The Baby Question

by Caroline Anderson

  ‘Your tea’s there,’ she told him, scrambling to her feet and getting out of the way. ‘I’ll just go and wash.’

  ‘I wouldn’t bother to shower,’ he said crisply. ‘I think the water is actually frozen in the pipes—I swear there were ice crystals in it. I thought I was going to cut myself on it.’

  She chuckled and went into the bathroom bearing the pan with its leftover inch of hot water. The room smelt of his soap and shampoo, familiar and rather enticing. She shrugged, ran a bowl of cold water and put the hot into it, then stripped and washed quickly, trying not to fantasise about the jacuzzi at home. The power would be on soon.

  It had to be—didn’t it?

  It came on at eleven, and they checked that the heating was working and then she looked towards the garage with its office above and sighed. ‘I ought to check my email.’

  ‘Can I check mine?’ he asked. ‘I probably have a thousand messages from Mike—he gets deranged if I’m out of contact for more than a couple of hours.’

  She shrugged. ‘Sure. Feel free. We can put the fan heater on flat out. It might take the edge off it until the storage heater’s had time to charge up.’

  It was freezing, of course, but while he checked his mail and answered a few of Mike’s more pressing queries, she huddled over the fan heater and looked out of the window. It was a glorious day—too nice to be shut in an office. Suddenly her business held no appeal at all.

  ‘There—all done. It’s all yours.’

  She glanced through her emails and shrugged. The sun was calling her, and nothing seemed as important as that. ‘I’ll do it later,’ she said, closing down the machine. ‘It’s Sunday—day off. I’d quite like to go for a walk with the dogs up the track and see what the lane looks like.’

  He nodded slowly. ‘May I come too?’

  ‘Of course you can,’ she replied, surprised that he’d even asked. She’d expected him to come—hadn’t for a moment thought that he wouldn’t. So much for her newfound independence—he seemed to be taking it more seriously than she was!

  They went back to the cottage, put on extra jumpers and socks, and set off with the dogs up the track over the thick, crushed snow left by the tractor treads.

  Midas and Minstrel bounced around and barked and chased each other, and she and Rob strolled side by side, carefully maintaining a little space between them. It was probably coincidence as much as anything, because they were walking in the parallel tracks left by Iain McGregor, but nevertheless there was a formality about it that seemed to underline the gulf between them.

  The lane, when they reached it, was completely blocked beyond Iain McGregor’s farm entrance just a few yards up the hill, and downhill beyond their track.

  ‘Look at the way the wind has sculpted the snow,’ he said, but all she could see was that it was thick, too thick for there to be any hope of him driving out of there for days—maybe a week, even, or more, if the snow ploughs didn’t come.

  And that being the case, she knew she was going to die of frustration—if they didn’t starve to death. Judging by the state of the cupboard, there was a real danger that might happen.

  Ah, well. No doubt the dog food was perfectly wholesome, if not very appealing, and anyway, the frustration was bound to get her first unless he stopped looking so darned appealing. He hadn’t shaved that morning—said the water was too cold and he’d cut himself.

  She’d teased him and said it was a weak excuse, but he looked rugged and macho and even more delicious with dark stubble on his jaw, and the tiny crease in his cheek looked sexier than ever when he smiled. And of course, just as if he knew that, he kept on smiling.

  They headed back towards the cottage, the dogs running ahead of them sniffing at the occasional patch of grass or heather that showed through where the snow had been scraped away by McGregor, and as they reached the gate Laurie hesitated.

  ‘I really don’t want to go back inside yet,’ she said slowly. ‘It’s so beautiful out here, and without the wind it’s not even very cold.’

  ‘We could build a snowman,’ he suggested with a lazy grin, and her heart flip-flopped.

  ‘We could.’

  ‘Start with a snowball and roll it,’ he told her. ‘I’ll make the body, you make the head.’

  It was hard to find any snow shallow enough to roll the ball through, but they managed, and within half an hour their snowman was built. They’d found a little bit of branch for his mouth, and two pebbles for his eyes because she wouldn’t let Rob use their precious coal, and a chip off a log for the nose, but Rob refused to give up his silk scarf to tie round the snowman’s neck.

  Laurie scooped up a handful of snow and held it threateningly out. ‘Take it off,’ she ordered, struggling to hide her grin, but he just bent down and scooped up a bigger handful of snow and hefted it gently in his palm, rotating it, patting it into shape, his mouth kicked up into that sexy grin that did for her resolve.

  ‘Make me,’ he taunted her, and she lobbed her snowball at him.

  He ducked and she missed, but his hit her with deadly accuracy, taking her breath away.

  ‘Oh! That was freezing!’ she shrieked, shaking the snow off her neck and laughing. ‘That’s it! War!’

  She scrambled behind the garage, taking a handful of snow with her and lobbing it at him as she went, but her aim was wild and missed him by miles. She shot round the corner, spent a few moments making a little pile of missiles and then cautiously poked her head round the side.

  ‘Gotcha!’ he yelled, laughing, and she ducked back and wiped the snow off her face. The sneaky rat had moved, taking up a position behind a hummock that had to be a bush, but she knew where he was now and she wouldn’t be caught again.

  She crept out of her hiding place, missile in hand, but there was no sign of him. ‘Well, where the—aagh!’

  He laughed as she spun round and brushed the snow off the back of her head. ‘That’s cheating!’ she said, trying not to laugh, and grabbing a handful of snow she ran at him full tilt and knocked him over, shoving the snow down his neck while he laughed and yelled and tried to push her away.

  Not hard. Not hard at all, in fact, and after a moment he lay motionless, his fingers coming up to wipe the snow gently away from her cheek.

  ‘Laurie?’ he murmured, and she scrambled to her feet, her heart pounding.

  ‘Look at us, we’re covered in snow! We’ll have to shake it off—’

  ‘Laurie.’

  She stopped and turned towards him, speared by the blue lasers of his eyes. The heat in them made her tremble, and she turned away, calling the dogs and heading back to the cottage. Dear God, she wanted him. Wanted him to touch her, to hold her, to make love to her.

  Idiot. What did she think she’d been doing? Playing with fire, not ice. Fire, hot and dangerous, tempting her, tormenting her, drawing her relentlessly in, but nothing had changed. Their relationship was still on the rocks, and this wouldn’t solve anything.

  He was right behind her, catching the door as she shut it and following her inside. She went into the bathroom and shut the door firmly, hoping he’d take the hint. He did. At least, he didn’t follow her. She took her coat off with trembling hands, shaking it out over the bath and then hanging it on the hook near the radiator.

  ‘I’m going to have a bath,’ she told him through the closed door. ‘Just in case the power goes off again.’

  He grunted something, but she couldn’t hear it. He was in the kitchen. She could hear him moving around, talking to the dogs, filling the kettle. She ran the bath and climbed in, eyeing the lock on the door nervously. It wasn’t very substantial, the slightest pressure would open it. Was he likely to come in?

  Please, no, she thought desperately, but he did, his earlier reticence clearly overcome. He walked calmly in, set a mug of tea and a piece of cake down on the little rack over the bath and went out again without a word, leaving her more confused than ever.

  She wondered if he’d come in again, but when he didn�
��t she relaxed and sipped her tea and lingered in the bath, enjoying the hot water and coincidentally hiding from her next encounter with him. She didn’t know what it would hold, or how she would deal with it, but she was sure it could only bring her heartache.

  Regardless, she couldn’t hide in there all day, and the room still wasn’t exactly warm. She climbed reluctantly out of the bath, towelled herself briskly dry and realised she hadn’t brought any clean clothes in.

  Idiot. She stuck her head round the door and saw the sitting room door was closed. He must be in there with the dogs, she realised in relief, and ran upstairs into her bedroom. She dressed quickly in a fine wool sweater and her favourite dark trousers. She looked good—too good for a quiet afternoon by the fireside with two grubby dogs. She knew that—she just wasn’t sure why she’d done it, and she didn’t really want to examine her motives.

  She’d just picked up the hairdryer when there was a tap on the door. She scraped her wet hair back from her face and opened the door, and he looked down at her with searching eyes.

  She swallowed hastily and stepped back. ‘What is it? I have to dry my hair.’

  ‘I’ll do it for you.’

  He took the brush from her hand and pushed her gently into the chair, then started to ease the tangles out. It was a slow process, but he worked patiently without tugging it, and all the time her nerves were drawn tighter than a bowstring.

  He did nothing, though, to alarm her. Said nothing, did nothing, just brushed her hair again and again in the stream of warm air until it hung smooth and glossy around her shoulders. He threaded his fingers through it, sifting it, letting it fall like a silken curtain, over and over again. She felt the whisper of his fingers against her skin, infinitely gentle, teasing, tormenting her, and then suddenly, abruptly, he dropped his hands and stepped back.

  Now what? she wondered, but apparently again it was nothing. Nothing yet, at least.

  He put the brush down beside her, unplugged the hairdryer and coiled it up and went to the door, his face unreadable. ‘I’m making fresh tea if you want some.’

  ‘Thanks. I’ll be down in a minute,’ she told him, and for some reason she found herself putting on a touch of make-up with fingers that trembled slightly. Just tinted moisturiser, because her skin was dry after being out in the sun, and a little lipstick because her lips were chapped—ditto, and then a touch of mascara because without it her eyes looked unbalanced because of the other two.

  Nothing to do with the man downstairs who had seen her in every conceivable state of dress and undress in the past five years.

  Of course not.

  She went down to the kitchen and found him there with the dogs at his feet, looking hopeful. He was cutting up vegetables, slicing onions and carrots and parsnips, and there were potatoes boiling on the hob.

  ‘I’m getting supper,’ he told her, and she blinked in astonishment.

  Rob, cook? She had no idea that he could. She retreated to the other side of the table with her mug of tea and sat watching him.

  ‘So what are we having?’ she asked, wondering why he was making supper at something after three in the afternoon.

  ‘Roasted vegetable flan in a mashed potato case with white sauce, and that naughty tin of syrup sponge with instant custard that I found lurking in the cupboard.’

  ‘Sounds lovely,’ she said, suddenly hungry.

  ‘Washed down with that bottle of wine you had stashed at the back behind it,’ he added, and she felt herself colour a little guiltily.

  ‘Ah.’

  ‘Ah, indeed. Saving it for a rainy day?’ His face was deadpan but there was a teasing smile in his eyes that made her go weak at the knees.

  ‘Sort of.’ Actually she’d got it to celebrate her great escape, but at the end of the day she hadn’t really felt like celebrating, oddly. More drowning her sorrows, and she’d felt that wasn’t a very sensible thing to do. It might be the thin end of the wedge, and anyway, she’d never been much of a one for drinking alone.

  ‘Want a hand with anything?’

  ‘Nope. I can manage. You just sit there and drink tea and talk to me.’

  ‘What about?’

  He shrugged. ‘You could tell me about your business.’

  So she did, explaining how she’d got into it, how it had expanded, how she’d got her name known.

  ‘I built a website, and people seemed to like it. They contacted me for help and information, and that was it. I offer a service, people buy it, I give them what they want.’

  ‘Simple, really.’

  She laughed. ‘Not always. People can be very hard to please.’

  He snorted. ‘Tell me about it. You ought to let me see what you’ve done. You might be able to do something for one of our companies.’

  ‘I have.’

  He froze, knife in hand, and stared at her. ‘You have?’

  She nodded. ‘The New York office’s new offshoot. Mike contacted my website. Ironic, really. He was very pleased with it.’

  ‘I know,’ Rob said slowly. ‘He showed it to me. It’s good. He didn’t say it was you.’

  She grinned cheekily. ‘He didn’t know. I didn’t think there was any point in telling him.’

  ‘All part of the independence thing?’

  ‘More not wanting to look like nepotism. I wanted it to be me, for myself, not because I was your wife.’ She shrugged. ‘It was fine. He was happy, I was happy. It wasn’t like I was cheating you.’

  ‘No.’ He dropped the last carrot into the roasting pan and put it in the oven, then poured himself another mug of tea and sat down opposite her. ‘You look lovely, by the way,’ he said softly, and she felt warm colour brush her cheeks.

  ‘Thank you,’ she murmured, and her voice sounded a little breathless. Rats. It was all part of the charm offensive, of course, but suddenly she found she didn’t care. What did she have to lose? It didn’t matter if she succumbed. They were married, after all—except that now, because she’d moved out, somehow there was an edge to it that made it more exciting. And even if she succumbed, it changed nothing. He still worked ridiculous hours, and he always would.

  She watched as he prepared their meal, creaming the potatoes with egg yolk and butter, spreading the mash onto a baking tray, adding the white sauce to the vegetables and folding beaten egg whites into the mixture before piling it in the potato case, baking it until it was golden brown and fluffy like a soufflé.

  While they waited between operations, they played chess with a set he’d found in one of the drawers of the dresser, and she beat him.

  Only once, but it was a miracle and made her wonder if he was more on edge than she’d realised. How interesting. She hid the smile and let him challenge her to another game. He won it easily, because by then, of course, she was busy contemplating what he might have up his sleeve, and she wasn’t concentrating.

  Finally, though, the chess set was cleared away, the dogs had been fed and the meal was on the table.

  It was delicious. The bottle of indifferent wine didn’t do it justice, but she drank it anyway. It had a wonderfully mellowing effect—just enough to help her relax and enjoy his company.

  They shifted to the sitting room after their wickedly sticky syrup sponge, and sat on the floor in front of the fire and finished the wine. The edge of the settee was hard, and so he moved her, pulling her into his arms so she was leaning back against his chest, her head on his shoulder, basking in the warmth of the fire and the mellowing effect of the wine.

  She could have gone to sleep quite easily, except that she would have missed it and that seemed a shame, so instead she sat and revelled in the feel of his chest behind her and the slight rasp of his stubbled chin against her temple.

  She couldn’t imagine anything more blissful.

  And then he bent his head and laid a gentle kiss on the corner of her mouth, and she turned her head and looked up into those amazingly expressive eyes, and was lost.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  HE L
OWERED his head slowly, his eyes half-closed, shielded from her, and his lips touched hers with the softness of a whisper.

  ‘Laurie…’

  He kissed her again, so lightly that if she closed her eyes she might have thought she’d imagined it. She felt the trace of his fingers over her cheek, her throat, under her ear in that sensitive spot that only he knew about. His lips moved, following the path of his fingers, leaving a heated trail that cooled in the air, fire and ice, unravelling her.

  Then he lifted his head and leant back against the settee, his eyes closed, and she could feel his heart against her shoulder, matching the rhythm of her own.

  She sat there for a minute, aching for him, needing the closeness they’d had and lost. Could they get it back? Was their marriage worth fighting for? She didn’t know, but she wanted the answer, and there was only one way to get it.

  She stood up, looking down at him on the hearthrug, one knee drawn up, the other leg stretched out towards the fire, his head tipped back watching her. Her heart was pounding slowly as she held out her hand to him.

  ‘Come to bed,’ she said softly, and his eyes flickered shut for a moment. When they opened, they blazed with a blue fire that stole her breath away.

  He took her hand and stood up, then pressed it to his lips. ‘You go on up. I’ll be with you in a minute. I’ll sort the dogs out and put the fire guard up. I won’t be long.’

  He released her hand and she went, her heart thundering, making a detour into the bathroom on the way. She cleaned her teeth until they sparkled, and took off her make-up. There was nothing worse than mascara down your cheeks in the morning, she thought, giving her skin a last cursory swipe with fingers that trembled with anticipation.

  Then she went upstairs, suddenly inexplicably nervous. She’d been to bed with her husband countless times before. Why was tonight so different?

  Because it was, she thought. For some reason it just was.

  She closed the door behind her and leant on it. Should she undress? Be in bed? Sitting on the side? On the chair in front of the dressing table, brushing her hair? That was too hackneyed, and anyway, she didn’t have the silk and lace negligée to do the scene justice. It would hardly work with a cotton nightshirt!