In the aftermath of that wild coupling, he seemed to freeze as if too stunned for words, and, when he had finally spoken, Chantal wished he'd kept that one succinct four-letter oath to himself. And that she had kept her eyes averted. Then she wouldn't have seen the unguarded flash of anguish in his eyes, wouldn't have been reminded of that moment in the hospital when he'd backed away from her family's joy over a new baby.
Fear had glazed his eyes. Fear of the consequences of that torn condom, sheer terror at the thought of being permanently tied to her through an unplanned pregnancy. The knowledge banded around her chest, driving the zillion shards of her splintered heart deeper into her flesh.
What a stupid loveblind fool she had been. He didn't love her. How could she have misconstrued so badly?
Tonight hadn't been about building a relationship of any kind. It was about sexual chemistry and raw desire and a man missing out for too long. It was about doing it, hard and rough, against that man's front door. And the consequences had to be faced.
Mustering her pride, she pushed to her feet. So, okay, she could take charge here. She could supply the response a man in this situation wanted to bear, and perhaps she could even toss in a cool, accepting shrug. She could do all that and maybe even walk out the door with her head held high. If not, she would die trying.
* * *
The living area seemed gloomily dim after the brightness of the bathroom, and that pretty much described the mood as well as the lighting. Quade stood in front of the unlit fireplace, his posture as stiff and unyielding as the columns of brick at his back. His face looked even more forbidding.
A lesser woman might have turned tail and fled, but, after one faltering step, Chantal pushed back her shoulders and kept on going. It didn't matter if it felt as though she were wading through treacle, all that mattered was getting through the next five minutes so she could turn tail and flee.
"Now we really do need to talk," she said with fake breeziness. "And it would be easier if you weren't glowering at me."
Hands on hips, he stared back at her. "You think I should be smiling? You think you should be smiling? Have you forgotten what just happened out here? Hell, Chantal, you might be pregnant."
"I don't think even yours would swim that fast."
"Now isn't the time for cute," he ground out. "Think about this."
"I have."
"Obviously not hard enough. I assume you wouldn't want a baby?"
Obviously he didn't, but what about her? How would she feel to be carrying Quade's baby, to be building a bond through their joint love of a child? How would she feel to see her man reduced to unashamed tears by the birth of his child? Hope bloomed, shy and tentative, in the remains of her shattered heart.
"It's not something I've considered," she said carefully. "At the moment I'm flat out keeping up with my job and my family."
"And if you are pregnant?"
The harsh intensity of his eyes sent a chill through her whole body, freezing out that first fragile inkling of warmth. And that just made her mad.
She didn't want to feel cold and hollow; she wanted to feel warm and whole again. In that moment it didn't matter that he didn't love her. He knew how to touch her, how to make her come alive, how to make her feel a thousand times stronger, a million times happier, than anything else in her life. She wouldn't let him cut her out of that. She would not allow that
"Damn, Quade, I don't have to be pregnant. Isn't this what the morning after pill is for?"
His head rocked back as if he'd been slapped, and for a split second Chantal thought she had made a terrible mistake. But before that thought had half-formed his expression turned stony.
"You'll see your doctor in the morning?" he asked in a cold, flat voice.
Yes. No. Please, give me some sign. A muscle flicked in his tight, shadowed jaw, and she couldn't stand it any longer. Couldn't keep up the pretence any longer. She had to get out of there.
"Chantal."
She stopped before she reached the door but didn't turn around.
"Let me know if you change your mind."
* * *
"Well?" Kree asked, lowering her scissors. The question could have been for Chantal herself, or for the other stylist at the next station.
Tina lowered her blow-dryer and inspected Chantal's head through seriously narrowed eyes. "Sexy, yet stylish."
"Precisely." Kree smiled with satisfaction. "Now, don't go letting it get so out of hand again, okay?"
Chantal agreed. It was easiest, and sometime in the past seven weeks that had become her motto. Whatever's easiest. Whatever got every concerned family member off her back. Whatever got her through the next long day and even longer night.
Kree finished brushing away the loose hair and whipped off the cape with a flourish. When a frown creased her mobile face, Chantal felt a lecture coming on. Rising from the chair, she checked her watch and winced. "I'm running late, again. What do I owe you?"
"Don't keep running till you drop, okay?"
"You sound so much like Julia, it's scary."
Laughing, Kree reached for a bottle from the shelf behind her and plonked it on the counter. "You want to try this product? Your hair seems awfully dry."
She'd said much the same before she started cutting. As she ran her fingers through its length she'd tutted about the coarse texture and Chantal's stomach had pitched. Lately she'd been reading up on expected changes during pregnancy and breastfeeding. Hair texture wasn't supposed to change until much later.
"You want?" Kree prompted.
"Okay." I doubt it will help, but whatever's easiest.
Kree punched cash register buttons, and, from somewhere to her right, Chantal heard a soft whistle of appreciation.
"Cool car." Tina was peering out the window into the main street. "Know anyone who drives an old red sports car?"
This time Chantal's stomach did more than pitch. It rolled like something on the high seas. Dimly she heard other voices, conjecture over who might own such a vehicle, while the certainty turned her inside out.
Quade was back. After six weeks on some work experience jaunt at a Hunter Valley vineyard. At least that's what she'd extrapolated about his whereabouts from the various tidbits she'd heard from Godfrey or Zane or Julia. No one knew very much but they all knew more than she.
Six weeks of no see, no hear, no contact. No chance to tell him that her only trip to the doctor had been to confirm the home pregnancy kit result.
"Hello? Earth calling Chantal?"
She snatched the credit card Kree was waving in front of her nose and dropped it into her purse, then she forced her legs to take her out the door, forced her eyes to locate her car, forced her hands to open the door. Twice she fumbled her keys before she got them into the ignition, but once the engine kicked over she drew several deep calming breaths and allowed the solid feel of the wheel in her hands and the smooth hum of the engine to gradually center her.
This is a good thing. Once I tell Quade, I can share with Julia. I won't have to pretend I can't hold Bridie through horror of her sicking on my clothes. I can hold her without fear of my response signposting my secret. I can relax and laugh and cry and shake with trepidation over this incredible, amazing, terrifying event. This tiny life growing inside me.
The shadow of a smile skittered across her lips as she reversed out of the car park. A complicated mix of apprehension and relief and anticipation rolled through her as she drove down Plenty's main street. Her glance flicked left and right, pulse rocketing any time she glimpsed a red car. Whether in town or at home, she would find him now. She would end this now.
On the outskirts of town she started to accelerate, picking up speed as the houses gave way to farming land. She didn't even see the truck until it was too late. A flash of movement coming out of a lane to her right, too fast to stop, too big to avoid.
The last thing she heard before it hit was her own cry of distress at not finding Quade, at never having the chance to tell him a
bout their baby. To tell him she loved him.
* * *
"Ready to go, man."
Zane patted the hood of the MG he'd just returned from a last test and grinned, the relaxed easy grin of a thoroughly contented man. Quade tried not to resent that, even as he tried to think of another reason to delay his departure. The thought of walking through the front door – that front door – and into his empty house filled him with a panicky kind of dread.
"You got time for a drink?" he asked, hoping the question sounded casual rather than desperate.
"Yeah." Zane's grin returned. "I can tell you all about Bridie."
Yeah, and then you can go right ahead and stick a dagger in my gut. He shifted uncomfortably. "On second thoughts, I'd better be getting home."
Laughing, Zane punched his arm. "Come on, man, I was only joshing. We can talk about your baby instead."
Dagger. Not in his gut, but right through his heart. Reflexively he took a step back, but Zane was inspecting the MG. That's what he'd meant by baby.
"Hey, Zane." Bill stuck his head out of the workshop door. "Tow call. An accident out near Harmer's. You want me to take it?"
"Yeah. Please."
Zane sighed. "Looks like we'll have to take a rain check, unless you want to go pick up a six-pack and bring it back here."
"Sounds like a plan."
* * *
The phone rang before they'd finished their first beer. Still laughing at the story he'd been telling, Zane picked it up. "Bill. What's up?" His smile died, instantly supplanted by tension. His gaze jumped to meet Quade's across the office desk.
"Who?" he asked before Zane had the receiver down. Already on his feet. Already knowing in his gut.
"Chantal."
Fear sliced through him, as sharp and quick as a steel blade. "How bad?"
"According to the other driver, not too, but Bill says her car's totaled. They've taken her to Cliffton Base."
Quade was already moving but Zane stopped him before he cleared the office door. "I'll drive."
He started to object, needing to be in control, needing to be there, with her, now. But then memories of their fight over who drove assailed him, and he felt the fine trembling in his hands, in his legs. In his heart.
He nodded once. "Just drive fast, okay."
* * *
Chantal heard the commotion, the sound of raised voices, demands and objections, about five seconds before Quade burst through the door into the examination cubicle where they'd parked her. For another five seconds he stood there staring at her, head to foot and back again, as if checking that she was all present and correct.
Dimly, she heard the clearing of a throat and realized a sister had followed him in – obviously the one he'd been remonstrating with outside. "Now, you've seen her," she said with studied patience, "how about you do as you promised and wait outside?"
Quade's gaze didn't leave hers. "I'm not going anywhere."
Chantal felt her heart skip a long beat, then start to pound. She wanted to smile, to reassure him she was fine, to tell him never to leave her again, but she couldn't manage anything for the thickness of tears in her throat.
"What is she doing here?" he asked, finally turning to fix the sister with that fierce glare. "Where's the doctor?"
"Dr. Lui has examined her. She's under observation."
"Because?"
"Because of the bump on her head." The sister smiled reassuringly. "She's fine, the baby's fine. In a few hours you'll be able to take them home."
The door swung shut noiselessly behind her and Chantal closed her eyes. She couldn't bear to see the confusion on his face, couldn't stand the thought of watching it turn to anger. Perhaps he would leave now, as noiselessly as the sister.
When she felt the first tears leaking from the corners of her eyes, she squeezed her lids more tightly shut hoping to contain them, concentrating so hard on staunching them she didn't hear his approach, didn't know he had hunkered down at her side until she felt the touch of his hand, wiping away her tears with a hand that shook. Then kissing them away.
With a long sniffling breath, she managed to ease the flood but not to stop it completely. Through the moist blur she could see his dark scowl, the shadows beneath his eyes, the tightness at the corners of his mouth. She kept her gaze fixed there, away from his eyes, avoiding what she didn't want to know.
"Thank God you're all right. When I heard about your accident…" He trailed off, shaking his head, and she couldn't bear it any longer. Her gaze slid to his, found it and couldn't let go. The sharp intensity of fear, the soft glitter of tears. Oh dear God. Fear for her; tears for her. An ache started in her chest, so deep and bittersweet with hope, she could barely breathe. And she had to explain. She had to tell him everything…
"I have to tell you…"
"I saw your car and…"
They both spoke at the same time, both stopped at the same time. Both drew a breath. Chantal's hitched in the middle when he picked up her hands and touched them to his lips.
"I've never been so afraid."
"Me, too. They said the restraints and the air bags stopped me being…" A shudder run through her. The memory, the sound, her fear. "I thought I wouldn't have the chance to tell you."
"About the baby?"
"Yes."
It was no more than a hiss of sound yet it seemed to slither through her, filling her with a new trepidation, an old apprehension. When she tried to pull her hands away, his grip tightened and that lent her strength. Determination.
"I was going to tell you. Today. I heard you were back and I was on my way home…" Her voice shook and she needed to stop. Tears built again, annoying her, frustrating her. She hated this fragility, hated this shakiness.
"That morning…" He paused, studying their joined hands. "Did you go to the doctor?"
"No."
"Too busy?"
She started to shake her head but stopped, flinching. She'd forgotten about the bump. "No. I couldn't. I didn't want to."
His grip on her hands tightened painfully and she looked away, didn't want to see his anger.
"Look, I know you don't want this—"
"What?"
Startled by his loud exclamation, she stared at him openmouthed.
"What makes you think I don't want a baby?"
"Here, the day Bridie was born, as soon as Zane mentioned the 'b' word, you left with the hounds of hell at your heels."
He rocked back, the look on his face almost comically bewildered. "You thought that was because I have an aversion to babies?"
"What else was I to think?"
"Is that why you reacted as you did, said what you did, after the condom business?" His grip on her hands was almost painful. "Were you saying what you thought I wanted to hear?"
She nodded, gingerly in deference to her head, and heard him laugh. It sounded like a rough husky mixture of relief and self-derision. It sounded like a glimpse of heaven.
"Talk about misconstruing." He shook his head. "When I saw Zane, the look in his eyes… Hell, there's nothing I want more than babies. Children. Laughter. My home as it should be, like it was when I was a child."
He huffed out a breath full of emotion, anguish hope.
"When I learned what Kristin had done, when I found out that I'd not even had a choice about that child…"
"Kristin was pregnant?"
"Yes, but I didn't know. She didn't ever tell me. She just went and had an abortion and carried on as if she'd been to have a tooth out or something."
Oh dear Lord. This woman was some piece of work. If Chantal weren't trussed up on a hospital stretcher with a head that threatened to explode every time she moved it more than an inch, she would chase her down and do some serious damage.
"I found out after the blowup at work. When I confronted her about that, she tossed in the pregnancy story as well. A going-away present."
"Do you still love her?" Immediately the words left her mouth, she wished them back. "Forget I a
sked that. Don't answer."
"I don't love her. I don't know if I ever did." The simplicity of that statement blew her away. That and the look in his eyes as he lifted her hands and turned them over, as he pressed a kiss into each palm. "I don't remember ever feeling the way I do about you."
Good answer. No, great answer. "How is that?" she asked huskily, needing to hear the words.
"Like I never want to let you go. Like I can't think of living any way but with you by my side. As my friend, my lover, my wife." He kissed the tender skin on the inside of her wrist. "I love you, Chantal and I know this isn't the most romantic place and, hell, I'm not so good with romantic gestures."
Chantal thought he was doing just fine. Especially when he did the down-on-one-knee bit.
"Will you marry me?"
When the stupid choking tears started again, she couldn't do any more than sob out her answer. "Yes." And again in case he didn't hear the first time. "Yes. Yes. Yes." And when he gently kissed her, on her forehead, her cheeks, and finally her lips, she thought her heart would burst with love.
"Will you take me home?"
He laughed, a soft rough-edged sound that hummed over her senses with the same gentleness as his lips. "I'll go see."
"Wait." Her demand pulled him up short of the door. "Come back here."
"Bossy." But he was smiling as he came back to her. "You must be feeling better."
"You have a way with your kisses."
"The healing touch?"
"Apparently." She paused, studying him soberly. The man she loved, the man who would be her husband. Her lifelong lover. "There's something I haven't told you, yet."
"I don't know if I can take any more of your revelations."
"Oh, I think you want to hear this one."
He arced a brow.
"I love you, Cameron Quade. With all my heart. There's nothing I want to do more than be your wife and fill your home with babies."
He smiled as he ducked his head a little, and she thought she caught the glint of tears in his eyes. "Will they all be as bossy as you?" he asked.
"Most probably."
QUADE: THE IRRESISTIBLE ONE Page 14