Free For the Babies' Sakes (Expecting) (Harlequin Presents, No. 2280) by Sara Wood Page A

now?’ she snapped. ‘I admit, I’m probably run down and anaemic—’
    â€˜With all the signs of early pregnancy,’ Dan said remorselessly, his arms folded in a belligerent attitude.
    Helen flushed with resentment, puzzled by his fierce interrogation. ‘Don’t go on at me!’ she cried, feeling suddenly emotional.
    â€˜You cry more than you used to,’ he observed coldly as a tear trailed a shiny path down the side of her nose.
    â€˜I’ve more reason to!’ she yelled.
    â€˜Keep calm!’ he barked. ‘If you are pregnant, you need to change your way of life.’
    â€˜Typical!’ she snorted. ‘I have to start wearing pink gingham and drinking lemonade and smile sweetly all day long, while you swan about swashbuckling your way through life as usual!’
    â€˜I don’t swashbuckle. I work darn hard. And whatever you say, you can’t continue with your current job,’ he said obstinately. ‘Your schedule is so hectic that you’d put my child’s life at risk, and I won’t have that!’
    â€˜It’s my child, too!’ she pointed out heatedly. ‘And I’m certainly not mooning around waiting to give birth. I need to earn a living if I’m to provide for my child—’
    â€˜You don’t know you have a child yet,’ he reminded her grimly.
    â€˜Oh. No.’
    Deflated by that possibility, she felt confused and uncertain whether she welcomed the idea or not, now. Practically speaking, it would be a nightmare. But…something undeniably maternal was tugging at her heartstrings, whispering seductively that a baby would be wonderful.
    It was just the wrong time. When she was ready, shewanted a proper family: husband, child or children—the whole package. The whole point of having a baby was to share it with someone you loved. To coo over it together, watch it learn to toddle and speak, to play daft games and make sandcastles…
    Her body drooped with the realisation that it could be years before she met someone as special as Dan. And she’d be old and grey by then and they’d have to try IVF—
    â€˜Your shirt’s done up all wrong,’ Dan said huskily.
    Hormones, or something deep and needy, made her heart leap. With smoky eyes she gazed at him in puzzled confusion. He was moving towards her. Reaching out a hand. Undoing the buttons.
    The nerves in her body screamed at her. It had been a mistake to meet his black molasses eyes. She was beginning to drown in their hauntingly unfathomable depths and now the soft sultriness of his achingly sensual mouth was weakening her will and melting all her defences.
    Slowly she raised her hand. And miraculously stopped him.
    â€˜I can do it,’ she breathed, shocked to find how ragged she sounded, how rapidly her chest was rising and falling. She had to rebuff him. She knew that look of his. It was stark-naked carnality.
    And she ached to be in his arms again, to know that new and exhilarating sensation of their recent love-making, which had teetered precariously on the edge of desperation. But for her own sanity she must get a grip.
    Something in her eyes must have alerted him of her decision to stay aloof.
    â€˜Go on, then, do it,’ he challenged, remaining whisper-close, mind-numbingly desirable.
    Of course she fumbled. Made a hash of it. Got hot andbothered while he stood there, exuding male pheromones that were sending her crazy, her entire body liquid for him.
    â€˜There,’ she said shakily, standing her ground. ‘Dan, you’ve got to stop making passes at me. It’s over.’
    â€˜Is it?’ he asked hoarsely.
    Her eyes virtually crackled with anger. ‘Yes! You know it is!’
    â€˜Then how do you explain what keeps happening between us?’ he growled.
    â€˜I can’t answer for you. But my mind is clear, it’s just my body that’s still working in the past. It’ll soon get