style="font-size:15px;"> Logan lifted his mouth off hers and cocked his head. ‘Is that your phone or mine?’
‘Mine.’ Layla slipped out of his loose hold and picked up her phone from one of the lamp tables where she’d left it earlier. She glanced at the caller ID and smiled and answered the phone. ‘Hi, Isla. How are you? I was going to call you and—’
‘Guess what?’ Excitement and joy sounded in Isla’s voice.
Layla’s heart skipped a beat ‘Oh, my God, you’ve had the baby?’
‘Yes, a little girl,’ Isla said. ‘She was in a big hurry to get here—almost three weeks early—and I was only in labour two hours. Rafe was beside himself, trying to get me to the hospital in time. We’ve called her Gabriella Marietta Layla. I can’t wait for you to meet her. She’s adorable. Rafe is completely and utterly smitten.’
Tears came to Layla’s eyes and her chest swelled with love for her friend. ‘You named her after me? Oh, my goodness, I don’t know what to say.’
‘Say you’ll be her godmother,’ Isla said. ‘And we’d like Logan to be her godfather. We would be so honoured to have you both as Gabriella’s godparents.’
Layla pictured Logan standing with her at the christening font, agreeing to spiritually sponsor their godchild. It was such an honour for any couple. And since they had become more of a connected couple than before, it seemed the perfect cementing of their relationship. Didn’t their increasing closeness signify a more promising future together? There were times when she was almost certain he loved her. He hadn’t said it but his body, his gaze, his touch said it for him. And didn’t hers tell him much the same?
‘We would be delighted to,’ Layla said. ‘I can’t wait to meet her in person. Can you put the face camera feature on so I can see her now?’
‘Here we go…’ Isla did the necessary button-pressing and the real-time camera showed a tiny pink bundle cradled in her adoring father’s arms.
Layla was so overcome with emotion once she got off the phone that she could barely speak. Happy joyful emotion. Jubilation for her friend and for the love and security she had found in Rafe. That was what she wanted with Logan. Lasting love, a family. Building a harmonious home life together. ‘Gosh, I can’t believe I’m a sort of aunty. And a godmother.’ She turned to Logan and smiled. ‘Did you hear? We’ve been invited to be Gabriella’s godparents. I’ve never been a godparent before, have you?’
Logan’s expression and posture were so still he could have been snap-frozen while she’d been on the phone. ‘No. I have not.’ His voice was flat, almost toneless, except for a fine thread of anger running underneath.
Layla frowned, her heart missing a beat. Why was he looking so cold and distant? ‘What’s wrong?’
He drew in a sharp breath and moved a few paces away, released the breath and then turned back to face her. ‘Do you not think it might have been appropriate to ask me first before accepting an invitation like that?’
Layla swallowed a bauble-sized lump in her throat. ‘But I thought you’d be honoured to—’
‘You thought wrong,’ he said, brows drawn down heavily in a brooding frown.
‘Logan…’ She tried for a conciliatory tone but missed the mark. ‘Why are you so upset? Being asked to be a godparent is such a lovely thing. It’s mostly symbolic these days but, still, it’s wonderful to be asked. I would feel awful saying no. And besides, they want both of us.’
‘You’ve seen the rubbish job I’ve done of being responsible for my brother. And don’t get me started on what a mess I made with Susannah. I’m not signing up for any more responsibility, especially when we’re not really a couple. Or at least not for the long term.’
Not really a couple. Not for the long term.
The words hit her like slaps. Cold hard stinging slaps of truth. A truth she had been hiding from for weeks and weeks, fooling herself her relationship with Logan was something else. Something like Isla had with Rafe. But it wasn’t. It never had been and never could be.
Why had she fooled herself it could?
Layla took a steadying breath, trying to control her spiralling emotions. ‘So, what you’re saying is you don’t want to be Gabriella’s godfather?’
‘I don’t want to be any child’s godfather.’ His eyes were as hard as his tone. Diamond hard. Don’t-ask-me-twice hard. ‘You had no right to answer for me. We might be having a good time but it doesn’t mean you get to sign me up for things I have no interest in.’
‘A good time?’ Layla gasped. ‘Is that all this is to you? Is that all I am to you?’ Pain ripped through her chest as if her ribcage was being wrenched apart with steel claws. But she wouldn’t allow herself to cry. Not now. Not in front of him. How could she have been so gullible, so foolish as to think their physical closeness meant emotional closeness? He was as far away from her as he had ever been. She had fooled herself that his touch meant he loved her. That his passionate kisses meant he cared. That his lovemaking was lovemaking, not just sex.
Logan shoved his hands into his trouser pockets, glaring at her like she was an intruder he had never seen before and not the woman he had spent the last two months making passionate love to. ‘Don’t put words in my mouth. I told you right at the start how things were going to be. You accepted my terms.’
‘Your terms are completely ridiculous,’ Layla said. ‘They’re your insurance scheme against getting hurt, that’s what they really are. And here I was thinking my limp was holding me back, stopping me doing all the things other people do. But at the end of the day it’s just a physical limp. Your emotional limp is far worse. It completely disables you and yet you can’t see it.’
He gave a mocking laugh that grated on her already shredded emotions. ‘Thanks for the free psychoanalysis but I don’t need you to tell me how I think.’
‘You don’t need me at all,’ Layla said. ‘You don’t need anyone. You won’t allow yourself to. Which is why I can’t stay here any longer. I can’t be in a relationship that has limits set on it. I spent my childhood trying to fit in with impossible standards. Standards that didn’t factor in my needs or aspirations. Standards that didn’t include love. I want more than that now. I deserve more than that and you do too.’
His expression was masked but she sensed a simmering anger behind the dark screen of his gaze. ‘You’re free to come and go as you please. I can’t make you stay.’
Yes, you can, Layla wanted to say. Just three little words would make me stay.
But those three little words had never been a part of their arrangement. Neither had a future together ever been part of the deal. Logan had always been blatantly honest about that. ‘I don’t think it will help either of us if I were to stay on in this relationship. Of course, I won’t jeopardise your inheritance of Bellbrae. I will be your wife on paper, as you first suggested, to fulfil the terms of your grandfather’s will.’
‘Magnanimous of you.’ His coolly delivered comment was as cutting as a switchblade.
Layla pressed her lips together to stop them from trembling. She couldn’t fall apart now. He was making it perfectly
