Page 33 of Shy Innocent In The Spotlight

CHAPTER ELEVEN

MACKHEARDAfaint buzzing during the night and rolled over in bed to see Elspeth reaching for her phone. She checked the screen and gave a deep sigh and turned the phone off, placing it on the bedside table.

‘Who was it?’

She turned to him with a rueful expression. ‘My mother.’

He frowned, and propped himself up on one elbow. ‘Doesn’t she realise what time it is?’

She began to chew at her lower lip, her gaze drifting away from his. ‘I didn’t tell her I was in France. She thinks I’m in Scotland, doing a tour on my own.’ She flopped down on the pillows and released another sigh. ‘She texts or calls dozens of times a day or night. I’m so tired of it, I usually turn off my phone but I forgot when we went to bed.’

Mack trailed his fingers down the silky skin of her arm. ‘She loves you and is probably worried about you.’

‘I know but I can take care of myself. I’m not a little kid any more.’

‘If you keep ignoring her calls and messages, she’s going to worry even more. It’s what mothers do—they worry.’

Elspeth turned her head on the pillow to look at him. ‘What do you think I should do? Answer every one of them? I’d never get anything else done.’

Mack took her nearest hand and brought it up to his chest. ‘Call her first. Let her know how you’re doing. She’s pursuing you because she’s sensing you’re pulling away. If you reach out to her instead it might rebalance things a bit. It’s worth a try.’

‘I guess...’ She sounded doubtful.

Mack kissed each of her fingertips in turn, his gaze holding hers. ‘Learning to let go is hard for some parents, especially when they’ve had good reason to worry in the past.’

‘I know but I’m trying to live my own life now. She’s spent the last twenty-six years fussing over me like I’m going to drop dead in front of her. I need to know who I am without her. I need autonomy but she won’t let me go.’

Mack could only imagine the terror for a parent having a child with a life-threatening allergy. His mother had told him of her fear the day he inhaled a peanut that went down to his lung. He had only been a toddler and had only the slightest memory of it but she had never forgotten it and every time she had spoken of it, he had sensed the raw unmitigated fear she had experienced that day. But Elspeth’s mother had had many such harrowing days. Days when she would have been terrified that the anaphylaxis would take away her beloved child. ‘I really don’t know how parents cope with the stress of bringing up kids even without a life-threatening allergy. It seems like such a lot of hard work.’

Elspeth looked at him with her clear blue gaze. ‘Don’t you want to be a father one day?’

It wasn’t the first time he’d been asked the question but it was the first time he paused for a moment over his answer. He had always ruled out having a family, figuring he’d been responsible for two already. But now, he allowed the thought some space in his mind...picturing what it would be like to hold a baby, his own baby, in his arms. A baby conceived out of love.

And there was that tricky word again—love. The word he avoided, the concept, the emotion he shied away from because it had already done enough damage in his life. Loving had led to hurt, to loss, to bitter disappointment. To scars that never quite healed.

‘Mack?’ Elspeth’s soft voice broke through his moment of reflection.

He gave her hand a playful squeeze. ‘Not right now.’

‘But maybe one day?’

He shrugged. ‘Who knows? What about you? Is becoming a mother important to you?’

A shadow passed over her features and she focussed her gaze on their joined hands. ‘I’d be worried about a baby inheriting my allergy.’

‘There’s no guarantee it would, though.’

She gave a tight smile that was sad at the corners. ‘And no guarantee it wouldn’t. The genetic lottery being what it is.’

‘There are worse things to have than a peanut allergy, surely?’

Elspeth turned on her side to face him. ‘Twins?’

He stroked a finger down the cute slope of her nose. ‘Was it hard being a twin?’

‘No, not really. I adore my sister but while we might look exactly the same, we’re completely different in personality.’ She paused for a beat before adding, ‘I found it hard to keep up with her, especially with Mum being so overprotective of me all the time. In some ways, Elodie got shoved aside. I guess that’s why she always craved the spotlight because she certainly didn’t get much attention from Mum. But then, Elodie got to do heaps of stuff I never could. Going to school, parties, playdates, that sort of thing. I lost confidence, became shy and introverted. My world shrank while hers expanded.’

Mack gently tucked a strand of her hair behind her ear. ‘You have no reason to lack confidence. You’re an accomplished young woman in your own right. And beautiful and sexy too.’

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