‘I’m sorry,’ he said. ‘It’s a shock.’
‘I know that.’ She replaced her cup rather too emphatically on the table and reached for a napkin as the liquid sloshed over the side. ‘It wasn’t exactly easy for me to find this out either. I had plans, you know. I have plans. I have responsibilities that don’t exactly fit well with an unplanned pregnancy.’
‘Of course—your permanent role at work. Have you had any news? I guess a baby’s going to throw all your plans out of whack.’
She wasn’t sure whether to be impressed that he’d remembered or annoyed that he was making light of the massive upheaval her career was going to have to go through. She decided quickly on the latter. ‘Don’t you dare be flippant. I need this job, and my career plans are important. I have responsibilities. Responsibilities and a career that are going to be hard enough to make work without you cracking jokes about it.’
Saying the words out loud was making the reality sink in. How on earth was she going to cope? She’d spent the last God knew how many years asking herself that same question. How was she going to care for her sister when her mum was gone? Or when her mum was older and needed a lot of care too? And now a baby in the mix? It was just too much.
She took a long drink of her tea, letting it wash away the lump that was threatening to form in her throat.
‘So—what? You want me to take the baby?’ Fraser asked.
‘What? No. Are you deliberately making this harder?’
How could he jump to that conclusion? It made her realise that he really didn’t know the first thing about her. Any of her friends, her colleagues, anyone who had met her for more than a random night at a wedding would know that she would never let someone else raise her child. And here she was, planning on co-parenting with a man who didn’t even understand the basics about her.
‘What I want, Fraser,’ she said, slowly and deliberately, knowing that her temper wasn’t going to help this situation, ‘is some sort of plan for co-parenting this child that doesn’t completely derail everything I need to happen in my life.’
‘Well, it might be a bit late for that. Babies have a habit of derailing things.’
It was Fraser’s turn to shrug, and she narrowly avoided the temptation of throwing her tea at him. How could he be so damn casual about it? Simply brush away her concerns?
‘Well, in this case it can’t.’ She ground out the monosyllables, her temper still on the up.
At some point she was going to have to tell him about her life. Her responsibilities. The reason she had called off her engagement. And what would she see in his eyes? Pity? Fear? Horror at what he had got himself involved in?
‘Okay, are you going to tell me what this is about or do I have to read between the lines and guess? Are you going to throw me a clue?’
Well, it looked as if she was about to find out.
‘It’s not a secret,’ she said. ‘I already have caring responsibilities. I have a sister with a disability and a mother who’s getting older, whose arthritis is getting worse by the day. I need to get ahead with my career now, because the time will come pretty soon when I’ll need the money I’ve banked, and I’ll need to have reached a point in my career when I can work flexibly.’
‘You were engaged before?’ Fraser said thoughtfully.
Elspeth bristled. ‘I’m not sure what that has to do with anything. I’m talking about the baby, here. I’m not proposing.’
‘I’m just saying you must have thought at one time that you could have both. I don’t want to marry you, Elspeth. I just want to understand you.’
She tried to throw off the feeling that he was criticising her and answered as calmly as she could. ‘You’re right. At one time I thought that things could be different, and then I proved myself wrong. When my family and my relationship were both suffering because I was being pulled in opposite directions I had to choose, and I chose my family.’
Fraser’s face creased, and Elspeth had a moment to see pain in his eyes before he wiped his expression clear.
‘What?’ she asked, when Fraser’s silence stretched.
‘Nothing,’ he replied.
But she could tell that something she’d said had touched him. Had resonated with him. She knew he was keeping things from her. But why shouldn’t he? He barely knew her. Other than the cells dividing and multiplying inside her, they shared nothing in their lives. They might as well be strangers.
Not quite strangers.
Not when she knew the curve of his buttocks and the scratch of his stubble. The deep, bass notes of his groans and the gentle huff of his breath while he slept.
But not familiar either. Unfamiliar enough for her skin to tingle when it sensed him close. New enough for her heart to pick up its pace a little every time her eyes flickered to his face. Enough of an unknown that she had to resist the temptation to reach out and touch his mouth, just to remind herself of how it had felt pressed hard and hot against hers among the giant trees of the botanic gardens.
Elspeth finished her tea and replaced her cup and saucer on the table, wondering where they were meant to take this next.
‘So, what do we do now?’ Fraser asked.
Elspeth wondered why she was meant to have all the answers. Just because she was the one doing the gestating? But the answer suddenly seemed straightforward enough—not that that made it easy.
‘Well, if we both want to be involved in this baby’s life, then I guess we ought to get to know one another,’ she said.
Then Elspeth’s phone buzzed; she glanced at it and gave a start.
‘I’m sorry,’ she said. ‘I have to get back to the surgery. I’ll call you soon and we can arrange something. We’ve got lots still to talk about.’
* * *
Fraser stood as Elspeth did, and for an awkward moment he didn’t know whether to offer his hand or lean in to kiss her cheek. A look of alarm on Elspeth’s face betrayed that she was as confused as he was and she took a step backwards, making either action impossible.
‘We’ll speak soon, then,’ Fraser said. ‘Look after yourself,’ he added.
And look after our baby.
He didn’t say it out loud, but she must have known that he was thinking it. He was still trying to get his head around the fact that he was going to be a father. What would his mother say? She’d be excited—he had no doubt about that. But he was pretty sure that this wasn’t how she’d imagined it happening, with a woman he had only known for one night of passion, and with whom had he had no intention of settling down.
Not that Elspeth wanted to settle down either. He’d breathed a sigh of relief over that—the fact that she didn’t want a relationship any more than he did. But there was no question that it would make the whole ‘practicalities of parenting’ thing harder. He had no intention of being an absent father, but he didn’t want to live in the city either. Which meant he’d better get used to being in his car, driving in and out of Edinburgh’s busy roads on a—what? A weekly trip to see his child?
It wasn’t going to be enough, he realised. He didn’t want to miss a day of his child’s life. He wanted to be there for all of it.
A shudder went through him as he thought about what his father had missed out on when he’d chosen his stepmother over him. All those years he had lost that couldn’t be retrieved. Fraser was not going to let that happen to his baby. His child would always know, unquestioningly, that his father loved him. His child would always come first.
At least he and Elspeth saw eye to eye on that one. He thought back to what she had said about her family—her responsibilities. He had to respect the choices she had made. They were the choices he wished his father had made. Choosing family and responsibility over the passion and lust that everyone knew would fade a couple of years into a relationship.
Emotions like that could not and should not be trusted. They certain
ly shouldn’t be the basis of important life decisions.
So why did his mind and his body have to torment him with reminders of just how much passion and lust he had felt for Elspeth? He was trying to make smart decisions. Trying to do the right thing, But all his brain cared to remind him of was how good it had felt to be with her. How satiated and content he had felt, exhausted and sweaty, with her lying in his arms. How still he had felt in that moment, just holding her close.
But it couldn’t happen again. Because he’d seen how the lure of those feelings clouded judgement and screwed up priorities. His only priority now was his child. And that meant that any thoughts of a rematch of that wedding night had to be shelved. If there was one woman in the world that he couldn’t have, it was Elspeth.
CHAPTER FOUR
ELSPETH LACED UP her trainers and wondered at what point she would stop being able to tie her own shoes. At just about twelve weeks pregnant her body barely felt any different from before. Her jeans were maybe a little tight, and her breasts a little sore. But the nausea that had coloured the last few weeks was starting to fade, and she could feel a surge of energy building to carry her through the next trimester.
There were no obvious outward signs of the life that was growing inside her, and even her mother hadn’t guessed what was going on until she’d confessed all a week or two ago. But now Elspeth was booked in with a midwife and had a scan appointment in a few days. There was no escaping the fact that this baby was real.
She wondered whether Fraser would be able to see a difference in her and thought back to that night after the wedding, how he had touched her and held her and caressed her. Would he notice the very slight roundness of her belly? The subtle changes in her breasts?
Not that he was getting anywhere near her breasts, she reminded herself. The last thing this situation needed was the complication of a romantic relationship. They had enough to worry about without their feelings getting involved.
Since that morning in the lounge of the hotel they had exchanged a few brief texts, mainly about how the pregnancy was going, and relaying any news about the baby. Other than that there had been nothing said between them that would have given away how intimate they’d been just a few months ago. No hint of the chemistry that she couldn’t deny had been seriously hot that night.
The sudden arrival of an enormous muddy black four-by-four beside her broke her train of thought, and she looked up to see Fraser behind the wheel, disconnecting a cable and tapping on his phone so she had a minute to watch him before he realised what she was doing.
The stubble on his jaw looked more than a day old, and his hair was wild and unkempt. He couldn’t look more different than he had at the start of that wedding, with his hair dragged straight and under control and a smooth jawline. But she suspected that this was closer to the man he really was, with no regard for his hair and mud spattered up the sides of his car.
She smiled, pleased to have been gifted this unguarded moment, and then started as Fraser glanced out of the window and saw her watching. She refused to blush, breathing deep and evenly, forcing her body not to react. It was a trick she’d learnt young, not wanting her pale Celtic skin to give away her every emotion.
Fraser swung down from the car and, remembering their awkwardness the last few times they’d seen each other, Elspeth decided to take the lead and reached up to give him a peck on the cheek. A handshake would have been ridiculous, given everything that had happened between them, and she’d been thinking about how this was going to work.
They needed to be friends. It was important for their baby that they got on with one another. That they worked together to give this child everything it needed. If they couldn’t manage a kiss on the cheek, then they were in serious trouble.
‘Hi,’ she said, trying to make her smile seem natural as she lowered herself from her tiptoes. She’d forgotten how he towered over her. How much she’d loved the feeling of her body being literally overwhelmed by him.
‘Hi,’ Fraser replied, and for a few moments he didn’t move away.
She didn’t want to either. She stayed close to him, smiling up, caught in the memory of how good it had felt to have his body tight against hers. How naturally they had read one another, how in sync they had felt that night.
And then Elspeth’s smile dropped as she remembered where it had led. The consequences of that intimacy.
Basking in the warm glow of a smile and a physical connection was all well and good if you had no responsibilities. But that wasn’t her life—and she had to remember that. The days when she had been able to indulge herself with romantic fantasies were long gone—if they’d ever really existed at all.
She took a deliberate step back, and Fraser seemed to sense her change in mood, his face falling and darkening as she could only assume her own had.
‘Are you sure you’re up to a walk?’ he asked. ‘I don’t know much about this pregnancy stuff, but I read a couple of books and I’m pretty sure you’re meant to take things easy.’
Elspeth couldn’t help her smile returning at the thought of him poring over mother and baby manuals.
‘I’m fine, really. I’d tell you if it wasn’t. We’ll take a gentle route up.’
Fraser nodded and looked out over the park, up towards the climb to Arthur’s Seat—a jagged rocky peak that towered over the city of Edinburgh, the remains of a long-extinct volcano. ‘Do you come and walk up here often?’ he asked.
‘Not as often as I should,’ Elspeth said, realising it was true. ‘I suppose it’s that thing of stuff being on your doorstep—you forget to do all the things that the guidebooks flog to the tourists.’
Fraser gave an offended snort, digging his hands in his pockets. ‘It’s not just the tourists, you know. I walk up here whenever I’m in the city.’
‘I’m calling you out on not being a tourist,’ Elspeth said, clicking the button to lock her car as they walked towards the path leading out of the car park. ‘You might not be wearing tartan trousers and touring a distillery, but you’re not part of the city—I can tell that much.’
She’d had to go on her instincts, fill in some blanks, she realised, because she knew so little about him. This man had donated fifty per cent of the genetic material she was growing inside her, and yet she didn’t know even the most basic things about him.
Time for some digging, she realised. Time to work out who this man was and how she was going to fit him into her life.
‘I lived here for a few years when I was a teenager,’ Fraser said. ‘Before I went back north.’
‘That explains the accent, at least.’ Elspeth smiled. ‘The city’s softened it.’
Fraser returned her smile, but it didn’t quite reach his eyes. ‘You’d make my mother weep.’
‘I live to make mothers weep.’
‘I like the sound of that.’
She caught his eye and enjoyed the heat in his expression as they stopped and took one another in. It was so easy. Like it had been that night at the wedding, talking with him was so natural. And afterwards, falling into bed with him had been effortless. He’d known everything that she’d wanted. She’d seen everything that he’d needed.
And then she jerked back to the present and self-consciousness set in as she remembered that she shouldn’t be thinking of him like that—that the life growing inside her put anything else entirely out of reach.
‘What about you?’ Fraser asked. ‘Edinburgh born and bred?’
‘Yep, that’s me,’ she said, gratefully leaping on the change of subject. ‘I’ve never left the city limits. God, I’m kidding,’ she added, when she saw the look of horror on his face. So much for lightening the mood. ‘You don’t like the city?’ she asked.
‘Edinburgh’s my favourite city. Does that count?’
She narrowed her eyes. ‘Well, that kind of depends on what you think of all the others.’
<
br /> ‘I don’t feel natural in a city.’ He shrugged. ‘It feels...constraining. I need fresh air. Open spaces.’
Elspeth smiled. That much she’d started to work out for herself. ‘So you left as soon as you could?’ she guessed. ‘College? University?’
He nodded and named a specialist agricultural college near Inverness.
‘When you say you’re a country boy...’
She found that she was somewhat impressed, though she couldn’t put her finger on why. But his commitment to a way of life, to the countryside that he so obviously loved, was commendable. And there was something sexy and grounded about a man who was so connected to the earth.
‘I mean there’s mud in my veins, rather than blood.’
Elspeth realised that even with as long as they had been talking about what he loved she still had no actual idea what he did for a living.
‘So you work in—what? Farming?’ she asked, pitching a guess towards the only countryside occupation her city-bred mind could think of.
She knew that she sounded ignorant, but in all honesty she couldn’t think of a time in her life when she had even thought about how the countryside worked. That someone had to be out there making it work.
‘Not really. I had a little money from my grandparents’ will when I turned twenty-one, and I invested it in some land I wanted to see developed in a sustainable way. The development made a profit, so I bought more land, built some more properties,’ Fraser replied.
Elspeth raised her eyebrows, encouraging him to tell her more.
‘Well-developed and well-managed country estates generate an income, which means I can buy more land, which I manage profitably... You can see how it goes.’
‘Okay...’
With those titbits of information, and what she’d already seen of where he stayed when he was in Edinburgh, it was becoming increasingly clear how different their lives were. She hadn’t given much thought to the luxurious hotel suite he’d taken her back to the night of the wedding. But when he’d suggested the same luxury hotel when she’d met him for a second time she’d guessed that he had money. Serious money.
Surprise Baby for the Heir Page 4