A Question of Pride (18 page)

Max stiffened. 'Who asked you?' he came back curtly.

Clea smiled, because she knew he had been leading up to suggesting it. 'I must have counted at least four different women you've found comfort in over the past months.'

'Are you back to character assassinating, Clea?' he drawled. 'Since you refused any kind of relationship with me—legal or otherwise—I don't see that you have the right to comment on my private life.'

'True,' she conceded. Then added, curiously, 'But how would you feel if, when this is all over—the baby, I mean—if I take another lover?'

His face tightened at that, eyes narrowing to cold slits, 'You're digressing somewhat.'

I'm trying to understand how you feel about me, she answered silently. His feelings towards her had certainly changed, she would have to be stupid not to realise that after last night Max had revealed a desperate need for her that went deeper than the mere physical. It reminded her of the rare times before the baby when he had become frantic in her arms; only, then, he'd hated the feeling it left him with, and now he was willing to face it openly.

'OK,' he sighed suddenly. 'You've made your point. I would hate to think of another man touching you.

And that therefore means you have the right to feel the same about me. Do you,' he added curiously,

'hate to think of me with other women?'

I despise it, she thought, and smiled slowly. 'This is becoming very profound, isn't it? I tell you what...'

She sat back in her chair to look directly at him, eyes wide and bland. 'I'll come and live with you. How does that appeal? I'll move in here for the time it will take for us both to wear out whatever it is that makes us want each other so badly.'

She was goading him into something, though he didn't know what. Max eyed her suspiciously, trying to peer through the bland mask she wore. 'And the baby?' he asked.

She shrugged. 'We wanted each other before, and we still want each other, despite the baby. If you're suggesting it's morally wrong, then I can't see the difference. Being your mistress with a child or without it makes no difference to the morality in the relationship.'

'I've never lived with a woman before,' he murmured absently.

'Have you ever wanted one as you want me, before?'

He thought about that quite seriously, then said, 'No, I want you quite desperately, Clea. I have to admit that. But what about you? What are you planning to get from such an unsatisfactory arrangement?'

'Who said it was unsatisfactory to me?' she challenged. 'I have to say at this point, Max,' she went on, throwing him an obstacle, 'I don't know for how much longer we can make love before the baby is born.

I'll have to enquire.'

'You're talking about this as though it were just some cold business deal!' He was becoming angry with her. Clea stayed calm. Couldn't he hear himself? she thought wryly. Couldn't he make the comparison she was trying to draw for him, between himself when he'd commissioned her as his lover, and the way she was doing it now to him?

'OK,' he agreed suddenly, making her blink. He was eyeing her in a calculating way that made her stir uncomfortably. 'You can move in with me. Right away. Today,' he announced firmly, standing up and moving around the table towards her. 'We'll close up your flat for the time being—until you're ready to break this off between us. Then it will still be there, waiting for you to return to when the time comes.

Now let's go back to bed.' He grasped her arm, pulling her, bewildered, from the chair. 'We've got a couple of hours left before we need get up for real.'

'B-but...' she stammered helplessly. This wasn't going the way she'd expected it to. Max had thrown her by agreeing to her proposition. She'd expected him to turn tail and run!

'No buts,' he commanded. 'I'm tired, even if you're not. We can discuss details later.'

'But, Mrs Walters

A dark brow rose sardonically. 'She'll have to get used to finding you in my bed some time. Why not now?' he pointed out quite logically, his hand firm on her arm as he took her back into the bedroom. 'I see no sense in forsaking a warm and comfortable bed for the sake of the misplaced sensibilities of my housekeeper.'

It wasn't her sensibilities I was thinking of, Clea thought mulishly, as he turned her around and deftly dealt with the zip on her dress, so it was once again falling into a heap on the floor.

She didn't see the amused tilt to Max's mouth. She had no idea how he was aware that he had just called her bluff and turned it to his own advantage. 'Mmm,' he murmured, placing his lips to her shoulder.

'Like silk.' His hands curved her thickened waist, pulling her back against him, face buried in the soft fall of her beautiful hair. 'Delicious. My warm and sensual Clea. Wild and wanton Clea ... I could lose myself in your sweetness ...'

'Max ...' She was trembling with the emotions he stirred in her, her mind beginning to swirl.

'I know.' He sighed tragically. 'It's late, and you're too tired. So am I, come to that—let's go to bed.'

That wasn't quite what she'd meant when she had uttered his name in that husky way, but Clea didn't correct him, sighing contentedly as she coiled up against him beneath the thin sheet.

I've done it again, she acknowledged as she slipped into-sleep, I've let him take me over again. Weak, Clea, she rebuked herself, but couldn't find any strength to go with the censure. Weak ...

They slept, curled up in each other's arms, problems shelved until the morning proper. But the morning brought a whole new set of problems with it. Worries that managed to banish all the rest by the sheer weight of concern.

Max woke her with a kiss on her flushed cheek. 'Wake up, sleepy head,' he murmured softly, his smiling face so gentle, as it leaned over her, that it took a moment to convince herself that she wasn't dreaming. 'I would much rather have left you to sleep on,' he continued while she struggled to throw off the mists of sleep. 'But I didn't think you'd take kindly to my leaving you to face the dreaded Mrs Walters on your own.'

He was already dressed for work in a dove-grey business suit. His skin smelled of soap and felt smooth against her cheek, his black hair was still damp from a recent shower, his eyes were warm on her sleepy face.

'What time is it?' she mumbled, instinctively reaching up to hook a lazy arm around his neck, bringing his face closer to hers. 'Mmm, you smell nice—fresh and clean.' She kissed him on the mouth, the embrace meandering into a sluggish desire.

It was Max who pulled away, reluctance in the slowness with which he disentangled himself. 'Don't tempt me,' he sighed. 'It would be so easy to climb back in there with you and forget everything else, but I daren't. Not if I'm going to pack two days' work into one morning.'

He grinned at her puzzled expression. 'We're going to move you in here, or have you forgotten? I thought I'd pick you up here at lunch time, and we'd go over to your flat to pack your things.'

'You don't mean to waste any time, do you?' she noted wryly. 'What if I've changed my mind?'

Max shook his head. 'No can do,' he stated glibly. 'Now you've had your wicked way with me, you're going to have to stand by me.'

It was nice, all this. He
looked
like the 'day-time Max' she was used to seeing at this time of the day, but in every other way he was different: indulgent, tender—loving, almost.

Clea smiled, and it was a slow, sensual smile that darkened her eyes and lent temptation to her soft mouth. 'It seems I've been trapped,' she sighed in mockery, privately amazed at the ease at which they were teasing each other about something that had rather sensitive undercurrents. 'But no lunch,' she refused sadly. 'I have to work till five. The packing will have to wait until then.'

Max sat away from her, swapping indulgence for gravity. 'Let me call Brad Gattings and tell him you won't be going in again,' he suggested huskily. 'I'll lend him one of my own secretaries until his own gets back, if it will ease your conscience. But don't go back there, Clea, please.'

She levered herself up on to an arm, using her free hand to push the tumble of hair from her face, revealing the stubborn set of her mouth. 'Don't spoil it, Max,' she advised softly, but with enough warning to carry.

He stood up abruptly. 'Have I any choice?'

But half an hour later they had to acknowledge that the choice had been taken away from both of them.

Clea got up, showered, dressed in her white dress and made for the kitchen, praying that Mrs Walters hadn't yet arrived. She could do without the woman's disapproving stares this early in the morning.

Max was alone in the kitchen, to her relief. He had made a pot of coffee and, as she slipped into a chair at the kitchen table, he placed a round of freshly made toast in front of her. 'Eat,' he commanded, and Clea hid her amusement.

The old Max wouldn't have thought of making her coffee and toast! That one would have been out of the door as soon as he could make his get-away, off into that other world he occupied, lover forgotten for his real love—his company and the exhilarating challenges waiting for him there.

She sipped slowly at her coffee, aware of a nagging ache in her head, and a strange feeling of malady about her body; nothing to put her finger on, just a general sluggishness and the headache. Overtiredness, she put it down to, and a disturbed night, she thought wryly. She wasn't used to them any more, disturbed nights.

'I'll drive you home when you're ready,' Max offered, leaning against a shiny worktop to drink his coffee.

He was eager to be off, yet containing it, prepared to wait.

In reward for his unusual thoughtfulness, Clea turned to smile at him. 'If you need to be off, I can always order a taxi. It
is
getting late, and I remember how you like to be in the office for eight-thirty.'

'I'll wait for you,' was his quiet, firm reply.

Clea accepted his word with no demur. Her head had begun to pulse rather alarmingly, and she stared distastefully at the coffee left in her cup. I feel decidedly ill, she thought dully. She hadn't suffered morning sickness for months, yet the feeling overwhelming her now was warning just that. She got up, swaying slightly when her legs wobbled beneath her. Her hand went unconsciously to her brow. A surge of heat prickled along her skin and she took in a deep gulp of air.

'I feel—strange,' she murmured to the watchful man close to her.

It seemed as if every pulse in her body had decided to make itself felt, thumping heavily, throbbing in a strange, frightening way, slow and sluggish, yet making her feel breathless, as though she'd been running.

A desperate panic hit her from nowhere, setting up a mad buzzing in her ears, and she screwed up her face on a wave of pain.

'My head,' she moaned, pressing a hand to her brow, stumbling slightly as she tried to move. 'Max!'

A pleading hand went out towards him and was caught in a firm grasp. Max was reaching for her as she began to fail, her legs buckling beneath her. The whole episode could only have spanned mere seconds, yet she felt everything in strange slow motion. Her head pounded at the temples, and she knew at that precise moment that she was about to pass out.

Max caught her as she went, cursing softly as he scooped her up into his arms, his body muscles clenching to take the sudden extra weight.

'Damn you, Clea!' he rasped, and went pale when he looked took in the hectic flush on her face, felt the heat emanating from her body, and the way her pulses raced frighteningly. 'Damn your stubbornness!'

Dr Fielding arrived just as Clea showed signs of coming around, but she was dazed and not entirely aware of what was going on around her.

Max watched worriedly as the doctor examined her, took her blood pressure, listened for a long time to the baby's heartbeat. She had gone from burning hot to icy cold in moments. It had made Max frantic, because he didn't know what to do. Now she lay very still, her hand resting loosely in his, eyes closed and breathing shallow.

'I'll give her something to make her rest properly,' the doctor announced as a concluding mutter to his unrushed examination.

'No, I don't want anything.' Clea roused herself enough to refuse. 'No drugs, they're not good for the baby.'

Dr Fielding looked down on her pale face and raised bushy brows in a sardonic expression Clea missed because her eyes were still closed. 'And you think I would prescribe something that was
bad
for the baby?' he challenged haughtily. 'A mild sedative, nothing more, Miss Maddon,' he assured in his gentlest doctor's voice. 'Your blood pressure is way up. The only way to get it down is by complete rest—and I mean flat-on-your back, not-moving-off-the-bed kind of rest,' he added sternly, then turned his attention to Max.

'I should inform her mother,' he said frowningly. 'She mustn't be on her own ...'

'She's staying here,' Max stated grimly.

The doctor's eyes widened in surprise. 'But Miss Maddon is ...'

'Having my baby,' Max put in harshly. His grip on her limp hand increased. 'You can be sure I'll take good care of her.' He dragged in a deep breath, trying desperately to grasp at control, his gaze locked on Clea's white face. Tm responsible for her. She's mine.'

'I was thinking of a few days in hospital, actually,' the doctor said gently.

'No hospital,' Max once again stated. 'Clea has a dislike for hospitals. Her father was confined to one for a long time before he died. She'll hate it there.'

The doctor hesitated assessingly, noting the strength of character, the set of Max's square jaw—and the way his gaze had hardly left the wan face on the pillows. Then he nodded mutely, and indicated that they should leave the room.

Having to force himself, Max stood up and followed the doctor from the bedroom. 'What's the matter with her?' he demanded as soon as they were out of earshot of Clea. He had spent the last thirty minutes torturing himself with the idea that he was directly to blame for Clea's unexpected collapse. If he hadn't ...

'Overwork, overtiredness, high blood pressure—I could go on and blame the weather, plus a whole lot of other things, but I won't. I'll just say that I've been warning her for weeks now to ease up. Now her body has told her the same thing, but with more authority than I could manage.' He smiled wryly at that, as though Clea's stubbornness had already tested him greatly. 'She'll want her iron tablets. Perhaps you can get her to take them regularly! God knows, she's the worst pill-taker I've ever come across.'