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Uncharacteristically, he had not shaved. His dark hair was unruly—and his black eyes wild and angry. He walked straight in and shut the door behind him, and when he turned to face her his breathing was unsteady—as if he had been running in a long, long race.
‘Now I see that your words are true,’ he breathed, because for the first time in his life he felt out of his depth as he raked his eyes over her body.
She was pregnant! Rosily and unashamedly pregnant! Oh, the curve of her belly was not huge, but on a woman of Jennifer’s slenderness it looked huge. Her breasts were swollen, and she had a look about her which made her appear quite different—but he couldn’t pinpoint what it was. An experience which had changed her? The most profound experience a woman could have? Or just a kind of luminous fragility which almost took his breath away?
‘You thought I would lie about something like this?’ she questioned wearily.
He lifted his dazed eyes to her face to study that, slowly and properly, and there he could see changes, too. For her skin was whiter than milk and there were dark shadows beneath her eyes. He knew that pregnant women were supposed to glow from within, yet her eyes were dull, with none of their customary inner fire.
‘Dio! What have you been doing to yourself, Jenny?’ His eyes narrowed. ‘Come through and sit down!’ he commanded. ‘At once.’
Jennifer laughed. After doing his utmost to wriggle out of coming to see her—how dared he? ‘It’s my home and I won’t stand for being bossed around by you!’
He sucked in a low breath. ‘I will forgive you your stubbornness because of your hormones. But I am telling you this—if you do not do as I say and go and lie down on the sofa, then I shall pick you up and carry you there myself!’
‘Isn’t that how we got ourselves into this whole mess to begin with?’ she questioned bitterly.
Matteo opened his mouth to ask the question which was uppermost in his mind, but something told him to wait until she was comfortable.
He went through to the kitchen to make coffee while she settled herself, clicking his lips with disapproval as he looked inside the fridge. He carried the tray through and poured her a cup—just the way she liked it—and watched with approval as she slowly sipped it. His own lay cooling. Suddenly he could wait no longer.
‘It is mine?’
She put the cup down quickly, before she dropped it. She had been expecting this, and had tried to tell herself that it was not an unreasonable question under the circumstances. But knowing something and feeling something were two entirely different things, and Jennifer felt as if he had driven a knife of accusation through her heart.
‘Yes.’
‘You are certain? There is no other candidate?’
Her mouth crumpled with hurt and scorn. ‘Candidate?’ she echoed. ‘You make it sound like a presidential election! No, there isn’t another “candidate”. I haven’t slept with anyone else since the day I first set eyes on you.’
He looked up. ‘You haven’t?’
She heard the macho pleasure in his voice and felt as if she’d been scalded. ‘No. Unlike you.’
His eyes narrowed. ‘But…how can this be, Jenny? How can it?’
She looked at him. ‘You’re thirty-three years old, Matteo—do you really need me to tell you?’
‘You took a chance like that when we were separated?’ he demanded incredulously. ‘You risked getting pregnant?’
Something inside her snapped. The weeks of waiting and wondering and worrying all came to a head. ‘How dare you make it sound as if it was something I planned?’ she exploded. ‘It happened in a lift, for God’s sake! A lift which you found! If anyone planned it, it must have been you!’
‘Oh, don’t be so ridiculous!’ he countered, and he saw her eyes darken in response. With a giant effort of will he drew a deep breath, trying to contain his emotions. But it wasn’t easy. Yet he knew that he had to make allowances for her condition. He had to. For Jenny held all the cards, and if he was not careful…
‘If you were unprotected then you should have told me, Jenny. And, yes, we were hot for each other—but there are other ways we could have pleasured each other without risking this type of consequence.’
Jennifer clapped her hand over her mouth as if she was going to be sick. ‘I’m having a baby!’ she choked. ‘And all you can think about is mutual masturbation!’
‘Jenny!’ he protested. ‘How can you say that? This is not like you!’
‘What isn’t? I don’t know what is like me any more! And what do you expect me to say in the face of your monstrous accusation? If you must know—I was still on the Pill—’
‘And why was that?’ he shot back immediately. ‘If, as you say, there was nobody else but me and we were divorcing?’
Jennifer’s hand fell from her mouth to lie protectively on her belly as his suspicions reinforced how hopeless it all was. ‘Because my periods are heavy—remember? My doctor thought it advisable. But it must have let me down.’ She gave him a crooked kind of smile. ‘Don’t they say that the only surefire form of contraception is abstinence?’
‘But you never got pregnant when we were married—when we were having sex every second of the day!’
