Laura looked down in puzzlement at her son; this was the first she had heard of that particular cereal being Bobby’s favourite. But, with no permanent male figure in his life, she accepted that Bobby was likely to suffer a few cases of hero-worship over the following years. It was just that Liam was the last person she wanted Bobby to see in that role!
‘It looks like it’s sugar-coated cornflakes all round, Laura,’ Liam told her with satisfaction, already following Bobby towards the kitchen.
Laura followed much more slowly. Did Liam know who Bobby really was? If he did, he was giving no indication of it. Which was even more disquieting.
Amy raised surprised brows in her direction when Laura entered the kitchen. Liam was already seated at the pine table in there as Bobby got out the cereal, bowls and milk, putting them on the table before sitting down himself.
Laura gave the housekeeper a resigned shrug. There was really nothing else she could do; she couldn’t exactly throw Liam bodily out of the house. Besides, she was still uneasy about how much Liam might or might not have guessed about Bobby’s parentage…
‘Shouldn’t a big boy like you be at school today?’ Liam asked Bobby once the two of them had their bowls of cereal.
‘I fell over two days ago and bumped my head,’ Bobby said. ‘I had to stay in hospital overnight. But Mummy stayed with me.’ He looked up at Laura for confirmation of this momentous event in his young life.
‘I certainly did.’ She ruffled the darkness of his hair with gentle affection, looking up challengingly at Liam as she sensed his gaze on her.
So that’s where you rushed off to two days ago, his eyes clearly said.
Laura gave him a withering glance before turning away. She had told him the man in her life he kept referring to was mythical; it was Liam’s own fault if he hadn’t believed her.
‘Sit down and eat some breakfast.’
Angry colour flooded her cheeks at Liam’s dictatorial tone. She would eat breakfast when she was good and ready, not when he told her to. Who did he think—?
‘Please?’ he added cajolingly, blue gaze on her flushed cheeks.
Laura sat. Until she had spoken to him alone, found out whether or not he had guessed that Bobby was his son, then she didn’t particularly want to antagonise him. Although his manner seemed rather too pleasant for that of a man who had just realised he had a son he knew nothing about…
It was impossible to tell with Liam. Able to read and gauge other people’s emotions, he also had the ability to completely hide his own behind an inscrutable mask. That mask was firmly in place at the moment!
Liam continued to talk to Bobby as Laura drank her coffee and ate a slice of toast, encouraging the little boy to talk about school, and his friends there.
Laura’s own troubled thoughts drifted as her wariness increased.
‘—think you would really like Ireland, Bobby.’ Liam’s suggestion brought Laura’s wandering attention back to their conversation.
What did he mean, Bobby would like Ireland? She had no plans ever to take her son there!
Liam turned to look at her with expressionless eyes as he sensed her renewed attention. ‘Bobby was just telling me that he likes it when you and he go out for a drive at weekends so that the two of you can go for walks in the countryside,’ he explained. ‘There’s nowhere quite like Ireland for beautiful countryside and peaceful walks,’ he opined.
That might or might not be true—Laura had no intention of visiting Ireland to find out! ‘I think after Bobby’s accident our walks will have to wait for a while,’ she replied—firmly stamping on any suggestion that Liam might join them this weekend before he even made it!
‘Your mother is probably right,’ Liam told Bobby as the little boy looked about to protest. ‘Mothers usually are,’ he added enigmatically.
Laura gave him a sharp look, surprised that he had actually agreed with her concerning the walks, but equally puzzled by his last remark, although she could see no mockery or sarcasm in his expression.
She stood up abruptly. ‘If you’ve finished breakfast, I think it’s time I took Bobby upstairs for a bath…’
‘Oh, but, Mummy—’
‘Remember what I said about mothers.’ Liam teasingly interrupted Bobby’s protest, standing up as he did so. ‘It’s time I was going anyway. But I’ll come and see you again, Bobby, if that’s okay with you?’
Laura gave him another look. She didn’t want Liam and Bobby becoming any closer than they were…!
‘Great!’ Again Bobby gave Liam that toothless grin.
‘Upstairs, young man,’ Laura told her son firmly. ‘While I see Liam to the door.’
Bobby followed them out into the hallway, running up the stairs with all the exuberance of his youth.
‘There doesn’t look too much wrong with him now,’ Liam remarked as he watched Bobby disappear up to his bedroom. ‘What happened?’ he prompted, turning back to her.
‘A fall at school. Nothing’s broken, though, so he should be back at school on Monday.’
‘He’s a fine-looking boy, Laura.’
She swallowed hard, reluctant to look up into the hard handsomeness of Liam’s face. A face that, after seeing the two of them together like this, was so obviously—to her, at least!—a mature version of Bobby’s…
She drew in a deep breath, lifting her head in defiance. ‘I like to think so.’
‘You must be very proud of him.’ Liam gave an acknowledging inclination of his head.
‘Very,’ she confirmed curtly, still uncertain of where this conversation was leading. If Liam had seen Bobby’s likeness to him, guessed that he was actually his son, why didn’t he just say so?
‘Have dinner with me, Laura,’ Liam said instead.
Her eyes widened in alarm. ‘I can’t leave Bobby—’
‘Not tonight,’ Liam interrupted. ‘I realise that at the moment Bobby is your first priority, that for today, at least, he needs all your attention. But tomorrow is Saturday; I’m sure by then he’ll be settled enough for you to leave him with Amy for a few hours. By that time you will probably welcome the break too,’ he added as she would have protested once again.
Laua’s mouth closed with a snap. Since when had Liam become so attuned to another person’s feelings? He was certainly showing more sensitivity than she had ever known from him before.
But did she want to have dinner with him, tomorrow or any other evening?
The answer to that was a definite no! But there was much more at stake than her own feelings…
‘In that case…thank you. Dinner sounds fine,’ she accepted tersely. ‘But could you find somewhere discreet for us to eat? I don’t relish the idea of having reporters leering all over us!’
Liam’s face tightened at this reminder of the reporters waiting outside the house. ‘Don’t worry, I’ll make sure it’s somewhere no one will recognise us.’
Very few people would recognise her anyway—at least, until that photograph of the two of them had appeared in the newspaper today they wouldn’t have done!—but Liam was another proposition altogether. But he had issued the invitation; it was up to him to find the venue.
Not that it was a dinner Laura was particularly looking forward to. She just felt in the circumstances, until she had ascertained exactly how much Liam had guessed about Bobby’s true parentage, that it might be better to meet Liam halfway. Dinner together sounded harmless enough.
Although, as she had discovered only too well this morning, what sounded harmless didn’t always turn out that way. Who would have thought, when Liam had arrived so unexpectedly this morning, that the two of them would end up in each other’s arms before he left again…!
‘It will be a business dinner, Liam,’ she told him firmly.
His brows rose mockingly. ‘Will it?’
‘There’s no other reason for the two of us to meet.’
‘If you say so.’
Laura frowned darkly. ‘Liam—’
‘Your son
is waiting upstairs for you to bath him,’ he cut in dryly, reaching out to lightly grasp her shoulders. ‘If mothers are usually right, then little boys shouldn’t be kept waiting!’
She was very aware of the warmth of his hands on her shoulders. ‘How about big boys?’ she teased.
Liam shrugged, his mouth thinning grimly. ‘We’re just as impatient for what we want, but we’ve learnt to hide it better!’
‘And what do you want, Liam?’ she prompted softly.
He grimaced. ‘Like most people, what I apparently can’t have.’ He sighed heavily. ‘Tell me, Laura, do you hate me very much?’
She drew in a shocked breath at his words. Hate him? Of course she didn’t— Well…maybe eight years ago for a while she had, she accepted. But that was so long ago, and her successful marriage to Robert, Bobby’s birth, had more than compensated for that.
‘I have too much in my life that’s good to feel hate towards anyone,’ she answered truthfully.
Liam looked down at her with assessing eyes. ‘Did you love Robert Shipley?’ he ground out harshly.
Her face softened with the remembrance of that love, eyes glittering with unshed tears. ‘Very much,’ she responded.
‘He must have been quite something.’ Liam nodded, his hands dropping away from her shoulders. ‘I would like to know more about him.’
Laura looked up at him warily. ‘Why?’
‘Because you loved him!’ Liam rasped harshly.
‘I see no connection between the two things.’ She shook her head uncomprehendingly. ‘I certainly see no point in the two of us talking about my husband.’
‘No?’ Liam glanced up the stairs. ‘From the little Bobby said about him over breakfast, he obviously adored him too.’
‘Why shouldn’t he have done? He was his father!’
Too defensive, Laura, she instantly rebuked herself with a pained wince. But she couldn’t help it. There was much more to being a father than the mere act of bringing a child into being. And Robert had more than filled all those other roles necessary for being a father.
‘Yes, he was,’ Liam conceded gruffly. ‘I’ll call for you here tomorrow night about eight o’clock, shall I?’
The sudden change of subject threw Laura for a few seconds. Would she ever be able to keep up with this man’s change of moods…?
‘I don’t think that’s a good idea.’ She shook her head. ‘If, as I suspect, there’s going to be more speculation about the two of us in tomorrow’s newspapers, then it would be better if we weren’t seen leaving my home together tomorrow evening.’
‘Good point,’ Liam conceded. ‘Okay, I’ll telephone here tomorrow with the name of the restaurant. If you don’t mind meeting me there…?’
‘Why should I mind?’ she replied. ‘As I’ve said, as far as I’m concerned it’s business.’
His mouth twisted into a humourless smile. ‘There’s no need to belabour the point, Laura; I heard you the first time.’
He might have heard her, but she just wanted to make sure he understood!
‘I won’t come to the door, if you don’t mind,’ she said. ‘I think the press have enough photographs of the two of us together for one day!’ And she hated to think what they were going to do with them!
Although that was the least of her troubles as she walked up the stairs a few minutes later. Dinner with Liam tomorrow evening definitely headed that particular list!
‘When I said somewhere discreet, Liam,’ she snapped, ‘I did not mean your hotel suite!’
She looked around them pointedly, at the dining table in the sitting room of his suite elegantly set for two people to dine, the crystal glasses, the cutlery gleaming silver, a vase of red roses in the centre of the highly polished table.
Liam had telephoned the house earlier and spoken to Amy, as Laura and Bobby had gone out to buy Bobby a toy, asking Laura to meet him at his hotel at eight o’clock. Laura had assumed—mistakenly it now turned out!—that the two of them would be going on to a restaurant from there. One glance at that elegant set dinner table had shown her how wrong she was!
‘Don’t look so accusing, Laura,’ Liam responded impatiently. He was wearing a black dinner jacket, snowy white shirt and black bow tie, his hair still damp from the shower he had recently taken. ‘I don’t have an ulterior motive for deciding it was easier to eat here; I tried all the restaurants I thought fitted your description and they were all fully booked.’
She gave him a scathing glance, very aware that her glittering figure-hugging gold dress, with its short length that showed the long expanse of her slender legs—chosen as a boost to her own confidence rather than any sort of come-on!—seemed slightly out of place in the intimacy of this hotel suite. Liam’s hotel suite!
‘Didn’t you explain that you’re Liam O’Reilly?’ she threw back totally put out by the fact that she was expected to eat here alone with Liam in the intimacy of his hotel suite.
His expression darkened at her deliberate antagonism. ‘I’ve never worked that way,’ he rasped coldly. ‘Look,’ he sighed, ‘I know you aren’t happy with this arrangement—’
‘You have no idea how unhappy it makes me,’ she muttered grimly.
‘But the alternative was to cancel the whole thing—and to me that was no alternative at all!’
Her eyes sparkled angrily as she glared across at him. ‘Maybe you should have given me the benefit of choosing for myself!’
His mouth twisted furiously. ‘And we both know what choice you would have made!’
She was breathing hard in her agitation, not at all pleased at the thought of spending the evening here alone with Liam.
She was still uncertain as to the reason for this dinner invitation, had been uneasy about it all day, and feeling herself cornered like this, without even the distraction of other diners to alleviate some of the awkwardness, had not improved those feelings of unease.
‘This is impossible, Liam.’ She shook her head.
‘Why is it?’ he reasoned impatiently.
‘Don’t be deliberately obtuse,’ she returned. ‘Did you see the newspapers this morning?’
Liam sighed, picking up the opened bottle of chilled white wine to pour some of the fruity liquid into two glasses. ‘Of course I saw them,’ he said evenly, handing her one of the glasses before taking a sip from his own. ‘They would have been hard to miss.’
As Laura had guessed, photographs of Liam arriving at her home yesterday morning had appeared on the front page of several of the more sensational tabloids, and speculation about their relationship, both professional and personal, was continuing.
‘Then you must see,’ she said impatiently, ‘that the two of us having dinner together in your hotel suite will only add to the rumour that we’re—that we’re—’
‘We’re what, Laura?’ Liam interrupted, dropping down into one of the armchairs to look up at her with mocking blue eyes.
‘Involved!’ she spat the word out angrily.
He raised dark brows. ‘And…?’
‘We aren’t!’ Laura bit out through gritted teeth. Liam wasn’t just being obtuse now, he was being deliberately awkward!
He shrugged broad shoulders. ‘Not through lack of trying on my part.’
She gasped, colour heating her cheeks. ‘You—I—’
‘Yes, you and I,’ Liam repeated softly, standing up to put his glass down on the coffee table before slowly walking towards her. ‘Is that such an awful idea?’ He came to a halt only inches away from her, his eyes navy blue now as he looked down at her.
‘Awful?’ she repeated incredulously. ‘It’s ludicrous!’ she told him heatedly.
Liam’s mouth tightened, his eyes narrowing. ‘Why?’ he prompted huskily.
‘Not again, Liam!’ She moved sharply away as he would have reached out and grasped her shoulders, moving to the other side of the room. ‘Yesterday morning was a—a mistake. With maturity I’ve come to try not to repeat my mistakes,’ she added challengingly.
‘Believe it or not, I’m trying, in my own way, to do the same thing.’
Laura gave him a sharp look. Exactly what did he mean by that remark?
‘Through my own stupidity I let you slip through my fingers eight years ago, Laura,’ he said quietly, answering her unasked question. ‘I don’t intend letting it happen a second time.’
Laura could feel her cheeks paling as she stared across at him with wide disbelieving eyes. She might have told him this was a business dinner, but she had really come here purely to discover what he might or might not have realised about Bobby’s parentage, and for no other reason.
Hadn’t she…?
As she looked at Liam, so handsome in his evening attire, the warmth in his eyes for her alone, she began to question her own self-honesty. Had part of her, the part of her that also remembered how good they had been together eight years ago, ached to know whether it would still be the same between them? If their response to each other yesterday morning was anything to go by, then she could have no doubts about that!
But had she been aware of that when she’d dressed to come out this evening? Had her motives in wearing this gold dress, a dress that she knew suited her dark colouring and the slenderness of her figure, been as self-orientated as she had told herself they were at the time?
As she looked up into Liam’s face, her own gaze locked with mesmerising blue eyes, she didn’t know any more!
She moistened dry lips. ‘Liam—’
‘Laura, won’t you give me a chance to make up for the past?’ he cut in. ‘I was an idiot; I freely admit that. But don’t even idiots deserve a second chance?’
A second chance to do what? Ruin her life once again? To just disappear when it suited him, never to be heard from again?
She shuddered just at the thought of going through that again. Not again.
Never again!
‘Laura!’ Liam reached her side in two long strides, having watched the emotions flickering across her face, reaching out to grasp her shoulders, shaking her slightly as she refused to look up at him. ‘Won’t you at least give me a chance to try to make amends for—?’
‘No!’ she finally gasped, shaking her head in firm denial as she glared up at him. ‘I like my life just the way it is, Liam. I do not want you around, with your egotistical arrogance, cluttering it up!’ She was deliberately nasty, wanting to put an emotional barrier between them even if, with Liam’s close proximity, she couldn’t get a physical one.
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