Page 170 of Modern Romance Collection February 2025, 1-4

The coffee machine finished just as the kettle boiled. She turned off both, making her mint tea while Vincenzo reached forward to take his coffee. An ache filled her. To be here with him, like this, in such circumstances...

Isn’t it enough of a mess already? Without me messing it up even more?

Anguish clutched at her again. Why, oh, why had she allowed what was already an impossible situation...one she’d never wanted...to become so much worse?

‘Siena?’

Vincenzo’s voice made her start. Hastily, she grabbed her mint tea. ‘Come into the sitting room,’ she said, heading heavily for the kitchen doorway.

‘Are you all right? You look...upset.’

Concern was in Vincenzo’s voice. It hurt to hear it.

‘Just tired,’ she said, making her way to the armchair and lowering herself ponderously into it.

‘I’ll leave you in peace as soon as I’ve drunk my coffee,’ Vincenzo was saying.

She was grateful. This was an ordeal, and it was hard—so very hard.

But I have to get used to seeing him again—to him being around. I have to!

He was sitting himself down on the sofa opposite the armchair, crossing one long leg over the other. She wanted to gaze at him. Gaze at him and drink him in...

But I can’t. He isn’t mine to gaze at. He’s just the man who fathered my baby, and he is concerned only for that reason.

That was all she had to remember.

She took a sip of her mint tea, aware that he was speaking again.

‘Is there anything that you might like to do over the weekend?’ he asked.

‘Not really.’

She didn’t mean to sound indifferent, but the weekend was just another two days to get through—two days closer to her due date.

‘Well, then, I wondered...’ His voice was cautious, speculative, his eyes resting on her with the same careful expression. ‘I wondered whether you would feel up to an outing by car? Nothing strenuous. And only if you would like it.’ He paused. ‘You told me you grew up in this part of the country. Is that why you chose to base yourself here?’

‘It seemed as good a reason as any,’ she answered. ‘I know the district hospital has a good reputation, and I had to settle somewhere—at least for the duration of my being pregnant. What I’ll do afterwards I don’t yet know...’

Her voice trailed off. She could feel Vincenzo’s eyes resting on her, and wished they would not.

‘I would still like to help you—’ he began.

‘No.’ Her voice steeled. ‘Vincenzo, please—we’ve had this discussion. I... I need to make my own way after...after the baby is born. Deal with it in my own way.’

Deal with so much more than simply having a baby...

She gave a sigh. It was all such a mess. A mess from beginning to end. Vincenzo had said that it need not be—but it was.

Longing filled her, intense and hopeless. This whole situation was wretched—her unwanted pregnancy, her poor, benighted little baby being born into such a mess, with neither of its parents welcoming its arrival but seeing it only as a problem, a difficulty...

And now, on top of all of that—

She thrust it from her. What was the point of brooding over it? She had to cope with it—and she had to get used to coping with having Vincenzo showing up. What else could she do?

After all he would be doing it for years ahead. Years she could not bear to think about.

‘Maybe,’ she heard herself saying now. ‘Going for a drive tomorrow might be OK.’

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