‘That’s what my hubby always says when he rolls back from the pub after one too many,’ Janet said drily, ‘usually after helping himself to what’s in my purse.’
‘You’re too good for him. You know that, don’t you?’
Janet smiled at him as Forde left the kitchen. Be that as it may, and she certainly didn’t disagree with Forde’s summing up of her Geoff, Mr and Mrs Masterson were a perfect match. She had always thought so.
Her smile faded. She just hoped they could work their problems out, that was all. In spite of her encouraging words to Mr Masterson, she was worried Mrs Masterson would never come home, short of a miracle.
IT WAS the middle of November. A mild November, thus far, with none of the heavy frosts and icy temperatures that could make working outside difficult. But Melanie wasn’t thinking of the weather as she left the doctor’s surgery. She walked over to her pickup truck in the car park, but once she was sitting inside she didn’t start the engine, staring blindly out of the windscreen.
She hadn’t seen Forde since the day she had begun working for Isabelle, although he had phoned her several times, ostensibly with questions about his mother’s garden. On learning from her solicitor that they’d been waiting for some time for Forde to sign and return certain documents appertaining to the divorce, she’d called him at home two nights ago.
She leant back in the truck’s old, tattered seat and shut her eyes. Forde had been cheerfully apologetic about the delay, making some excuse about pressure of work, but what had really got under her skin was the woman’s voice she’d heard in the background when she’d been talking to him. She hadn’t asked him who he was with, she had no right whatsoever to question him after the way she’d walked out of their home and the marriage, but it had hurt her more than she would have thought possible to think of another woman in their home.
Stupid. Opening her eyes, she inhaled deeply. Forde was at liberty to see whomever he wished. Nevertheless, she hadn’t been able to sleep that night. She had arrived at work the next morning feeling ill, and when she’d fainted clean away as she and James had been preparing a gravelled area for a number of architectural and structural plants her assistant had been scared to death.
Poor James. If she weren’t so shocked and dazed at what the doctor had found she could have smiled. He’d been beside himself, saying she hadn’t been well for weeks and what if she fainted again when she was driving or using some of the equipment they’d hired for the job? She could badly injure herself or worse. In the end, just to appease him, she had promised to call her doctor’s surgery and as it happened they’d had a cancellation this morning. She had walked into Dr Chisholm’s room explaining she knew she was suffering from stress and all her symptoms could be put down to that, and if she could just have some pills to take the edge off she would be fine. He’d gently reminded her that he was the doctor and he’d prefer to give her a thorough examination after asking her a few questions.
Her hands trembling, she forced herself to start the engine. She had to get back to work. There was still plenty to do at Hillview and each day the mild weather continued was a bonus. The old-timers were predicting that a mild October and November meant the country would suffer for it come December and January. They were on target to finish the job mid-December and if any bad weather could hold off till then, it would be a huge benefit.
But she found she couldn’t drive. She was shaking too much. She sat huddled in her seat as reality began to dawn on her stunned mind. She was expecting a baby. Forde’s baby. That one night in August had had repercussions the like of which she hadn’t imagined in her wildest dreams. With hindsight, it was ridiculous she hadn’t suspected the non-appearance of her monthlies, the tiredness and queasiness that had developed into bouts of nausea and sickness could be something other than stress. But she hadn’t. She really hadn’t. Perhaps she’d blanked her mind to the possibility she could be pregnant, but there was no mistaking it now. She was thirteen weeks pregnant.
She had fainted a couple of times in the early days when she was carrying Matthew. Matthew. Oh, Matthew, Matthew… She began to cry, her mind in turmoil. ‘I’m sorry, my precious baby,’ she murmured helplessly. ‘I never meant for this to happen. I love you, I’ll always love you. You know that, don’t you?’
How long she sat there she didn’t know. She only came to herself when her driver’s door was suddenly yanked open and Forde crouched down beside her, his voice agonised as he said, ‘Nell? Nell, what is it? What’s the matter?’
He was the only person she wanted to see and yet the last person, and she couldn’t explain that even to herself. Desperately trying to control herself, she stammered, ‘Wh-what are you—you doing here?’
He had closed her door and walked round the bonnet, sliding into the passenger seat and taking her into his arms—in spite of the gear stick—before she knew what was happening. ‘My mother realised you weren’t with James this morning and asked where you were,’ he murmured above her head. ‘James said you’d gone to the doctor’s, that he was worried about you. Damn it, Nell, I’m your husband. If anyone has the right to be worried about you, it’s me. What’s wrong?’
She hadn’t had time to think about this, to decide what to tell him—if anything. But no, she would have to tell him, she thought in the next moment. He had a right to know. He was the father. The father. Oh, hell, hell, this couldn’t be happening. And yet in spite of her desperate confusion and the feeling she’d let Matthew down in some way, her maternal instincts had risen with a fierceness that had overwhelmed her.
She thought of all the heavy work she’d done over the past weeks and breathed a silent prayer of thankfulness she hadn’t lost this tiny person growing inside her. But now she was scared, petrified something would happen to the baby because of her.
‘Nell?’ Forde’s voice was a rumble above her head as he continued to hold her close. ‘Whatever this is, whatever’s wrong, we’ll get through it, OK?’
His words acted like an injection of adrenaline. She pulled away, wiping her eyes with the back of her hand in a childish gesture that belied her words when she said baldly, ‘I’m pregnant.’
Forde heard the words but for a moment they didn’t register. Since his mother had called him to say Melanie was at the doctor’s surgery, that she had been ill for weeks without telling anyone, he’d imagined she was suffering from every terminal illness under the sun.
She had been so thin and fragile-looking the last time he’d seen her, he’d told himself with savage self-condemnation. He should have done something about it. And everyone knew certain diseases and conditions were only successfully treated if you did something about them fast. And it had been weeks, months …
He had driven like a madman to the address of the surgery James had given his mother, one eye on every vehicle coming in the opposite direction in case she had passed him. He’d fully expected she would be gone when he pulled into the doctor’s car park and when he’d seen the truck had known a moment’s deep relief before he’d realised she was bent over the steering wheel with her head in her hands. Then he’d known a panic he’d never felt before.
His face as stunned as hers had been when Dr Chisholm had given her the news, he said, ‘What did you say?’
‘I’m—I’m expecting a baby.’ Drawing on every scrap of composure at her disposal, she went on, ‘The night you came to my cottage in August, it happened then. I’m thirteen weeks pregnant.’
He raked back his hair in the old familiar way. ‘But you’re on the pill.’ It had been one of the things they had argued about in the months following the miscarriage, her insistence