The Baby Swap Miracle (17 page)

‘And has it now? Is it working?’

The smile faded. ‘I’m getting there. Slowly. But—’ He broke off, his brow pleating as he held her eyes. ‘I don’t know if I can do this bit, Emelia. Us. You and me and the baby. I don’t know if I trust it, it seems so…tidy, and I don’t know if I trust my own reaction to you both. I’ll be a father to Max, gladly. I could never walk away from that and I’m more than happy to accept as much responsibility as you like. But I don’t know if I can give you more. I know you
aren’t like Alice, but there’s no way on earth I want to make myself that vulnerable again.’

She held his eyes, then swallowed, retrieving her hand from his. ‘So—why did you make love to me? If you couldn’t do “us”, then why—?’

‘I don’t know. I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have.’

‘No, you shouldn’t,’ she said softly, hugging her upper arms and looking away. ‘If you didn’t want me, then you should have left me alone. Left us as we were, Sam. You shouldn’t have touched me if you didn’t want me.’

‘I wanted you,’ he said, the words dragged out of him against his will, and she turned back to him, her eyes pools of betrayal and pain.

‘Not like that. There’s a difference between wanting my body and wanting the whole package, the sleepless nights, the colic, the morning sickness, the labour, the arthritis and incontinence pads—that’s wanting me, Sam. Wanting me when I’m old and grey, just because you love me. Wanting me when the bad stuff happens, as well as the good, being there to hold my hand—that’s wanting me. Not a little recreational sex to pass the time until the baby arrives.’

‘It was more than that,’ he said, his words a harsh denial.

‘Was it? How much more, Sam?’

He swallowed and turned away, uncrossing his ankles and standing up, hands rammed in his back pockets.

‘How much more?’ she repeated.

He turned back, his eyes black with the shadows of Alice’s deception. ‘Much more, but—’

‘But?’

‘I’m sorry, Emelia—more sorry than I can tell you, but—I just can’t do it.’

‘So where does that leave us?’ she asked quietly. ‘Am I staying, or am I going?’

For a long time he said nothing, and she was so, so afraid he’d say go. But he didn’t.

‘Stay,’ he said, the word a plea. ‘If you feel you can. And I’ll support you and the baby, pay all your bills, give you your own bank account so you don’t have to ask for anything. I’ll buy the baby equipment—either pay for it or come with you to choose it, and when you’re ready we’ll talk about the nursery here, but in the meantime if there’s anything you need that I can give, it’s yours.’

Fine words. And sincere enough. Honest.

The only trouble was, she wanted the very thing he couldn’t give. She wanted Sam.

And he was off the menu.

She spent the next few days licking her wounds.

She felt tired and listless, the adrenaline high of finishing the rose garden wiped away by the realisation that Sam could never let himself love her.

She pottered in the house, resting more than usual, thinking about the baby and drawing up a list of equipment she’d need. The cottage had broadband, and he’d lent her a spare laptop so she could go online and look for goodies.

She couldn’t summon any enthusiasm, though, and on Tuesday, when the sun came out, she went out into the cottage garden and started to clear it. She’d been meaning to for ages, and somehow it was only when her fingers were connected to the soil that she felt grounded and secure. And she needed that. Missed it.

It reminded her of the rose garden, though, which she’d put so much love into for Sam, and she found her eyes filling up from time to time.

She didn’t do long. Half an hour at a time, because there was no pressure, and anyway this garden was easier to clear. Smaller, for a start. And in between her weeding
sprees, she would make a cup of tea and sit in the shade at the back of the house with her eyes closed and listen to the birds.

It was her antenatal class that night, and she wasn’t sure if Sam would come. He hadn’t said he wouldn’t, and he’d been round every day to check on her, putting her bin out this morning, cutting the grass in front of the house last night, but he’d refused her offer of a coffee.

So that was over the boundary, then, she thought, and wondered why she hadn’t kept her mouth shut. It had been so much easier before. She should have pushed him away in the garden instead of kissing him back. Instead of pleading with him…

She wondered, as she worked, if he would turn up. And she wondered how she’d feel about it. Much more shy, curiously, she thought. Crazy, because the other night he’d investigated every inch of her body, as she’d investigated his, and there were no secrets left.

She knew he’d had his appendix out, and that he’d slipped out of a tree as a boy and sliced his leg on a metal gatepost. There was a faint scar under the springy, wiry hair that covered his thigh, and he’d told her the story of how Andrew had run for help and left him hanging there by his ripped jeans. He’d been eleven, and too adventurous for his own good, and she wondered if Max would be as wild and free.

She was about to leave for the class when she heard his car pull up outside, and there was a knock on the door. He was dressed in jeans and a T-shirt again, but black this time—in case she cried?

‘I didn’t know if you’d still want me,’ he said, and she had to swallow hard.

Want him? She’d never stop wanting him. Somewhere between discovering he was the father of her child and
handing over the rose garden to him, she’d fallen in love with Sam Hunter, and even though she’d thought she’d never love again after James, she’d been proved wrong.

‘It’s up to you,’ she said. ‘I don’t want you to feel uncomfortable.’

‘Don’t worry about that,’ he said, worryingly not denying it. ‘I said I’d come, and if you want me to, I’m still willing.’

‘Then—yes, please,’ she said, and tried to smile, but it was a pretty pathetic effort and he pressed his mouth into a hard line and closed the door after her, turning the key and slipping it into his jeans pocket.

He was obviously finding it hard being around her, and she almost wished she hadn’t asked him to come, but she hadn’t wanted to exclude him. So long as there was the slightest chance he’d come round, she wanted that door left open for him, and if that meant putting up with a little awkwardness from time to time, so be it.

They talked about baby equipment at the class, amongst other things.

Cots, buggies, prams, gadgets that performed all three functions and turned into bouncy chairs and car seats and all manner of other things besides, and they had the great nappy debate, real versus disposable.

He should have found it all immensely dull and irrelevant. To his astonishment, he was riveted—because this was his baby they were talking about, his and Emelia’s baby…

Not only would there be a person in the world that owed his life to him, but he would, at least, have a practical and useful role in that person’s life.

Starting very early with changing nappies, if the class was anything to go by!

They spent a few hilarious minutes trying to get a nappy on a doll, and he found himself hoping that Emelia opted for disposables, because sticky tabs looked like the way forward to him. Sticky tabs he could cope with. Maybe.

There were things that weren’t relevant to him—things like massage and using oils and preparing the body for birth—some really quite intimate things. He tuned them out, trying not to think of her body in that way, trying to forget what it had been like, for those few short hours, to have been granted the licence to touch her in such intimate and personal ways, to learn the secrets of her body.

The body of a woman was a miracle, he was discovering, and he felt oddly dislocated by his role simply as father of the baby and not as her partner. Excluded. He wanted to share that miracle, to have the right and the privilege to see this thing through with her, to be there when the child was born.

Even though it terrified him.

But, fortunately or unfortunately, it wouldn’t happen, because he wasn’t going to be there. Her mother would have that privilege, and no doubt she’d be far better at it than him.

But he felt a real sense of regret.

They talked about nursery equipment on the way home.

‘We ought to start thinking about this,’ she said. ‘I’m getting closer—only another eight weeks to go. And it could be early.’

She thought his fingers tightened on the steering wheel. She could understand that. It filled her with an element of panic, too.

‘Want to go shopping tomorrow?’ he offered.

‘Can you? How about the builders?’

‘I can bunk off.’

They shopped for hours.

He left Daisy in the care of the builders, and they went to the retail park where they’d shopped for the garden furniture and her clothes.

There was a huge choice. Bewildering, Emelia thought. So much stuff, and it was so horrendously expensive. With Alice in the back of her mind, she was wary about running down her fantasy wish list and ticking all the boxes, but after an hour of studying the various ways of moving babies around the world in safety, Sam ground to a halt.

‘What’s your ideal?’ he asked. ‘Of what we’ve seen, which would do the job best for you?’

She thought, and pointed one out. ‘It looks well made, it’s easy to operate and switch from one mode to another, it’s light enough to lift—’

‘So what’s the problem? Don’t you like the colour?’

She laughed softly. ‘I don’t like the price.’

‘Don’t look at the price. Look at the safety, look at the ease of use. Those are the key things.’

It was much, much easier after that.

They chose the bulky, expensive items of kit, arranged for them to be delivered and then moved on to the accessories. And on. And on.

They’d stopped for lunch, but by three-thirty she’d had enough.

‘I need to go and rest,’ she told him, and he frowned and ran his eyes over her, his mouth in a hard line.

‘Why didn’t you say something?’

‘I just did.’

‘You look shattered.’

‘It’s just come on suddenly. It does that.’

‘Does it?’ he growled, looking unconvinced. ‘Stay here, I’ll get the car.’ And he strode off, pulling up alongside her
just a minute or two later. ‘Right, home—unless there’s anything else you want to do today?’

She shook her head and fastened her seatbelt. ‘I’m fine.’

‘You’d better be,’ he muttered, and set off at a nice steady pace. Daisy was waiting for them, lying down on the step by the front door and watching, and she ran over, tongue lolling, and greeted them as they pulled up outside the little shooting lodge.

‘You need to sleep.’

‘Actually, I’m fine,’ she told him, for the second time. ‘I thought maybe we could sit here and talk about the other things we’ll need while we trawl the net and drink tea?’

He eyed her searchingly. ‘OK. I ought to go and check on the builders, and feed Daisy, and at some point I need to order more food or I won’t get a delivery tomorrow. Why don’t I go and do that and you can wander over when you’re ready and we’ll sit in the rose garden and do it.’

She crumpled. They’d spent hours sitting in the rose garden. It was where she’d grown to love him, and the temptation to go back there, to sit with Sam surrounded by the scent of the roses and the sound of the birds, just overwhelmed her.

‘OK. You go and I’ll join you in a while.’

He nodded and drove off, and she walked into her little house and closed the door and leant against it. She’d lied. Well, not really, she
was
fine. But she was also emotional. It had been hard shopping with Sam, doing all the things that normal couples do, getting ready for their first baby.

But they weren’t a normal couple, and they never would be, and today had just rammed it home. Not that it needed ramming. She was more than aware of it, more than conscious of the gulf between them, and she wondered now if she could do this, if she could live so close to him, alone,
loving him, wanting him, needing him, with him wanting and needing her but refusing to love her, and neither of them able to walk away because of Max.

She plopped down onto the sofa and picked up a cushion, hugging it. It felt so inviting. Too inviting. She snuggled down on her side, tucking the cushion under her head, and closed her eyes. She’d just lie here quietly for ten minutes, gathering her thoughts, and then she’d go over…

CHAPTER NINE

S
HE
was lying on the sofa, curled on her side, her head resting on her hand, and he stood there for a moment by the window, watching her.

Wanting her, in so many ways, and yet so unsure of the way forward. He thought of all the things she’d said, all the ways in which he should want her. He wanted her in all of them, but this—this was so hard. Could he do it? Keep a safe distance, be there for his child, offer Emelia support and yet still feel as if he was locked in an emotional wasteland, so near and yet so far?

He closed his eyes and rested his head against the glass. He didn’t know. Sleeping with her had been a huge mistake. Even so, he’d do it again, just for the memories that haunted him now day and night.

The feel of her skin, like silk beneath his hands. Her body, soft yet firm, supple, warm, welcoming him. The soft cries. The gentle touch of her hand against his skin, the urgency, and then the boneless relaxation, the utter contentment of repletion.

Never before had it been like that, and with an instinct born of bitter experience, he knew it never would be again.

And there was guilt, now. Guilt that he’d taken something
that hadn’t belonged to him, and overlaid her memories of her beloved husband with a lie.

Was it a lie? It had felt more true, more honest than anything in his life before, but behind the door he dared not open was a deep, dark void of bitterness and regret that had stopped him from believing in it.

Still stopped him believing in it.

He tapped lightly on the window, and she opened her eyes and struggled upright. She’d been asleep, he realised, and wished he’d left her there. His cowardice would have been happy at that.