Eyes the same colour as Chad’s lifted to his. It didn’t make any difference tel ing himself that ninety per cent of the population had brown eyes. At this moment in time they were the spitting image of the child’s he’d loved and lost.
‘What would you cal a baby boy?’
Chad. He’d chosen Chad.
Davey frowned. ‘Are you feeling sick again?’
Alex latched onto the excuse. He didn’t know what t he
Davey nodded.
‘Can you tel them that I went home because I was feeling sick?’
Davey nodded and jumped up. He raced off.
With a heart that grew colder with every step, Alex made his way back to the car.
Kit found Alex sitting at the dining table when she let herself into the house. Her heart slowed and relief flooded her. Alex did not look as if he were on his deathbed yet. Davey had exaggerated.
So…something had spooked him? Again?
Davey?
She fought the exhaustion that threatened to settle over her. She recal ed their kiss at the breakwater.
She wasn’t ready to give up on Alex yet. He’d make it. He just needed…
More time?
She swal owed. How much longer did she mean to keep making excuses for him?
He was. Her every instinct told her so. He worked hard, he tried to do what was right, and when he kissed her she grew wings.
The expression that stretched through his eyes when he lifted his head to meet her gaze had a lump wel ing in her throat. She couldn’t keep this up, not for much longer. At her last doctor’s visit, her obstetrician had warned her that her blood pressure was creeping up.
Kit knew why. Alex. Her constant worry whether he would accept their baby into his life. Her constant worry whether he could overcome his demons. It was starting to take its tol . He was worth fighting for, but not at the expense of their baby’s health.
For a moment tears made his face blur. She swal owed and blinked hard. She couldn’t find a smile and she didn’t try. ‘I see you’ve made a miraculous recovery.’
He shook his head. ‘I’m sorry, Kit, I can’t do this. I can’t be what you want me to be. I cannot be a father to your baby.’
Her hands clenched, her stomach tightened. ‘You don’t need to make a decision about that right now.
We can talk about it and—’
‘No!’
The word snarled out of him. Al the hairs on her arms lifted. The skin at her nape and her temples chil ed.
‘Every child reminds me of Chad. Every child is a source of pain. Remembering Chad every single day, remembering what it was like to lose him, it wil drive me insane, Kit.’
His eyes dropped to her stomach and al she could do was stare at the white lines that slashed deep on either side of his mouth. Lines that spoke of grief and pain beyond her understanding.
‘That’s why I can’t be a father to your child.’
For a moment, everything stil ed, hung suspended
—him, her, those words with their awful meaning.
Then her stomach fel and fel and kept fal ing. She couldn’t move, couldn’t speak.
He’d warned her, he’d tried to tel her, he hadn’t made her any promises. For the moment, though, it was his pain that touched her and not her own. She forced herself forward, sat in the chair opposite. ‘Tel me about Chad,’ she pleaded.
The darkness in his eyes didn’t abate. He shook his head. ‘There’s no point.’
She reached out to touch the back of one of his clenched fists. ‘There is a point, Alex, it’s—’
‘I can’t!’ he burst out, pul ing his hand away.
She didn’t know how one moved on after they lost a child, where one found the strength to pick up the pieces. Already she’d do anything to protect her baby and it wasn’t even born yet. Chad might not be dead, but he’d been removed from Alex’s world as surely as if he were.
surely as if he were.
She swal owed. She might not know what Alex was going through, but she did know that bottling it up would only hurt him more.
‘You don’t understand, Kit. This life of yours—the same life my parents led—it can never be my life. I don’t have
