envelope with ‘Amaryllis Jones’ picked out in elegant black and gold lettering on the top left-hand corner. So, she’d got the cheque. He hadn’t expected such a swift response and he held the envelope for a moment; it was thick and soft and contained more than a polite ‘thank you’ note. As he pushed his thumb beneath the flap and ripped it open, he had a very bad feeling about it.

Jake frowned at the contents. Pink and soft. He wasn’t sure what he was expecting. Nothing pink and soft, that was for sure. As he pulled it out, a handful of tiny scraps of paper fluttered about him, settling at his feet. The cheque had been shredded so thoroughly that only when Maggie began to gather up the pieces and he saw part of his signature did he realise what it was.

‘What the devil…?’

Maggie handed him the pieces. ‘One of two things, Jake. It wasn’t enough. Or she doesn’t want your money. Take your pick. But if it’s the latter, I’d say you’re in big trouble.’

‘The question was rhetorical,’ he said coldly.

Maggie had been his secretary for too long to be choked off by a chilly put-down. ‘Sorry, Jake,’ she said, almost kindly. ‘I’m afraid trouble doesn’t come in “rhetorical”. Not this kind.’

‘And what kind is that?’ He was just digging a bigger hole for himself, he knew, but he couldn’t stop himself.

‘The kind involving a woman and a cheque. Especially if she’s pregnant.’

‘Pregnant?’ His face remained impassive, even while his gut was churning. ‘What makes you think she’s pregnant?’

‘Well, the pink bootees are a bit of a giveaway,’ Maggie said. ‘It would seem she’s—you’re—expecting a girl. Congratulations.’

‘Bootees…’ He realised what he was holding. Bootees. Blossom-pink, thistledown-soft. ‘Oh…’ he said. Then, ‘Sugar.’

‘I think, under the circumstances, a little more enthusiasm is called for.’

‘Sorry, Maggie. I can’t do enthusiasm. Not for this.’ He continued to stare at the bootees. They were so…so…small. He tried to imagine feet tiny enough to fit them. Toes… He snapped his mind back from the brink. ‘She knows that. I thought the cheque would help.’

‘Did you?’ Maggie shook her head. ‘And I thought you were quite bright, for a man. Never mind, keep trying. I’m sure you’ll figure it out eventually.’

‘You think that I’m heading for wedding bells and happy ever after?’ He could read her like a book. ‘Give me a break.’ She said nothing, but she was thinking for England, he could see. ‘Okay, what would you do? If you were me? Forgetting the white lace and promises bit,’ he added quickly.

‘That would depend on what I—as you—wanted.’ Maggie waited a moment. Then asked, ‘What do you want, Jake?’

‘Me? I’ve got everything I ever wanted.’ He was successful, rich. His father would have been proud… ‘I don’t want this.’

Maggie gave him an old-fashioned look. ‘It appears that you don’t have a choice. It is yours?’ She quirked an eyebrow. ‘There’s no doubt?’ He shook his head. It was his. The only thing he could imagine worse than this situation was knowing that Amy was expecting someone else’s baby. It didn’t make sense, he knew, but then emotional stuff never did. ‘You know, Jake, having a baby is a bit like a bacon and egg breakfast.’

He dragged his thoughts back from the golden moment when they’d made the baby. ‘This should be good.’

‘It takes two to make it happen,’ she said, ignoring his muttered interjection. ‘But while the chicken makes a contribution, the pig is totally committed. The mother of your baby can’t walk away, Jake. Or pretend it isn’t happening. Or pay someone else to feel the pain.’ About to say more, she apparently changed her mind.

‘What?’

‘Nothing. At least… Well, maybe you shouldn’t take the way she handled your cheque too seriously. Her hormones are probably acting up. Leave it a few weeks. Try again when everything’s settled down.’ Then she shrugged. ‘Or you might get lucky. It might just take an extra nought.’

What did he want?

That was easy. He wanted Amy. He wanted to stop the world, rewind the tape, replay those hours they’d spent together. He wanted to breathe in the sweet scent of her skin, he wanted to wake with her in his arms, wanted to hear her whimpering softly as he took her over the edge, followed her there, briefly, to a place beyond pain. For now. He knew it was a fleeting thing. An ache that would soon pass.

Unlike fatherhood.

He didn’t want to be a father. He didn’t know how to be a father. Not the kind of father any baby would want. What he wanted, what he needed, was for Amy to take the money so that he could walk away with a clear conscience. Money to pay for help. Money to pay for everything.

Maggie was being over-sentimental about that. Money would do it every time. One way or the other. And Amy would take it. Eventually. She’d have no choice. But maybe sending it like that had been a mistake. It had been cold and impersonal, and she was a warm and caring woman. In her place, he realised, he would have been angry, too.

That she was angry he didn’t doubt for a moment. It would take a really angry woman to reduce his cheque to such tiny shreds of paper. What the bootees meant, why she had enclosed them with the cheque, was a mystery he refused to confront. He suspected he already knew the answer. She wanted him. On his knees.

He crumpled the bootees in his hand, stuffed them out of sight in his pocket. No way.

But Maggie was right, he acknowledged belatedly. The cheque had been crass. His father would have sent a cheque. He should have thought of something less direct, something that she could have accepted without losing her dignity. A trust fund for the baby, maybe. She wouldn’t, couldn’t refuse that, not once she accepted that he wasn’t to be turned to marshmallow by a pair of pink bootees.

He’d go down there tonight. Apologise. Check that she was keeping well. Not overdoing it. She shouldn’t be on her feet all day…

Dammit, he was doing it again. Thinking about her. Worrying about her. He spat out an expletive that had once earned him a beating from…

No!

He dragged his fingers through his hair. Dear God, where had that thought come from? He’d blanked it out. Walled it up in the attic of his mind with all the other ghosts.

This was her doing. Amy, with her green eyes and gentle touch. His wall was defenceless against her. He knew, just knew, that if he wasn’t very careful she would dismantle it, take it down, brick by brick, and let out all the pain. It had already begun.

Emotion was a loose cannon. Uncontrollable. And the one thing he’d always promised himself was that he would never be out of control of his life. Never again. He would get this over with. Deal with it. Finish it.

For a moment, Amy thought the courier was back. She was behind the cottage, working off her bad mood on the weeds. They would never let her down. They were predictable. They’d always be there.

She was carefully easing out a dandelion with the trowel when she heard the motorbike roaring up the lane, then slowing. Then stopping at her gate. The dandelion root snapped, leaving half still embedded in the soil.

‘Damn!’

Damn, damn, damn. The day had begun so well, so joyfully; then Jake’s conscience had given him a jab in the ribs and after that it had been downhill all the way.

She straightened as the leather-clad figure rounded the side of the cottage, wondering what he’d sent her this time. A bigger cheque? Did he really believe that was what she wanted? Was he that stupid?

That scared?

The man pulled at the strap beneath the black helmet. Removed it. And her heart did a crazy flip-flop that made her feel just a little dizzy, so that she grabbed for the post of the compost bin. Not a courier this time; this time Jake had come himself. Which could be better—or much worse.

He looked tired, she thought. There were dark shadows beneath his eyes and his cheeks had a sucked-in, hollow look emphasised by the stubble of a day’s dark growth of beard. He looked like a man to whom sleep was a stranger.