‘You’d better come in,’ she said. After all, what else could she do? She had a feeling he was coming in if he had to break the door down, so she might as well do this the easy way.
He followed her back to the kitchen, his footsteps loud on the tiles, and she could hear Murphy fussing around him and thrashing his tail into all the furniture and doors. She thought of Max’s suit and how it would look decorated in dog hair, and stifled a smile. He’d hate that. He was always so particular.
‘Shut the door, keep the heat in,’ she instructed, and he shut it and turned towards her, that muscle jumping in his jaw again.
‘Is that all you’ve got to say? A whole year without a word, and all you’ve got to say is “Shut the door”?’
‘I’m trying to keep the babies warm,’ she said, and his eyes tracked immediately to the baby in her arms, his expression unreadable. Supremely conscious of the monumental nature of the moment, she locked her legs to stop them shaking and said, ‘This is Ava,’ and, gesturing with her free hand towards the lobster-pot playpen near the Aga, added, ‘and this is Libby.’
And, hearing her name, Libby looked up, took the bubbly, spitty teething ring out of her mouth and grinned. ‘Mum-mum,’ she said, and, holding up her arms, she opened and closed her hands, begging to be picked up.
Julia went to move towards her, then stopped and looked at Max, her heart pounding. ‘Well, go on, then. Pick up your daughter. I take it that’s why you’re here?’
He was transfixed.
Your daughter.
Oh lord. It was ages since he’d held a baby. He wasn’t even sure he’d ever held one this age. Older, yes, and probably walking, but not small, dribbly and gummy and quite so damned appealing, and he was suddenly terrified he’d drop her.
He shrugged off his jacket and hung it over a chair, then reached into the playpen, put his hands under her armpits and lifted her out.
‘She’s light! I thought she’d be heavier.’
‘She’s only a baby, Max, and twins are often small, but don’t be scared of her. They’re remarkably robust. Say hello to Daddy, Libby.’
Daddy?
‘Mum-mum,’ she said, and, reaching up, she grabbed his nose and pulled it hard.
‘Ouch.’
‘Libby, gently,’ Julia said, easing her fingers away, and told him to put her on his hip, then handed him Ava, settling her in the curve of his other arm. ‘There you go. Your children.’
He stared down at them. They were like peas in a pod, he thought, wondering how on earth she told them apart, and they smelt extraordinary. Like nothing he’d ever smelt before. Sweet and clean, and somehow…
Then Ava reached out to Libby, and they beamed at each other and turned and stared up at him with brilliant blue eyes exactly the colour of his own, and they smiled at him in unison, and, without warning, Max fell headlong in love.
‘Here, you’d better sit down,’ Julia said with a lump in her throat, and pulled a chair out from the table and steered him towards it before his legs gave way. He had a thunder-struck look on his face, and the girls were clearly as fascinated as he was. They were pawing his face, pulling his ears, grabbing his nose and twisting it, and he just sat there looking amazed and let them do it.
Then he looked up at her, and she saw that behind the burgeoning love in his eyes was a simmering anger fiercer than any she’d ever seen before, and she fell back a step.
He hated her.
She could see it in his eyes, in the black, bitter rage that filled them, and she turned away, tears welling. ‘I’ll put the kettle on,’ she said, more to give her something to do than anything. But then Ava started to cry again, and Libby whimpered, and she plonked the kettle down on the hob and turned back and took Ava from him.
‘Come on, sweetheart,’ she murmured, her voice sounding fractured and uncertain, and Ava picked up on it and threw herself backwards. She caught her easily, snuggling her close, and the baby started to tug at her jumper.
Oh, hell. Her breasts were prickling, the babies needed feeding, and Max—Max, who knew her body better than she knew it herself—was sitting there watching her with black, brooding eyes.
‘I need to feed her,’ she said, and then Libby joined in and started to yell. ‘Both of them.’
‘I’ll help you.’
‘I don’t think you can. You don’t have the equipment,’ she said with an attempt at levity, and as the penny dropped a dull flush of colour ran over his cheekbones.
‘Um—here,’ he said, handing Libby to her. ‘I’ll—um—’
‘Oh, sit down, Max,’ she said, giving up and heading for the sofa in the bay window. There was no point in procrastinating. And, anyway, he wasn’t going to see anything he hadn’t seen before. She sat down, pulled the cushions round to rest the babies on, one each side, undid her bra, pushed it out of the way and plugged them in.
He didn’t know where to look.
He knew where he wanted to look. Couldn’t drag his eyes away, in fact, but he didn’t think it was exactly polite to stare.
He stifled a cough of laughter. Polite? This situation was so far from being polite that it was positively off the chart, but he still couldn’t sit there and stare.
‘Kettle’s boiling. I’d love a cup of tea,’ she said, and he realised she was looking at him.
‘Ah—sure.’
He got up, went over to the Aga and lifted the kettle off, then didn’t know where to put it. On the lid? Maybe. He put the lid down, then realised there was room beside it. What a ridiculous system. What on earth was wrong with an electric kettle or the tap for boiling water they had in their apartment?
Their apartment?
Still? A year later?
‘Where are the mugs?’
‘Over the sink. The tea’s in the caddy there by the Aga, and the milk’s in the fridge in the utility room. Put some cold water in mine, please.’
He put the teabags in the mugs, stepped over the dog, fetched the milk and sloshed it in the tea, then put the milk away, stepping over the dog again, and took Julia her mug.
‘Thanks. Just put it there on the end of the table,’ she said, and he set it down and hesitated.
He could see the babies’ mouths working on Julia’s nipples, a bluish film of milk around their lips, fat little hands splayed out over the swollen white orbs of her breasts. They were so much bigger than normal, the skin on them laced faintly with blue veins, and he was fascinated. There was just something basic and fundamental and absolutely right about it.
And he felt excluded.
Isolated and cut off, kept out of this precious and amazing event which had taken place without him.
Cheated.
He turned away, taking his tea and propping himself morosely against the front of the Aga, huddling against its warmth. He felt cold right to his bones, chilled by his exclusion. And angry.
So furiously bloody angry that he was ready to hit something. A door? A wall? Not Jules. Never Jules, no matter how much she might infuriate him. It was only his surroundings that bore the brunt of his recent ill-temper, and right then he was ready to tear the house apart.
‘Max?’
He glanced across at her.
‘Could you take Ava for me? She’s finished, she just needs to burp. Could you walk round with her? Oh, and