Free The Heiress's Secret Baby by Jessica Gilmore

slip up herself. Not careful Polly Rafferty.
    Not until now.
    How could she have not known? Suspected that the bug she just couldn’t shift might be something more? But she had continued with the pills her doctor had prescribed her for her trip, relieved to be spared the inconvenience of her monthly cycle, and missed nature’s most glaring warning.
    ‘Okay,’ she muttered. How hard could taking one of these be? A blue line, two pink lines, a cross for yes. A positive sign? That was a little presumptuous. Another simply said ‘pregnant’. She swallowed, hard, the lump in her throat making the simple act difficult. Painful.
    She jumped as a knock sounded on her window, muttering as the packets fell to the floor. She hastily gathered them up. They felt wrong, like contraband. It was as if just being seen with them branded her in some unwanted way.
    Looking up, she saw Gabe. He must have seen her reading the packets. Heat flooded through her and she took a deep breath, trying her best to summon her usual poise.
    She opened the door. ‘Hi.’
    ‘They have a room we can use.’ He stood aside as she got out of the car and waited while she gathered the dropped boxes, stuffing them into the carrier bag.
    ‘Won’t they wonder why we are checking in so late with no luggage?’
    Gabe huffed out a short laugh. ‘Polly. They will think we are illicit lovers looking for a bed for an hour, or travellers realising we need a bed for the night. Or, more likely, they won’t think at all. Come on.’
    He took the bag from her as if it were nothing, as if it didn’t carry the key to her hopes and dreams. To the freedom she had never even appreciated until this moment.
    ‘Come on.’ He strode off towards the hotel.
    Polly hesitated. Maybe she could wait until she got home after all. In fact maybe she could just wait, wait for this nightmare to be over.
    Her hand crept to her abdomen and stayed there. What if? There was only one way to find out.
    The hotel lobby was as anonymous as the outside, the floor tiled in a nondescript beige, the walls a coffee colour accented by meaningless abstract prints, the whole set off by fake oak fittings. Gabe led the way confidently past the desk and Polly noted how the receptionists’ eyes followed him.
    And how their eyes rested on her in jealous appraisal, making her all too aware of her old tracksuit, her lack of make-up. She lifted her head; let them speculate, let them judge.
    They walked along a long corridor, doors at regular intervals on either side. ‘Aha,
voici
,’ Gabe muttered and stopped in front of one of the white wooden doors.
    Number twenty-six. Such a random number, bland and meaningless. It didn’t feel prophetic.
    He opened the door with the key card and stood aside to let Polly enter. Her eyes swept around the room. The main part of the room was taken up by a large double bed made up in white linen with a crimson throw and matching pillows. The same tired abstracts were on the walls of the room; a TV and a sizeable desk completed the simple layout.
    The door to her right stood open to reveal a white tiled bathroom.
    The bathroom.
    Panic whooshed through her and Polly put out a hand to steady herself against the wall. It was time.
    What if she was pregnant?
    What if she wasn’t?
    The thought froze her. That was what she wanted. Wasn’t it?
    ‘I’m going to order some food. I didn’t manage more than a couple of forkfuls of that omelette. You should eat. What do you want?’ Gabe’s voice broke through her paralysis like a spoon stirring slowly through thick treacle.
    Polly blinked at him, trying to make sense of the words. How could he even think of food at a time like this? ‘I’m not hungry.’
    ‘I’m ordering for you anyway. I’m going to have a beer. What do you want to drink?’ He flashed a look at the bag on the bed. ‘You’re going to need a lot of liquid to get through that lot.’
    As if the whole episode weren’t mortifying enough. Why hadn’t they