This couldn’t be only emotional distress. This had to be something more.
“Ms. Helton,” he said. “A moment of your time, per favore.”
Her head jerked up, her blonde hair bobbing in soft curls on her shoulders. The hair wasn’t the same, though. Not like his memory of silky, healthy strands wrapping around his hands as he plunged into her. Now the strands appeared lackluster and lifeless.
Something was wrong. He was sure of it. Something physical.
The beat of his heart sped, then stilled.
“I’m quite busy today.” Her words were rushed.
“A mere moment.”
Her gaze darted to the door as the last person left the room.
Left them alone. For the first time in seven long weeks. For the first time since they’d lain beside each other naked.
The door thudded shut.
She folded her arms in front of her and straightened into her usual erect, royal stance. “What is it, Mr. Mattare? Another one of your schemes?”
A grudging respect pulsed deep in him. A reluctant appreciation for her stubborn determination to keep fighting him at every turn. Except strangely, he didn’t want to fight back. At least not right now. He wanted to know what was going on. What was the matter with her. He wanted to be sure the odd thought that had popped into his head moments ago was a complete impossibility.
Sticking his hand in his pocket, he jiggled the spare pence. “Are you sick?”
Her eyes widened, her skin turned pale as marble, even paler than before, and her body went rigid. On the whole, it looked like a breath of wind could knock her over. His words did more, however.
They scared her.
He stared across the table at her and knew.
Something was seriously wrong.
* * *
“It’s none of your business.” Nausea welled in her throat.
Vico Mattare’s eyes went hard. “I disagree. You are my employee. If you are sick, your work will suffer.”
My employee. He’d edged the two words with spite. At any other time, she’d have told him to stuff it. But her agenda had changed during the last month. Her priorities were far different now than before.
Her baby was all that mattered.
Not the fight for her company, even though she still wanted the control back. Not the determined war she’d fought against him and his shady proposals, even though she still argued against his changes. Not even her pride.
Now the only thing she cared about was her baby: her baby’s needs, her baby’s welfare, her baby’s future.
Which included finances.
Babies were expensive. She’d had the distant knowledge of that before this whole situation came about. Yet now it had come into focus with a stark, brutal clarity. Her financial picture, thanks to her father’s ill-advised investments before his death six years ago, had been precarious for years. Her salary was generous, but it strained to cover her mother’s needs as well as her own. Her mother’s adamant refusal to even think of selling the family estate was understandable. Nevertheless, taking care of the damn barn was expensive.
Her baby’s needs came before all else, still Lise hadn’t figured out how she was going to balance all the financial balls in her court. Selling her Mayfair house would be a step in the right direction, though she’d need somewhere to live and prices in London were astronomical.
Keeping this job was the key to her financial future.
She knew that. So she bit her tongue, stopping the blast of her temper.
“Ms. Helton.” Her nemesis's words were clipped and forceful. “You will tell me what is wrong immediately.”
The demand stiffened her spine and the nausea diminished as anger stirred. “I have a touch of the flu.”
She’d lied to him. To her baby’s father.
The queasiness swept back in with a vicious intensity. She swallowed it back. In some situations, lies were needed. Situations she’d never found herself in before, true, but there was always a first time. And the right time.
“That’s all?” His gaze traveled over her pale face. “It is quite a long bout of the flu.”
“I also suffer from migraines on occasion.”
The man at the end of the long table frowned. “I didn’t know that.”
“Why should you?” Lise slipped her laptop into its case and zipped it closed, hoping the action would cover her shaking hands. “All you need to know is I went to the doctor and she gave me a clean bill of health. The sickness will pass.”
She had gone to her doctor who’d confirmed the pregnancy and also confirmed she had no diseases—much to her relief. Her doctor also assured her this overwhelming sickness that had swept in on her, only days after she acknowledged the pregnancy, wasn’t unusual for the first few months.