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Freezing. He sighed. ‘I didn’t want—’
‘To burn them?’ Her smile faded. ‘OK. I’m sorry. I just thought it was common sense.’
‘Well, clearly I haven’t got any,’ he retorted, sick of the whole business and wondering what he was going to do wrong next, but she took pity on him.
‘Max, you’re doing fine. Here, look, use the inside of your wrist. It should feel comfortable—not hot or cold. That’s the best test.’
Hell. He was never going to survive this fortnight.
Never mind the rest of his life.
‘How can it be so hard?’ he grumbled gently, retrieving Libby this time from the loo brush and plopping her in the bath beside her sister. ‘Fourteen-year-old girls manage it.’
‘No, they don’t. They manage to get pregnant, but they don’t manage to look after babies without support and coaching and lots of encouragement. Having ovaries doesn’t make you a good mother, and not knowing how to run a bath doesn’t make you a bad father. You’ll get there, Max,’ she added softly.
And he swallowed hard and looked away, because they were kneeling side by side, their shoulders brushing, and every now and then she swayed against him and her hip bumped his, and all he could think about was dragging her up against him and kissing her soft, full lips…
‘Ow!’
Jules laughed and detached Libby’s fingers from his hair, and the scent of her skin drifted across his face and nearly pushed him over the brink.
‘Right, what next?’ he asked, and forced himself to concentrate on the next instalment of his parentcraft class.
Eventually they were washed, dried and dressed in little denim dungarees and snugly warm jumpers, and Jules declared that as soon as he was dressed himself they were going out for a walk as it was a lovely day.
‘Can they walk?’ he asked, and she rolled her eyes.
‘Of course not. We’ll take the buggy.’
Obviously. Of course they couldn’t walk. They could barely crawl. Except towards the loo brush. He put it on the window sill out of reach while he thought about it, and had a quick shower to get the baby breakfast out of his hair. And eyes. And nose.
Then he threw on his clothes and went down to the kitchen to join them. ‘Right, are we all set?’
She eyed him thoughtfully. ‘Jeans?’
‘You know I don’t own jeans,’ he said, and then gave a short sigh when she rolled her eyes. ‘What? What, for God’s sake? Is it a character flaw that I don’t own jeans?’
‘No,’ she said softly. ‘It’s a character flaw that you don’t need to own jeans.’
He worked out the difference eventually, and scowled at her. ‘Well, I don’t—either own them, or need them.’
‘Oh, you need them, of course you do. How are you going to crawl around the floor with the girls and the dog in your hand-tailored Italian suit-trousers?’
He stared down at his legs. Were they? He supposed they were, and, when she put it like that, it did sound ridiculous. ‘We could go and buy some,’ he suggested.
‘Good idea.’
‘And while we’re in town we can go to the Mercedes garage and talk about changing the car for something a little more baby-friendly.’
‘There’s nothing wrong with my car, and, anyway, it’s John’s!’
‘Not yours,’ he explained patiently. ‘Mine.’
She swivelled her head and stared out of the window at his car. ‘But Max—you love it,’ she said softly.
He shrugged. ‘So? I need a baby-carrier, Jules. No matter what happens with us, I need a baby-carrier. So I might as well do something about it now. And there’s no room at the apartment for more than one car, so it’ll have to go.’
‘You could leave it here. Take mine when you have the girls.’
‘I thought it was Blake’s car?’
She frowned. ‘Oh. Um—yes, it is,’ she agreed. ‘So I can’t really let you have it.’
‘So it’s back to plan A.’
She looked at his car and chewed her lip doubtfully. She’d never driven it—never driven any of his sports cars. She’d had a little city car when he’d met her, and she’d hardly used it, so she’d sold it when they’d moved in together and she hadn’t bought another one.
But she knew how much he loved it. It would be such a shame if he had to get rid of it. ‘Or plan C,’ she suggested. ‘You buy another one, and leave it here for when you come up.’
He stared at her, then looked away to conceal his expression, because he’d suddenly realised they were talking as if she was going to be staying here, and he was going back to London without them.
And he didn’t like it one bit.
They bought the jeans and some casual shoes and a couple of jumpers in one of the high-street department stores, and he emerged from the changing room looking stiff and uncomfortable and utterly gorgeous. ‘Better?’ he asked, a touch grumpily, and she smiled.
‘Much. Right, let’s go and sort the car out.’
They did. It was easy, because they had an ex-demon-stration model which he could have instantly, and he held his hand out. ‘Phone?’
‘It’s at home. But I’ve got Andrea’s number in mine, if you want to call her to get the car on cover.’
He rolled his eyes and took her phone, made the call and handed it back in disgust. The negotiations complete, the salesman handed him the keys, and they headed back to the house in convoy, her with the babies, him alone in his new and very alien acquisition.
He followed her into the house and held out his hand again.
‘So—my phone?’
She smiled a little guiltily. ‘It’s fine. You don’t need it.’
‘I might.’
‘What for?’
‘Apart from calling Andrea just now to get the car on cover—emergencies?’
‘What—like contacting one of your business associates to set up a new deal, or checking that one of your overpaid and undervalued team is doing his or her job?’
‘They aren’t undervalued!’ he protested, but she just arched a brow and stared straight back at him until he backed down. ‘OK,’ he sighed. ‘So I have delegation issues.’
‘Hallelujah!’ she said, sounding so like Andrea that it made him want to strangle them both—or do something to ensure that they never spoke to each other again! ‘So, anyway, you don’t need your phone.’
‘But what if there is an emergency?’
‘Like what?’
He shrugged. ‘I don’t know. Like I set fire to the house or fall over on you all and squash you or drop one of the babies down the stairs—’
She went pale. ‘Use the house phone.’
‘What if we’re out like we were this morning?’ he pushed, the empty pocket in his jeans making him feel nervous and a little panicky.
‘I’ll have my mobile. You can use that. It’s always in my bag.’
His eyes slid to the bag, just there on the side in the kitchen. It hadn’t moved since he’d arrived last night, apart from to go to town with them, and, now he knew her phone was in it, the temptation to borrow it and sneak down the garden and make a couple of calls was overwhelming. Except, of course, he didn’t have the contact numbers.
‘Max, get over it,’ she said firmly, and he realised there was no way he was going to talk her round. He swallowed hard and told himself Andrea would ring when she needed him. Except that he’d forgotten to tell her…
‘Max, let it go. Andrea said she’d ring if it was urgent.’ And then she added curiously, ‘What’s she like? She sounded nice.’
He smiled at that, a little wryly. ‘I don’t know if I’d call her “nice”. She’s fifty-three, slim and elegant, and frighteningly efficient; she rules me with a rod of iron. You’ll probably love her, but it’s not like having you there, Jules. It was great working with you. You just knew what I wanted all the time and it was there, ready. I hardly had to think the thought, and sometimes I didn’t even need to do that. I miss you.’
‘I’m not coming back just because your new PA isn’t as good as me,’ she retorted, but his mouth quirked and he shook his head.
‘Oh, she’s good, but at the end of the day, when we’ve finished work, she doesn’t look at me like you did,’ he said, his voice lower. ‘As if she wants to rip my clothes off. And I don’t undress her in the shower and make love to her up against the tiles until the security staff wonder who the hell’s being murdered because of all the screaming.’
She felt a tide of colour sweep over her at that, and shook her head. ‘Max, stop it. It was only once.’
‘And it was amazing,’ he said softly, and, reaching out his hand, he cupped her flushed cheek and lifted her chin, as his mouth came down and found hers in a gentle, tender kiss that could so easily lead to…
She stepped back, her legs like jelly. ‘Max, no! Stop it.’
He straightened up, his eyes burning, and gave a crooked smile. ‘Sorry,’ he murmured, but he didn’t look in the least bit sorry. He looked like the cat that got the cream, and she could have screamed with frustration.
‘So—how about that walk we were going to have?’ he said, which just showed what he knew about babies and their timetabling.
‘The girls need lunch and a nap, and so do I. We can go for a walk later if it’s still nice.’
‘What am I supposed to do, then?’ he asked. She realised he was utterly at a loss with so much unstructured time on his hands, and she gave a wicked little smile.
‘You could wash the nappies.’
He’d never gone in her handbag.
It was one of those unwritten rules, like swearing in front of ladies and leaving the seat up, that his mother had drummed into him as a child.
But, with the house quiet and all of them asleep, he stood, arms folded, and stared at her bag. It was only the phone. Just one call. He could sneak down the garden, or out to the car, and she’d never know.
He could even see the corner of it, sticking up out of the pile of junk that she seemed to have in it. And that was a change. Her bag had always been immaculately well organised before, and now it was a walking skip.
With a phone in it.
He caught the corner of it gingerly between finger and thumb and lifted it out of the bag as if it would bite him. It was a very ordinary phone, and he knew how to use it because he’d made a call on it this afternoon. And he knew Andrea’s number was in there. He had to talk to her, he told himself, trying to justify it.
He had to.
He went into the address book and then, on impulse, he scrolled down to M, and there he was: Max, and his mobile number. And the apartment. And work. He looked under ICE—in case of emergency—and found his numbers all repeated.
In her new phone.
Because of the girls, he reminded himself, squashing the leap of hope, and then had a thought. If he rang his mobile number, it would ring, and he’d be able to find it…
What on earth?
She lifted her head, stared at the pillow and pulled it aside.
Max’s phone was ringing—on silent, because she’d silenced it, but the vibration had alerted her. And the number that had come up was her mobile.
Which was in her handbag.
‘You’re cheating,’ she said into it, and there was a muttered curse and he cut the connection. Suppressing a smile, she threw back the covers and slipped out of bed, pulled on her jeans and jumper, ran her fingers through her hair and went downstairs.
He was standing by the bag, her phone in hand, looking defiant and guilty all at once, and she felt suddenly sorry for him, plunged head-first into this bizarre situation that was totally outside his experience, dislocated from everything that was familiar.
Except her, and even she’d changed beyond recognition, she realised.
She smiled. ‘It’s OK, Max, I’m not going to bite.’
‘Just nag me.’
‘No. Not even nag you. I’m going to ask you, one more time, to take this seriously. To give it your best shot, to see if we can make a go of it. If not for us, then for the girls.’
He swallowed hard, and looked away. ‘I need to make a call, Jules. There’s something important I forgot to tell Andrea.’
‘Is anyone going to die?’
He looked startled. ‘Of course not.’
‘Or be hurt?’
‘No.’
‘So it doesn’t really matter.’
‘It’ll just hold things up a few days until they realise.’
‘Realise?’
‘There’s a document I was going to get faxed to Yashimoto.’
