Special Deliveries: Her Gift, His Baby: Secrets of a Career Girl / For the Baby's Sake / A Very Special Delivery

And it was still just a kiss, but the secret was deepening, his hand now sliding into her panties, and they would both never repeat or mention it again, but in this too he knew what to do. He cupped her for a moment before he began to stroke her with precision, and he couldn’t for a moment kiss and concentrate, so he let her mouth work his neck, and then he warned her to be careful because there must be no evidence, and as she removed her mouth, Penny lost her head.

She just gave in to the bliss and the scent of him, her hands around his neck to steady herself, her legs shaking as she fought the urge for him to lift her, to wrap her legs around his waist, yet she stood as she forgot how to breathe.

Ethan felt the rip of tension and her quiver and her thighs clasp around his hand and he stroked through her pulses as frantic need left her and leached into him, and he got back to kissing her, but with urgency. Pressing himself hard into her, Ethan’s hands moved to lift her, a fierce need to be inside her, but then sense reared its head and moved into his and he released her hips, because if he didn’t, he would have her over that desk.

And, no, Ethan told himself, that he did not want.

Except he did.

No wonder he didn’t like being responsible, Ethan thought, peeling them apart. ‘And now I’m handing you back to Jasmine.’ He looked down and smiled and she looked up and nodded, and there was that awkward bit, because she had come and he hadn’t, and she wanted more too, yet he was releasing her, about to head out there to where this had never happened.

‘Ethan …’ She wanted more of him, wanted more than a corner of chocolate before it was wrapped and returned to the fridge, and she didn’t care if they were in her office; right now, she simply didn’t care.

‘Penny.’ He gave her a small kiss to interrupt her invitation, and then he made it very clear where they were. ‘You go and concentrate on getting that baby.’

CHAPTER NINE (#u4745aace-ed9b-57fe-b4a0-9cab8ef91f28)

IT WAS ALL happening.

It was like a train she had boarded and she so badly wanted the baby at the end, but she’d lost something along the way. Ethan was a bit aloof and she was back to being frosty but she missed the Ethan she had glimpsed and, in turn, he wanted more of Penny, just not that much more.

Because Ethan knew what was happening now. He didn’t turn a hair when she asked if they could swap their days off at short notice.

‘Sure,’ was all he said.

He asked no questions, though he did look things up on the internet, knew that when she came back after her couple of days off, there was a high chance she would be as horny as hell.

But no orgasms allowed, Ethan thought with a black smile as he knocked on her office door to update her on one of her patients.

‘I feel like a delivery boy,’ he said, holding a card and chocolates.

She wished she had a delivery boy who looked like Ethan—she’d be ringing for pizza every night, Penny thought as he handed his wares over. ‘Heath’s parents asked me to give these to you.’

‘You should have buzzed me.’ Immediately Penny stood, but Ethan shook his head.

‘I went to, but they were getting upset so they asked if I could just hand these to you. I think they were a bit overwhelmed being back in Emergency.’

Penny nodded and sat back down.

‘I spoke to them for a bit,’ Ethan told her.

‘How were they?’ Penny asked as she read the letter.

‘Just struggling through. They said they knew that one day they’d be pleased with the decision they had made for Heath to be a donor, but not yet.’ And Penny nodded because the letter said much the same—thanking her for her care that day and for gently preparing them for what was to come a few hours later. She showed the letter to Ethan and as he read it he forgot to be aloof, forgot he didn’t really want to be talking with Penny at the moment.

‘I couldn’t have dealt with it that day,’ he admitted.

‘I’m not surprised.’

‘Phil used to feel guilty about that. He said he was lying there basically hoping someone would die.’

‘You can’t think like that.’

‘But you do think like that,’ Ethan admitted. ‘Because even I was thinking that if Phil had lasted for just a few more days …’

‘There are a lot of people waiting for hearts.’ Penny said, practical with the facts. ‘And a lot of hearts are wasted. How’s Justin dealing with it all?’

‘I don’t know,’ Ethan admitted, and saw the rise of her eyebrows. ‘It’s all a bit of a mess. Gina wants nothing to do with Phil’s side of the family and I can’t say I blame her. She wasn’t exactly treated well by my uncle and aunt.’ He gave a tired shrug. ‘Anyway, there’s nothing I can do.’ He went to ask how she was doing, but changed his mind—he really didn’t want a conversation about egg retrieval and a five-day wait before embryo transfer. ‘I’d better get back out there.’

‘Sure,’ Penny said, but there was an impossible tension between them.

And so they muddled through and it was a bit easier to be aloof than he’d thought it might be, because he was a bit fed up too, not just with Penny but with himself. He didn’t particularly like the superficial Ethan who, a couple of weeks later, had this guilty image of Penny’s test results being negative and asking her for a night out in the city to cheer her up and then taking her back to his apartment to make love, not babies.

And, yes, he was glad it was a long weekend coming up and that in one hour from now he’d be out of there.

Hopefully without seeing Penny, because she was about to start a stint of nights and was off today.

Then, just when he thought he’d got through it, in Penny walked. She had Jasmine’s toddler son with her—must be picking him up from crèche to help Jasmine out. He saw Jasmine give her a brief, excited hug, saw Penny warn her to hush, and even without that, Ethan knew that she was pregnant, he just knew from the timing, because he’d been back on the IVF site again.

And, no, there was no avoiding her and no avoiding the fact he was crazy about a woman who was pregnant, and not with his child.

‘Hi, there.’ Jasmine had taken Simon to the vending machine and he came over when she caught his eye. ‘Ready for nights?’ he asked.

‘As I’ll ever be.’

‘So?’ he asked, because even if he didn’t want to know, he knew. ‘How are you?’

‘Good,’ Penny said, and her back teeth clamped down because she wanted to tell him her news but it was far too early. But more than that she wanted to flirt, she wanted him and he was just out of bounds. She wanted dates and dinners and laughter and fun, yet she badly wanted the baby inside her too. ‘What are you doing for the long weekend? Anything nice?’

‘Yep.’ Ethan nodded. It had been a long day and now, with the unspoken news hanging between them, more than ever he just wanted to get away. ‘I’ve got the long weekend and then two days off, I’m not back here till Thursday. I’m going out on a boat and hopefully we’ll all be eating too much, drinking too much and talking too much.’

‘With friends?’ She thought her face would crack from smiling.

‘Family,’ Ethan said. ‘We do it every year.’

‘Sounds great,’ Penny said. ‘Kate will have her hands full.’ Penny could imagine nothing worse than being at sea with toddlers—she’d have a nervous breakdown.

‘God, no.’ Ethan pulled a face. ‘Once a year my mum has them all for her so she can get away. Kate says it keeps her sane. It would never happen otherwise.’

‘I don’t blame her,’ Penny said. ‘She’d be worried sick trying to keep tabs on them on a boat.’

‘I meant I wouldn’t be going if she brought them.’ He hesitated, tried to turn it into a joke and then stopped, but he’d said it all, really—he was Mr R&R, heading off, kicking back and just so removed from the world she was about to join.

‘It sounds lovely,’ Penny said, because a few nights out at sea with Ethan, well, there was not a lot she could think of that sounded nicer than that.

He looked at her for a very long time, wished she could come along, could almost see her in a sarong with sunburnt shoulders, and he couldn’t help but regret all the things they could have done, all the dates they could have been on and he was, for a ridiculous moment, tempted to ask her to see if she could swap her nights with someone and come with him, but he stopped himself, because even if the impossible could be achieved, he soon saw the real picture.

No wine, because she wasn’t drinking.