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Her back straightens. Yep, just made her spikier. Too bad.
‘The nanny isn’t making any major parenting decisions.’ I aim to inject a little levity. ‘It’s enough that the two of us will probably debate them intensely. I’ve no doubt we’ll overthink our way around all sides of any issue and won’t need any outside interference to make it worse.’
She shoots me a look but to my pleasure she can’t hold her smile for long. She actually chuckles. ‘I don’twantto disagree with you.’
‘Then don’t,’ I reply, as if it’s the most obvious answer ever. But I feel a ridiculous level of relief and I smile back at her. ‘You can’t do it all by yourself, all of the time. You don’t have to. Not any more. You can share the load.’
‘Like you do?’
‘I have plenty of people who support me—I just told you only a few of my home team. So let’s get a nanny to tend to him for the late night feed. Just that one. We’ll see how it goes and then assess. Okay?’
She doesn’t actually know I’m being uncharacteristically reasonable here so she can’t appreciate my effort in that regard.
‘Okay,’ she mumbles. ‘Thank you.’
I can’t resist teasing her more so I lean really close. ‘Pardon? I didn’t quite catch that.’
‘Thank you.’ But there’s a defiant gleam in her eye as if giving me thanks is the last thing she wants to do.
And yeah, it’s the last thing I want from her. Idowant her time and attention. Her company. But somehow that has to be separate from all this and I can’t see how that’s possible so I pull back.
The flight drags. She reads every résumé cover to cover and puts them in an ordered pile of preference. Then she plays on her phone. I’m actually fidgeting because I want to talk to her but at the same time I want to control that urge. Just to prove to myself that I can. She suddenly reaches over and offers her phone. The screen is unlocked and there’s a photo of Lukas in front of me.
‘I thought...’ She shrugs and worries her lip somewhat helplessly. ‘I don’t know if you want to see them but, if you flick through, there’s every photo or little film I have of Lukas since he was born.’
Speechless, I take the phone from her and stare hungrily at the screen. I don’t know how much time passes as I absorb every image, every small video, every glimpse into his little life thus far. He’s only three months old but she has a hundred pictures of him and every last one is stunning. Maybe it’s her social media work but the woman can construct a frame. Maybe it’s that her subject is so completely perfect. He’s so beautiful. Yeah, I’m smitten with him. I never imagined I could feel so much for something—someone—so small. I slowly scroll backwards through the pictures and at one I draw a sharp breath. It doesn’t show Lukas. It’s Talia. A very heavily pregnant Talia.
Talia glances across and leans over to see which picture has me so floored.
‘Oh.’ Her cheeks redden. ‘Romy took some. She said I needed to record the pregnancy because it goes fast. So I posed a few times.’
She’s looking embarrassed in the photo and even more embarrassed now. My heart pounds. I swipe back one more.
‘Oh!’ She gasps. The colour in her face instantly intensifies. ‘That’s terrible,’ she babbles. ‘I forgot it was there. I didn’t mean...’
I don’t let her take the phone back. It’s a bathroom selfie. She’s wearing a bra and panties and nothing else. She has to be almost at full term. She’s so beautiful my heart basically bursts.
I just stare at it. At her. Raw yearning overwhelms me. ‘I missed yourentirepregnancy,’ I mutter between gritted teeth. ‘I never got toseeyou...not once...’
Not that night in the gondola cabin either. It was too dark. There were only glimpses of perfection when lightning lit the sky. And right now I’m almost overcome by the urge to tumble her to the floor and impregnate her again here and now and then chain her to me so I don’t miss another damned second of it. Yeah. Shocking.
I don’t, of course. But I do tap the phone and flag all the photos I’ve just been looking at.
‘What are you doing?’ she mumbles.
‘I want a copy of them,’ I almost growl as I pull out my own phone and wirelessly transfer the files. ‘Okay?’
I’m too gruff and it’s not really a question because I really don’t want her to say no. And for a guy who—I fully admit—is fully paranoid about other people having photos of me, it’s rough of me to just send copies of these direct to my phone.
‘Even those ones?’
Yeah. The ones of her. I nod jerkily. There’s silence and I slowly look up. I have to look her in the eyes to check I have her consent. Her bloody beautiful deep brown eyes snare me. I just drown in them. She’s still for a while, not saying anything while she reads who knows what in my own tense expression.
‘Okay,’ she says softly.
I swallow and make myself build some humanity. ‘Tell me about his birth,’ I croak. ‘Was it okay?’
She hesitates and now her gaze skitters from mine. ‘I don’t remember a lot of it.’
