Her Pregnancy Surprise (21 page)

Like a naughty child who’d been warned about staying away from a place that might potentially bring her harm, Caroline walked surreptitiously down the little cul-de-sac where Jack and his mother had lived all those years ago, glancing guiltily from side to side as if Jack might appear at any second and demand to know what she was doing there.
Truth to tell, she didn’t really know what she was doing there herself.
But Jack’s telling her that he was having his old home renovated had feverishly sparked Caroline’s curiosity, and instead of driving to open up the shop—as she should have been doing—here she was, creeping about like some kind of private detective hoping to get an illicit compromising picture of somebody’s wife or husband cheating on their spouse.

Automatically she touched her chilled fingers to her mouth and imagined she could still feel the lingering aftermath
from his blisteringly hot kiss of yesterday.
The fevered recollection of that kiss in every detail had dominated Caroline’s dreams last night.
Even though she knew all Jack had wanted to do was punish her in some way for what had happened in the past, it hadn’t relegated her near-erotic dream to a nightmare, as it should have done.
No—her body had thrashed around in bed, tormented by the memory of his touch as though it would never know peace or rest again.

Work had begun on the old Victorian semi-detached dwelling with a vengeance, she saw. Besides the huge digger outside, and the crew of workmen going in and out of the front door with wheelbarrows full of bricks and mortar, or busily occupied up scaffolding, a well-dressed man in a beige raincoat and with a bright yellow hard-hat on his head consulted drawings with another man dressed in jeans and sweatshirt with a well-known sports logo on it.

It looked like a huge and pretty serious undertaking, and Caroline could only stand there in wonderment that Jack had made his passionate promise come true…made his fortune and been able to come home and buy the old place where he and his mother had lived their sometimes hand-to-mouth existence.

It hurt her deeply to remember his despair over their lack of money, but even then Caroline had known that Jack would turn his family’s fortunes around. He’d always had a Herculean determination to rise above any adversity and turn a disaster into a triumph. It was just
too bad and too tragic that his mother had not lived to enjoy the fruits of her son’s labour…

But why? Why had he wanted to buy the house and do it up?
As far as Caroline knew, he didn’t have any family left around there to keep in touch with, and most of his memories of their little town were hardly the kind he would look back on with fondness—so what had driven him to commit to such a strange undertaking?

Telling herself that her curiosity was bound to be left unsatisfied, because relations between them were hardly conducive to exchanging secrets, Caroline turned to walk back the way she’d come. Right now she should just be getting on with her life and enjoying the results of her own personal success. Jack might imagine she’d failed somehow by not making art her full-time career, and he might see her working in the shop and teaching as a poor substitute—but Caroline knew better. She had the best of both worlds. She could still enjoy her painting without earning her living by it, and working in the shop and teaching arts and crafts at the school helped her enthuse and assist others in making their own art.

There was nothing in that arena she should feel remotely ashamed or regretful about. She should certainly not allow her hostile ex-boyfriend to make her feel bad about the way her life had turned out.

Jack was just walking round from what was now a flattened and decimated garden, in preparation for the spectacular transformation that he and his designer had in
mind for it, when he stopped, his stomach jolting at the sight of Caroline, walking away down the street on the opposite side of the house.
What the…?
Before he could check his own rash decision, he removed the hard hat the foreman of the site had given him, threw it down amongst some rubble, and ran to catch up with the raincoat-clad figure down the street.

‘Were you looking for me?’ he asked huskily, planting himself in front of her so that she was forced to stop.

Digging her hands into her coat pockets, Caroline felt her astonished glance trapped as thoroughly as a rabbit in a snare. She was wearing her hair loose today, and it flowed over her shoulders in healthy and shiny golden curls that, coupled with her shapely figure were already attracting the inevitable wolf-whistles from some of the men on the site.

Glancing round at the direction they came from with a frown, Jack soon had them silenced with an icy admonishment from a reproving blue glare.

‘No…I mean, I was—I was just…’

It was no use.
How could she act nonchalant when last night’s combustible kiss was clearly in their minds as their heated glances locked?

She had been
drawn
here as inevitably as moths drew near bright light.

Struggling to maintain her rapidly diminishing composure, Caroline tried to move around him, but Jack touched her coat-sleeve to waylay her.

‘I suppose you came to take a look at the house? I’m having some major work done, as you can see.’

Caroline found it near impossible to tear her too-starving gaze from Jack’s compelling and mesmerising visage, but she gave the house a cursory once-over anyway—thoroughly embarrassed and ashamed at being caught out showing an interest in his project. An interest that might lead him to believe she still felt something for him after all these years.

The thought electrified her. She should know well enough by now to give him a wide berth—not deliberately put herself in the vicinity of wherever he happened to be!
Hadn’t they hurt each other enough without coming back for more?

‘It always was a beautiful old building,’ she commented, her face flushing hotly when he continued to examine her with the kind of searing intensity reserved for objects of impossible fascination.

‘Beautiful, but dilapidated. There never
was
any money to maintain it back then.’

‘Well, I’m sure you’ll more than restore it to its former glory.’ About to smile, Caroline nervously withdrew the gesture and told herself it was time to go. ‘I’m on my way to work and I’m already late,’ she explained lifting her shoulders in an apologetic shrug.

Jack helplessly focused in on her lips. She had a mouth that teased and provoked even when she didn’t mean it to. A throb of languorous heat radiated straight to his groin. Apart from idle curiosity he had no idea what had prompted her to come and look at the house this morning—
especially
after their passionate clash
yesterday—but her appearance told him that she was finding it as difficult to remain immune from him as he was to her.

Amid Jack’s undeniable flare of satisfaction at the idea, he knew deep down that their dangerous attraction for one another could only lead to the kind of trouble he should be hell-bent on avoiding…

‘D
O YOU
take a lunch-break?’ he found himself asking, before the thought had even fully formed in his brain. Her brown eyes visibly widening in surprise, he heard her release a long slow breath.

‘If I can spare the time…why?’

Why, indeed?
Jack was asking himself as he listened in on his own suggestion with increasing incredulity at the lack of wisdom it contained.
Just what in God’s name did he think he was doing by making it clear that he wanted to see her again?
He scrubbed his hand round his jaw, as if he was all but contemplating flying a plane and then turning off the engine mid-flight and letting himself plummet to the ground, to crash, burn and die.

‘I don’t think I have an answer for that right now…
do you?
’

Trapped in a hypnotic spell that suddenly seemed to make the world stand still, Caroline stared back at him with equal confusion…equal knowledge that in the
world of right-thinking decisions this one wouldn’t even get its
toe
in the door.

‘No…no, I don’t.’

‘One o’clock okay with you?’

A little shudder of heat rippled through her. ‘That’s fine.’

‘See you then.’

Before either of them could come to their senses and fully realise the sheer stupidity of such an arrangement Jack quickly walked away in the opposite direction, and didn’t once glance back…

Nicholas rang. He told her he had something important that he wanted to discuss. Fearful that he might be going to reiterate his warning to her about Jack, Caroline found she wasn’t looking forward to the prospect.

Having agreed that he could drop round that evening to see her, she tried to focus on work. But—between serving customers and trying to put her piling paperwork into some kind of helpful order—her thoughts inevitably returned to Jack, and that promise of his to stop by at lunchtime…

The shop was empty, and there was a sign on the door that read ‘Closed for Lunch’. Not entirely certain that Caroline hadn’t decided to go out for lunch and stand him up, Jack hesitated for a long moment before pressing the bell at the side of the door. If she was out, he told himself, she would be doing them
both
a huge
favour. One of them should come to their senses and put an end to this…this
suicide
mission.

But, even though he prayed she
would
be out, so he could walk away from her relatively
unscathed
, Jack knew that it was already too late. From the moment he’d bumped into her the other day, and they had stood face to face after a lapse of time that should have permanently erased all want, need, or desire for ever, Jack had known that trying to resist Caroline Tremayne was like trying to resist a life-saving drink of water when you’d been stumbling through the desert for days without one. He was fatally infatuated by her…always had been and probably always
would
be.
It was an infatuation that was surely destined to bring them both nothing but further agony of spirit.

He pressed the bell.

‘Come in.’

Jack both cursed and thanked God at the same time for her almost immediate appearance.

Watching him warily from beneath her dark blonde lashes, worrying that she had answered the bell too quickly and might appear over eager to see him, Caroline stood back to let Jack enter. Once inside the colourful interior of the shop, she carefully shut the door again, and turned the latch. Glancing up guiltily as he watched her perform this action, she witnessed the merest glimmer of a mocking smile touch the corners of his mouth.

‘If I don’t lock the door we won’t get any peace
while we’re eating,’ she remarked nervously, endeavouring to keep her voice light.

Pulling the knitted edges of her long dove-grey cardigan closer together, so that they overlapped the plain black sweatshirt and jeans she wore underneath, Caroline was glad she had donned these nondescript items of clothing, because they lent her psychological protection against the man who was currently putting her so helplessly on edge. She would not have him imagine for even a second that she was hoping to appear alluring or appealing in any way, to resurrect potentially hazardous long-dead feelings between them. All she planned for them to do was eat the sandwiches she had bought from the bakers, have a cup of tea, and keep the conversation as neutral as possible—because they were both mature adults…and then Jack would leave.

But when she glanced across the room, and her anxious searching gaze fell beneath the spell of his dangerously irresistible blue eyes, Caroline knew with devastating certainty that the supposedly ‘long-dead’ feelings they had once passionately felt for each other still simmered perilously close to the surface, and weren’t going to go away any time soon.
Surely she’d been mad to think that they might do something as ordinarily mundane as share some sandwiches and tea together, as though they were two old friends catching up on old times?
Especially when the Jack Fitzgerald who stood before her today had the kind of imposing presence that was hardly conducive to relaxation of any
sort. Everything about his expensively groomed appearance quite frankly put him completely out of Caroline’s league. He was a far cry from the wild passionate boy who’d willingly shared his dreams with her, who she had fallen in love with so long ago…

‘We’ll go into the back room, if you like,’ she said breezily, sweeping past him. ‘I usually eat my lunch there. I’ve got the kettle on and I—’

Before she got any further Jack swung her round, captured her head between his hands and kissed her ruthlessly on the mouth. When she drew back, stunned, his hands slid down from her face onto her shoulders, and Caroline was immediately aware that he intended to keep her right where she was until he decided different. His nostrils flared a little as he swept her with a heated, ardent stare, and such a feeling of hunger raged through her blood that she wondered how she didn’t immediately succumb to it—completely abandon all common sense and caution and simply let the most basic of primal longings have its way.

‘What is this…this
hold
you seem to have on me, Caroline?’ he asked gruffly, the palpable tension he exuded holding her spellbound.

Her mouth aching from his avidly voracious assault on her lips, Caroline barely knew how to answer him. His words had astonished her, because the very
idea
of her having any kind of hold on such a man seemed completely
preposterous.
He was angry with her, that was all. Still furious because she’d had an abortion
instead of going through with the pregnancy. Anger could easily spill over into passion, and Caroline knew with certainty that that was
all
this was about. There’d been no mellowing towards her over the years, and certainly no forgiveness now that Jack had seen her again.
Did she dislike herself so much that she’d willingly let him walk in here and treat her with such demoralising disrespect?

‘I don’t have any kind of “hold” over you, Jack. It’s all in your imagination. I didn’t
ask
you to come back here. I’ve just been minding my own business and getting on with my life, never once looking to contact you or see you again. Do you know how upsetting it is for me to have you walk in here and kiss me like you just kissed me? As if—as if I still
owe
you something? I think it’s probably best if you just go. Having lunch together was an
insane
idea.’

Hearing her words, Jack didn’t dispute the sense in them. Yet still he lingered, still his fingers bit possessively into her slender shoulders, as if waiting for some kind of divine inspiration that would tell him what to do about this—this
compulsion
he had for this woman.

Thinking about her accusation, he couldn’t deny that he
did
have a sense of Caroline ‘owing’ him. She’d dispensed with their unborn child as though the decision were hers and hers alone…as if he’d had
no rights and no say
in the matter whatsoever. According to her father, only people from
their
class had those kind of rights. That thought alone had kept his animosity towards her
simmering beneath the outward show of his material and professional success all this time.

Releasing his grip, he stood back and breathed in deeply through his nostrils. He thought about all that had happened in those intervening years since he’d left Caroline. First travelling to the States, working and studying at the same time, to gain an understanding of the world of finance, putting his cast-iron determination to good use in helping him rise above his difficult beginnings and make money…a
lot
of money…so that he would never be poor again,
never
be shown the door by anyone who imagined themselves better than he was ever again.

And, besides the money that had started to rain down on him in ever-increasing abundance, there had been
other
compensations too. There had been the undoubted admiration from the financial world in which he worked—the ‘movers and shakers’ in that world often holding their breath as they watched him accomplish success after success, until eventually he usurped theirs. And there had been the accumulation of beautiful homes—in New York, California and Connecticut, and lately Paris. He’d just signed the lease on a fantastic penthouse apartment in the heart of that lovely city.

Then, of course, there had also been the
women.
Over the years Jack had dated models, actresses, socialites, and women who were as ambitious in their careers as he was. He’d had some good times, some reasonably exciting sex, and led the life of a highly ambitious, successful
and
rich
man about town.
But no woman had really touched his heart since his youthful passion for Caroline Tremayne.
Not even Anna—the stunning ballerina from the Russian ballet whom he had met and married after a surprisingly swift courtship just three years ago, and to whom he had vowed he would stay faithful even if he didn’t—
couldn’t
—love her as she deserved. When he’d discovered that she was having an affair with the interior designer he’d hired to redesign their Manhattan apartment Jack had felt deflated, resigned, but
not
devastated by her betrayal. How could he when he had known where the fault
really
lay? It wasn’t necessary now, at Jack’s level of success, to put in the working hours that he did, and he
certainly
didn’t need any more money than he had already, but any woman would eventually become frustrated by a husband who was never home.

And then had come the heart attack.
Thinking of it now, Jack automatically laid his hand against his chest and winced, wishing he could demolish the fear that gripped him for good. Seeing the slight drawing together of Caroline’s dark brows—a frown that might spell concern—he quickly moved his hand away and shrugged.

‘Why didn’t you ever marry?’ he found himself asking.

Snapping out of the spell she had fallen under, Caroline felt her fingers clench a little round the edges of her wool cardigan. ‘I wasn’t aware that getting married was on the statute books,’ she answered a little coolly.

‘It must have disappointed your father that you didn’t
wed,’ Jack remarked. ‘No high-powered and ambitious son-in-law from the right class to welcome into the fold?’

Hearing the undoubted bitterness in his tone, Caroline shivered. ‘Did you ask that question just so that you could have another pop at my father? What’s the point, Jack? He’s long dead.’

Turning away from him, Caroline moved towards the door she’d just locked and unlocked it. Clearly upset, she opened it and carelessly brushed back a pale frond of golden hair from the side of her cheek.

The gesture made her appear far too vulnerable for Jack’s liking, and he deliberately stayed where he was…
almost
but not quite despising himself for his next question. A question that had troubled him often over the years and caused him many a ‘dark night of the soul’.

‘Did it make your life any
easier
, going through with the abortion?’

Witnessing the convulsive swallow in her throat, and the immediate sheen of tears covering her liquid dark eyes, Jack decided he
did
despise himself after all…

‘Get out.’

There was no fury in her voice, just a quiet dignity and a deep, abiding sense of heartbreak that cut Jack to the quick and made him feel like an utter bastard. Unable to do anything but regard her with equal parts longing, regret and rage swirling inside him, Jack nodded his head—as if in complete agreement with her decision for him to go—and swept past her without saying another word…

‘What happened to your lip?’

Before she could duck away, Nicholas had tilted Caroline’s chin towards him and examined the slight swelling at the right-hand corner of her lip with a concerned and at the same time professional eye.

‘I—I must have inadvertently bit it, or something…I don’t know. It’s hardly important.’

Pulling away, Caroline tempered her irritable response to Nicholas’s concern with an apologetic smile. She too had been slightly shocked to see the damning evidence of Jack’s furious kiss when she’d seen it reflected back at her in the bathroom mirror. She certainly didn’t want to tell her friend the truth about the cause of her tender abrasion. He’d already warned her against seeing Jack again, and she had ignored his advice and visited nothing but heartache on herself once more.

How could Jack believe for one moment that her life could possibly have been made easier because she’d had an abortion? Caroline wanted to die every time she recalled him asking that wickedly cruel question. But she expressly didn’t want to discuss Jack Fitzgerald this evening and make herself feel even more blue. She really hoped that that particular subject was
not
on Nicholas’s agenda.

Shaking off the gloom that kept clutching at her heart, she decided to try and keep the conversation as light as possible. ‘Will you have a glass of wine?’

Moving across the room, Caroline lifted the bottle of
Châteauneuf-du-Pape she’d left on the tray next to two sparkling wine glasses.