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‘So how did you guess that he was my doctor?’
‘Heathrow to Hawaii gives you quite a lot of thinking time.’ He told her all the questions he’d had for Anton and then he told her why. ‘I’m here because I love you, but I never wanted you to think I wanted you for the babies. Does that make sense?’
‘Sort of.’
‘Anyway, I’m not. I want the babies very much but if it hadn’t happened, it helps to know that you very probably can have a baby with me. Not naturally, but the choice and the chance is there.’
She turned and smiled at him. ‘Did you do it into a jar for me?’
‘I did,’ he said. ‘And, had it been necessary, I would have undergone a procedure that would involve a lot of local anaesthetic on a very delicate area but, thankfully, Anton seems to think I’ve got enough swimmers to work with.’
‘You asked Anton all those embarrassing questions for me?’
‘Yes.’ Steele sighed. ‘I did. I had no idea at the time that Anton had practically led me to ask them—you’ve got a lot of fans, you know.’
‘Who?’
‘Anton, Macey...’
‘How is Macey?’
‘Meddling. She practically told me to get on a plane.’
Then he got to the hard part. ‘Gerry’s parents and brother and sister were at the service and they told a few tales.’
‘How did they seem.’
‘Lost,’ Steele said. ‘Confused. I think the news of the twins is going to mean an awful lot to them.’
‘Why did you go to the service, Steele?’ she asked.
‘Because I wanted to know more about the man whose children I want to raise and perhaps if they have questions I might be able to answer some,’ he said. ‘And I’m here because I love you,’
Candy looked at him and her eyes filled with tears. She realised then what Macey had meant when she’d asked her about duty.
Steele had no duty to her babies unless he wanted them.
They had been together for just two weeks when the news had hit.
He had every reason to walk away, to be gone, for things to fade out quietly, and yet he was here, sitting beside her and loving her with his eyes.
‘I’m sorry they’re—’
‘You’re going to say that once,’ Steele broke in. ‘Now. Then it’s done.’
He was the most direct person she had ever met.
‘You’re sorry they’re not mine?’ he checked.
Tears shot out of her eyes without a sob. They just spilled out with such force that they splashed on her sarong.
‘We have to be honest now,’ he said. ‘We have to have the most honest conversation of our lives and I’m ringing in sick even if it take six months to sort this out because we’re staying here till it’s done.’
‘We’ve only got five months left till they’re here.’
‘So we need to talk, right here, right now, and nothing, nothing gets left unsaid. My first thought, when you found out you were pregnant, was just that...I wanted them to be mine,’ Steele said. ‘Then I asked myself what would have happened if the twins weren’t already here? My guess is that we’d have made it, because I was already coming to Hawaii and I don’t go on holiday with women yet I was about to with you...’
She thought back. Things had been so easy then.
‘And if we had made it, would you have wanted a baby at some stage?’ he asked.
‘I don’t know. I think I would want children but if we couldn’t...’ She looked at Steele.
Did his infertility change how she felt about him?
Never.
Could she love him less?
Not a chance.
‘If we couldn’t have children we’d have gone for treatment,’ Steele checked, and she nodded.
‘Or adoption.’
‘Okay,’ he said. ‘Had we adopted, would you have loved them less?’
‘No!’
‘Would you, in an argument, say that they weren’t biologically mine?’
‘No!’
‘So what’s the difference?’
‘I don’t know.’
‘If we had to use donated sperm, would it change how we feel about them?’
‘Of course not.’
