Page 9 of The Baby Behind Their Marriage Merger

Smiling to himself, he walked back into the kitchen, just in time to see Addi spinning around to glare at him. ‘I’ve lost signal.’

Yep.

‘I need to be connected,’ she told him, sounding frantic.

No, she didn’t. The world wouldn’t stop turning if she wasn’t plugged in for a couple of hours. He shrugged. ‘The signal out here is iffy; it might come back on, or it might not.’

If she gave it any thought, she’d realise that he ran a multi-billion-dollar operation and needed to be constantly connected. He was banking on the fact she was too tired and too stressed to work that out. As he expected, her shoulders slumped and she tossed her phone onto the couch next to her.

‘Lean back, kick off your shoes and stare at the mountain,’ he told her. ‘Breathe.’

Addi handed him another glare and turned her back on him. He put the bowl of soup into the microwave to heat up and, when he turned back to look at her, she’d done as he’d suggested—her feet were tucked under her bottom, and she had a cushion behind her head. She was also looking at the awesome view, watching the clouds skim over the mountain, blocking out the sun. It was going to storm later, and the temperature would drop. Winter was starting to come in the Cape, and the first of a series of cold fronts was rolling in.

‘How long have you owned this property?’ Addi asked, her voice drifting over to him.

He sliced the sourdough bread. ‘I bought the land about ten years ago and the house was completed about three years ago.’

‘Do you make wine?’ she asked.

He smiled. No; he didn’t have the patience or the knowledge. ‘I lease the vines to a neighbour and he takes the harvest. He makes a rather good Shiraz.’ ‘Rather good’, as in one of the best in the world. He considered offering Addi a glass and then remembered she had to drive home. Besides, wine on an empty stomach—a stomach he suspected hadn’t seen a decent meal for a while—was never a good idea.

The microwave dinged and he pulled out her soup. ‘Come on over here,’ he told her, sliding the bowl onto a place mat on the other side of the island. Addi stood up and, without bothering to put her heels on, padded over to the island, the hems of her now too-long trousers dragging against his slate floors. She climbed up onto a stool and bent down to smell the soup, her eyes closing.

‘It smells good,’ she told him. ‘It smells like Aunt Kate’s soup.’

He pushed the wooden board holding the bread over to her. ‘Who is Aunt Kate?’ he asked, keeping his voice neutral. He knew that if he got too demanding her shield would go back up.

‘Uh...she was a great-aunt. My sister Lex and I lived with her from the time I turned seventeen,’ Addi explained, dipping her spoon into the soup.

She took a deep breath and lifted the spoon to her mouth as if she wasn’t sure how she’d react. She swallowed, sighed and then dug in, rapidly lifting spoonful after spoonful to her mouth and taking greedy bites out of the bread.

Jude watched her eat, fascinated. It was almost as if he’d faded away and all she could focus on was the meal. His housekeeper Greta was a good cook, sure, and the soup was nice, but it wasn’t worthy of her constant murmurs of appreciation.

When Addi scraped the last of the soup from the bowl and ate the last bite of bread, she looked up at him. Her cheeks were red. She looked embarrassed at diving in but at least she had some colour. Her eyes were a little brighter and some of the tension in her shoulders had eased.

She patted her stomach and sent him a shy smile. ‘You have no idea how much I needed that,’ she told him.

Oh, he did. He rested his forearms on the counter and frowned at her. ‘Why haven’t you been eating, Addi? What’s Addi short for, by the way?’ He’d been wondering about that, mostly late at night when X-rated memories of the way they’d loved each other bombarded him.

‘Addison.’

He tasted her full name on his tongue and found he liked it. ‘So, what gives? And don’t tell me “nothing”.’

She stared down at the empty soup bowl and lifted a hand to her hair to run her fingers through the bright blonde. They were trembling, and it annoyed him. What was she scared of?

‘Talk to me, Addison,’ he commanded. She had the weight of the world on her shoulders, and he suspected that if she didn’t talk to someone soon that weight might just flatten her. He’d tried to push away his need to help her, to get involved, but every time he did it came roaring back, stronger than before. This woman could turn him inside out and he wasn’t enjoying the very alien sensation.

Addi cocked her head and tried to smile but it hardly lifted the corners of her lips and didn’t reach her eyes. ‘Are you sure you want to know, Jude?’

He wouldn’t have asked if he didn’t, as he told her.

‘People say that, but when they hear the unexpected they tend to shoot the messenger,’ Addi murmured.

‘I’ve been around for a long time, Addi, and I’m not easily shocked,’ Jude assured her. ‘And sometimes it’s helpful to get another person’s input.’

Addi didn’t look convinced. She picked up her spoon and tapped it against the rim of the bowl, obviously agonising over her decision to speak or not. He wanted her to, he realised. There was something about this prickly woman that made him want to pull her in, hold her close and be the barrier between the world and her. He felt protective of her, and he couldn’t understand why. The women he normally dated—or slept with; calling what they did together ‘dating’ was a stretch—were independent and successful, women who neither needed nor wanted his protection and would laugh if he suggested it. But Addi, stubborn and guarded, looked as if she needed it.

He removed the spoon from her hand and stopped the annoyingting-ting-tingof her spoon hitting the bowl. Addi looked surprised and he realised that she hadn’t even noticed the noise. She’d been too busy deciding whether to talk or how to frame her words.

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