His breath disintegrated and a sense of unreality engulfed him. Like the day, as a kid, when he’d learned his parents had died in a crash outside Lyon. Or four years ago, when his indomitable grand-père had had a stroke.
Was it possible?
Of course it was possible. He and Imogen had spent every night for almost two weeks together, insatiable for each other.
He’d never known any woman to test his control the way Imogen had. He’d plan some outing to tick off her bucket list—a visit to a dance club, or a moonlight picnic—and all the time she was beaming at him, laughing and thrilled at the novelty of new experiences, he was calculating how long before he could get her naked and horizontal. Or just naked enough for sex. As for horizontal...the missionary position was overrated.
Molten heat coiled in his belly.
‘There’s been no one else. Just you.’
Stupid to feel that punch of pleasure. Thierry forced himself to focus. This was too important.
‘Since when?’
‘That’s not relevant. I—’
‘Since when, Imogen?’ Stranger things had happened than a woman trying to pin an unexpected pregnancy on some gullible man.
Her chin rose and the expression in her eyes could have scored flesh. ‘Seven months.’
So long between lovers? Did that make him special, or a convenient way of ending the drought? Or maybe a target?
‘That’s very precise.’
‘I don’t make a habit of sleeping around.’
He’d worked it out. He vividly recalled her charmingly unpractised loving, the shock in her eyes at the ecstasy they’d shared.
‘Pregnant.’ He paused, frustrated that his brain wouldn’t function. Now it had side-tracked into imagining Imogen swollen with his child, her hands splayed over her ripe belly. He’d never lusted after a pregnant woman yet the image in his head filled him with all sorts of inappropriate thoughts.
Diable! He should be concentrating, not mentally undressing her.
He dragged his attention back to her face. ‘We used condoms.’
Jerkily she nodded. ‘It turns out they’re not a hundred percent effective.’
‘You’re sure about this?’ He searched her features. She looked different—drawn and tired. And...was that fear?
‘I wouldn’t be here if I weren’t. I took the test in London. That’s why I came to Paris, to find you.’
Thierry stared into those haunted eyes and told himself the sensible thing would be to insist on a paternity test. He had only her word the child was his.
Yet, crazy as it was, he was on the verge of believing her. He’d been with her just two weeks, but he felt he knew her better than any of the women he’d dated.
Even better than Sandrine.
The thought sideswiped him. He’d grown up with Sandrine and had loved her with all his youthful heart.
The memory served its purpose, like being doused in a cold mountain stream. He needed to think critically. He straightened.
‘What sort of test was it? One from a pharmacy?’
She nodded. ‘That’s right.’
Thierry stood, relieved to have a purpose. He strode around the desk and reached for a phone. ‘Then the first thing to do is get this confirmed by a doctor.’
The flare of relief in Imogen’s eyes intrigued him. She didn’t look like a woman trying to catch a man by getting pregnant.
She looked scared rigid.
* * *
‘Well, that settles that.’ Thierry’s voice was as delicious as ever, the silky burr a ribbon of warmth threading Imogen’s ice-cold body as they left the doctor’s rooms.
She’d felt chilled and resentful all through the consultation. Perhaps because Thierry had insisted he remain, as if he didn’t trust her. Perhaps from embarrassment, because she couldn’t shake the idea the doctor, for all his professionalism, was quietly judging her and sympathising with Thierry. He’d continually addressed Thierry rather than her. As if she didn’t have the wit to comprehend her condition.
Or as if she was an inconvenient problem.
‘What does it settle?’
Thierry didn’t answer. She darted him a sideways stare and guessed he was brooding over his own thoughts. That wide brow was furrowed, his eyes focused on the glistening cobblestones as they walked.
Yet, distracted as he was, his hand was reassuring in the small of her back. It felt...protective.
Imogen was needy enough right now to appreciate that.
Since the realisation of her fatal condition, she’d felt separated from the world by a wall of glass. Only her brief time with Thierry had seemed real. But the news she was pregnant... She’d never felt so frighteningly alone in all her life. Being responsible for another life as she faced the end of her own—how was she going to manage it?