Their Newborn Gift by Nikki Logan Read Free Book Online Page A

spoken to her in that pub. When he’d slid all six-foot-plus of himself into the shabby seat opposite her and refreshed the Chardonnay she’d been nursing all afternoon.
    He’d spoken exactly as he looked: sexy as anything.
    In her grief it had been easy to talk herself into it. Who would it hurt if she connected with someone just that once? Someone tall. Broad. Solid.
    Someone alive.
    Life, as it had turned out, was dangerously short. As her father had learned.
    She stared at the tiny white stick in her hand. ‘We’ll know in ninety seconds.’
    ‘Do we just sit here in silence?’ He sounded testy across three hundred kilometres.
    Despite her churning stomach, Lea smiled. So, Mr. Smooth was capable of getting ruffled. Good to know. ‘What would you like to talk about?’
    ‘What if you’re not pregnant?’
    ‘They’ve held a tiny fraction of your sample over. We try again.’
    Reilly’s convoluted contract allowed for that. The legal documents were necessary, and not unexpected, but were still a slap in the face, a reminder that this was pure business to him. But after a second attempt there would be no sample left. No contract. No Molly. Lea straightened. ‘But there’s no reason it won’t take. It was six days old, and quite robust by embryo standards, apparently.’
    She fought to keep the hint of pride out of her voice. She had no business feeling proud about this baby. In fact, she’d do better not to think of it as a baby at all, knowing she had to hand it over to Reilly. It was an umbilical cord, that was all.
    Its job was to attach to her.
    If she grew attached to it she’d never be able to fulfil the terms of Reilly’s agreement.
    ‘We haven’t yet locked down the timeline for my visits.’
    Lea rubbed her temples. No, they hadn’t. She wasn’t sure she wanted him visiting Yurraji every four weeks. But it could have been much worse. ‘Will you come to us each month?’
    ‘Unless Molly would like to break it up a bit—see Minamurra occasionally?’
    ‘We’ll see.’ A dull thud started up behind her left eye. She’d grown so used to only worrying about the needs of her daughterand herself. Driving out to Reilly’s property would be doable, except in the final few weeks of her pregnancy.
    Assuming she got pregnant at all from the implantation. Her eye went back to the stick. Nothing yet.
    ‘How is Molly?’
    ‘Molly’s…’ Not having the best week. She’d spent a lot of time in bed this week, pale and unhappy. It only shored up Lea’s resolve to get this new baby safely born. But there was no need to share her worry. ‘Sleepyhead is still in bed.’
    ‘Does she know I’m coming next week?’
    ‘End of next week.’ And not a moment sooner, thank you very much. ‘She does. She asks after you all the time.’ Unpalatable, but true.
    Reilly considered that in silence. ‘Thank you for telling me.’
    ‘You thought I wouldn’t?’
    ‘It wouldn’t surprise me.’
    Because I’m such a liar and a cheat. Lea knew she deserved some of Reilly’s anger, but not all of it. He’d been a willing participant that day five years ago. She’d been hypnotised by the local celebrity and district hottie with eyes straight out of a cologne advertisement.
    What was his excuse?
    ‘I have no interest in robbing Molly of her father,’ she whispered.
    Now. She almost heard him thinking it down the phone. ‘You told her I’m her father?’
    ‘No. Not while she’s so little. But I told her you were going to be the new baby’s father and you might like to be her daddy too.’ She cringed at how intimate that sounded.
    ‘A daddy that doesn’t live with you?’
    ‘Molly and I have been alone for so long, she doesn’t know any different. It’s going to be years yet before other people start making her doubt herself.’
    A raven cawed outside Lea’s window. Reilly’s voice dropped a note. ‘Is that experience talking?’
    She was not going to discuss her father with him. How she’d