His Pregnant Mistress

But watching Ethan as he left his pew and walked towards the front of the church, Mia felt her breath trap in her throat, her legs finally still—cold shock setting in as all over again, as if for the very first time, she witnessed his beauty face on.

He seemed taller if that were possible, his shoulders wider, and the years had treated him kindly. His hair, still jet-black, was cut shorter than it had been seven years ago. The last gasps of the youthful twenty-three-year-old she had witnessed in those unforgettable weeks they had shared were gone for ever now, replaced instead with a savage maturity that quite literally took her breath away. And not just Mia’s—the whole church descended into utter silence, every face turned to his commanding figure. Ethan held the packed church in the palm of his hand—not just because he was Richard’s brother, not just because his surname happened to be Carvelle, but because the mere sight of him, the very presence of him demanded respect. He could walk into a bar on the other side of the world, order a drink in that measured, clipped voice and every head in the place would turn, every woman would sit up straighter, and every man stand up taller.

He paused before he started his reading, staring down for a fraction of a second. Mia watched his Adam’s apple bob up and down, waiting in tense silence as a man used to public speaking prepared himself for the most difficult speech of his life. Seeing the hands that had once tenderly held hers gripping the lectern, proud, tall and commanding as his deep voice delivered the reading, it was as if each word shot an arrow to her already bleeding heart. And it was more than she could bear to watch, sheer torture to see what she could never now have, so she dragged her eyes away from the object of his outer beauty, trying to remember the cruelty within, focusing on her own tightly clasped hands, her fingers interlaced over the soft swell of her stomach, chewing her lip as tears flooded her cheeks, watching as her knees again started to jerk up and down as if dancing to their own private tune as his deep, measured tones ripped through her, every last word the antithesis of the treatment he had dished out to her.

The faith he had shattered, the hope he had destroyed; a fresh batch of tears welled in her eyes as finally the reading turned to what Ethan clearly couldn’t give, his voice searing through her as he delivered his final words…

“‘Meanwhile these three remain: faith, ho…”’ His deep voice wavered and then halted, a tiny cough as he cleared his throat and the beat of a pause dragged on mercilessly, the congregation shuffling uncomfortably as Ethan forced himself to continue.

“‘Faith.”’ He dragged the single word out, paused a second too long again and Mia found herself mouthing the next word silently to herself, bitterly recalling the hope there had once been, the hope that had surrounded the conception of her child, a future for Richard they had hoped to ensure. But as the pause went on her mind turned again, drifting back along the painful, familiar path she had followed for so long: the road to Ethan. Dragging her eyes up, she recalled the hope that had surrounded them all those years ago, those stolen, balmy weeks when the world seemed to have paused for a while, when they had stood on the threshold of tomorrow, glimpsed a future that might just have been kind, and despite the pain he had caused, despite the agony he had put her and her father through, at that moment she felt for him, felt her heart go out to this strong, proud man as he stood alone at the front of the congregation, for once faltering and hesitant. She felt no joy in watching him suffer, took no pleasure in his pain. His eyes flicked to hers, and for the first time in seven years their eyes met, and it was as if it were just the two of them in the church, as if the years that stretched behind them had somehow melted away and she was in his arms again, the closeness they had once shared somehow captured in that gaze. In an instinctive show of support Mia gave him a tiny nod, told him with her eyes he was doing okay. Like a parent at a school play she willed him to carry on speaking, and it worked, Ethan’s eyes holding hers as he finished the reading.

“‘Faith, hope and love… And the greatest of these is love.”’

Determinedly avoiding her gaze now, he made his way back to his seat, and for Mia the rest of the service passed in a blur. Her tears dried up as finally the crowd moved outside. She took in huge gulps of the humid mid-morning air, blinking at the sunlight as her high heels crunched in the gravel, the congregation slowly working the line, shaking hands with the Carvelles before they headed for the crematorium—a private cremation the order of the day for the Carvelle family. Shutting out friendship, discounting outsiders in their usual closed-rank way; it probably never even entered their heads that in the last few months Mia had spent more time with Richard than the whole lot of them combined.

She could argue the point, if she were that way inclined. Point out that, like it or not, she was very much family now; that the swell of her stomach beneath her black dress meant she had every reason to join them.

But she didn’t.

Instead she murmured her condolences, shook hands with the endless faces, and braced herself to kiss the cheeks of Richard’s mother as one would for touching a snake. Mia stared into the cold blue eyes of a woman who, though she had borne two sons, didn’t have a maternal bone in her body.

‘Miss Stewart.’ Her lips twisted around the two words, as if it were more than she could bear to say the name.

‘I’m sorry for your loss,’ Mia responded, willing the line to move, wanting this just to be over with, but Hugh Carvelle was talking intently to another dark-suited gentleman and, Mia realized with a sinking feeling, she’d have to face Richard’s mother for a little while longer yet.

‘It’s a blessing,’ Rosalind said in a practised voice, ‘Richard was in a lot of pain.’

And maybe the polite thing would have been to murmur her understanding, but quite simply Mia couldn’t do it. What would this woman know about Richard’s pain? How did she even have the gall to comment when, despite Mia’s phone calls urging her to come, she’d barely spent an hour with her son over the last few weeks, waltzing into the hospice for a brief visit before disappearing again? And where was the blessing?

Where was the blessing when a twenty-eight-year-old man lay dead?

Taking a deep breath, Mia willed herself calm, choked back the fury that welled inside her, told herself that Rosalind Carvelle was a grieving mother, that it wasn’t for Mia to judge, then let out a long sigh of relief when finally the line moved on. Mia listened as Hugh, clearly not even recognizing her, not even remembering that it had been her father he had so cruelly dismissed from his employment seven years ago, invited her back to a five star hotel for a dignified drink after the private cremation. Mia willed the line to move faster, despite the open space positively claustrophobic now as the moment she simultaneously dreaded and yearned for drew nearer, her breath so shallow she could barely catch it as finally Ethan’s hand closed around hers. She didn’t need to look up to know it was his, felt the force of his presence as they stood just a few inches apart, the touch of his skin on her hand enough to trigger a response only Ethan could ever yield.

‘Mia.’ His voice was low; she could feel his eyes burning into the top of her head as she stared fixedly at the ground. ‘Thank you for coming today. I know it would have meant a lot to Richard.’

‘How?’ Glittering eyes snapped up to his. ‘How do you know that it would have meant a lot to Richard when you barely even spoke to him?’

And she hadn’t wanted to do this, hadn’t wanted any sort of confrontation, had merely hoped just to make it through, so why was she courting disaster now? Why was she staring defiantly into the face of the man who had, not only cruelly broken her heart, but dragged her unsuspecting father into things just to turn the knife a touch further? Why wasn’t she walking away with the last shred of dignity she had instead of exposing her pain? Instead of staring at that unscrupulous face and questioning his love for his brother?

He couldn’t look.

Couldn’t look into those two sparkling jewels that always dragged him in, those aquamarine pools that had once captured his heart, remembering in that instant the first time they had met, how she had, quite simply, ensnared him with a smile.

Even before the waitress had led him to the table outside on the balcony, as he’d walked through the massive glassed doors his eyes had darted to where she’d sat. Her bronzed skin glistening in the low evening sun; eyes mirrored by glasses as she’d stared out onto the ocean; a soft mint-coloured linen shift dress that showed a tantalizing glimpse of toned slender thighs; simple silver sandals on her feet. Every detail Ethan had processed in a second, except her hair—blonde, tumbling ringlets piled loosely on top of her head—had taken a few seconds longer. So had the long, slender neck, long silver earrings dancing in the seductive shadow of her throat even though her head had been perfectly still. Even if the waitress had led him to another table, Ethan would, quite simply, have had to go over, to introduce himself to this incredible parcel of femininity. But in a delicious twist of fate the waitress had been leading him to her table.

‘Mia Stewart.’ She smiled as he sat down, held out a slender hand as he forcefully reminded himself that tonight was strictly business.

Business, Ethan reminded himself, forcing himself to get a grip. Richard was missing and this lady surely knew why.

Every road in his investigations had led him to her.

Mia Stewart—Richard’s hippy, arty girlfriend.

Mia Stewart—daughter of the manager of the Cairns Hotel. The manager who was secretly being investigated. Some of his transactions had caught Ethan’s sharp eye in the Sydney office and he had alerted his father. Any day now, Conner Stewart would be marched out of the office, not only without a golden handshake, but, if Ethan’s suspicions were confirmed, his wrist would be encased, not with a heavy watch to mark his years of service, but with handcuffs.

‘I’m Ethan.’ Offering his hand, somehow he kept his voice even, managed his usual detached smile as her hand met his, the other pulling down her sunglasses. ‘Thank you for agreeing to see me.’

‘How could I not?’ She gave a small shrug. ‘It all sounds very mysterious. Richard’s disappeared and you assume I know his whereabouts. You’ve got me intrigued.’

‘I’m the one who’s intrigued,’ Ethan replied evenly. ‘You’re supposed to be his girlfriend, yet you’ve no idea as to his whereabouts.’

‘You’ve got it all wrong.’

‘I don’t think so…’ Ethan started, but his voice trailed off as Mia carried on talking.

‘You see, Richard and I are just friends.’

Normally he would have pushed further, questioned her harder, but her glasses were off now, revealing aquamarine eyes, thickly framed with dark lashes, eyes as deep and as divine as the ocean that glittered behind, as entrancing and as captivating as the woman who was staring back now, and Ethan beat back the first blush that had graced his cheeks in a decade.

Mia Stewart, who that very moment had captured his heart…

‘I know that you and Richard were close.’ His hand was still holding hers, black eyes still boring into the top of her head, his voice steady, not a trace of the hesitancy that had stilled him in the church. ‘I know that the last few weeks must have been a terrible strain and that today must be hard for you too.’ His eyes dragged down and she could feel the blood rushing to her pale cheeks, colour suffusing her, her heart rate quickening more if that were possible as the weight of his gaze dusted her body. Her breath held hot in her bursting lungs as he took in the ripe swell of her stomach beneath her black linen dress, and she could feel the scorching heat from those black coal chips as they flicked down to her hands, undoubtedly taking in the absence of a ring. ‘Will you and your partner be joining the family for a drink after the cremation?’

‘I’m here alone.’

He nodded, those dark eyes giving nothing away. He might just as well have been wearing shades for all the expression in his eyes as he stared directly back at her.

‘Perhaps we could talk…’

‘I really don’t think there’s much to talk about, do you?’

‘I meant about Richard.’ For the first time he looked uncomfortable but he quickly recovered. ‘Wakes are supposed to be important for grieving, for remembering…’

‘I’ll remember Richard in my own way,’ Mia broke in. ‘And I certainly don’t need the Carvelles to give me permission to grieve.’

The fire died in Mia then. She couldn’t do this, couldn’t stand and score points off Ethan Carvelle, couldn’t besmirch Richard’s memory in this way, yet neither could she pretend to give or receive comfort to his cold, self-serving family, on this, one of the blackest days of her life.

It was safer to leave now.

Reclaiming her hand, she made her way down the line, holding her tears, her grief firmly back, her hand still tingling from his touch, the one area of warmth in her cold, frozen body apart from the silent tears that trickled down her now pale cheeks.

And she held it in, held it deep inside, watching in respectful silence as the coffin was loaded into the hearse, Ethan, proud and tall, carrying his brother on his broad shoulders for his final journey, a flash of tears in those black eyes, that delicious mouth quilted in pain.

Only when the entourage departed did her emotions finally catch up.

Only as she watched the car containing Richard disappear out of sight, the back of Ethan’s head in the family car following slowly behind, did the true depth of her loss finally hit Mia.

Her hands gripping her stomach, she contemplated the baby inside, the father it would now never meet, the loving gesture that had seemed so right at the time, so straightforward and uncomplicated, terrifying her now, spinning her into a panic that would surely never end. The full weight of responsibility descending on her tired shoulders seemed almost too much to bear.