She shrugged, a look of resignation turning her expression stony. ‘Have it your own way. And I’m sure you’ll understand that I’m no longer prepared to share my bed with you. I’m moving back into my own bedroom.’
Alek flinched. It hurt more than it should have done, even though it came as no big surprise. Yet something made him want to try to hang on to what they had—and briefly he wondered whether it was a fear of losing her, or just a fear of losing. ‘I know the doctor advised no sex, but I can live with that,’ he said. ‘But that doesn’t mean we can’t sleep together. I can be there for you in the night if you need anything.’
She stared at him as if he’d taken leave of his senses. ‘I can call you if I need anything, Alek.’
‘But—’
‘The charade is over Alek,’ she said. ‘I’m not sleeping with a stranger any more.’
He looked at her in disbelief. ‘How can we possibly be strangers, when you know more about me than anyone else?’
‘I only know because I wore you down until you told me—and it was like getting blood from a stone. And I understand why. I realise how painful it was for you to tell me, and that what happened to you is the reason you don’t do intimacy. I get all that. But I’ve also realised that I want intimacy. Actually, I crave it. And I can’t do sex for sex’s sake. I can’t do cuddling up together at night-time either. It’s too confusing. It blurs the boundaries. It will make me start thinking we’re getting closer, but of course we won’t be and we never will.’
‘Ellie—’
‘No,’ she said firmly. ‘It’s important that I say this, so hear me out. I don’t blame you for your attitude. I understand why you are the way you are. I think I can almost understand why you don’t want to stir up all the emotional stuff of reuniting with the brother you say you don’t have—I just can’t live with it. If I were one hundred per cent fit, I think I’d be able to get you to change your mind about wanting to stay with me until after the baby is born. Because I think we both recognise that’s no longer really important, and I hope you know me well enough to realise that I’ll give you as much contact with your child as you want.’ She gave a sad sort of smile, like someone waving goodbye to a ship they knew they would never see again. ‘Ideally, I’d like to go back to the New Forest and find myself a little cottage there and live a simple life and look after myself. But obviously I can’t do that, because the doctors won’t let me and because you’re based in London.’
‘Ellie—’
‘No. Please. Let me finish. I want you to know that I’m grateful to be here and to know you’re looking out for me and the baby, because this is all about the baby now. And only the baby.’ Her voice was trembling now. ‘Because I don’t ever want to get physically close to you again, Alek. I can’t risk all the fallout and the potential heartbreak. Do you understand?’
And the terrible thing was that he did. He agreed with every reasoned word she’d said. He accepted each hurtful point she made, even though something unfamiliar was bubbling inside him which was urging him to challenge her. To talk her round.
But he couldn’t. One of the reasons for his outstanding achievements in the world of commerce was an ability to see things as they really were. His vision was X-ray clear whenever he looked at a run-down business, with the intention of turning it around to make a profit. And he realised that he must apply the same kind of logic now. It was what it was. He had destroyed any kind of future with the mother of his child and he must live with her decision and accept it. She was better off without someone like him, anyway. A man who couldn’t do feelings. Who was too afraid to try.
A pain like a cold and remorseless wind swept through him.
‘Yes, I understand,’ he said.
SO WHY WAS HE so damned restless?
Alek stared out of his office window and drummed his fingers impatiently on his desk. Why couldn’t he accept a life which—despite having a pregnant wife living in his apartment—was still tailored to fit his needs? He told himself that things weren’t really that different. Why should it bother him so much that he and Ellie were now back in separate rooms?
He still went to work each morning just the way he’d always done, although Ellie had taken to sleeping late these days instead of joining him for tea before he went to the office. At least, he was assuming she was sleeping. She might have been wide awake, doing naked yoga moves as the sun rose for all he knew. Or submerging her rapidly growing bump beneath a bath filled to the brim with sensual bubbles. He had no idea what went on behind her bedroom door once it was closed, although he’d fantasised about it often enough. Hell, yes.
He wondered if his frustration showed in his face. Whether he’d given himself away the other morning, when he’d unexpectedly seen her padding back from the kitchen clutching a mug of ginger tea as he’d been about to take an early morning conference call. Her hair had been tumbling in glorious disarray around her shoulders and the floaty, flowery robe she wore had managed to conceal her changing shape while somehow emphasising it. Her skin had been fresh and her eyes bright, despite the earliness of the hour. She’d looked more like a teenager than a woman of twenty-five and he’d felt a pang of something like regret. Just the day before, the doctor had given her a glowing bill of health. Mother and baby were ticking all the right boxes, and Alek told himself that at least something good had come out of all this.
But wasn’t it funny how you always wanted what you hadn’t got? Why else would he be craving more of her company and wishing she’d linger longer over dinner? Wanting her to say something—anything—other than make those polite little observations about what kind of day she’d had. He’d made quite a few concessions to fit in with her pregnancy, but even they hadn’t softened her resolve. Hadn’t he eaten his words and joined that wretched antenatal class, where they were expected to lie on the floor—puffing like a bunch of whales? Yet still she kept her distance. He felt a stab of conscience. Wasn’t that how he used to be with her? And wasn’t he discovering that he didn’t much like being pushed away? And in the meantime, he was aching for her. Aching in ways which were nothing to do with sex.
He’d been brooding about it all week and not coming up with any answers about how he could change things, when on Saturday night she looked at him across the dinner table with an odd expression on her face.
‘I want you to know,’ she said in the careful way people did when they’d been practising saying something, ‘that if you decide you want to start seeing other...women, I shan’t mind.’
His fork fell to his plate with a clatter. His heart pounded. Rarely had he been more shocked. Or outraged. ‘Say that again,’ he breathed.
‘You heard me perfectly well, Alek. I’m just asking you to be discreet about it, that’s all. I don’t particularly want—’
‘No, wait a minute.’ Ruthlessly he cut across her words in a way he’d avoided doing of late, leaning across the table and glaring at her. ‘Are you telling me that you want me to start dating other women?’
Ellie didn’t reply, not immediately. She fiddled around with her napkin for just long enough to hang on to her composure—telling herself that this was the only solution. She couldn’t keep him chained up like a tame lion. ‘I don’t know if want is the right word—’
‘Maybe you want to watch?’ he suggested crudely. ‘Perhaps that’s one of your fantasises. Does the thought of me having sex with somebody else turn you on, Ellie?’
‘Don’t be so disgusting!’ she snapped, feeling her cheeks growing hot. ‘That’s not what I meant at all and you know it.’
‘Do I?’ he demanded furiously. ‘What am I supposed to think, when you give me your