Page 69 of Worth the Risk

Her censorious stare pierced awhile longer before she pushed the door open.

I got halfway to the bed before changing course. If I hoped to make a half-decent job of apologising, I needed my faculties intact. ‘What I did this morning was less than admirable.’

‘You mean trying to use sex to shut me up again?’

‘I wanted to fuck you because you’re bloody irresistible. I won’t apologise for that. And yes, you drive everything else out of my mind when I’m inside you.’

Colour flared up into her cheeks. ‘Is that supposed to be an apology?’

I sighed. ‘I’m a bastard for trying to take advantage of the situation. The timing was awful and you didn’t deserve to take the brunt of my shitty mood.’

‘Apology accepted,’ she said, but shadows lingered in her eyes. My stomach dropped when she stepped back and reached for the door. ‘Was that all?’

The jagged ache cracked inside me. ‘You’re kicking me out?’

She hesitated, her gaze dropping to where I’d impatiently freed the top buttons of my shirt somewhere between Giles’s tenth and fifteenth drinks. She licked her lower lip. ‘I should.’

I reached for the next button and casually flicked it open. Her breath puffed out of parted lips. I released the next one.

‘You don’t play fair, Gideon.’

I continued undressing as I walked towards her. I stopped when we were an inch apart. ‘I want you, Leonora. Badly. Enough that I don’t want to play fair.’

‘Then I should warn you that equity is high on my must-have list.’

I dragged a finger over her lower lip. ‘Tonight you hold all the power. Tell me if you want me to go. But I’d much prefer it if you command me to stay.’

She didn’t immediately reply. Then, ‘Tell me something first.’

Tension knotted my nape. ‘What?’

‘Why were you so weird when Gemma mentioned she was pregnant?’

I staggered back, my insides turning to ice. ‘Leonora...’

‘You don’t play fair. Neither do I. I’m renegotiating our deal. I want to know more about you. And this one is a take-it-or-leave-it deal.’

I caught a glimpse of that bleak landscape again and I knew I had to refuse. She was stripping me of everything. If she took away my barricades, what would I have left?

What do you have now?

Nothing.

So what did I have to lose?

I swallowed hard, walked to the armchair and sank into it. Elbows on my knees, I braced myself for the hardest thing I’d ever said out loud. ‘Penny was pregnant when I tossed her out. I’d be a father by now...if she hadn’t got rid of my child.’

She gasped, regret for my pain pooling in her eyes. ‘Oh, my God! I’m sorry, Gideon.’

My insides clenched tight, raw pain threatening to overwhelm me. ‘It’s one of the many things I try not to think about but which ends up fucking up more areas in my life than I want to acknowledge.’

‘You wanted to be a father?’

I drew shaky hands down my face, suddenly wishing I hadn’t started this harrowing recounting. ‘I wanted the chance to give it a bloody good go, not have it thrown in my face as hellish punishment for refusing to give Penny the time of day when she begged me to take her back a month after we broke up.’

‘You mean she didn’t tell you she was pregnant when... After Damian?’

‘No. I refused to see her or take her calls after it happened. I think at some point she knew there was no chance so she got rid of it. We met by accident a month later. She begged me to take her back. When I refused, she tossed it in my face. Then had the nerve to tell me if I really wanted a child, we could try again if I took her back.’

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