His face became more rigid as the seconds dragged. ‘I swam after. I just scrunched it up and put it in my pocket to get rid of later.’
So he hadn’t checked—it could have shredded. Neither of them knew for sure. And, given the sustained action the thing had endured, it probably had.
Oh, no.
‘Come on,’ He said suddenly, taking her hand in a tight grip and next thing he was walking her out of the flat, down the path, dragging her behind him like one of those wooden pull-along toys.
He went to the driver’s side of her car. ‘Keys.’
‘I thought you believed in walking,’ she said sarcastically, needing to get a bite in.
‘Right now I really feel like running.’
Ha ha.
She got in the car and gripped her hands tight together, pressing them to her chest. ‘Where are we going?’
‘The supermarket.’
She looked blankly at him.
‘To get a pregnancy test.’
Supermarkets stocked pregnancy tests? And he knew this how?
‘They have everything. If they don’t we’ll try the pharmacy.’
But the supermarket did have pregnancy tests—next to the lubricant and the ribbed condoms.
‘I can’t do this.’ She dropped her gaze down to the plasters—brightly coloured ones with cartoon characters on them. She looked to another shelf—kids’ toothpaste, kids’ shampoo, kids’ talc. Everywhere she looked there were kid things. Only a little farther along were nappies—nappies!
No, no, no and no again.
Jack didn’t answer, just reached up and grabbed two boxes—different brands. Then he took her by the arm again and stalked to another aisle, picked up a bottle of juice.
‘I prefer apple,’ she said, just to retain some element of control.
‘There must be a bathroom somewhere round here.’ He looked around the building.
‘I am not doing this in a public loo.’ She shook her head, appalled. ‘I’m going home.’
He frowned but nodded. ‘I’m coming with you.’
She saw the look in his eyes and decided not to argue. She went ahead so she wouldn’t have to see the checkout operator’s eyebrows lift when she scanned those few specific items.
He got in the car and handed her the bottle. She held it in a death grip but she couldn’t drink. She didn’t want to move—not even an inch, not ever again. The bottle was taken from her and he took a gulp from it. She’d laugh if she wasn’t so scared. He was on her heels as she walked up the path to her building. She could feel his breath on her shoulder as she unlocked the door. But when he walked with her up to the bathroom door she drew the line.
‘I’m having privacy for this.’
‘Of course. I’ll be right here.’ He handed her the plastic shopping bag, then took up position leaning against the wall right outside.
This just couldn’t be happening. Just couldn’t.
She’d never done a pregnancy test in her life, but it wasn’t as if it was hard. Hideous, yes, as her stomach swirled with sickened nerves. She held the little stick thing in front of her and watched as she waited to see if her life really was ruined. She’d opened the most expensive one first, hoping it meant greatest accuracy, but all it meant was that it was the one that flashed the result in a bright neon light—pregnant!
As if it were the best news in all the world.
For some women it would be. For some women it would be the result they’d been praying for after months of trying or treatment. But for Kelsi?
She slumped. An unplanned pregnancy was bad enough. But from a one-night stand? Not even a relationship? They had no basis, nothing to try to make the best of, nothing between them but animal, sexual attraction—that was as everyday to him as breathing. And utterly overwhelming for her.
Wincing, she closed her eyes. But still she saw the light flashing with that single, life-changing word.
It had to be wrong. Had to be.
She ripped open the second box.
CHAPTER FIVE
JACK banged on the door, never so impatient in all his life. ‘Kelsi? Are you okay? Open up.’
Silence. Just as there’d been silence for the last ten interminable minutes.
‘If you don’t open up now I’m breaking the door.’
It wouldn’t take much. He seemed to have more adrenaline running in him than he’d had even on the most difficult jumps. He made himself uncurl his fingers from the fists they’d bunched into and tried to relax. Half a second later he banged again.
There was a muffled reply. Not good.
The door opened and he saw her face.
Definitely not good. Definitely really, really bad.
‘Don’t worry.’ He didn’t know who he was trying to reassure more—her or him. ‘It’s going to be OK.’
Oh, hell, it wasn’t. She walked past him, handed him the thing that had ‘pregnant’ flashing on the tip—two of them plus two that had the two blue lines. He’d seen enough movies to know what they all meant; he didn’t need the damn flashing neon signs.
Was this why he hadn’t been able to get her out of his head these past weeks? Was there such a thing as male intuition?
No. It was pure lust. All day, all night she was all he could think about, until he could fight it no more and he’d had to come and deal with it. He’d actually blown off his training and come back to finish what they’d started. That was nightmare enough, now it had turned into a full-on horror film.
His brain fast-tracked down another nightmare route. Had she known? She’d been cool when she first saw him—had she known she was pregnant but was never going to tell him? Would she ever have told him?
He stared at her. Of course she hadn’t known. No one could fake this kind of shocked reaction. But would she have told him once she found out? The question burned deep and he didn’t like it.
‘We can deal with this,’ he said into the silence, still trying to reassure someone—anyone.
She said nothing. Just looked stricken.
Problem solving. He could do that. He just had to figure out a plan. But he wasn’t thinking much at all at the moment other than—pregnant.
And then came the panic. The sheer, freezing panic as he thought about a baby and its birth and then about his own awful arrival into the worl
d.
‘It is mine, right?’ his mouth blabbed before his brain could stop it.
She went rigid. ‘Right.’
Big mistake. But he had to be sure—because there were things she had to know. But not now—she was upset enough already. She didn’t need more to terrify her. Oh, hell, no.
‘I take full responsibility,’ he said urgently. ‘I was the one who—’
‘I said yes,’ she interrupted fiercely. ‘I don’t blame you.’
Silence. Long, long silence. But doubts whispered inside and he, who usually had such formidable mental strength, now could not resist them. ‘Can I ask you something?’
She shrugged. ‘Sure.’
‘If I hadn’t come here tonight, would you have contacted me when you found out? Would I ever have known I’m going to be a father?’
Kelsi didn’t think the evening could have got worse. But it just had. ‘We don’t know each other very well, do we?’ she said bleakly. ‘Of course I would have.’
She turned away from him and walked to the window. What a mess. But this was one she had to get control of really quickly. And freeing Jack was right up there on her priority list. Because he was a Jack-the-lad all the way. He lived for adrenaline and extreme sports and travelling the globe year round and he needed it like that. He wasn’t up for this, and she wasn’t up for him being trapped and resentful. Or for her having her self-respect decimated as her mum’s had been. Kelsi didn’t want someone who played so fast and loose wandering in and out of her life. Or her child’s. She didn’t want her baby disappointed every time its daddy didn’t turn up. And on top of that, his questioning if the baby was his hurt—he might play like that, she didn’t.
She flung back her head. ‘You know what? I’m not ashamed about what we did on the beach. I’m not going to be ever. I enjoyed it—you already know that. But it’s irrelevant. This is going to take some time to get used to.’ She swallowed. ‘I just want to think and decide what to do.’ She wanted him to go away and leave her free to do just that.