‘I’m...working myself up to it. I thought...you should be the first to know, considering you’re the father.’
‘Thank you for that.’
‘For what?’ Celia laughed humourlessly. ‘For being honest with you? Look, I’m not sure how much there is to talk about, Leandro. You forget we spent time together...long enough for me to know that this must be your worst nightmare come true. I’ve already told you that I don’t expect anything from you.’
‘And for that,’ Leandro said quietly, again glancing across at her.
‘For what?’
‘For telling me that you don’t expect anything from me.’
That stung. Celia’s eyes glazed over and she stared out of the window in absolute silence, digesting what he’d said.
Of course he was grateful that she wasn’t going to make a nuisance of herself. Did he think that she might have turned clingy and needy? She loved him but he didn’t know that and he never would. She might have lost her heart to him, but she hadn’t lost her dignity and she never would.
She almost laughed out loud when she thought about how he would have reacted if he’d known, not just that she was pregnant, but that she was in love with him! He would have strapped rockets to his ankles in his hurry to see the back of her.
So was he whipping her away to the privacy of his house to try and come to an arrangement whereby they worked out how she could become invisible?
No...even as Celia thought that, she knew, deep down, that that just wasn’t the guy she had fallen for.
‘We’re here.’
Celia shook herself and took stock of the electric gates opening to a pale grey courtyard fringed with impeccably manicured grass. By London standards, it was huge for a house within easy reach of the city. The house itself was as modern as his manor estate in Scotland had been old and established, a marvel of sharp angles and banks of glass, all protected by high walls even though it was a quiet and tree-lined residential street.
She was ushered into a vast, cleverly arranged open-plan space, the sort of uber-sophisticated bachelor pad that would have cost a small fortune. The kitchen, to the left, looked over an island the size of a skating rink and behind which sat a vision of metal and chrome and marble. Ahead were various rooms, some behind doors and the living area was a sunken space sparsely furnished with pale tan leather and a white rug. A galleried landing, where the bedrooms were, she assumed, overlooked everything on the ground floor.
‘Celia...’ he guided her to the sitting area and waited as she gingerly perched on the edge of one of the immaculate leather sofas ‘...I thank you for telling me that you expect nothing from me because I can’t think of any woman who wouldn’t see this situation as a passport to asking a great deal from me. What can I get you to drink? Tea? Coffee? Are those things off limits for pregnant women?’ He squatted next to her, then swerved to sit so close that his thigh was pressed against hers. ‘Surely you know that the last thing I have any intention of doing isnothing.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘I mean you can trust me to do what needs to be done. I am a man of honour, as you know, and I have every intention of doing the honourable thing. Neither you nor our child will want for anything. I’ll take care of that.’
‘You’ll take care of that...’ Celia parroted.
‘It’s a pretty scary time for you,’ Leandro murmured as Celia continued to gape at him. ‘You haven’t told your parents and I’m guessing, when you say that you’reworking up to that, that you’re privately apprehensive about what their reaction is going to be...maybe scared at what you might think will be inevitable disappointment.’
Celia dragged her eyes away with some effort. ‘You have no idea what’s going through my head, Leandro.’
Except he did, right down to the last detail, from the sounds of it.
‘I might not have seen this coming,’ Leandro admitted, ‘but you’re pregnant and there’s no other option than for us to be married.’
Celia, who had been gaping before, now uttered a strangulated sound of complete shock. Her eyes widened. ‘Get married? Getmarried? No! Leandro, we’re not going toget married.’
‘We are,’ Leandro countered quietly and without a shred of doubt in his voice. ‘I could give you a thousand reasons why. I could write a book on how beneficial it would be for our child to be raised with financial security and I speak from a position of experience. I could tell you that your traditional parents would welcome their only daughter getting married and settling down to raise a family, not having to go through the heartache of disappointment and anxious that they may have failed to provide you with the wherewithal to make sensible life choices. But the only reason that counts is this: when you have a child, it becomes time to put selfish concerns about your own happiness behind you because there’s no room for that. Something else—’ his voice hardened as he rose to his feet ‘—I learnt on my travels through life. I don’t intend to be an absentee father because I don’t happen to fit the bill when it comes to the life partner you had in mind, because this is not what either of us signed up for.’
There was intent behind his words but, more than that, a sincerity that made her realise that he would do everything it took to fulfil his fatherly obligations. He was a man who had no problem with a marriage of convenience. He had just left one behind. This was more of the same, if for a different reason.
How far would he go for the sake of honour and was that something she wanted to find out?
And how much wouldshesacrifice because she was in love with a guy who didn’t love her back? The happiness of her own baby? Because she might not be able to deal with daily contact with Leandro? Was that somethingshewanted to put to the test?
‘Can I think about it?’ Celia murmured.
‘You can think about it—’ his voice was deadly serious ‘—but there will only be one answer I’m willing to accept...’