The Secretary's Secret (15 page)

The knowledge poured into him, making him feel fuller and more real than he had in weeks. Than he had in two years.

Memories of Chad pounded through him—Chad, hot and grumpy from teething. Chad, tearing the Christmas wrapping from his presents one Christmas morning. Chad, completely absorbed watching a Labrador puppy. His chest cramped, a groan broke from him, but he didn’t push the memories away. He readied himself for crashing waves of grief, but…

The pain didn’t get any worse. It didn’t take him over, bury him or send him mad. It didn’t cover him in despair. And as he followed the memories as they flitted through his mind, he even found himself starting to smile. Chad had been a great little kid. He’d brought laughter and love and tenderness into all the lives he’d touched. Into Alex’s life.

The answer to Kit’s last question came to him bright and shining and full of promise then. He wouldn’t give back a single moment he’d had with Chad. If he’d known that one day Chad would be whisked away from him, he’d have done all he could to have spent more time with him, not less.

He couldn’t walk away from Kit and their baby. They needed him. They loved him. Such a gift should be treasured. He should be giving thanks for it every day, not walking away from it. He should be doing everything in his power to make them happy—to make them feel as loved and blessed as he was.

He swore and scrambled for the shore and then swung back to grab Frank. ‘Frank, I’ve gotta go! I’ll talk to you later, all right?’

‘Rightio, lad.’

Alex turned and bolted for the shore. When he reached the beach he bolted towards the car park, half-falling in the soft sand in his haste. All he had to do now was convince Kit to take a chance on him. Again. He swallowed and hoped he hadn’t stretched her love so far that it had snapped.

He hoped she would agree to see him.

‘Kit!’ Caro slammed her hands to her hips. ‘Get down from there at once! Pregnant women should not climb ladders.’

Kit tried to find a grin, but from the expression on her friend’s face it wasn’t a very successful one. ‘It’s only a stepladder. I’m only on the second rung. I’m barely two feet off the ground.’ She was trying to attach the wallpaper frieze to the wall. She’d thought decorating the nursery might lift her spirits.

She’d thought wrong.

The wallpaper frieze fluttered to the floor.

Decorating a nursery should be a joyous occasion. She hadn’t found much occasion for joy since Alex had left, though.

She pushed the thought away. She’d made a pact with herself to stop thinking about Alex. So she forced herself to grin again at Caro. ‘Ooh, look, pregnant woman on a stepladder! Must mean she’s going to fall.’ She gave a mock wobble, back-pedaling with her arms as if fighting to find her balance.

Caro rolled her eyes. ‘In all the movies the woman only falls when the hero storms into the room, so he can catch her in his arms and kiss her.’

‘Yeah, well, not going to happen here.’ Her so-called hero had roared out of town so fast they hadn’t seen him for dust. He hadn’t phoned, he hadn’t emailed, he hadn’t nothing! She bit her lip. She had been pretty adamant, though, and for once it seemed that Alex had listened.

She thrust out her chin. Darn man!

‘Jeez, Kit!’ A large shape loomed in the doorway and her heart hammered all the way up into her throat. ‘What the hell are you doing on a stepladder?’

Alex!

This time her wobble wasn’t feigned. She recovered herself and clambered down before she really did fall. She wouldn’t let him catch her.

She couldn’t let him touch her.

‘What on earth are you doing here?’ She wasn’t dreaming, was she? She hadn’t conjured him up through the sheer force of her longing?

But, as his dark malt scent hit her, she knew she wasn’t dreaming. She wanted to cry. She’d just about rid her house of that scent.

‘Alex?’ She did all she could to make her voice hard and demanding, which was difficult given that she could hardly breathe.

He looked delightfully and deliciously adrift.

No! He wasn’t delightfully and deliciously anything.

‘Find me a meat cleaver,’ Caro muttered.

Decision suddenly stamped itself all over his face. It took her breath away.

‘Caro—’ his hands descended to her friend’s shoulders ‘—if I can’t make this right I’ll meat cleaver myself. You have my word on it. But until then—’ he propelled Caro out of the door ‘—I need you to give me and Kit ten.’

‘Kit?’

It hurt her to see him. It was wonderful too. ‘It’s okay.’

Caro shrugged and held her right hand up to her ear as if holding a phone. ‘Call me.’

Kit swallowed and nodded. ‘I will.’

Caro left before Alex could close the door on her. ‘Leave the door open,’ Kit said as Alex went to close it.

Shadows chased themselves across his face. ‘So you can call for Caro?’

No, so she could breathe! His scent beat at her, making her light-headed. Not that she had any intention of confessing that.

She cursed her weakness for this man. And then had to swallow at the baby’s sudden activity. As if it too sensed Alex in the room and couldn’t contain its excitement. The thought sent pain shooting through her heart.

She folded her arms and lifted her chin, stared at his throat. ‘What are you doing here, Alex? As you can see, the work on the house is done.’ Except for the nursery. And Alex wasn’t interested in the nursery.

He wasn’t interested in the baby.

He wasn’t interested in her.

Finally, she lifted her eyes to his and her heart started to pound as loud and hard as their baby’s kicks. The expression in his eyes, it said otherwise—that he
was
interested. Really, truly, seriously interested.

She swallowed, stuck out a hip. She’d been wrong about him before.

A ridiculous shyness, a ludicrous nervousness, made her hands shake and tangled her tongue.

‘The house looks great.’

It did.

He suddenly frowned. ‘May I have a look at the bathroom?’

She gestured for him to go right ahead. It was easier than saying anything. It provided her with an opportunity to feast her eyes on him as he surveyed the newly appointed bathroom.

‘Do you like the shower unit?’

That unglued her tongue. She transferred her gaze from him to it and shook her head. ‘It’s the ugliest thing I’ve ever clapped eyes on, Alex.’ Its fibreglass starkness seemed at odds with the rest of the room. ‘What on earth were you thinking?’

‘If it wasn’t for that shower unit I wouldn’t be here. It’s that shower unit that’s made me come to my senses.’

She pressed a hand to her forehead. The man had gone mad.

‘And you. And Frank.’

She pulled her hand away, narrowed her eyes. Frank had been wonderful these past two weeks—solicitous and caring, offering her practical help but giving her space too when he sensed she needed it. The turncoat! He’d known Alex was here and he hadn’t—

‘He made me realize that running away from you and our child was the worst thing I could do.’

She promptly lowered the brand new lid of the toilet and sat before she fell. She covered her face with both hands. ‘Alex, please don’t do this to me. I can’t stand it. Me and the baby, we don’t want your guilt and your sense of duty and responsibility.’ She got that, she really did, but… ‘That’s not what we need.’

‘Tell me what you do need, Kit.’

His voice, its intensity, made her lift her head. ‘We need your joy, Alex. We need your joy and your happiness, and we need your love.’ She dragged in a breath that made her whole frame shake.

She closed her eyes and counted to three. When she opened them again, Alex was still there. She frowned. ‘I know those things are not on offer. I understand that you don’t have them to give. But please, don’t torture me with consolation prizes. I…I can’t stand it.’

He sat on the side of the bathtub so they were eye to eye. ‘But what if they are on offer, Kit? What if I tell you I’ve found my joy, my happiness and my love? What if I tell you I’ve found all those things?’ He reached over and flattened his hand against her baby bump. ‘What if I tell you I know those things are here in this room with me? Kit, what if I tell you that you and our baby…’

She blinked. He’d said
our
baby. Not
her
baby or
the
baby but
our
baby!

‘…that you are my joy and my happiness and my love?’

She gripped her hands together. The only thing keeping her steady was his hand on her baby bump. ‘If you did by some miracle say those things to me, I’d say that you’d have a hard time convincing me of their truth.’

But his eyes, his smile, the light shining in his face and the way his hand curved against her stomach. All those things told her that he spoke the truth.

He leaned towards her. ‘Frank told me about Benji.’

Her jaw went slack. That meant Frank trusted Alex. Really trusted him.

‘And that’s when I realized what you’d been trying to show me all along—that love isn’t a weakness, it’s a strength. And that’s when I could finally answer that last question you asked me.’

He met her gaze—strong and steadfast. ‘I would not give up a single moment I had with Chad.’

The truth shone from every inch of his being. Hope lifted through her. She tried to keep it in check while she took in the deeper meaning of his words.

‘I don’t want to waste a single moment of the time I’m given with you and our child either. It’s too precious. I want to treasure it.’

He went down on one knee in front of her. Her hope burst free. ‘Alex! You can’t propose to me when I’m sitting on a toilet!’

His grin when it came was slow and sexy as all get out. ‘Considering I stayed in town because of that darn shower unit, I think the bathroom is the perfect place to propose to you.’

She glanced at the shower unit.

‘I’ll explain it to you later,’ he promised, taking her hand. ‘What I have to say now is much more important, believe me.’

Oh, she did. When he looked at her like that she’d believe anything.

‘Kit, what happened with Jacqui and Chad, for a long time I thought that must have been my fault. I figured that if I’d been a better father and husband, they wouldn’t have left like that.’

‘Oh, Alex.’ She cupped his face with her free hand.

‘But I’ve started to realize it doesn’t prove I’m either a bad husband or a bad father. I just wasn’t the right husband for Jacqui. And, if I’m truly honest, she was never the right wife for me. It took a long time for me to realize that because I was so busy counting all the similarities between my grandfather and me. I thought his coldness and bitterness were part of my genetic make-up too. But my mother wasn’t like that.

‘There’s no reason why I have to be like him either. He had choices too. He made the wrong choices.’ His eyes didn’t drop from hers, not once. ‘I don’t have to be like him unless I choose to be. And, Kit—’ his grip tightened about her hand ‘—I’m choosing not to be.’

She still held his face cupped in her hand and she couldn’t help herself, she leaned forward and pressed her lips to his.

He kissed her back—gently, wonderingly and with the same love that had splintered her mind when he’d kissed her at the breakwater that day.

He gripped her by the shoulders and pulled back. ‘No way! No more of that.’

Her eyes bugged.

He smiled that slow, sexy grin. ‘Until you tell me that you’ll be my wife.’ His expression sobered. ‘Kit, I love you more than I ever dreamt it was possible to love another person. I will spend every single moment of every single day making you and our children happy. I swear.’

Her breath hitched. ‘Children?’

‘I hope so,’ he murmured. ‘You do want more children, don’t you? We’d want brothers and sisters for junior here.’

Through a blur she desperately tried to blink away, she nodded. She wanted children, she wanted the life he’d described. She wanted him. ‘I love you, Alex. You, this baby, this bathroom—’ she suddenly laughed ‘—it’s all I’ve ever wanted. Yes, I will marry you!’

With a whoop, Alex swung her up and around and kissed her till she could barely breathe. She wrapped her arms around his neck and kissed him back.

She didn’t know how long they stayed like that. She only knew that it was quite some time—a wonderful, magical, I-can’t-believe-this-is-happening time. Alex rested his forehead against hers. She swore she could stare into those dark eyes of his for all of time. ‘Are you sure this is what you want?’ she whispered. This had been such a hard road for him. If he needed more time…

‘I’ve never been surer of anything in my life. I’m only sorry it took me so long to come to my senses. Knowing that I hurt you—’

‘Shh.’ She reached up to brush the frown from his brow. ‘It’s the future we look towards now, not the past.’

He seized her hand and pressed a kiss to her palm. ‘Kit, I don’t have much to offer you. I don’t have any family and I’ve only a few friends…’

She smiled then. ‘Alex, I don’t think there’s another billionaire on the planet who would ever say that they didn’t have much to offer.’ She took his hand then and pressed a kiss to his palm. ‘I have enough friends and family for us both. We’ll make our own family. Alex, all I want is your heart.’

‘It’s yours.’

She went to kiss him again and then stopped, cocked her head to one side. ‘Can you hear that?’

‘Hear what?’ he said, nuzzling the side of her neck.

Mmm. She wrapped her arms around his neck and…

She cocked her head to the side again. ‘Someone is singing in the back garden.’

He lifted his head. ‘They are?’

She took his hand and led him through the house and all the way out to the back door and then stumbled to a halt as four sets of eyes swung to them—Caro, Frank, Doreen and Davey, who was singing.

‘Well?’ Caro demanded.

‘Speak up, lad,’ Frank ordered. ‘Do we all get to dance at your wedding?’

Alex’s grin threatened to split his face in two. Kit’s breath caught. She’d never seen him look so happy. If she’d had any doubts left about his feelings for her, they’d be gone now. He glanced at her and she nodded.