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Outside the sun was bright as he led her from the shed and across the gravel turnaround in front of the farmhouse, the silence broken only by a kereru, a wood pigeon, cooing contentedly on the roof of the porch, its iridescent feathers gleaming in the sun.
“We can chat in the workshop,” she muttered behind him. “We don’t need to go into the house.”
Finn ignored this, going up the steps and opening the front door.
When Clint had owned the place, the housekeeping had been rather haphazard, since he wasn’t a man who particularly cared about such things. But it was obvious from the moment Finn stepped into the hallway that a new sheriff was in town. Things had changed. Radically.
For a start, the place was spotless, the wooden floors gleaming, the little hall table that had once been piled high with an assortment of items and never dusted now home to a small peace lily and all the dust gone. As were all the cobwebs.
Before, the house had smelled of mustiness and damp parka with a tinge of unwashed socks, but now all he could smell was lemon furniture polish, the faint traces of freshly baked bread, and the loamy scent of the fields outside.
It was certainly a welcome change.
Finn went into the front living area, which was also spotless, and sat Beth down on the old couch positioned in front of the big wood burner that dominated the room. Her fingers were cold in his, and since he didn’t want to stand over her like a disapproving father, he crouched in front of her instead, taking both her hands in his.
Her attention was on the floor, her usual brightness dimmed. It made his chest feel tight, which was odd considering he’d always thought her brightness way too fake.
Then again, he hadn’t that night in her arms. That night she’d been nothing but sunshine.
And look what happened.
Irritated by the thought, Finn told his brain to shut the hell up.
“Okay, so, want to tell me what’s going on?” He kept his voice quiet and his tone very neutral.
She gave a short laugh but didn’t look at him. “Not really.”
“Beth.”
“Okay, okay. Yes, I think…I think I’m pregnant.” Her lashes lifted, her green gaze flickering with what he thought was defensiveness. “And before you ask, no, I haven’t been with anyone else but you.”
An unfamiliar sensation caught him, one that felt almost like possessiveness, which was strange when he’d never felt that way about a woman before, not even with Sheri.
“I wasn’t going to ask that,” he said mildly. “I know you haven’t.”
Beth scowled, which was an expression he hadn’t seen on her face before, and it made him stare. She was even pretty when she scowled, which was quite something.
“Hey,” she muttered, “I could have been with a lot of men, you don’t know.”
“You haven’t though.” He rubbed her cold fingers absently in his to warm them. “Which men would you have been with? I mean, have you been carrying on a secret affair with Bill that somehow no one knows about?”
She gave a little snort of disgust, her gaze returning to the floor once again. “I might. It would be worth it for the sausage rolls.”
“Hey, I’d have an affair with him for the sausage rolls.”
As he’d hoped, the tightness around her mouth eased. “Don’t try to make me smile. It’s not going to work.”
“I wouldn’t dream of it.”
A breath escaped her, and there was a silence he made no attempt to fill, allowing her a couple of moments to get herself together.
At last she said, “I haven’t had a test, so nothing is certain. It might not even be true.” She left her hands where they were. “And if I am pregnant, I might not stay that way because it’s early days.”
It occurred to him, almost idly, that he could be angry about this, because if thingswerecertain and she did stay pregnant, there would be a child at the end of it. And it would behischild.
He and Sheri had always planned on having children. A couple of years to enjoy a child-free marriage first, Sheri had said, and then they could get on with the business of trying for a baby. He’d been fine with it and hadn’t minded waiting. Both of them had thought they’d have all the time in the world…
But you didn’t have that time, and now the child you might potentially have isn’t Sheri’s.
