In Bed With a Stranger Read Free

again. ‘The legal situation is utterly incomprehensible and the finances are worse. It’s such a bloody mess—I still can’t forgive Dad for dropping a bombshell like that in his will. The fact that Kit isn’t his natural son is just a technicality—he was brought up at Alnburgh and he’s taken responsibility for the place almost single-handed for the last fifteen years. I guess that if I’m gutted by the way things have turned out, it must be even worse for him. Has he mentioned it in his letters or anything?’
    Not meeting his eye, Sophie shook her head.
    ‘No, he hasn’t mentioned it.’
    The fact was he hadn’t mentioned anything much. Before he went he’d warned her that phone calls were frustrating and best avoided so she hadn’t expected him to ring, but she couldn’t help being a bit disappointed that he hadn’t. She had written to him several times a week—long letters, full of news and silly anecdotes and how much she was missing him. His replies had been infrequent, short and impersonal, and had left her feeling more lonely than if he hadn’t written at all.
    ‘I just hope he doesn’t hate me too much, that’s all,’ Jasper said unhappily. ‘Alnburgh meant everything to him.’
    ‘Don’t be silly. It’s not your fault that Kit’s mother disappeared with another man when he was just a little boy, is it? And anyway, it’s all in the past now, and, as my barking-mad mother would say, everything happens for a reason. If Kit was the heir there’d be absolutely no chance I’d be marrying him. He’d need a horsey wife who came complete with her own heirloom tiara and a three-year guarantee to produce a son. I’d fail on all counts.’
    Her tone was flippant, but her smile stiffened slightly as she said the bit about the son. Jasper didn’t seem to notice.
    ‘You come closer than Sergio. You’d both look good in a
tiara, but you certainly have the edge when it comes to bearing heirs.’
    ‘I wouldn’t bet on it.’
    It was no good. To her shame both her voice and her smile cracked and she had to press her hand to her mouth. Across the table Jasper looked horrified.
    ‘Soph? What’s wrong?’
    She grabbed her drink and took a gulp. The gin was cold, bitter, good. It felt as if it was clearing her head, although that was probably an ironic illusion.
    ‘I’m fine. I finally saw a doctor about the monthly hell that is my period, that’s all.’
    Jasper’s eyes widened. ‘God, Soph—it’s nothing—?’
    She waved a hand. ‘No, no, nothing serious. It’s as I thought—endometriosis. The good news is it’s not life-threatening, but the bad news is that there’s not much they can do about it and it could make getting pregnant a problem.’
    ‘Oh, honey. I had no idea having children was so important to you.’
    ‘Neither did I, until I met Kit.’ Sophie slid her sunglasses back down, feeling in need of something to hide behind. Having spent years listening to her mother and the women in the haphazard commune in which she’d grown up analyse everything in minute, head-wrecking detail, she usually went out of her way to avoid any kind of serious discussion, but there was part of her that wanted to share this bittersweet new feeling. ‘Finding out it might be difficult has made me realise how important it is—how’s that for irony?’ She sighed. ‘Anyway, the doctor didn’t say it was impossible, just that it could take a long time and it was best not to leave it too long.’
    He reached across the table and took her hand.
    ‘So when are you going to start trying?’
    Sophie looked at her phone again and looked up at him with a determined smile. ‘In about twenty-seven and a half hours.’
    The second hand quivered slightly as it edged wearily around the clock face. Sitting on a plastic chair in Intensive Care, watching it with wide-eyed fatigue, Kit kept thinking that it wouldn’t make it through the next minute.
    He knew the feeling.
    He had been here since late