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‘But you said you saw hihteen?’

Ellie didn’t answer for a moment, because this territory was not only forbidden—it was unmarked She wondered whether she should tell him—but how could she not? She hadn’t talked about it with anyone before because she didn’t want to look as if she was drowning in self-pity, but ht to know

‘I did see him,’ she said slowly ‘After my mother died, I tracked hihtly surprised when he agreed’ And slightly scared, too, because she’d built him up in her head to be so for the closeness she’d never had with her uilty as the next person of wanting a fairy tale which didn’t exist The big reunionwhich was going toin her life better

‘What happened?’

She narrowed her eyes ‘You really want to know?’

‘I do You tell a good story,’ he said, surprisingly

She wanted to tell him that it wasn’t a story, but when she stopped to think about it— story—wasn’t that how the old cliché went? She cleared her throat ‘There was no psychic connection between us No sense that here was the person whose genes I shared We didn’t even look alike He sat on the other side of a noisy table in a café at Waterloo station and toldbitch who had almost ruined his life’

‘And that was it?’ he asked after a long moment

‘Prettyabout ht I’d asked his account, froly look on his face, but the look had been tinged with satisfaction—as if he’d been glad of an excuse to be angry with her She reainst the table and her untouched cappuccino slopping everywhere in a frothy puddle ‘He told ain And then he left’

Alek heard the deter twisted darkly in his gut Was it recognition? A realisation that everyone carried their own kind of pain, but that most of it was hidden away? Suddenly her fierce ambition became understandable—an ambition which had been forced into second place by the baby He felt a pang of guilt as he recalled how cavalier he’d been about her losing her job Suddenly, he could understand her insistence on e—a request which must have been fuelled by the uncertainty of her own for his wife, but because she wanted to give her own baby the security she’d never had

But recognising so He needed to be clear about the facts and so did she—and the most important fact she needed to realise was that he could never do the norht be capable of honouring his responsibility to her and the baby—but, emotionally, wasn’t he cut from exactly the same cloth as her father? Hadn’t he walked away from women in the past—blind to their tears and their needs?

Ellie Brooks wasn’t his type, but even if she were he was the last man she needed She needed his name on a birth certificate and she needed his e that Neh A bitter se that very well But if she wanted soiven her, then he was the wrong person

She had pushed the heavy fringe away froht And now that she no longer had those generous curves, there was a kind of fragility about her which gave her skin a curious luminosity And suddenly, all his certainties seeot that it was infinitely more sensible to keep his distance from her as he was overcome by a powerful desire to take her in his arms and offer her comfort

He sed, his feelings confusing hi him He didn’t want to be in thrall to anyone, but certainly not to her Because he recognised that Ellie possessed so which no woman before her had ever possessed A part of hiive her a special kind of power? A power she could so easily abuse if he wasn’t careful

He walked quickly towards the door, realising that he needed to get the hell out of there ‘You’d better unpack,’ he said abruptly ‘And then we need to sit down and discuss the practicalities of you living here’