If he had stayed they could have worked this out. With IVF she could have been the one who had just had a baby. She could be a mother now.
She needed to think. She needed a walk to help focus her mind. She changed into a pair of shorts and her sneakers and headed for the beach.
As she walked she realised it was unlikely that her marriage would have survived regardless. They had broken up because of the stress of infertility but Ben had very quickly moved on. If she’d been unable to rely on him to stick by her through that situation she knew she wouldn’t have been able to rely on him for anything else. Quite possibly he would have run for the hills the moment the going had got tough. Quite possibly she would have ended up divorced with a baby.
Would she want to be a single mother?
Yes.
If she could have a baby without a partner she knew she would take that opportunity. She had never imagined herself as a single mother but she knew that if that was her only option she wouldn’t hesitate any more. She still wanted a baby more than anything.
More than she wanted Seb?
Yes. Her heart ached with longing and her womb ached with emptiness. A baby was very much her priority.
She had fallen in love with Seb but planning a future with him had never been realistic and especially not now. He was her second ever boyfriend and she wasn’t even sure she could call him that. They weren’t thinking about the future and he didn’t want commitment. He didn’t want to settle down and she was pretty sure he wasn’t going to want kids.
She would have to break up with him. It was her only option.
She wanted it all but if she couldn’t have it all she was going to choose motherhood, or the possibility of it at least, and if her dream was to become a reality she needed to find the man who could help her to make that happen.
Which meant she needed to break up with Seb.
He was starting his holidays at the end of the week. He was heading off in his boat so their relationship wasn’t going to last any longer than that anyway, no matter what she wished for, so the best thing to do would be to end it now. Quickly and swiftly. Waiting a couple more days wasn’t going to make it any easier. She needed to move on to the rest of her life.
The decision was made. Now all she had to do was tell him.
Telling him would give him the chance to change his mind if he wanted to and she knew she was still hopeful that he would make that choice. Perhaps he would decide that she was worth it.
* * *
The sun was low in the sky as she returned to the apartment. Her phone buzzed in her pocket. She pulled it out and looked at the caller ID. Seb.
‘Where are you? Is everything okay?’
He sounded worried but she didn’t think she could put his mind at ease so she opted for a simple reply. ‘I’m almost home. I’ll see you in a minute.’
But Callum’s apartment wasn’t home. And Vickers Hill hadn’t felt like home either.
Luci knew she wouldn’t be going back to Vickers Hill. She’d felt like a fish out of water there. Everyone was settled or, worse, if they weren’t she had known them all her life and she knew she wasn’t going to find the man she was looking for amongst them. She needed new faces. New places. She had no idea where she would go but she knew she wouldn’t go back.
She would need to find somewhere that felt right.
Also, she needed a man, or his sperm at the very least, and a place to live. But one thing at a time. Her first priority was to speak to Seb. She needed to tell him her decision. There was no point delaying. She needed to get on with things. She was a girl with a mission.
* * *
The door to the apartment was open. Seb was waiting for her. He still looked worried. There was a little crease between his eyebrows and his blue eyes were dark with concern. But she almost didn’t notice. It was a hot night and he was dressed only in a pair of shorts. Shirtless and bare-chested, she found it hard to notice anything else.
He looked incredible. She’d almost forgotten how gorgeous he was. She should ask him to put a shirt on, she wasn’t going to be able to concentrate when he was semi-naked, but she resisted. Why deprive herself of her last chance to see him like this? She could use the memory.
He greeted her with a hug. God, that felt good. His arms were strong, his embrace warm, and Luci could have stayed there quite happily for the rest of her life.
‘I’ve missed you,’ he said as he let her go. ‘Is anything wrong?’ He ran a thumb under her eye and Luci’s knees buckled slightly at his touch. ‘Have you been crying?’
Her tears had dried long ago but she knew her eyes would still be puffy and red. She wiped a hand across them. ‘Yes. But they were happy tears, I think.’
‘You think? What’s going on?’
‘I need to sit down.’
Seb ushered her to the couch. ‘Can I get you anything?’
She shook her head. ‘No. But I need to talk to you.’ Luci launched into her news. She knew if she waited she’d chicken out. She was sorely tempted to spend one last night with Seb and tell him tomorrow but it wouldn’t be any easier then. She needed to do this now. ‘I had a phone call from my GP today. She was calling about some test results. Results that I should have got ages ago but the lab made a mistake. I didn’t really notice that the results hadn’t come back because of everything else that was going on at the time between Ben and me.’
‘Are you okay?’
‘Yes. I’m perfectly okay. That was what she was ringing me about. Apparently I am perfectly healthy and fertile. I can have children. The problem wasn’t with me. It was with Ben and me. But even so we could have had a family together if we’d stuck it out. IVF would have fixed it.’
‘Wow.’ Seb sat back and ran his hands through his hair. The muscles in his arms and chest flexed and Luci averted her gaze so she wasn’t tempted to throw herself into his arms. ‘Does Ben know?’
She shook her head. ‘No.’
‘Are you going to tell him?’
‘I hadn’t thought about it. Probably not. It doesn’t matter to him any more. He’s moved on. I have too. My marriage is over but now I have a chance to fulfil my dream of having a family. I am going to chase that dream. Which means I need to find the man who wants to follow that same dream, the man who wants to share my future. I know that’s not what you want so I need to say goodbye.’
‘Now?’
Luci nodded. She knew it would be hard. It was so tempting to spend their last remaining nights together but she knew the longer she waited the harder it would get. If her heart was going to break she wanted to get it over and done with.
‘You’ll be gone in a few days anyway. We both knew it was only a bit of fun, just a temporary arrangement. It was always a matter of when, not if, and I need to move on to the next phase of my life. I appreciate every minute, everything we have shared, you have helped me more than you’ll ever know. I know I’m ready to let someone else into my life now.’
‘What are you going to do?’
‘I’m not sure yet. Finish off my last two weeks here while I try to work out what this all means and then I don’t know what. But I’m not going back