Page 60 of Where the Wattles Bloom

Her mental machinations must have shown on her face because he laughed and said, ‘It’s the left one.’

Rowena blushed but forged on. ‘Did you have chemo?’

‘Yes.’

‘Where were you treated?’

‘At Royal North Shore in Sydney.’

‘Was it bad?’

‘It was pretty brutal, yeah.’

He didn’t elaborate and Rowena didn’t pry, but his brevity alone spoke volumes.

‘As they predicted,’ he continued, ‘the chemo knocked off my sperm count and I was told that it would probably never fully recover.’

‘Did you bank any?’

‘Yep. It’s still at a lab somewhere.’

Rowena nodded. She couldn’t believe that two supposedly infertile people could somehow manage to produce a pregnancy. The odds of that had to be infinitesimal.

‘Have you had your sperm tested recently?’

‘The last time was at my five-year clearance. The count had apparently rallied a little but I was still classified as sub-fertile. And when neither Gabby nor Brit ever got pregnant, despite rather, er’—he looked sheepish—‘lackadaisical contraceptive practices from time to time, I just assumed I was still firing blanks.’

‘Well … apparently not.’ And it could well have recovered in the interim to be enough in the right set of circumstances.

‘Yeah.’ He shook his head, clearly stunned by the turn of events. ‘Apparently not.’

‘You don’t seem freaked out?’

‘No.’ His gaze locked with hers, composed and serious. ‘I know this development has stunned you but … I’m forty, Ro. Not eighteen. This wouldn’t be the worst thing in the world.’

And for a crazy moment, Rowena almost allowed herself to fall into the possibilities inherent in that phrase. This wouldn’t be the worst thing in the world. But she caught herself just in time.

‘Lachy … please don’t—’

He held his hand up to interrupt her. ‘I know. I won’t. It’s okay. One day at a time.’

‘I’m sorry.’ Rowena blinked back another batch of brewing tears. ‘That’s not fair to you. I just don’t want you to get your hopes up when my uterus is such a dud.’

Her words were light but they hid a vast quarry of emotional turmoil. Logically, she knew it wasn’t her fault, but it had never stopped her devastation over her body’s inability to fulfil its most base biological purpose.

Nor the feeling that she’d brought it upon herself.

‘Don’t worry about me. I’ll be fine. You, on the other hand …’ He eyed her critically, clearly not happy with her rather wan appearance. ‘I meant what I said earlier. Why don’t you move into the homestead?’

Rowena’s first instinct was to decline. She was pregnant, not terminally ill, and had been living by herself for a long time now. She opened her mouth to tell him that but he cut her off.

‘Wait. Just hear me out, okay? I don’t mean into my bed or anything. There are two other bedrooms you can use. But you’re obviously suffering from morning sickness and if you feel as bad as you look—’

She honked out a laugh. ‘Wow. Don’t beat around the bush there, McCabe.’

He grinned but ploughed on. ‘My point being, maybe you need a little TLC right now? Some hearty, nutritious food and people around who can check in on you when you’re not feeling great. Call me crazy, but that has Reggie’s name written all over it. She’s never happier than when she has a person to fuss over and spoil.’

Rowena had to concede the point. Lachlan’s grandmother did love to spoil people.