Emma Richmond: Instant Mother

‘Charity shop?’

‘I help out sometimes. I needed something to do!’

‘You don’t need to justify yourself, Alexa, but it might have been helpful if you’d given me alternative telephone numbers so that I could contact you.’

‘Sorry,’ she apologised perfunctorily, and discovered that she didn’t like being reprimanded in such a reasonable tone. As though it were obvious, and she was monumentally stupid. ‘I never thought.’

‘Nor about the size of this rabbit hutch,’ he complained wryly as he looked round him.

‘No,’ she agreed stiffly. ‘But I wasn’t expecting anything to happen until next month, and so I thought I had plenty of time.’

With a long sigh, he put his cup on the tray and leaned back. Staring into the fire, he said quietly, ‘I know, I’m sorry. It’s guilt talking.’

And regret? she wondered. Marry in haste? Repent at leisure?

Hunching forward, forearms along his knees, he shoved his hands through his hair. ‘I should have done something sooner,’ he continued levelly. ‘But I couldn’t take her when her parents died last year. I was living in a cramped room at the Institute. She loves her grandparents, seemed happy and settled with them, and I didn’t want to disrupt her schooling, her life any more than necessary. I knew I would be returning permanently one day—’ Breaking off, he added indistinctly, ‘And I’m jet-lagged, have the mother and father of all headaches, and I just need to sleep. Is there a hotel in this place?’

‘Yes. There’s one just along the road. I don’t expect they’ll be busy this time of year.’

‘No.’

‘I should have done it, shouldn’t I?’ she murmured guiltily. ‘Booked us all in.’ Something else she’d failed at.

‘It doesn’t matter.’ Settling himself more comfortably in the armchair, he watched her through half-closed lids. ‘Still getting headaches?’

‘Not so often.’ And before he could ask about David, if he’d been in touch, she asked, ‘Are you hungry? I can heat you up some soup, or something.’

‘Thank you.’

Getting to her feet, she walked into the kitchen, felt despair. She should never have married him. The old Alexa could have coped with all this. The new Alexa couldn’t.

‘I’ve bought a house near to the school,’ he said quietly from behind her, and she jumped again, dropped the spoon she was holding.

‘You don’t need to react quite so strongly, Alexa,’ he stated tiredly. ‘I’m not about to ravish you.’

‘I didn’t suppose you were,’ she denied stiffly. ‘But I don’t find this easy. I thought I had another month before...’

‘Yes,’ he agreed.

‘And I’m sorry the cottage is so small, but...’

‘Stop babbling,’ he reproved mildly. ‘And I don’t know why I make you so nervous; you’ve had six weeks to get used to the idea.’

‘I’m not nervous.’

‘And you don’t need to make small talk or entertain me.’

‘No.’

‘I’m very aware that I shouldn’t have accepted your hasty offer to marry me when you were still feeling so vulnerable...’

‘Yes,’ she swung round to agree eagerly, ‘and that’s why I don’t think this is going to work!’

‘It has to work,’ he stated flatly, his green eyes holding hers. ‘I never deceived you, never pretended it was anything other than what it was. I needed a wife in order to gain custody of Jessica, and I need you to stay with us for at least a year in order to comply with the court’s ruling, and then you may divorce me using whatever grounds you choose. I will pay you the lump sum we agreed upon, and you can go back to your life. If you back out now, Alexa...’

‘Don’t threaten me, Stefan. And I am not backing out. I’m merely saying...’ What? What was she merely saying? That she hadn’t remembered him being so large? So powerful? Hadn’t consciously accepted the fact that he was really her husband and that they would have to share their lives? Hadn’t yet come to terms with the fact that she was attracted to him? ‘I’m merely saying,’ she continued determinedly, ‘that it won’t be easy. We don’t know each other. I don’t know how they do things in Poland,’ she added aggrievedly, ‘but...’

‘I’ve never lived in Poland, and I’m only half Polish. And I never said it would be easy. Of course there will be a period of adjustment—we don’t know each other, and I have no more desire to be married than you do. But you needed somewhere to stay, and I needed a wife, so calm down and stop imagining difficulties that might never arise. She’s six years old, Alexa...’

‘I know how old she is.’

‘Vulnerable and frightened...’

‘I know!’ she agreed tearfully, ‘But look at me! I can’t even cope with myself, let alone a child!’

‘Of course you can cope with her,’ he stated impatiently. ‘You coped today. I know it will take time. I know that. You’ve lost all that was dear to you. Your home, your business. Dav...’

‘Don’t,’ she begged.

‘But you have to talk about it. You can’t keep shutting it away as though it never happened.’

Yes, she could. It was easier that way.

‘He sold your home, your livelihood, whilst you were in the hospital...’

‘I hadn’t been paying the rent!’

‘Of course you hadn’t been paying it! How could you? He never came to visit you...’

‘He came once,’ she interrupted defensively.

‘Yes,’ he agreed grimly, ‘whilst you were unconscious. He never wrote, explained...’

Shoving her hands over her ears, she begged, ‘Stop it. Please. Just stop.’

He sighed, gently reached out to remove her hands, stared into her white, distressed face. ‘He ran out on you, Alexa. Face it. Accept it. The man’s a rat.’

She knew he was a rat. She didn’t need it spelled out.

Removing her hands from his, she turned away, stirred aimlessly at the soup. ‘The Davids of this world can’t accept—ugliness,’ she murmured. ‘They can’t help it any more than I can help some of the things I do.’

‘You aren’t ugly!’ he argued, with an irritability that she would have thought foreign to his nature. ‘You look fragile and lost and hurt. Has he been in touch?’

‘No.’

‘I’m sorry. I am sorry, but...’

‘But your own troubles come first,’ she stated quietly. ‘I know that.’ He looked as though he were about to say something, but in the end said nothing. ‘I’m not running out on you, Stefan, I just...need a little time to get used to this. Tell me about the house you’ve bought. I didn’t know you were buying one. You never said.’

‘No,’ he denied wearily. ‘I contacted a house-hunting agency, asked them to find me something near the school.’

‘And you bought it sight unseen?’ she demanded in astonishment.

‘Yes. They sent me photographs.’

‘But you can’t buy a house from a photograph!’

‘I already did,’ he said flatly. ‘But it won’t be ready for occupation until next week at the earliest. We’ll have to find a hotel—I gave her my word Alexa,’ he added quietly. ‘Promised her that we would be her family. I can’t go back on that.’

‘No. I’ll bring this soup through to the lounge, shall I?’

He examined her face for a moment, then nodded, returned to the lounge.

Letting her breath out on a long sigh, she relaid the tray, poured the soup into a bowl, cut up the remains of the crusty bread, took a moment to compose herself, then carried it through.

He was lying back in the chair, his eyes closed.

‘Stefan?’

Nothing.

‘Stefan!’

With a tired sigh, she put the tray on the footstool and gave his shoulder a shake.

He merely turned his head to one side, exhaled gently.