Page 217 of Modern Romance Collection February 2025, 1-4

He.Dominic was going to have a son.

Yet another feeling washed over him, colder this time and full of doubt. This baby was getting more real by the moment and he hadn’t once thought about what kind of father he’d be. The baby had been only a thought, an abstract, but now...

It hit him then, like a thunderbolt straight from heaven, the certainty that he wouldneverbe the kind of father his own had been. His son would not be left alone, his son would not be handed an itemised account of the cost of his upbringing. Like Jacob, Dominic had never wanted children, but unlike Jacob, he would embrace being a father. He would give his child everything he’d never had growing up, attention, protection, tenderness and care.

This would be the purpose of his life now, because this was the thing he’d been looking for, the next challenge to throw himself into, and he would not fail. He couldn’t.

‘I’m sorry,’ Maude said.

Dominic looked at her, for a second not processing what she’d said, his head too full of the epiphany he’d just had. ‘For what?’

‘For not telling you that we were having a boy.’

He blinked, her face suddenly leaping into focus. Delicate features, tawny gold brows, warm honey-golden skin, dark gold hair in soft waves around her face. His nymph.

Your child. Your woman.

The power of the thunderbolt was resonating inside him, spreading out from the baby, spreading wider, becoming possessive and intense. Part of him wanted to deny it, because he never felt that strongly about anything and never wanted to, except it was there in his heart, as relentless and inevitable as the tide.

This woman and the child she carried were his now, and it was time for him to claim both of them.

Maude was looking at him with some concern. ‘Are you okay?’ she asked, sitting up slowly, her hair falling around her shoulders.

She was astonishingly lovely, naked like this, with the beautiful swell of her stomach beneath her full breasts, and his breath caught.

Shewas why he’d been so restless and tense.Shewas why he didn’t want any other woman. Which madeherthe answer to the problem.

If he wanted any peace at all, he needed to be sleeping with her. No longer resisting her, but indulging himself fully and to the utmost, and with no one else but her.

It felt foreign to think that, to limit himself that way, yet, instead of feeling constrained, he suddenly felt as if he’d been given a freedom of sorts. As if it had been the resistance that had constrained him rather than the other way around.

‘I’m fine.’ His voice sounded rough even to his own ears. ‘But I have decided something.’

Her gaze flickered and he could see the apprehension in it. She thought he was going to demand again her presence in London, that was obvious. Well, she was wrong. He’d already made that demand and she’d protested, digging in when he’d threatened, and he didn’t want to make that mistake again.

Demanding things from her didn’t feel right, not after what she’d given him just now on the couch, the gift of her trust. And it was a gift. She’d given him the same that night in the woods back then, but he hadn’t realised its value until now. And now he knew...well. He wasn’t going to throw that away.

‘I understand why you don’t want to come to London,’ he said. ‘In which case, I’ll come here.’

Her eyes widened. ‘What?’

‘I’m tired of London. I’d rather be here where I can keep an eye on the baby, and where I can have you.’

A flush crept through her cheeks. ‘Have me?’

He held her gaze steadily. ‘I’ve been thinking about you for months, nymph. Thinking about that night. I tried to put it out of my head when I woke up and found you gone, because I thought I wouldn’t see you again. Then there you were, swimming in the forest pool, and I knew it was you instantly.’ He paused, letting her see that he was telling the truth. ‘I haven’t had a woman since you and I find I don’t want one. The only woman I want at the moment is you.’

A shocked expression rippled over her face. ‘But...why?’

‘I don’t know,’ he admitted. ‘You’re unlike any woman I’ve ever met, and perhaps it’s only physical chemistry, but... What I do know is that it’s been impossible for me to think of anyone else.’

Her lashes lowered abruptly, veiling her gaze, but she didn’t move. ‘So...what are you thinking?’

‘No, don’t do that,’ he ordered softly. ‘Look at me.’

Her lashes lifted and she met his gaze, apprehension in it.

‘You don’t want me here?’ he asked bluntly. ‘Because if so, that might be too bad since I own this house and the grounds.’

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