In Bed With...Collection

He’d hate not knowing about the child, if there was to be one. To be left wondering would be a dreadful torture. It didn’t matter that it hadn’t been planned. His child was his child. A fiercely paternal possessiveness swamped every other consideration and Beau was on a feverish roll of resolution to pursue his bloodline to the ends of the earth, if necessary, when a knock on the door delivered a swift kick to his heart.

“Yes,” he snapped, expecting bad news.

Maggie Stowe stepped into the library.

Disbelief choked Beau for a moment. The subsequent relief at seeing her was short-lived. She wore jeans and a T-shirt and her gorgeous hair was confined to a plait, making the contours of her face sharper and the blue of her eyes more blue...guarded eyes, wary and watchful as though he were a wild animal who might strike at her, and she hugged the door, keeping her escape route handy.

Beau’s hand came up, a finger stabbing emphatically at her. “You are not to leave, Maggie.”

Her chin came up. Defiance flared. “I don’t believe you have the right to tell me what to do, Mr. Prescott.”

“Oh, for God’s sake, call me Beau! After what we’ve shared, it’s ridiculous to stick to formalities.”

A flush stained her cheeks.

He was doing this wrong. Beau knew it but somehow couldn’t stop it. Every time he saw her he went haywire. “Relax! I’m not going to assault you,” he shot at her as he turned aside to walk to the desk and put it between them. “Not that I did last night,” he added with a warning look over his shoulder. She was not going to pin that on him. No way! He might be guilty of a lot of things but he wasn’t guilty of taking an unwilling woman to bed with him.

“I have no intention of accusing you of anything, Mr. Prescott.”

“Beau,” he repeated with fierce insistence, glowering at her from behind the desk. “You are perfectly safe with me, I promise you. I just want to talk.”

“Surely the simplest solution is for me to leave.”

“No!”

“You could pretend this never happened. Out of sight, out of mind,” she quietly argued.

“That won’t work.”

She looked bleakly at him. “What will work? You hate this. You’re obviously upset. Why make a meal of it when I’m willing to walk away?”

“Is that what you were preparing to do? Without telling me?’ Just the thought made him feel hollow inside.

“No. I agreed to wait until we know,” she answered flatly.

“Why didn’t you come down to breakfast?”

“I overslept.”

“My grandfather wouldn’t have bought those clothes for you,” he pointed out. A flash of pride.

“No. They are rightly mine.” A flash of pride. “Vivian did pay me a salary and I bought some things for myself.”

“Why are you wearing them?”

“I feel more comfortable in them.”

“Because of me? Because of what I implied?”

She shrugged. “There’s no reason to dress up anymore.”

“I’ve spoilt it,” he said regretfully.

“It doesn’t matter.”

“Yes, it does. I’m sorry. I really am.”

She stared at him.

He could feel her scepticism and the turbulence of spirit behind it. He held her gaze, projecting sincerity, determined she know he genuinely rued the way he’d treated her. Whoever she was, whatever she was, she’d given something special to the last years of his grandfather’s life and he did respect that.

“Please...I’d be grateful if you could overlook my manner to you regarding the clothes...and other things,” he said, desperate to break the tension between them. “I’ve been very wrong to cast any aspersion on what gave everyone here pleasure. Most of all, my grandfather.”

Her gaze slid away. Sadness was etched on her face. Beau wanted to reach out to her but didn’t know how without seeming to be threatening. He searched his mind for a more effective peace-offering and couldn’t come up with anything.

“I called a women’s clinic.” The soft words were directed at the carpet. It obviously took an act of will to bring her gaze up to his again and the resolution in her eyes didn’t quite cover the fear and anguish behind it. “I can have a blood test in four days. It takes one working day for the results to be determined. A week all up, and we’ll know one way or the other.”

She didn’t want to be pregnant. The realisation thumped into Beau’s heart. He’d been wrong about that, too. Whatever had driven her response to him last night, it wasn’t the possibility of having him father a child on her.

“They say a blood test is definitive,” she added.

“I’ll go with you,” he said, impelled to stand by her and give what support he could.

Her mouth twisted. “Don’t you trust me to do it right?”

He frowned, shook his head. “I just want to be there. Some people faint at having a blood test taken. You shouldn’t be alone. I’m involved in this.”

She looked at him quizzically, reassessingly, and Beau felt his pulse quicken with the hope he was getting through to her, touching a base that was more than physical.

Finally an ironic smile. “I guess it is a togetherness project. And it’s best you are with me to make sure everything’s correct. It removes all doubt.”

Practical. The hope withered. She didn’t trust him, didn’t believe he would actually be concerned about her.

“If the test is positive, I will look after you, Maggie. And the child. I’ll look after both of you.” he declared emphatically.

Again she stared at him. He saw her throat move in a convulsive swallow. “It’s my responsibility, too,” she said huskily. “You don’t have to feel...I don’t want to be a loadstone around your neck. And there’s nothing worse for a child than to feel... unwanted.”

As she had been.

An abandoned baby.

“I promise you it won’t be like that,” he said with a fervour that rose so strongly in him Beau had to fight the impulse to cross the room and enfold her in a comforting embrace, promising her all the security he could provide.

“Well, if the test is negative, there won’t be any problems,” she said flatly.

Beau felt his whole body clench in rejection of that outcome. It was utter madness, he told himself. She was doing it to him again, getting under his skin, twisting him around, raising instincts that raged through him, robbing him of any common sense.

He wanted the child.