Harlequin Presents January 2015 Box Set 3 of 4(196)

‘Yes. I think we should try again. For a baby.’

The see-saw crashed down to the ground with a shuddering thump.

‘A baby?’ She hadn’t meant it to sound so sneery, so nasty, but incredulity had taken her words and twisted them with bitterness.

‘Yes, a baby, Charlotte. I see no reason why we shouldn’t at least consider the idea.’

No reason at all, Lottie reasoned numbly, other than the fact that their marriage had been a disaster, he hadn’t spoken to her for two years and he obviously still hated her guts. ‘Why would you even think...?’

‘I have found a new IVF specialist—someone in Iran,’ Rafael continued with baffling logic. ‘He knows the situation—that we still have one frozen embryo. He is very confident that this time it will work, that this time we will succeed.’

An Iranian IVF specialist? What on earth was going on here? Despite the controlled voice, the even tone, the powerful sense of conviction running through him was clearly, disturbingly unmistakable.

She had seen it before, of course. Rafael’s determination to get her pregnant. But that had been in a previous life, before they had split up. After Seraphina had died.

Born at just twenty-five weeks, their daughter had only lived for a few precious hours. The trauma of the accident, followed by premature labour and a complicated birth was now little more than a foggy blur—almost as if it had happened to somebody else. But the pain of watching their tiny daughter’s vain struggle for life would stay with Lottie for ever.

When Seraphina had finally died, and the clips and wires had been removed from her perfect, breathless body, Lottie had gazed at the still warm bundle in her arms, brushed an oversized finger against the soft down of her cheeks, convinced that nothing could be worse than this, that this was the bottom of the blackest pit. But fate had had one more arrow in its quiver. It seemed that the accident meant she would never be able to conceive naturally again—that IVF was their only hope of ever having another child.

Rafael had set about making it happen with a tenacious stubbornness that had bordered on obsession. They had embarked upon a series of IVF treatments, none of which had worked, and after each crushing disappointment it had seemed he was more obstinate, more insistent that they would not fail, that nothing was going to prevent him from achieving his goal. It had taken over their lives and eventually destroyed their marriage.

Lottie pushed the blonde hair away from her face with a hand that shook slightly in the way that the memory of Seraphina always weakened her limbs. She needed to put a stop to this madness now.

She drew in a sharp breath. ‘Well, you have wasted this man’s time. The idea of us having a baby is totally ridiculous. Why would we even consider it now? After all this time? When our marriage is obviously over?’

Rafael stared across at the wide violet-blue eyes that were searching his face for an explanation. Certamente, their marriage was over, all right. It had ended the day Lottie had walked out on him. The day she had told him that she didn’t love him. That she had never loved him.

He cursed silently, struggling to keep his frustration inside, rein in the storm of his feelings. He had to remain calm. Not let himself be riled by her fake show of concern or her harsh dismissal of their shared past. He was already a hair’s breadth from totally screwing this up, and he knew it.

But what he hadn’t known was the way his heart would start pounding in his chest the second she walked into the room, as if jolted from a dormant slumber or poked into life by the jab of a stick. What was that? Anger? Betrayal? Lust? Whatever it was, it was damned annoying.

He’d been so sure that the two years they had been apart would have killed any desire he might have had for her. Now he knew that was not the case and he cursed her for it. She had no right to look like that—all heart-shaped face and soft pink lips, her slender body clad in skinny jeans and a plain white shirt, demurely buttoned almost to the top but still failing to conceal the unconscious jut of her breasts as she squared up to him.

Scowling, he raked a hand through his hair.

‘Because an accident like this makes you think, Charlotte—that’s why. Makes you realise that you are not invincible, that you need to plan for the future—a future when you are no longer around. Ten days in a hospital bed focusses the mind, believe me, and it gives you plenty of time to work out what’s important.’

‘Go on...’

The gentle probing of her voice was threatening to undo him, unleash a side of him that had nothing to do with the purpose of this meeting.

‘What is important is this place.’

Roughly gesturing around him, he was rewarded with a sharp stab of pain that shot through his shoulder, mocking him with its power. He would not let it show. Whatever else, Lottie must not see his weakness. He knew she was watching every movement of his lips, analysing every syllable of his words. Grimly he carried on.