Sheikh's Baby Bombshell Read Free Page B

one-night-stand protocol. I thought it best to make an early exit in case you had another appointment lined up.’
    Something hardened around his mouth. ‘I might have a reputation as a playboy, but I don’t have a revolving door on my bedroom.’
    ‘Is it true?’
    ‘Is what true?’
    ‘That you’re about to announce your engagement.’ Abby wasn’t sure why those words should hurt her so much, but they did.
    Your engagement. Not our engagement.
    He stepped away with a frown as he raked a hand through his hair. ‘Yes.’
    Ouch .
    ‘Congratulations.’ Her face almost cracked on her forced smile.
    ‘It is my duty to marry and produce an heir.’ His tone was flat, as if he were reading the words from a formal document.
    Abby had to stop her hand from straying to her abdomen to cover it protectively. ‘Do you love her?’
    The shutter came back down over his face. ‘Love has nothing to do with the arrangement. In fact, it is better if it doesn’t.’
    She frowned at him. ‘How can you do that? How can you marry someone you don’t love?’
    His mouth had that grim set to it again. ‘It is my destiny. I have no choice but to fulfil my duty.’
    ‘It sounds like it totally sucks to be royal,’ Abby said. ‘I would hate someone telling me who I could or couldn’t marry. I would only ever marry for love.’
    He looked at her for a long moment. He seemed to be memorising her features, one by one, storing them away for a time when he would revisit them. He touched her face again, an almost absent touch, as if he wasn’t quite sure if she was really standing there or just an apparition he had conjured up in his mind. ‘I’ve thought of you a lot over the last month.’ He traced a fingertip over her lower lip until every nerve was on fire. ‘Wondering what you were doing. Who you were with.’
    Abby suppressed a little shiver. ‘Me, too... I mean I thought of you, not me. A lot. About what we did that night. The one-night-stand thing. It was fun—’ fun? ‘—I mean it was wonderful. The best night of my life, actually...’
    His hands settled about her waist, his eyes dark and intense as they held hers. ‘Stay here with me this week. Just the two of us. Alone.’
    Abby bit her lip until she tasted blood. ‘Talib...I have something to tell you. It’s the reason I’m here.... The thing is...I’m not sure how to say it. I’ve been rehearsing it for the last couple of days, but there’s no way of saying it without shocking you. I’m shocked myself. I nearly passed out when I saw those positive lines come up on the test....’
    His face suddenly stilled and then drained of colour. ‘You’re... pregnant? ’

CHAPTER FIVE
    ‘Y ES ...’
    Talib closed his eyes for a moment. He opened them again and Abby was still standing in front of him with those big nutmeg-brown eyes, her face looking pinched and worried. ‘You’re sure?’
    She gave a miserable nod and said in a soft whisper. ‘I’m so sorry....’
    He tightened his hands on her waist. ‘It’s mine?’ Her face immediately fell and he felt like a jerk for even asking. ‘Of course it’s mine. You wouldn’t have come all this way if it wasn’t, would you?’
    Her forehead was puckered. ‘I don’t understand how it happened.’
    Talib did. He had been very slow to withdraw the last time. He had wanted to hold her for as long as he could, to store the memory of her touch in his head. In his body.
    ‘Condoms can leak or tear.’ He held her against him, stroking her back to soothe her as he tried to think.
    Abby was having a baby.
    His baby .
    His heir.
    ‘Are you well? Is everything all right with the pregnancy so far?’
    ‘Yes, I’m fine. I feel fine. But I don’t want to get rid of it. Please don’t ask that of me.’ Her voice was soft but no less implacable.
    Talib eased her away to look at her. ‘No one is going to make you do that, least of all me. I’ll sort something out. A way to manage this.’ There has to be a way to