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He elbowed the call button on the elevator, grateful when the doors zipped open and they could get out of range of their audience. Stepping inside, he nudged the button marked Penthouse Only.
‘My place. Top floor.’
‘What happened?’
He glanced down to find her eyes glazed, her face still pale as a ghost. She looked sweet and innocent and scared—the way she had once before.
‘It’s positive. I’m going to have a baby. What are we going to do?’
He concentrated on the panel above his head, shoving the flashback where it belonged—in the file marked Ancient History.
‘You tell me.’ He kept his voice casual. ‘One minute we were yelling at each other and the next you were hitting the deck.’
‘I must have fainted,’ she said, as if she wasn’t sure. She shifted, colour flooding back into her cheeks. ‘You can put me down now. I’m fine.’
He should do what she asked, because having her soft curves snug against his chest and that sultry scent filling his nostrils wasn’t doing much for his equilibrium, but his heartbeat was still going for gold in Kentucky.
His grip tightened.
‘Uh-huh?’ He raised a sceptical eyebrow. ‘You make a habit of swooning like a heroine in a trashy novel?’
Her chin took on a mutinous tilt, but she didn’t reply.
Finally, score one to Redmond.
The elevator arrived at his penthouse and the doors opened onto the panoramic view of the downtown skyline.
At any other time the sight would have brought with it a satisfying ego-boost. The designer furniture, the modern steel and glass structure and the expertly planted roof terrace, its lap pool sparkling in the fading sunlight, was a million miles away from the squalid dump he’d grown up in. He’d worked himself raw in the last couple of years, and spent a huge chunk of investment capital, to complete the journey.
But he wasn’t feeling too proud of himself at the moment. He’d lost his temper downstairs, but worse than that, he’d let his emotions get the upper hand.
‘Stop crying like a girl and get me another beer, or you’ll be even sorrier than you are already, you little pissant.’
His old man had been a mean drunk, whom he’d grown to despise, but one thing the hard bastard had taught him was that letting your emotions show only made you weak.
Xanthe had completed his education by teaching him another valuable lesson—that mixing sex with sentiment was never a good idea.
Somehow both those lessons had deserted him downstairs.
He deposited her on the leather couch in the centre of the living space and stepped back, aware of the persistent ache in his crotch.
She got busy fussing with her hair, not meeting his eyes. Her staggered breathing made her breasts swell against the lacy top. The persistent ache spiked.
Terrific.
‘Thank you,’ she said. ‘But you didn’t have to carry me all the way up here.’
She looked around the space, still not meeting his eyes.
He stifled the disappointment when she didn’t comment on the apartment. He wasn’t looking for her approval. Certainly didn’t need it.
‘The company doc’s coming up to check you out,’ he said.
That got her attention. Her gaze flashed to his—equal parts aggravation and embarrassment.
‘That’s not necessary. It’s just a bit of jet lag.’
Jet lag didn’t make all the colour drain out of your face, or give your eyes that haunted, hunted look. And it sure as hell didn’t make you drop like a stone in the middle of an argument.
