by Dani Collins
The doctor showed her into a comfortable lounge with a number of tea and coffee options. She kept it simple and chose a bagged herbal tea that she dropped into a cup while he started the kettle.
He chatted about his relatives in Toronto, but all Ivy could think about was Jun Li stroking himself to orgasm in another room. She recalled his shape in intimate detail. The heat and hardness against her palm. His swollen head against her tongue. The way he’d thrust with lazy purpose when he filled her and made love to her, telling her how good she felt squeezing him. The way he’d watched to ensure she was getting as much pleasure as he was. How he had waited for her to grow tense and breathless beneath him before he’d increased his speed and power so they shattered in unison...
From the depths of the corridor, she heard Ah-Pei say something that might have been, “Thank you.” Was that what someone said under these circumstances?
Jun Li came into the room on a wave of energy that struck with hurricane force. The one glance Ivy dared send him noted a fading flush across his cheekbones. She went back to staring into the bottom of her cup.
“The results won’t take long,” the doctor said. “I’ll be back shortly.” He left behind a dense silence.
“There’s tea,” Ivy murmured, though she was only holding hers to warm her hands.
Jun Li ignored her and stood at the window, hands in his pockets, looking so remote she wasn’t sure he’d heard her.
“I’m sorry if that was difficult,” she was compelled to say.
“I practice. It was easy.” He bit off the words, leaving no humor in the sarcasm.
She set aside her tea and covered her face with her warmed palms, leaning her elbows onto her knees, trying to hold everything off. The walls were closing in anyway.
“I didn’t mean for this to happen.”
“Nor I. Obviously.”
His subdued fury shrank her farther into herself. She had convinced herself she would feel only an air of superiority at having done the right thing by informing him, not this squirm of anguish as though she’d caused him some kind of injury. Not this sting of being blamed for something that wasn’t her fault.
“All these moving parts and you happened to be fertile? You’ll forgive me for being incredulous.”
“So was I.” She straightened and folded her arms across her middle. “The signs were there right away, but you’d said it wasn’t possible. I thought I was missing cycles because I was moving and interviewing for a new job.” She’d been exhausted and nauseated, breasts sore, emotional. “When I finally went to the doctor, she looked at me like I was a complete idiot for not suspecting sooner.”
“You’re keeping it, obviously.” His tone was ruthlessly neutral.
“Yes.” Ivy had always wanted children. Her vision of a family had always included a loving spouse, but the fact this wasn’t her perfect scenario hadn’t given her any pause when she discovered she was pregnant. In fact, there was a certain relief in not having to wait until Mr. Right came along.
“Have you had any tests?” He turned to pin her with a penetrating look.
“Routine bloodwork and a scan to confirm my dates. Everything is normal. I’m not really a drinker and I take a decent multivitamin, so there doesn’t seem to be any problem with my having taken so long to realize...” She trailed off as she heard footsteps approaching.
The doctor wore an unreadable expression as he entered. He looked to Jun Li.
Jun Li nodded to indicate he should speak freely.
“You are not sterile. If you were having difficulty conceiving, we would make a more thorough study of count and motility, but the fact sperm is present and appears viable leads me to conclude your vasectomy has failed. It’s possible you’re responsible for this pregnancy.”
* * *
Responsible. Yes. That was the avalanche of emotion befalling Jun Li to the point he could hardly breathe. It was exactly as all-encompassing as he recalled from the first time.
“Shall we move on to the paternity test?” The doctor’s voice came to him from a thousand miles away.
Jun Li nodded. His heart was thrashing so hard, he could barely breathe. His head felt as if it wasn’t even attached. He moved with Ivy into a room where the technician poked them both in the arm. He barely felt it. This part was only a formality. If he could make babies, he had little doubt he was the father of Ivy’s.
Condom?
What’s the point?
A kick of fury with himself struck deep in his belly.
Ivy was watching him with a wary expression, perhaps anticipating some kind of blowup.
He wanted to point fingers and shout blame. He had never wanted to be in this position again. He’d taken the ultimate step to avoid it. Old betrayals and streaks of loss were fueling his anger, but he tamped all that down.
The only emotion that seeped through the cracks was guilt. Jun Li’s life was one of enormous pressure and responsibility. He had never wanted to put that burden on his own child. It was a secondary reason he had made the decision not to procreate, and he’d always been comfortable with the action he’d taken.
A pregnancy had happened anyway. His baby, his heir, was on its way. There was no point in railing over how things were supposed to be. His energy would be far better spent working out how to fit two new people into the life he already lived.
“Paternity results will take a day or two,” the doctor said as Jun Li closed his elbow over the cotton ball inside it.
He ensured the doctor had his direct number and escorted Ivy to the car.
“What hotel are you booked into?” he asked Ivy as he placed a call to his PA.
She told him, and he relayed an instruction to collect her luggage.
“What are you doing?” she blurted, cutting off a yawn she couldn’t stifle. “No. I’m tired. I want to go to bed.”
“I’m saving you the trouble of packing. You’ll be more comfortable with me.”
“You don’t know that! My hotel is fine. I have to be up early for a cruise anyway.”
“To where?”
“Around the harbor. I’m on a package.” Whatever astounded look was on his face made her brow crinkle defensively. “It was the cheapest way to book a flight and accommodation. It’s my last chance for a vacation before the baby.”
He couldn’t tell if she was joking or serious. “You really think I’m going to drop you and my unborn child at a three-star hotel and wave goodbye?”
“I assure you the baby’s current accommodation is top-notch,” she said snippily. “But I’m ready for bed. If you want to talk after you get the paternity results, text me.” She took out her phone and offered it for him to put in his number.
He took it and pocketed it.
“Hey!”
“You didn’t come all this way to talk me into a fertility test so you could trick me into believing I’m the father of a baby that isn’t mine. I believe you. We have made a baby.”
“Okay. Don’t you have other women to check with, though? I’d rather not hang around listening to that.” She kept her hand out.
“Are you trying to make my head explode?”
“Oh, were you a virgin that night? I’m the only woman you’ve ever slept with?”
She was serious. For some reason it infuriated him, probably because he hadn’t been able to look at another woman since her.
“That night with you is the only time I’ve ever skipped a condom. I don’t sleep with legions of women.” And he’d already done a quick mental review. Of the handful of women since his last test three years ago, one was married with a baby of the wrong age and the other two were childless. “I’m confident you’re the only woman I need to worry about.”
“But you don’t have to worry about me,” she insisted. “You don’t even want children!”
“That doesn’
t mean I don’t want this one,” he shot back, tearing a small hole inside himself with the admission.
Duty required him to claim his child, but he wanted their baby in ways he couldn’t articulate. It was a disturbing sensation of something in him reaching out to her, feeling the connection that had been forged.
“You and I are inextricably linked now.” It was unsettling. He kept thinking of the way she’d tilted him off his axis once. She was doing it again, this time in a far more jarring way. “We have a life to plan.”
It bothered him that he didn’t know what that would look like. It bothered him that he couldn’t control any of this. She had stepped back into his life and had effortlessly thrown everything into chaos. Perhaps it wasn’t intentional, but that was the deeply unnerving part of it. She wasn’t trying to hurt him, but he was at her mercy.
The rational side of him was reminding him to proceed with caution, to work through this methodically. Other parts were taking leaps and bounds into the future, trying to anticipate every possibility and create contingencies.
That scattered approach wasn’t helpful in the long run. He knew that. He couldn’t let this turn him inside out. That’s why they needed a plan.
“We don’t.”
He frowned at her. “I don’t remember you being argumentative.”
“Gee, I wonder what got into me.”
That would have been a solid gold comeback if he wasn’t straining to hold on to his patience.
Tension crept into her expression as she read his mood. Her mouth tightened.
“I keep telling you I didn’t come here to obligate you. We don’t have to make a plan because I have one. I’m starting a new job and will live in my father’s house. It’s probably not your version of five-star—” her brow lifted with derision “—but it’s cozy and in a good neighborhood with lots of young families. My father is remarrying so I’ll have a stepmother and two stepsisters who already have children ready to give me lots of advice and support. You don’t have to be involved at all.”
He was affronted by her desire to sideline him from their child’s life. From hers.
“If you didn’t wish for me to be involved, you shouldn’t have involved me.”
“That’s not fair! We each had information we needed.”
“So you thought I’d book a fresh vasectomy and that would be my last thought on the matter? What kind of man do you think I am?”
“I don’t know, do I? I don’t know you.” She slouched into her seat, reminding him starkly, “But that was the deal we agreed to. One night, no strings. So yes, I expected to inform you and go home to raise this baby alone.”
“The strings are there whether we want them or not. Neither of us can walk away now.”
CHAPTER THREE
“THAT WASN’T WHAT we agreed,” Ivy insisted, but she was so dizzy from everything that had happened she couldn’t work up a stronger retort.
When she had considered all the ways this might unfold, the most likely scenario had been that Jun Li would disbelieve and reject her. Perhaps he might have taken a test at some later date to reassure himself. When he realized he could cause a pregnancy, he might have reached out for a paternity test.
In her most romantic fantasies, she had let herself dream he would welcome the news with excitement and tell her he had been thinking of her all this time, the way she had been thinking about him. But if he hadn’t sought her out to continue their relationship by now, she knew it was ridiculous to imagine he had any feelings for her beyond a nice memory.
No, she had expected that once he got over the shock and got some test results, he might take some financial responsibility while they proceeded with their separate lives. He didn’t want children, so why exactly did he want this one?
“Look, I’m willing to talk about you having a place in our child’s life,” she said tentatively. “But you understand I’m having this baby in Canada and raising it there, right?”
“No.” His expression was grave. “We’re marrying and raising this baby together. Here. Or Shanghai. Maybe both if the expansion is approved. We’ll work that out later, but Canada is too far away.”
“Exactly! That’s where my life is. My family.” Actually, only her father. The rest were in Hong Kong, but his decree was sending her into a tailspin. “I can’t move here— Where are we going?” she asked as she realized they were crossing a bridge.
“My home.”
“I said I wanted to go to my hotel. You can’t kidnap me.”
“I’m not.” He gave her the annoying look men gave women that said she was overreacting.
“Well, you’re taking me somewhere against my will. What else do you call it?”
He held up a hand as his phone rang. “I have to take this.”
He accepted a call while she huffed and sat back again. He told someone in Mandarin that he would not be returning to the hotel. “Ask Mutya to make the closing remarks tomorrow. Let the board know I’ll be in touch in the next few days regarding the expansion.” He ended the call.
“Don’t let me keep you. You seem busy.”
“I am. But we have a lot to work out.”
“Not tonight. I’m far too tired. And now I’ll have to book a car to take me all the way back...” She opened her purse before recalling, “You have my phone.”
“Ivy.” He took the hand she held out.
Each time he touched her, helping her in and out of cars and elevators, he realigned the polarity in her, so she felt magnetized toward his stainless-steel core. Drawn to him.
She ought to pull away. Don’t let him take you over, she warned herself, but her hand stayed in his while she quivered like a compass arrow.
“Did you not see the people photographing us in the lobby when we left the hotel? My staff is already fielding inquiries about who you are and why we looked so serious. It won’t take any time for reporters to find you and begin pestering you. I’ll take you on a day cruise if it’s important to you, but everything has changed. You can’t wander around anymore.”
“I don’t wander.” She jerked her hand free of his, voice a jagged thing that she tried to steady. “I want to live my life. No one bothered us in Vancouver.”
“Because I slipped in without my usual entourage or any publicity. I’ve been making headlines all week with this event. That means anyone with bills to pay will sell our image to the highest bidder along with whatever story they can make up to go with it.”
“You don’t know that.”
“I do know that. It’s happened when I’ve had completely innocuous lunches with female colleagues. That’s why I’m careful about whom I date and how serious we get.”
Her heart gave a little stumble at hearing he was discerning, even though it was more convenient to think of him as a promiscuous playboy who’d added her to his notched bedpost and forgotten her. At the same time, he was making it sound as if she would be treated like one of those poor women who dated a royal and became fair game for gossip sites.
Tears of frustration welled in her eyes. She wanted to insist on going to her hotel but was nervous now that she would be accosted. Besides, the car had arrived at a pair of gates.
“Why were you in that sky mansion if you have a house here?”
“Convenience. I took several meetings, and I don’t like strangers in my personal space.”
“I’m a stranger.” An unwanted houseguest. A harbinger of life-changing news.
“You’re family.”
“I haven’t agreed to marry you.”
“You will.”
She opened her mouth to accuse him of conceit, but he wasn’t being cocky. No, his confidence was more that of a negotiator who would hammer out a deal however he had to. It was a lot harder to argue against that sort of certainty. It set a heavy rock in the pit of her stomach, because she wanted to insist th
ere was nothing he had that she wanted while the firmness in his profile told her he would dig until he found something.
They parked, and the driver opened her door. Jun Li came around as she was straightening to her feet.
He was doing it again, standing there all effortlessly gorgeous and disconcerting, lights throwing mysterious shadows into his face. He seemed to take up all her vision and consume her thoughts. Despite her annoyance with him, she couldn’t help thinking, Now I’m here, will we sleep together?
No.
She tamped down on her yearnings and made herself look past him so she wouldn’t be so dazzled. She took in the modern architecture with its flared, pagoda-style roof over half walls dripping with greenery. Recessed lights emphasized the breezy openness of the home while creating a warm, inviting glow.
She’d always been a fan of reality shows about home makeovers and house hunting in exotic locales. Despite her misgivings about being here with him, she was intrigued.
The house was surrounded by flowering trees and twelve-foot walls disguised by vertical gardens, but who needed a backyard when there was a stunning courtyard in the middle of the home?
She goggled as she entered a high-ceilinged space where a slate pathway led between two shallow pools, one narrow and trickling with a wide waterfall that poured out of the wall, the other a much larger square pond.
“The housekeeper is off since I was planning to be in the city.”
They were alone? She ignored the way her skin tightened with even more acute awareness of him.
“Your house has an island,” she noted as she took in the circle of greenery in the bigger pool. It surrounded the trunk of a tree that grew toward a large rectangular hole in the roof. Posts made of warm, honey-colored wood contrasted beautifully with the tiles in the water that formed a muted mosaic of ivory and pale blue.
“This is a terrible house for a baby,” she added, even though she imagined a crawler would be in heaven, paddling about in that inch of water.
“I have others.”
Houses? Well, that’s what she got for being rude, she supposed.
On the far side of the tree, they arrived in an open-concept kitchen of stainless steel, clean lines and bar seating.