A Baby on Her Christmas List

by Louisa George

  And to a certain extent Liam was right. He didn’t stick around anywhere for long, his job took him to some of the most dangerous parts of the world, and for the most part she thought it was exciting, glamorous even. But in reality it was dangerous. He ran a serious risk of being killed, caught or tortured. Did she want that kind of anxiety to infiltrate her life and that of her child’s from here on?

  His warm hand covered hers. ‘You know I wouldn’t do anything to hurt you, right? But we can’t put our whole friendship under threat because of curiosity. Things would inevitably change. They couldn’t not change. Everything would come under the spotlight—past partners, broken promises, how we fill the dishwasher, whose turn it is to empty the bins. And everything we’ve ever done with other people will come under scrutiny too, what we’ve said, what we’ve done. There’ll be expectations, and I’m not good with that. You know that. I don’t want things to get complicated.’

  Too late, mate. ‘Like me having your baby?’

  ‘Yeah. That. It’s complicated already, without getting things involved sexually, too. Not that I don’t want to...wouldn’t...you know...mind. That kiss wasn’t ick. It was good. Very good.’ He shook his head. ‘God, this is awful. I think I preferred your way of pretending it didn’t happen. Let’s go back an hour, shall we?’

  Or twelve?

  He held her gaze for a few seconds and smiled apologetically. Then his smile melted. As if distracted by something over his shoulder, he turned away. When he looked back he didn’t give her eye contact at all. Just stared down at his cup. ‘And...’

  ‘And?’

  His head jerked up, and he looked spooked and shocked. ‘Nothing. Forget it. Just that. I can’t give you what you need.’

  ‘I don’t need anything. It was only a kiss.’ But the caution in his eyes told her he had been about to say something else. Had broken off before he’d dared say it. What the hell? Her heart began to rattle against her ribcage. ‘Wait a minute. What are you hiding?’

  ‘Nothing. I don’t know what you mean.’

  ‘You look edgy and worried and I’ve seen that look on your face many times. Right before you give your poor sap of a girlfriend the old heave-ho.’

  He looked down at his hands and dragged in a breath. ‘Georgie, there’s something else. Something I’ve been meaning to say since I got back, but haven’t...quite found the right words.’

  The chocolate croissant felt like a hard lump in her churning stomach. Things had become really messed up. ‘I won’t jump you again, if that’s what you’re worried about.’

  ‘Of course I’m not worried.’ No? Well, he just looked it, then. ‘I’m going to help you renovate your house, I promised I’d do that. And I will.’

  She knew a man was stalling when she saw it. ‘And then, when you’ve done your dutiful bit and fulfilled the promises, you’re going to adhere to the baby daddy contract and do a runner.’

  ‘Far from it. In fact, just the opposite.’ He stood up, took her by the arm and began to walk back through the market. ‘Not at all. Georgie, I know it’s taken me a long time to outright say it, but I wanted to make sure. I was trying not to mess you around.’

  ‘What? What is it?’ You’ve met someone. Someone important. Words clogged in her throat, thick and fast. ‘Spit it out, man. I’m on tenterhooks here.’

  He gave her a sideways smile. ‘Thing is, I do want to be the father of this child. I want to provide, I want to take responsibility for my baby.’

  ‘What? Your baby? Your baby? Whoa. That’s a surprise.’

  ‘Yes. My baby. It’s got my DNA. Just like we agreed. Like you wanted.’

  ‘But you said...’ All her ideas tumbled around in her head with a sharp mix of frustration.

  All she’d known about him for ten years suggested he didn’t want a child. He didn’t want a family. He’d signed a damned contract, made that the only condition. So instead of being the far side of elated, her gut felt churned up. Would he change his mind again?

  And again?

  And then there was the small matter of the kiss, which coloured everything.

  His involvement was what she’d wanted ever since he’d offered to be the donor, but this was not how she’d imagined it would make her feel.

  Irritated, she shook her arm free from his. Shoppers jostled against them as they headed back towards the house. The busy street was so not the place to be having this conversation. ‘I know it’s what I wanted, but I thought you didn’t...weren’t...aren’t...’ She pulled herself together and chose bluntness and honesty. ‘Why now? Why this all of a sudden? How can I trust that you’ll take this seriously? You’re so confusing.’

  Unlike her, he seemed far from irritated, his voice steady and determined. ‘It’s not confusing at all. This is the most serious and the most single-minded I’ve ever been about anything.’

  ‘And you decide to tell me now? Here, on Parnell Road?’

  ‘Okay, I have to admit my timing’s lousy.’

  ‘You can say that again.’ She whirled round to face him, her head woozy at the sudden and fundamental change in her life. She didn’t know how she felt about this. He hadn’t exactly declared his overwhelming love for the baby, and she didn’t know how she felt about him—except that he’d just completely blindsided her and everything was getting more complicated by the second.

  And more, she had to be sure this wasn’t some passing phase he’d move out of next week, next month, next year. ‘Is this some kind of misdirected duty thing? Because you don’t get to do that. You don’t get to mess around with other people’s lives just because it makes you feel better. Here one minute, changing your mind the next.’

  ‘I won’t change my mind.’

  She tried to stay calm. ‘A contract has been signed, Liam. You’re legally bound, remember? Clause number six? “You will have no paternal rights whatsoever over the child, and will have no authority of any kind with respect to the child, or any decisions regarding the child.”’

  ‘Whoa. Really? Off by heart?’ He stared at her open-mouthed.

  ‘What? I counsel about this exact dilemma every damned day, Liam. So I know the wording. Okay?’

  ‘So you’ll remember clause ten, then? You can agree to me having social contact—at your discretion.’

  He’d certainly read it. He’d taken the time and effort to read and research. He was serious. ‘Yes, I can, if I think contact will be good for the child. But what do you know about bringing up a child? About being a father? What’s changed for you?’

  Love, she thought. She hoped.

  Because love for her child, even though it was still so small and so precious, had changed her fundamentally.

  But Liam’s expression turned thunderous. ‘This is ridiculous. I don’t want to mess anyone around, I want to be involved—the two things are completely different. I knew you were going to react like this. You just don’t want anyone butting in on your little family of two.’

  ‘How dare you? I would love my baby to have a father, you know that. You know I want that more than anything.’ She shook her head. Amazing that he could think that. ‘Is that what you think of me? That I’m selfish? That I want to keep this child purely for myself, like some kind of...toy?’

  ‘Of course not. But surely, as the father, I have a say in things?’ He really meant it. He wanted to be part of this. But could she trust him to be wholly there for them?

  ‘No. Actually, you don’t. You signed your rights away. All I know is that not many months ago you demanded a contract and now you don’t want that. Maybe next month you’ll want the contract again.’

  He stopped short, breathing hard, dragged a wad of paper out of his jacket pocket. ‘Here. Here’s the contract.’ He held the papers up and tore them in half. Then half again. Then again. Pieces of ripped paper fluttered to her feet like large bits of confetti. Only this was the severing of something, not celebrating the uniting of something. ‘I want to be a father. The father of the child you are c
arrying. My child.’

  And the word ‘love’ is still not there.

  She’d listened hard and it was still missing. No matter how much she wanted it to be there, no matter how much she strained to hear it in the cadence of his words, in the silence between them.

  He wanted to be a father, but he didn’t want to be a daddy. That was the fundamental difference. He wanted the label but not the emotional involvement. That was Liam through and through.

  But, on the other hand, if he was truly serious and did want to be involved, she couldn’t deny him that, couldn’t deny her child the right to know its father.

  Why did this have to be so complicated? Why couldn’t he have kept to his side of the deal? Why did she have to have developed more than friendly feelings for him? Those emotions were tainting things, making her think in a way she’d never done before. This whole morning wasn’t about the kiss at all. It had never been about the kiss.

  His hand was on her arm now. ‘Georgie, I don’t want to have this conversation here on the street and I don’t want to argue. This was the furthest thing from my mind. You look upset and that really wasn’t my intention. I honestly thought you’d be pleased.’

  Pleased? If his intentions were genuine then she’d be delighted. How could she not want him to be a father? He was smart, funny and, if she was honest, would make a great daddy—if he stuck around long enough. And there it was again, her immediate concern: he just wasn’t the staying sort of guy. For whatever reason—and she only knew half of his story—he didn’t commit.

  She picked the pieces of paper up and shoved them at him. Then hesitated on her doorstep. ‘Can we talk later? This is pretty big for me, I need some time to think things through.’

  ‘Yes, by all means, think it through.’ He followed her up the steps and when it was clear he wasn’t giving up, she took her key out of her bag. As he watched her he shook his head. ‘But I need to say this now, Geo, and I need you to listen. It’s tough work, bringing up a child. I don’t want you to go through it on your own and I don’t want our child to miss out on having a father. I know how that feels and I couldn’t condemn my own flesh and blood to that kind of life. Don’t you want me to be involved?’

  ‘This is my flesh and blood too. My only flesh and blood. So I’ve got to be careful, make the right decisions.’ At least he had a family. He might not want to have them, but he was tied to them. And now she would be tied to him for ever. Oh, why the hell hadn’t she thought this through more thoroughly at the beginning? ‘What exactly do you mean by “involved”? Cash? Because that’s not enough. Is that why you’re here? To pay us off or something?’

  ‘It’s been in my head for the last few weeks, I just didn’t know how to say it. When to say it. What to say, even. But the more I see you, the more I think about it, the more it makes sense.’

  ‘It’s not about making sense, it’s about how you feel. In here.’ She touched her chest. It felt a little cracked open and raw. ‘In your heart and your soul. You can’t do something because it makes sense, otherwise we’d never do any of the rash, amazing stuff we do. Like this pregnancy thing from the start. None of it made sense, not to you or anyone else. But it did to me.’

  ‘And it does to me now.’

  His words hovered in the air as she thrust the key in the lock and threw the door open. She took several long deep breaths and tried to clear her thoughts.

  Then tried to explain them to him. ‘If I was going to co-parent I would expect a fully one hundred per cent committed father who was around, who wouldn’t flinch during the darker times. Because there will be some, I’m sure.’ And although she adored Liam, he wasn’t reliable. He was away a lot of the time, never knowing when he’d be home. And she couldn’t get past the fact that he’d told her that this baby plan was the worst thing he’d ever heard.

  ‘It’s got to be for ever, you can’t change your mind again. I don’t want to open our child up to a whole world of hurt. I saw plenty of kids at the home whose families made promises and broke them, and in the end broke their kids’ hearts and crushed their spirits.’

  ‘I know you had a hard time, Georgie. And that’s why I’m here now. So our child doesn’t have to go through what you went through.’

  ‘You have no idea. You don’t know what it means to be alone. To make up a pretend family because you don’t have any. To watch others being chosen. To wish that someone, anyone, would choose you. And to try to be, oh, so brave when they didn’t, when inside every part of you is crumbling.’ She would never crumble again. This child inside her gave her twice the strength and three times the resolve. ‘This is your last chance to decide, Liam. I’ll hold you to whatever decision you make now. This is it. No going back. No coming to me in three years, six, twelve and saying you made a mistake and you’ve changed your mind again. You have to be in or out—for ever.’

  * * *

  This was something Liam could answer. Because this was the one thing he knew. He would not let his child down. He’d known that with every damned fibre of his being since the moment he’d seen her carrying his child. Since he’d seen that scan of a real living being. His child. Their child.

  Every single mention of a baby, every thought of who was growing inside her, brought back the crushing pain again. And with that hurt still beating against his rib cage he knew he’d make every effort to make his child safe. Because that was his job. A father did that.

  But he was also going to keep any emotions out of it. Because, hell, he needed to keep his heart safe, too. He would provide from a distance. He would have visits but he wouldn’t—couldn’t—put any of them at risk by allowing himself to care for them. He would treat his child with the same compassion and consideration he treated his patients, no more and certainly no less.

  ‘I know what I said. I didn’t think it through. But this is my child and my responsibility and I will never shirk from that. I don’t want your experiences for our child, or mine either. This child will know he’s always wanted.’ This was not how Liam had imagined this scenario playing out, but he had to go with it. He’d already stumbled too far along without saying what he felt. Although he’d been shocked by the ferocity of Georgie’s reaction. He’d seriously misjudged her. She was growing braver and stronger and more independent every moment she carried that baby. ‘I am in it for ever.’

  ‘How can I be sure?’ Her hands were on her hips while her dark eyes blazed.

  ‘So tearing up the contract isn’t enough for you?’

  ‘No. Actions speak, Liam. I want actions—and not dramatic hollow ones like those shreds of paper.’

  Now this was well and truly out in the open he knew there could never be any more kisses. He needed to keep a good long distance from her, too. Anything else would make things far too complicated. They could both be good parents if they were a team, a platonic team. Messing with that, opening a whole potential for destruction, would be a recipe for disaster.

  He knew how much pain a child suffered when their parents couldn’t bear to look at each other. Knew how destructive it was, watching arguments unfold, always calculating when the bomb was going to drop. Always being on guard. Always feeling, believing, knowing that every single ounce of friction was his fault. He couldn’t put his own child through that, so if there was no intimacy there would be no chance of that damaging scenario happening. ‘You’ll know, Georgie, because I’ll damned well prove it to you.’

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  Three months ago...

  ‘IT’LL KEEP ME busy for weeks.’

  Ha. He wished.

  By Liam’s reckoning it should have been finished months ago, but whenever he turned around this tinpot wreck of a house threw another job at him. Georgie had been wrong about the roof. With the winter came high winds that blew off and cracked more than enough tiles for the whole thing to need replacing.

  Then there was the floor in the kitchen. Weathered and abused over seventy years, it took four consecutive weekends to sand it dow
n enough that it was even and usable. Then three coats of varnish. A perfect parquet floor it was not, but it was now an acceptably usable one. All done on a tight budget, and fitted in between exhausting twelve-hour shifts at work. It had taken a lot of coercing Georgie to even allow him to do that.

  Climbing down the stepladder from where he’d been fixing the new light fitting in the flash living area, he huffed out a long breath. He had to admit she’d had a point about knocking the wall down, the open-plan space was amazing. With the renovated floor and antique white walls it was impressively large and light, with a good flow from one area to the next. She’d managed to find, on the cheap from a trading website, a set of elegant French doors that opened the kitchen out onto the small deck. Beyond that was a riotous garden, overgrown and dingy. But he had no doubt she had plans for there, too. The woman clearly had a gift for renovation.

  A loud bang and a very unladylike curse came from above him. Liam was up the stairs and in the bathroom in two seconds flat. ‘You okay? What the hell was that?’

  ‘Just a little contretemps with a tin of paint. And...damn, I was so nearly finished.’ From her crouched position on the floor she grimaced up at him as a pool of off-white gloop seeped across stained dustsheets. A paintbrush stuck out of her denim dungarees pockets, her face was splattered with paint and she wore a plastic carrier bag tied round her hair. She dabbed at the ever-increasing seepage with a rag, huffing and puffing a little. ‘I’m going to have to nip out to the hardware store and get some more paint now. Do we need anything else?’

  His eyes flickered from her to the stepladder, back to her. Unbelievable. ‘You were painting the ceiling?’

  ‘Um...yes?’

  ‘After I specifically told you it was next on my list of jobs?’