‘Well?’ Nash demanded.
His voice cracked through her momentary paralysis. She reached for it, taking it from him, staring at the test window with the pretty pink plus sign.
Pregnant. Pregnant. A baby. A baby. A baby. Her hands shook. But how? It couldn’t be. It had to be wrong.
‘It’s positive,’ she said, looking at him for confirmation, feeling like a dyslexic toddler.
‘I can see that,’ he said grimly.
‘But…how?’ More with the two-year-old questions.
Nash’s jaw tightened. ‘I guess it was when the condom broke’ Once. Damn it! Once! Every other time they’d used nice, new, never-fail condoms.
Maggie knew he was opening his mouth, could hear him speaking, but none of his words made sense. Didn’t he remember she was infertile? ‘No. I mean…How…?
I can’t…I’m not supposed to be able to fall pregnant.’
Nash took the test off her and held it up. ‘Wrong.’
Maggie knew on a visceral level that Nash was not happy. Knew he had every right to be angry, but wrapping her head around this was taking some time. And despite it all her insides were singing. Yes, singing.
A baby. A baby. A baby.
‘Where are you going?’ Nash growled as Maggie pushed past him, scurrying into the house.
‘I’m taking the other test.’
Nash stared after her. What the hell? He went after her, finding her rooting through her handbag in the kitchen. ‘The other test?’
‘They didn’t have any single test kits,’ she said, locating the other pink box and heading for the toilet.
‘There’s no point,’ he said, following her. ‘it’ll be the same.’
Maggie turned around. ‘It’s wrong. It has to be.’ She was trying not to get excited. Trying not to get carried away. How many tests had she done in the past convinced she was pregnant? How many times had her hopes been raised, only to be dashed so wretchedly?
Nash sighed, resignation already taking a firm foothold in the mountain of his blind panic. ‘It’s not. You don’t get false positives. Only false negatives.’
If he’d had any idea how much she wanted to cling to that, he would have kept his mouth firmly shut. But Maggie had been down this road one too many times. She was forty, for crying out loud. And infertile. ‘It’s wrong,’ she insisted, before closing the door in his face.
Because if he was right, if the test was right, it would be just too surreal.
Nash paced outside, his brain churning, thoughts tossing around like garments in a tumble-dryer. He checked his watch. A minute later he checked it again. What the hell was taking her so long? ‘Maggie.’He banged on the door. ‘What on earth are you doing in there?’ he growled. How long did it take to wee on a stick?
Maggie was startled. The flow she was trying to coax instantly disappeared. She couldn’t believe her bladder was choosing this moment for an attack of performance anxiety. She could see the shadow of Nash’s pacing footsteps in the polished floorboards under the crack of the door which was putting a little more pressure on her urinary tract.
‘Give me a break,’ she said crankily. ‘I only did this twenty minutes ago. It’s not a bottomless cup.’
‘Do you want me to turn a tap on?’
Maggie glared at the door. ‘I want you to go away.’
‘I’m not going anywhere.’
Great! Maggie shut her eyes and concentrated. Hard. On waterfalls and pouring rain and dripping taps. And warm, yellowish fluid of another origin. Surrounding her baby. Nourishing it. Cocooning it. Protecting it. Rocking it to sleep. She smiled at the thought and finally found the release she was after.
This time she looked straight away, preparing to count to one hundred and twenty Mississippis before she saw a change in the test window. But it was there already. A result. Another pink plus sign.
Maggie stood for a few seconds, just staring at it, until another bang on the door interrupted the sheer incredulity she was feeling.
‘Damn it, Maggie.’
Maggie opened the door. Nash was looking equal parts harried and annoyed. And when he quirked his eyebrow at her she said, ‘I’m pregnant,’ and promptly burst into tears.
Nash stood temporarily paralysed as Maggie’s face crumpled and great heaving sobs screwed her face into one only a mother could love. Oh, God. Not tears. How could he be angry with her when she was so heartbroken? Still, he was surprised at her reaction. For a woman who’d spent a good part of an entire decade and a lot of hard-earned money trying to get pregnant, he’d thought she’d be ecstatic.
Maybe this news was as appalling to her as it was him? Maybe she’d got past the urge to procreate? The thought was comforting and he took her in his arms and held her while she sobbed into his chest. ‘Shh,’ he crooned, stroking her hair. ‘It’s okay.’
Maggie clung to his shirt while the news swirled around her in a whirlpool of emotions. Excitement. Incredulity. Amazement. Disbelief. But mostly joy. She was delirious with joy. After years of yearning, years of desperate maternal cravings she was finally going to be a mother.
‘This doesn’t have to be the end of the world,’ Nash murmured against her forehead. ‘We have options. It all might be a bit of a mess right now but we’ll figure it out.’
A bit of a mess? Maggie pulled away from his chest and looked at him. What on earth was he talking about? Things were perfect. ‘Are you kidding?’ she sniffled, wiping the heels of her hands across her cheekbones. ‘This is the best thing that has ever happened to me. Ever.’
Nash frowned. Her face was blotchy, her nose was red but she was suddenly smiling at him like a crazy person. ‘So…those were tears of happiness?’
Maggie nodded. ‘Supreme happiness.’
‘Right,’ he said, hoping he didn’t look as confused as he felt. He’d forgotten how contrary women could be.
‘I need another cup of tea. Do you want one?’ she asked, brushing past him, her mind on nursery colours and baby names.
Cup of tea? Nash watched her disappearing back. A slug of whiskey would be better. Much better. He took a few moments to let the enormity of it all sink in. A father. He was going to be a dad. A memory of his father’s face at his sister’s funeral rose through the jumble of his thoughts, the misery and desolation etched deeply into the grooves of his forehead, grooves that had never gone away. He drew in a ragged breath, fighting against the tonne of bricks sitting on his chest.
Maggie was humming—humming, for God’s sake— when he joined her in the kitchen. She handed him his mug as she headed for the deck.
Maggie placed her cup on the wooden tabletop outdoors but she didn’t sit. She couldn’t. She felt like a kid on Christmas Eve, excitement and nervous energy making sitting still an impossibility. She hugged herself as she stared at her small back yard, picturing a fort in one corner—with a ladder and a slippery dip. And a set of swings in the other.
Nash watched her, staring aimlessly. Where the hell did they go from here? ‘So?’
Nash’s voice intruded in on her little fantasy and Maggie turned to face him. For the first time she noticed his pallor. He usually looked so tanned, it was odd seeing the colour leached from his handsome face. And everything about him betrayed a tense watchfulness, from the tightness around his mouth to the erectness of his stance.
He always looked so loose, so relaxed, like he was about to break out into the broadest grin. But not right now. Right now he looked like any number of parents she’d been involved with who’d just been given bad news. He looked like he’d had the stuffing knocked out of him.
‘Oh, Nash, I’m sorry. I know you never wanted this.’
Nash nodded and felt the tension in his shoulders ease a little. Maggie had at least acknowledged that this news affected both of them. He pulled out a chair and sat down. She followed suit. ‘What do you want to do now?’
Maggie spread her hands. ‘I honestly haven’t thought about it.’ She looked into his face and saw worry
etching lines into his forehead and around his eyes.
‘But look,’ she assured him, placing her palms flat on the table, ‘you don’t have to worry. I don’t want anything from you. I understand. It’s okay. I’m going to be fine. We’re going to be fine.’
She felt a pang in her chest but it got lost amidst the marvel of being a we. She and the baby.
She was a we.
Nash frowned. ‘Don’t be ridiculous, Maggie. This baby is my responsibility too and I don’t shirk my responsibilities,’ he snapped.
Maggie gaped at him, stunned by his categorical rejection of her offer to absolve him of consequence. The man looked like he’d fly all the way to London today if he could, even if it meant he had to flap his own arms.
Maggie gave a half-laugh. Did he mean he wanted to be an us? ‘What?’
‘You heard me,’ he said tersely.
‘But…but why? This isn’t the Victorian age, Nash. Women can and do have babies without a man to take care of them. You have a whole career planned. You really don’t have to worry about this.’
Nash, feeling rather contrary himself amidst the roller-coaster of emotions he was experiencing, suddenly felt kind of disposed of. ‘Were you even going to tell me?’
Maggie shook her head dazedly, spun out by the unexpected turn of events. ‘What?’
‘If I hadn’t walked in here today and discovered the test, would you have told me?’
She struggled with the question. ‘Yes. No. I…don’t know…Maybe?’
Nash shot her a hard look. ‘Maybe? Well, that’s just great, Maggie.’
‘Oh, come on, Nash,’ Maggie pleaded, chilled by the way the warmth in his tropical island eyes had turned glacial. ‘I’ve only just found out. I haven’t really thought anything through.’
One blond eyebrow shot up. ‘Maybe?’ he repeated.
‘You leave for the other side of the world in a month. Wouldn’t it be wrong of me to dump this in your lap now? What possible good could come of it? You have this whole plan for your future. London for a few years and then setting up the flying paediatrician service. A baby doesn’t figure into that. Anyway, you don’t want to be a father. You told me that yourself.’
‘Not wanting to have children when there are none is entirely different from finding out someone’s carrying your baby and it’s very much a reality.’
‘I didn’t plan this, Nash.’ Hell, she’d have never thought it possible!
He sighed. ‘I know.’
‘Well, what do you want, then?’ Maggie’s heart thundered at the possibility that Nash might want to be part of his baby’s life. Part of her life. Was that what he wanted? What she wanted?
She had a sudden flash of him with Brodie on his hip that day in the Radio Giggle studio and the way he’d been with Dougy. He was great with kids.
Nash stood and raked his hand through his hair. ‘Damn it, Maggie, I don’t know. This is a lot to process.’
For him, maybe. For her it felt like she’d finally arrived at her destination. She was already this baby’s mother, already loved it more than she had words to describe.
‘I mean, do you even want me to be a part of this baby’s life?’ he demanded.
She shrugged. ‘I…I suppose…’
‘Gee, Maggie. Could you be a little more enthusiastic?’
‘I’m sorry, I didn’t mean that to sound half-hearted. I’m just surprised that you do, that’s all. I wouldn’t have thought for a minute that you would.’
Nash clenched his jaw at her unintended insult. He was from the country, where men were honourable and took their obligations seriously.
‘It’s my responsibility, Maggie. I told you that. I like to think I’m an honourable man and honourable men do not walk away from their mistakes.’
Even as the word came out Nash wished he could retract it. He saw Maggie freeze and felt like the worse kind of bastard. ‘I’m sorry, I didn’t mean…’
Maggie sat very still. He saw their baby as some kind of error? A blunder? A slip-up? She placed her hand across her stomach as if she could protect the baby from Nash’s words. No matter what happened, she would never look upon this occurrence as a mistake. The fact that he did spoke volumes. ‘Oh, I think you did.’
Nash pushed the pads of his fingers into his shut eyes and then dropped his hands to his sides. God, he felt tired. ‘I’m sorry, that came out all wrong.’
‘Really? Maybe it was a Freudian slip.’
‘Hell, Maggie, it was the wrong choice of word from the depths of fuzzy night-duty brain. Don’t read any more into it than that.’
Except sometimes when people were tired and their guards were down, they said exactly what they were thinking. Their filters didn’t work and their real thoughts spewed out.
Maggie felt her ire rising. She didn’t want to be anyone’s responsibility or her baby to be anyone’s mistake. She glared at him. ‘We’re not going to be your cross to bear, Nash.’
Nash rolled his eyes at her melodrama. ‘Oh, please. I just need some time to think about it. Figure it out.’
Maggie felt more and more like an inconvenience. A problem to be solved. A puzzle to crack. Okay, yes, he was tired and this was a shock. But she sure as hell wasn’t going to hang around waiting for him to figure her out, figure their mistake out.
She stood. ‘Well, why don’t you go and do that? You know your way out,’ she said frostily.
Nash looked at her as she regarded him with utter disdain. She was angry and he wasn’t exactly in the best of moods. He thought about how happy he’d been when he’d opened the front door half an hour ago and couldn’t believe so much could change so quickly.
One thing was for sure, this conversation needed a clear head and open mind and Maggie looked more unreachable than she had in the beginning when she’d refused to even give them a chance. Damn it!
‘Fine,’ he said tersely. ‘We’ll talk later.’And he turned on his heel, not stopping to look back as he strode through the house and let himself out the front door.
Maggie heard the bang from the deck and dragged in a gulp of air, her hands shaking. That had gone well.
Not.
She picked up their mugs, made her way back into the kitchen and placed them in the sink, her mind completely preoccupied, seesawing between giddy delight and irritation at Nash’s behaviour. But ultimately nothing could trump the realisation that she was pregnant—actually pregnant.
She was grinning as she detoured through the lounge-room to check that Nash had locked the door after his hasty exit. She stopped short in the archway as her gaze fell on the decorated Christmas tree that stood in one corner.
Despite the hour, the artfully spaced fairy-lights winked on and off and a small ‘Oh,’escaped her lips involuntarily. It was beautiful. Rich and green with red tinsel, frosted white ornaments and a gorgeous golden star.
‘Nash,’ she whispered, her hand pressed to her heart, moved by his gesture.
It was typical Nash. To her surprise he’d proven to be quite the romantic. Their relationship may have been clandestine but it hadn’t stopped him from constantly touching her heart with little surprises. From the vase of frangipani blossoms to candlelight picnics in bed and deliveries of her favourite chocolates. He really had spoiled her. But the tree was something else.
She sat on the lounge and watched the lights blink on and off, her anger at him dissolving temporarily, suddenly miserable that he had left as he had before she’d had a chance to thank him.
She’d deliberately not thought of Christmas in relation to him. She knew he was working on Christmas Day, as was she, but she hadn’t wanted to pry or push as to his plans for the night. She’d hoped they’d spend it together. But now? She was pretty sure whatever they had been building had just come tumbling down.
Nash went to work that night with a lot on his mind. He’d barely slept so he was more tired, crankier and grouchier than he’d ever been in his life. And everyone noticed. Because Nash was never any of
those things. Not even in the midst of a crisis. He was laid-back, unfailingly cheerful and if it was there, usually found the humour in any situation.
But tonight he was tense, snappy and grim-faced. And the nurses avoided him like the plague. Lucky for them their quiet streak was continuing so contact with Nash could be minimised. The snake bite patient had gone to the ward at lunchtime, which left only Toby and the duff, duff, duff of his ventilator and the critical airway baby.
So the night was interminable. Too much time to think. To dwell on things. A father. He was going to be a father! Something he’d made a conscious decision never to be. Something he’d never even imagined. Had always, in fact, taken every precaution to prevent. But it had happened anyway.
His mother would be ecstatic. So would his father. It wasn’t enough that their grandchildren already numbered twelve, they doted on each and every one and were overjoyed that his sisters didn’t appear to be finished yet.
But he didn’t want that for himself. Not now. Not ever. And yet here he was. Why? And why with the one woman who was rapidly coming to mean more than just a three-month fling to him. She ticked every box— smart, fascinating, gorgeous, funny and great between the sheets. Things had been going so well. And now this.
Still his honour demanded that he do the right thing and by the time he pulled out of the rooftop car park the next morning he knew exactly what that involved.
Maggie was lying on the couch at around nine-thirty, absently staring at the blinking tree lights just visible in the daylight, her mind adrift, when a knock at the door sounded. She’d fallen asleep on the couch late last night, staring at the lights twinkling in the tinsel. She’d been watching some dreadful midnight movie but the kaleidoscope of colour kept drawing her gaze and eventually she’d switched the TV off and just lain back and watched.
She let her head loll off the edge of the lounge slightly and looked back through her fringe to the front door. She could see a large male silhouette and she didn’t have to be a rocket scientist to figure out who was calling at this hour.
For a moment she contemplated ignoring it, feigning sleep, but whatever else had happened here yesterday, whatever challenges they faced right now, she needed to thank him for the tree.
Her Baby Out of the Blue/A Doctor, A Nurse: A Christmas Baby Page 24