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“Carrie!”

“I always thought you two would make the most beautiful babies,” Carrie said.

“You did not!”

“I did! Ask Michael! Well, not right now, obviously . . . but once you’ve had time to think and plan and everything’s settled down, definitely ask Michael.”

“This really isn’t helping!”

“Sorry.”

“What on earth am I going to do? I’m not ready to have a baby. How will I run the coffee shop?”

“I know this wasn’t planned, but you won’t be alone. Dylan—”

Lucy shook her head. “I really need to process this!”

“Of course you do,” said Carrie, putting her arm around her friend. “You know I’m always available if you need to talk. This must be a huge shock right now.”

“You can say that again,” Lucy mumbled.

“It’ll be fine, Luce. Better than fine. It’ll be fantastic,” said Carrie, pulling her in for as tight a hug as she could with her pregnant belly in the way.

“Thanks,” said Lucy, giving a little smile. “I’ll message you later?”

“Sure,” Carrie replied, releasing her. “Get inside, it’s freezing out here.”

Lucy let herself into the coffee shop. She really should bake her cakes for tomorrow, and maybe the activity would help her to think and stop her brain from panicking. She heated the oven, put on her apron, and got to work on some cupcakes.

She was pregnant. With child. Going to become a mother . . . She’d always wanted children at some point, in a sort of abstract sense, and she guessed that time was now. And with Dylan, of all people. It seemed the universe was absolutely determined to intertwine their lives as much as possible.

How was she going to tell him? She cringed at the thought of that conversation. And if she’d worried that running a business with him would be tricky, what would it be like to share a child with him? How was she going to tell him? How would this impact upon their business plans? Was there a chance Dylan might pull out of their agreement? Everything was signed though, and she recalled how certain Michael was that Dylan was completely trustworthy.

Strangely, she realised she knew instinctively that Dylan would be a good father; she was absolutely certain about that. She’d seen him with Poppy and Layla and, even she had to admit, it was adorable. It was more how she and he were going to parent together that was the problem.

She finished making the cake batter, and divided it into the twenty-four cases she’d placed in the baking tins. She’d just put them in the hot oven and set a timer when she heard a knock on the door. She wiped her hands and went out into the dining area.

Her heart sank when she saw Dylan on the other side of the glass door.

“Hi, everything all right?” she asked, as nonchalantly as possible as she opened the door.

“Yeah . . . I just wanted to check on you,” he said, stepping inside. “You didn’t look well next door, and you left so abruptly. I thought maybe I’d done something?”

“Nope,” Lucy replied, breezily. “I just had some baking I needed to do for tomorrow.” She indicated her apron.

Unfortunately, as she waved her hand, she unexpectedly caught a faint whiff of butter from her fingers. Nausea rose up out of nowhere and her stomach churned dangerously, and there was nothing for it: she had to race to the loo at the back of the shop.

Her stomach heaved into the toilet basin. She was so thankful that she at least had her hair tied back. She lingered for as long as she could, but eventually she had to come out. Her dream that Dylan had politely left, and would just send her a WhatsApp message to check she was OK, was futile. He was still standing in the coffee shop, but leaning against the counter now, checking his phone.

“I don’t usually have that effect on women,” he said, drolly. “Have you got a bug or something?”

“No,” Lucy said. She took a deep breath. It seemed there was no time like the present. She and Dylan were here by themselves. She could go away and think about the best way to tell him, but nothing she could do was going to lessen the shock. “So . . . when we slept together at the end of August . . .”

“I was under the impression that I was supposed to pretend that had never happened.”

Lucy closed her eyes for a second. Why did he have to be the way he was? Her stomach gave another little heave. She couldn’t believe what she was about to say.

“Yeah, well, that was the general idea, but . . .”