Prodigal Son, page 27
part #1 of The Family Business Series Series
“What about children?” she said. “If we have a child together, you’ll love him or her, won’t you?”
“That’s different,” Ethan said.
“Is it?”
“You don’t choose to love your children. It just happens.”
“You think people choose to love each other or not? That you can choose to fall in or out of love with someone?”
“I think that human beings are unreliable and fickle and childish and selfish and ultimately unknowable,” he said.
“And yet you want to make a baby with me?”
He looked blank for a moment, then he smiled self-mockingly. “Which only proves my point, right? People are unreliable.”
She understood what he meant. Jacob had let her down, hadn’t he? He’d proven to be all the things Ethan described. And yet her relationship with him hadn’t turned her into a cynic. It hadn’t destroyed her faith in love.
She looked at Ethan, wondering. What would it take to do that to a person? What had gone wrong between him and his wife?
She forced herself to swallow the questions crowding her throat. He didn’t want to talk about it. That much was obvious.
She leaned down and picked up one of the balls she’d been practicing with. “Think you can play with a dodgy eye?”
He didn’t immediately shift gears, but when he did he came out with all guns blazing. “Better still, I think I can beat you, slowpoke. Again.”
“Again? I won the last two matches in a row.”
“Are we counting last week? Because I believe I was up on points before we called it a night.”
“No, we’re not counting last week and you’re full of it, you know that?”
He smiled, and it felt like an achievement. As though she’d given him a small moment of lightness in an otherwise dark day.
“It’s been said before. Usually when I’ve got a game or two over you,” he countered.
“Don’t bank on that happening tonight.”
“We’ll see.”
“And don’t go thinking that I’m going to go easy on you because you smeared a little axle grease under your eye,” she added.
Ethan laughed, the sound loud in the enclosed court. “Them’s fighting words, Ms. Knight.”
“And talk is cheap, Mr. Stone.”
She watched him as he moved into position on the court. There was still a grim cast to his features but she could tell he was making an effort to shake off his mood. She felt as though she was seeing two people—the man she’d always thought Ethan was, and the man he truly was. The charming, slightly shallow, witty playboy, and the complex, damaged man.
He must have loved his wife a great deal once upon a time.
Because great disappointment was almost always preceded by great hope and great happiness, wasn’t it?
“Haven’t got all night, slowpoke. Clock’s ticking.”
He was watching her, one eyebrow cocked in challenge. She shook off her thoughts and bounced the ball.
“Buckle up, big guy. It’s going to be a bumpy night.”
The trash talking continued as they played the first game. Despite what she’d said about not giving him special treatment because of his injury, she kept a close watch on him and when he winced and rubbed his temple when he thought she wasn’t looking she walked straight to the corner and grabbed her towel.
“Don’t tell me you’re admitting defeat after one game?” Ethan asked.
“You’ve got a headache. Time to go home, Rocky.”
She started zipping the cover over her racquet.
“I don’t suppose it would make any difference if I said I was fine?”
“Nope. Go home and take an aspirin.”
Ethan joined her in the corner, crouching to collect his racquet cover.
“Worried about me, slowpoke?” He glanced at her, his head tilted to one side, a playful, warm light in his deep blue eyes.
They were close, a few feet apart, and for a moment she was flustered, unable to tear her gaze from his. Then she rallied.
“Of course I am. I’ve got a vested interest now, remember. Unless you’ve come to your senses and changed your mind?” She could hear the note of uncertainty in her voice and she winced inwardly. Hadn’t she already decided that Ethan wasn’t the kind of man to offer something so important on impulse?
He stood. “I’m not going anywhere, Alex.”
“Then you’d better get home and rest that pretty head of yours.” She knelt and fussed pointlessly with her gym bag, feeling ridiculously self-conscious.
Over the past week she’d revealed an enormous amount of herself to this man and it seemed she revealed more with every conversation. She didn’t like feeling at a disadvantage.
Better get used to it. If you’re going to make a baby with him, it’s only going to get worse.
She saw him bend to collect his bag out of the corner of her eye.
“I’ll see you tomorrow, okay?” he said.
“Sure thing.”
She threw him a quick smile but her shoulders didn’t relax until he’d left the court.
You’re an idiot.
Despite having had a night and a day to process Ethan’s offer, she was still trying to get her head around the concept that he wanted to be the father of her child. It was too, too surreal. In the space of a few days they’d leapfrogged about a gazillion intimacy levels and she simply couldn’t get the idea to stick in her head.
Saturday night ought to go a long away to helping on that score. A whole evening of hashing out the details of their proposed arrangement would surely make this about as real as it could get.
She checked the time. There was still twenty minutes left of their hour on the court. She unzipped her racquet and stood.
Perhaps if she ran herself ragged she’d sleep tonight.
* * *
Alex woke early on Saturday morning and spent the bulk of the day fretting—double-thinking everything, conjuring all the many, many things that could go wrong with what Ethan was proposing. She exorcised her demons by dusting, then she broke out her mosaic-tile supplies and spent a messy but satisfying few hours on the balcony making progress on a decorative tabletop that would never see the light of day.
By the time she was finished she was feeling calmer and more settled within herself. She cleaned up, then sat at the kitchen table with a pad and pen and composed a list of questions for Ethan. She started with the basics—questions about his family, his parents, his siblings. Then she started thinking about the things she needed to know about the man who might be the father of her child. By the time she’d finished, she had two pages. She stared at all her questions, a little embarrassed by how many there were. How was she going to remember them all? She couldn’t simply pull them out in front of Ethan and put him through his paces. Could she? Then she remembered what this was all about and decided that she owed it to herself and to him and to their potential child to be as nosy and intrusive as necessary to be comfortable with this arrangement.
She dressed carefully in a pair of tailored chocolate-brown pants and a soft beige silk blouse with a cowl-neck, brushed her hair until it behaved itself, then selected a bottle of wine and headed for the door.
He’d emailed her his address during the week and she’d learned he lived five minutes away from her Queens Road apartment. She smiled to herself as she pulled up in front of his building. Her own much more modest building had been built before the Second World War and would probably disappear inside the foyer of the sleek, stylish residential tower looming above her. But then she’d hardly expected Ethan to live in a hovel—the man spent thousands on his suits. It stood to reason that his residence would be equally stylish and exclusive.
She grabbed the wine, locked the car and approached the formidable front doors. It took her a moment to find his apartment number amongst the cluster on the door panel.
His voice sounded very deep when it came over the intercom. “Alex?”
“Hi,” she said. “Want to beam me up, Scotty?”
“Up you come.”
The door opened automatically—far classier than her own building, where the door made a loud buzzing noise and visitors had to push the door to enter—and she took the elevator to the tenth floor.
There were four doors leading off the hallway she stepped out into but only one of them was open, light spilling onto the plush carpeted hall. She walked toward it as Ethan appeared in the doorway, wiping his hands on a tea towel.
“Hey. Come on in,” he said with a smile.
He was wearing a pair of faded jeans and a V-neck long-sleeved T-shirt in gunmetal gray. His hair was ruffled and his feet were bare and she could see a few crisp, dark curls peeking over the neckline of his top.
She stared at his long, strong feet and wondered if they wouldn’t have been better off doing this on more neutral territory. Then she gave herself a mental slap. They were here to talk about an incredibly intimate, incredibly private subject. Where better to do it than at his place or hers?
The problem was—and this was something she should have considered earlier—Ethan was a compelling, charismatic man. She’d deliberately treated him like a buddy and not a man for that very reason. It had helped that he dated a lot and was clearly not the kind of man she was looking for. But now they were about to talk about joining forces to create a new life. A child that would be half him and half her. Even if the act of conception itself occurred via a clinical procedure, she and Ethan would be connected, bound together for life. He would become a mainstay of her world.
She glanced at him as he gestured for her to precede him into his apartment. His bruised eye had faded to a mottled yellow and blue, yet he was easily the best-looking, sexiest man she knew.
You’re going to have to be very careful if you do this.
She made an effort to pull herself together as Ethan led her through a small entrance hall and into a large, spacious living room with huge floor-to-ceiling windows. She stepped closer to the glass to admire the breathtaking view of the Alexandra Gardens and the Yarra River.
“This is pretty spectacular,” she said.
“Yeah. It sold the apartment for me, actually.”
“If I hang off the edge of my balcony, I’ve got a corner of Albert Park Lake.” She held her fingers an inch apart to indicate how limited her view was. “Nothing like this.”
He held out a hand. “Let me take care of that for you.”
She glanced down and saw that she was strangling the neck of the wine bottle. “Sure. Thanks. I wasn’t sure what we were having, so I brought a pinot noir….”
“Perfect. I’m making us slow-roasted lamb.”
He moved toward a doorway that she assumed must lead to the kitchen. She spared a quick, assessing glance for his living space before following him. His decor was bold—two black leather Simone Peignoir couches, a pony-skin Le Corbusier chaise lounge, a deep, bloodred rug and three vibrant modern paintings in primary colors that made her think of thunderstorms and wild, tempestuous seas. A red-gum dining table with clean, graceful lines dominated the corner near the window.
He was pulling the cork from the bottle when she joined him in the kitchen.
“I like your paintings,” she said.
“This is where I confess that I know nothing about art but I know what I like.”
“Well, I really do know nothing about art. I suspect I’m a bit of a Philistine at heart.”
She glanced at the array of ingredients and tools he had spread before him—little bowls of sliced-up herbs, halved lemons ready to be juiced, a fancy-looking whisk and an expensive copper-bottomed saucepan.
“You cook,” she said. “I mean, you really cook.”
“You sound surprised.”
“I’ve never pictured you wearing an apron.”
He gave her a dry look. “Just as well, since I don’t own one. Cooking is my way of unwinding.”
“I thought racquetball was your way of unwinding.”
“Racquetball is my way of not turning into a fat bastard. What about you?”
“Are you asking if I’m worried about turning into a fat bitch?”
He smiled. “What do you do to unwind?”
“I do mosaics.”
“As in tiles?”
“That’s right. Tabletops, mirror frames, that kind of thing.” She felt silly admitting it. It wasn’t as though she was any good.
“See, I would never have guessed that about you. You’ll have to show me your work sometime.”
“Or not.”
He laughed. “Not going coy on me, slowpoke?”
“Merely sparing you from having to be polite. I’m not very good. Most of my projects are never seen by human eyes once I’m done.”
“You’re exaggerating,” he said as he poured the wine and handed her a glass.
“No, I’m not. Trust me. My last creation wound up looking like a dropped pizza.”
She took a swallow of her wine. Alcohol coated her belly in soothing warmth and she took another big mouthful.
“Is there anything I can do to help?” she asked.
“You can set the table if you like—cutlery’s in the top left drawer under the counter there. Place mats in the one underneath.”
She selected two settings and a couple of place mats and headed to the living room. She placed the knives and forks carefully on the polished table, marveling at all the little insights she was gaining into Ethan tonight, things she’d never even thought about—the fact that he cooked, that he came home to this view every night, that he liked modern art. That he owned place mats—several types!—of all things.
The kitchen was rich with the smell of fresh mint and lemons when she returned. A butterflied lamb roast was resting on the cutting board and Ethan was busy doing something with the juices in the pan.
“What’s that you’re doing?” she asked, elbows propped on the counter.
“Making the sauce. Have to skim off the surface fat first so we don’t have coronaries before dessert.”
“Ah.”
“Let me guess—you thought sauce came in a packet from the supermarket, right?”
“No. I thought sauce came in a plastic tub from the take-out place.”
His mouth quirked up at the corner. “Can’t argue with that logic.”
He sliced the meat next, then pulled a tray of beautifully roasted vegetables from the oven. She watched as he plated the meal, adding sugar snap peas and baby broccoli at the last minute. He made it all look so effortless, his long fingers working confidently. And perhaps it was, for him. All her culinary experiments ended with swearing and pot banging and the inevitable high-pitched chirrup of the smoke alarm when she burned something. She simply didn’t have the patience.
No surprises there, given all the years she’d made dinner for two every night, week in, week out.
“Okay, we’re ready to go.”
He handed her a plate and they walked to the table.
“This looks great. Will I shame myself even more in your eyes if I confess that this is probably the best meal I’ve sat down to in months?”
“You couldn’t possibly be more shamed in my eyes,” Ethan said, absolutely deadpan.
“Well, I guess I asked for that,” she murmured under her breath.
Ethan laughed quietly. She concentrated on her meal, slicing into the lamb. She could feel him watching her as she took her first bite.
“Oh, wow,” she said, her eyes widening. “This is good. I mean, really, really good.”
“Thanks. Enjoy,” he said, raising his glass in a casual toast.
He was pleased that she liked it, she could see. He’d gone to a lot of trouble for her. For tonight. It gave her a funny tickle in the pit of her stomach to think of him planning a meal for her, wanting to impress her.
He wants you to have his baby, Alex. Didn’t we cover not getting carried away with any of this?
She sat straighter in her chair. The bossy-britches in her head was right—they were here for a purpose. She needed to keep that top of mind.
In accordance with her resolution, she took a big gulp of wine then cleared her throat. “So, Ethan, are your parents still alive?”
It came out sounding much more officious than she’d intended, as though she was conducting a job interview.
“My father is. Mom died ten years ago. Emphysema. Smoked all her life, and eventually it killed her.”
“I’m sorry.”
“It was tough at the time, but Dad remarried last year and seems happier now.” He shrugged. “What about you?”
“I don’t know about my father. I never knew him. My mother died when I was twenty. Complications from surgery.”
“Twenty’s young to lose a parent.”
“There’s not really any good time, though, is there?”
“No.”
“Do you have any brothers and sisters?” she asked.
“A brother, Derek. He’s younger—thirty-nine—and married with two kids, Jamie and Tim. How about you?”
“No brothers and sisters.”
“Ah. Spoiled only child.”
She thought about how she’d helped her mother dress every morning, the loads of washing she’d done, the household chores, and smiled faintly. “Something like that.”
She concentrated on her meal for a moment, trying to find a way to frame her next question. “So I take it there are no major health issues in the family…?”
Ethan put down his fork and regarded her with amused eyes. “Are you asking if there are any genetic skeletons in my family closet, Alex?”
