Gypsy

by Carole Mortimer

  ‘Shay, damn you, open your eyes!’ he ordered through gritted teeth.

  She did so reluctantly, her lids feeling heavy. ‘How long have I been drugged?’

  Lyon looked down at her with dark eyes, his face so pale he looked almost grey, his hair slightly tousled from its usual immaculate style. ‘You’ve been out about six hours; I’ve been here five of them.’

  ‘Why?’ she asked dully, wondering why he was bothering with her now.

  ‘Shay, what the hell is the matter with you?’ He thrust his hands savagely into the hip pockets of his trousers, the jacket and waistcoat to the dark suit unbuttoned to be pushed back from his chest. ‘You’re covered in bruises, have a dozen stitches in several cuts, and as soon as you regain consciousness you attack me because I’ve gone through hell sitting watching you!’ His eyes glittered ominously.

  She knew about the bruises, daren’t move because of the pain they caused in every part of her body, and she could feel several constrictive bandages on her legs too. ‘Didn’t you forget something, Lyon?’ she said bitterly, staring at the ceiling.

  ‘The fact that I don’t understand what you were doing at that underground station in the first place?’ he rasped.

  She turned to him with flashing eyes. ‘The fact that I’ve lost my baby!’

  A heavy frown settled on his brow. ‘Shay, you—’

  ‘Don’t tell me I can have other babies.’ Her voice rose shrilly at the thought of this man’s insincere platitudes. ‘I wanted this baby! What did they do with it? Oh God, they didn’t—’

  ‘Shay, stop this.’ Lyon put restraining hands on her arms as they waved about madly. ‘You haven’t lost your baby. Do you hear me?’ His voice rose as she continued to thrash about. ‘You-haven’t-lost-your-baby!’ He grasped her hands. ‘Feel, Shay. For God’s sake feel it. I have.’ His voice steadied as she began to calm a little, looking up at him disbelievingly as she registered what he was saying. ‘I’ve sat beside you with my hand gently resting on the baby. It’s moved, Shay. I think it even punched me once,’ he added teasingly, his voice gentle now.

  ‘It did?’ she said in a hushed voice. ‘It really did?’ The glow started to come back in her eyes.

  ‘Yes.’ Lyon held her hands flat against her stomach. ‘It’s going to be a tough little boy—or girl,’ he added ruefully.

  ‘But I—I felt the blood.’ She still wasn’t convinced. ‘I felt the baby go—’

  ‘No,’ Lyon insisted firmly. ‘You’ve cut your leg rather badly, enough to need several stitches,’ he frowned, ‘but the baby is still there. You aren’t usually this fat, Shay.’ He mocked the swell of her stomach.

  She was afraid to look down, afraid to believe him. ‘Some women still look pregnant for a few days after they’ve given birth.’

  ‘Not you, Shay,’ he cajoled. ‘You’ll have your baby and be as slender as you ever were.’

  ‘No, I—’ Her eyes suddenly widened with wonder. ‘It moved, Lyon,’ she said in an awed voice. ‘Lyon, it did move!’

  ‘I told you—’

  ‘Lyon, it moved!’ She sat up to fling her arms about his neck, crying and laughing at the same time, hugging him so tightly neither of them could breath. Her other aches and pains from the fall were forgotten in the wonder of knowing her baby was safe, her hatred of Lyon too in this mutual bond of relief.

  ‘I know, Shay.’ He stroked the silky softness of her hair as he cradled her to his chest. ‘I know, my darling.’

  Even the endearment went without rebuff, her relief and happiness too extreme at the moment to care that he used the insincerity. ‘You’re sure everything is all right?’ She moved back to look at him anxiously. ‘The fall …?’ she shuddered at the memory of that fall, of the iron steps cutting into her again and again.

  Lyon looked grim as she moved out of his arms completely to lie back against the pillows. ‘The doctors here have assured me there will be no repercussions, but I have Peter Dunbar standing by to examine you now that you’ve regained consciousness. I meant to call him the moment you woke up.’ He seemed irritated that he had been diverted from carrying out that decision.

  ‘You have Peter Dunbar, the specialist, waiting for your call?’ The obstetrician was world-known, hardly the sort of man to be at anyone’s beck and call!

  ‘No,’ Lyon answered arrogantly. ‘I have him waiting in the staff-room here. I’ll go and get him.’ He strode over to the door. ‘It’s about time he started earning the exorbitant fee he will no doubt charge me.’

  Even Lyon’s arrogance couldn’t spoil her happiness, smiling up at the ceiling as her hands rested possessively on the swell of her stomach. The baby was alive, alive! She could even like Lyon at a moment like this.

  Although he did little to endear himself to anyone during the next half an hour, hovering gloweringly over the doctor as he gently examined her, refusing to leave the room, even when Shay seconded the barely civil request of the harassed doctor that he do so. For her own part she felt no awkwardness in his presence, having known his full examination of her pregnant body weeks before. But Peter Dunbar was obviously agitated by the way Lyon watched his every move with narrowed eyes.

  ‘Thank God only the expectant fathers behave in this way.’ He scowled at the younger man as he washed his hands after the examination. ‘Expectant mothers, thank goodness, have more sense!’

  Shay’s sharp gaze flew to Lyon’s suddenly pale face, seeing he disliked the idea of the child she carried being his as much as she did. ‘My husband is dead, Mr Dunbar,’ she announced coldly, immune to the way Lyon flinched.

  Peter Dunbar looked totally confused by this revelation. ‘But I thought—’

  ‘We’re aware of what you thought,’ Lyon cut in harshly, his expression savage as his gaze raked over the other man. ‘And my relationship to Shay, or lack of it, is none of your damned—’

  ‘Lyon!’ she cut in warningly, looking apologetically at the tall distinguished specialist. ‘I’m Mr Falconer’s sister-in-law,’ she explained softly.

  ‘I see,’ he nodded, giving the other man a dark look. ‘It would have been a simple thing to have explained the relationship. I can understand your concern for your brother’s wife—’

  ‘Can you?’ Lyon scorned. ‘I doubt it!’ He turned away to stare sightlessly out of the window.

  ‘I’m really sorry.’ Shay was embarrassed at Lyon’s lack of courtesy to this highly respected man. ‘The baby?’ she prompted frowningly, ignoring Lyon.

  ‘Has had a shake up,’ the man smiled, ‘but otherwise it seems well.’

  ‘Seems?’ Lyon turned back sharply. ‘What’s that supposed to mean?’ he grated.

  ‘The baby is reacting—’

  ‘You said seems,’ Lyon repeated forcefully.

  Peter Dunbar looked at Shay for help—as if she had ever had any influence over Lyon’s arrogance!

  ‘Please let the doctor speak, Lyon,’ she said with quiet determination.

  Gold eyes flickered irritably but his lips remained firmly clamped together.

  She turned back to the doctor. ‘You were saying?’

  The specialist’s face softened at how gracefully elegant this woman was even after the trauma she had so recently suffered. He eyed Lyon Falconer warily, instantly banishing his admiration for the lovely Shay from his face; the man across the room looked set to tear him apart if he didn’t! A strange relationship, he shook his head, one he wouldn’t like to have the misfortune to be in the middle of.

  ‘The baby is moving normally, reacting normally.’ His smile was completely professional as he looked at the woman in the bed. ‘You seem to have come out of the fall a lot worse than the baby did,’ he gently mocked.

  ‘I’ll survive.’ She gave him a serene look. ‘It’s the baby who counts.’

  * * *

  SHE REALLY BELIEVED that, Lyon thought savagely. She could have been killed, broken her neck falling down those stairs, could have suffered brain-damage, broken limbs, and none of
it would have mattered as long as they could have saved Ricky’s baby.

  As he had sat beside her and gently felt the baby moving inside her he had felt a special bonding with it, a oneness with them both. But no baby would ever take Shay away from him. Heads were going to roll for what had almost happened to her today.

  ‘—special care and attention,’ he came back in on the conversation to hear Peter Dunbar advise. ‘The baby simply cannot take another upset like today.’

  ‘Shay will get all the care and attention she needs at Falconer House,’ Lyon told him bluntly, wishing the other man would stop looking at Shay the way that he was. She was his patient, damn it, was seven months’ pregnant; he had no right to be looking at her with desire in his eyes! Why the hell not; he desired her didn’t he, baby or no baby! ‘And I’d like you to attend her at the birth,’ he heard himself add.

  Rebellion flared in Shay’s eyes. ‘I have a perfectly good obstetrician of my own—’

  ‘Dunbar is the best,’ Lyon stated arrogantly.

  ‘Thank you for your confidence,’ the other man smiled, ‘but as Mrs Falconer is already satisfied with the man she has—’

  ‘She doesn’t have the best.’ Lyon’s voice was steely. ‘And I want that for her.’

  ‘And what about what I want?’ Shay flashed him a look of intense dislike.

  Lyon looked at her steadily. At least he hoped it was steadily; the way Shay looked at the moment he could take her to bed for a week and never tire of making love to her. ‘I thought you wanted what was best for your child?’ Bastard, he cursed himself as she paled once again. But he was determined that she should be in Peter Dunbar’s care, just as he was determined that she would move back to the house with him, where he would make sure she was never out of his care.

  Shay’s head went back with gentle pride as she turned to Peter Dunbar. ‘I should be very grateful if you would accept me as your patient.’

  Lyon dared the man to refuse her, dared anyone to refuse her anything when she asked so charmingly. He had once wanted to give her the world, even though he knew he could never give her what she really wanted—now he knew the world wouldn’t have been enough, none of it would have been enough for this beautiful gypsy. Gypsy. It had been the way he always thought of her, that image no longer his alone when his brothers also thought of the name with no prompting from him. Soon his brothers had taken more than just the name away from him.

  ‘Call my office as soon as you leave here,’ the other man invited smoothly. ‘I’m sure we can arrange something.’

  ‘In future you will call on her at Falconer House,’ Lyon put in softly.

  Glacial blue eyes were turned on him. ‘If that’s what Mrs Falconer wants, yes.’

  ‘It’s what I want.’ God, he was acting like a damned fool, treating this man like a lackey. But he had almost lost Shay today, surely that exonerated his behaving like some power-crazy idiot. But he could see Shay was boiling because of his arrogance, and he absently ran a finger over the scar on his temple. She could be a vixen when roused, and all her protective instincts had been brought to the fore by her pregnancy. There was going to be hell to pay once the doctor left them alone. But Shay angry was much more preferable to the coldly assured witch he had met at the airport in Los Angeles three months ago.

  * * *

  SHAY HELD ON to her temper with difficulty, knowing this added distress couldn’t be good for the baby. But Lyon wasn’t going to have everything his own way. ‘I’ll call your office,’ she smiled at Peter Dunbar. ‘Thank you for today.’

  The two men were like adversaries as they walked carefully around each other, dramatically, their parting at the door brief in the extreme.

  Shay was frowning when Lyon returned to her bedside, her hands folded calmly on top of the sheet. ‘Peter Dunbar seems an ideal choice,’ she spoke softly. ‘And I’ll look forward to him visiting me—at my home.’

  ‘Your things have already been moved to Falconer House,’ Lyon stated firmly.

  How could she stay calm, how could she when confronted with his damned arrogance! She had thought she had learnt to control her fiery temper long ago, had strived to do so since the time she had physically injured this man. But at this moment she could cheerfully have forgotten that resolve and struck him a second time. Only he had ever had the power to enrage her to this violence by his efforts to take over her life.

  ‘On whose authority?’ she demanded tautly.

  ‘Mine,’ he stated the obvious.

  ‘Mrs Devon—’

  ‘Was very concerned when informed of your accident.’

  ‘So concerned she let someone into the house to take all my things,’ Shay flashed.

  ‘So concerned she could see the sense of moving you somewhere where you would have constant care,’ Lyon maintained dismissively.

  ‘I had constant care in my own home!’

  ‘I’m well aware of Mrs Devon’s capabilities,’ he drawled. ‘I was most impressed by her efficiency in packing your things for Jeffrey to collect without asking too many questions.’

  ‘In that case Jeffrey will know exactly where to bring them back to, won’t he,’ said Shay stubbornly. ‘Mr Dunbar told me I can leave in two days’ time; I shall expect all my things to be back in their right place by then.’

  Lyon shrugged broad shoulders. ‘That’s your choice, of course.’

  ‘Shay’s pleasure was short-lived as she saw the look of satisfaction in his eyes, her own suspicion suddenly aroused. Lyon never looked satisfied unless things were going exactly the way he wanted them to. ‘What’s my choice?’ she asked warily.

  ‘If you won’t move to Falconer House I’ll simply move in with you,’ he stated calmly.

  ‘Like hell you will—’

  ‘Remember the baby, Shay,’ he warned softly. ‘You shouldn’t get upset.’

  ‘And who is the one making me upset?’ Two spots of colour stood out lividly on her otherwise pale cheeks. ‘It’s my home, and I will not have you violate it!’ She was breathing heavily in her agitation.

  ‘Violate?’ repeated Lyon in a steely voice. ‘What an odd choice of word.’

  ‘Is it?’ Shay scorned. ‘You destroy everything you touch, Lyon—and you aren’t going to do that to the peace and tranquillity of my home!’

  ‘Neil doesn’t seem to have received the same treatment.’ Lyon’s eyes were narrowed.

  Neil had visited her on his way back to Los Angeles ten weeks ago; it didn’t surprise her that Lyon knew about that. ‘Neil is one Falconer I can tolerate,’ she drawled.

  A power as dangerous as a volcano about to erupt emanated from Lyon. ‘You have your choice, Shay,’ he bit out icily. ‘But either way, I intend to see that nothing like today happens again.’

  ‘It was an accident—’

  ‘Does that make it any less serious?’

  She sighed, feeling as if the ground were being taken from beneath her. But the idea of having Lyon in the comfortable intimacy of her mews home was unthinkable. Damn it, she was a grown woman, an independent woman, he couldn’t do this to her! ‘It could have happened at any time—’

  ‘I agree, it could,’ he muttered grimly. ‘Which is why I think you should have care at all time. You walk about London as if you aren’t carrying the Falconer heir! Do you have any idea of the amount of lunatics there are about today who take pleasure in hurting people like us just for the hell of it?’

  ‘You’re over-reacting, Lyon—’

  ‘Am I?’ he demanded impatiently. ‘I don’t happen to think so. You didn’t even have any identification on you when you were found. I telephoned the hospital, they didn’t contact me!’

  ‘How did you know?’ she gasped. ‘How could you have known?’

  ‘You were late for your appointment with Marilyn, so she telephoned the house and was told you had left in plenty of time to get to her office. I was called, and from there we contacted the police and hospitals. I can’t risk that happening again, Shay,’ he
told her grimly. ‘I repeat, you either come to Falconer House or I move in with you?’

  ‘I don’t have to accept either!’ she snapped resentfully.

  ‘You don’t have to …’

  ‘Don’t threaten me, Lyon,’ she told him harshly. ‘I don’t react well to threats.’

  ‘Now who’s threatening whom?’ he taunted softly.

  She gave him a scornful look. ‘You don’t react to threats at all!’

  ‘No?’ he queried softly. ‘I remember I once reacted very strongly to a threat you carried out.’

  Her eyes glazed over coldly as he reminded her of that scene six years ago. ‘And I counter-reacted!’

  Once again he unconsciously ran a finger along the scar on his temple. ‘Yes,’ he acknowledged flatly. ‘I’m not threatening you now, Shay, I’m merely concerned for your welfare.’

  ‘I have Mrs Devon to do that.’

  ‘And I repeat, she isn’t enough,’ he said with barely controlled violence. ‘For God’s sake, Shay, do I have to beg!’

  ‘Now that would be a novelty, wouldn’t it!’ she jeered hardly.

  ‘Damn you!’ Lyon bit out furiously. ‘I’m tired of trying to reason with you; your things are at Falconer House, and once you’re discharged that’s where you’re going too!’

  She turned away from him, her face wooden. ‘Would you please go.’

  ‘Shay—’

  The cold gaze she turned on him silenced him in seconds. ‘The next time I’m not even going to ask, Lyon,’ she told him flatly. ‘I’ll just ring for the nurse and tell her you’re bothering me. I’m sure they employ someone to deal with people like you.’

  His mouth tightened. ‘Think of the baby.’

  ‘I think of it constantly,’ she assured him stiffly. ‘And that’s why I’m going to ask that you not be allowed in to see me again.’ Her face was emotionless.

  ‘Just having me around contaminates your child, is that it?’ Lyon scorned viciously.

  ‘Having you around contaminates me,’ she corrected evenly.