The Bride's Baby by Liz Fielding Read Free Book Online

‘poorer’—at least not with her—leaving her with everything in place for a wedding except the groom.
    That she would always be grateful to him for that. And for the precious gift of a baby.
    A new family. The chance to begin again…
    No. That would be laying an emotional burden on him. Any involvement must not be out of guilt, but because he wanted to be a father. If he didn’t, well, at least that way, her child would be spared the bitter disillusionment she’d suffered at the hands of her own father.
    Something dropped on to the paper, puddling the ink. Stupid. There was no reason for tears, absolutely none, and she palmed them away, took out a fresh sheet of paper and wrote out her letter minus the crossings out. Then she drove across to the other side of the river and placed her letter in Tom McFarlane’s letter box so that she wasn’t tempted to write again if he didn’t reply, just in case it had been lost in the post. Could be sure that no one else would open it, read it…
    Then, since there was nothing else to be done, she went home and started making plans for the changes that were about to happen in her life.
     
    Tom managed to get the last seat on the flight back to London. Four months. He hadn’t stopped travelling for four months. Like a man on the run, he’d been in flight from the memory, burned into his brain, of Sylvie Smith, silent tears pouring down her face.
    For a moment, in that still, totally calm space, when he’d spilled his seed into her, he’d felt as if the entire world had suddenly been made over for him, that he was the hunter who’d come home with the biggest prize in the world.
    Then he’d seen her tears and realised just what he’d done. That while she kept saying ‘I’ll be fine…’ she was anything but. ‘I have to go…’ when all he wanted was to keep her close.
    And work, he’d discovered, was not the answer, which was why he was going back to face her. To beg her to forgive him, beg her for more…
    About to go through passport control, he paused at a book shop—with a twelve hour flight ahead of him, he’d need something to read—and found himself confronted by the face that haunted his dreams, both waking and sleeping. Not crying now, but smiling serenely out at him from the latest copy of Celebrity.
    Saw the story flash— ‘Sylvie’s Happy Event!’
    He didn’t need an interpreter to decipher ‘happy event’ and for a moment he felt a surge of something so powerful that he felt like a man with the world at his feet. She was wearing something soft and flowing and there was nothing to show that she was pregnant. Only the special glow of a woman who had just told the world that she was having a baby and was totally thrilled about it.
    His baby…
    He picked up the magazine. Opened it and came crashing back to earth as he saw that the cover photograph had been cropped. Inside, the same photograph showed that she was posed with a tall, fair-haired man and the caption read:
    ‘Our favourite events organiser Sylvie Smith, who has just announced that she’s expecting a baby later this summer, is pictured here with her childhood sweetheart, the recently divorced Earl of Melchester. Their marriage plans were put on hold when Sylvie’s grandfather died and, as Jeremy put it, “life got in the way”. It’s wonderful to see them looking so happy to be together again and we confidently predict wedding bells very shortly.’
    He read it twice, just to be sure, then he tossed the magazine in the nearest bin and went back to the desk to change his ticket.
    ‘Where do you want to go, Mr McFarlane?’
    ‘It doesn’t matter.’

CHAPTER THREE
    J OSIE F OWLER flung herself full length into the sofa that had, at considerable expense, been provided for the comfort of their clients. With her feet dangling over the arm and her arm shielding her eyes, she groaned.
    ‘Late night?’ Sylvie asked.
    ‘Late and then some. I have to tell you that you are, without