done to her seconds ago.
Liam glanced down. ‘I’ve already seen it, thanks,’ he said, pushing away the photograph he had looked at so intently at the house a short time ago.
She nodded. ‘What you can’t see, what you can’t possibly know, is that slightly out of this picture is a wheelchair. Robert’s wheelchair,’ she explained shakily. ‘The wheelchair he had been confined to for twenty years.’
Liam reached out to slowly pull the photograph back towards him, peering down at the images.
Laura knew exactly what he would see on closer inspection; the way Robert’s legs were bent slightly unnaturally, his awkwardness as he held baby Bobby in his arms. Robert had injured his lower spine playing rugby twenty years earlier, had been completely paralysed from the waist down.
‘It never stopped him from doing the things he wanted to do.’ Laura spoke tearfully. ‘He was very supportive while I was pregnant, was present at the birth, would get up in the night and feed Bobby. He played with him for hours, never tired of being with him. Just looking at him…’ she recalled brokenly. ‘He cried the first time Bobby called him Daddy. He never believed he would be lucky enough to become a father, you see.’
Liam swallowed convulsively, looking down at the photograph once again. ‘Were you in love with him?’ he asked gruffly. ‘Tell me, Laura!’ he insisted harshly as she hesitated.
‘I’ve tried to tell you how I felt about him, but you don’t seem to be listening.’ She sighed. ‘I loved Robert very much. But I wasn’t in love with him.’ How could she have been, when the only man she had ever loved was sitting opposite her?
Was she getting through to him? Did Liam understand? Could he see—?
Liam straightened. ‘I don’t think this is the place for us to discuss this, Laura,’ he said abruptly, pushing the glass of whisky away untouched.
‘Will you come up to my suite with me?’ He looked across at her with narrowed eyes.
He no longer looked dangerous, just weighed down with a sadness Laura didn’t completely understand. But she would like to…
‘Yes, I’ll come with you,’ she answered softly, picking her bag up in readiness for leaving.
Liam took a light hold of her elbow as they walked across the reception area to the lift, but the two of them moved apart once they had stepped inside, neither of them speaking.
Laura’s tension started to rise again. So much depended on this conversation. So very much!
‘Very nice,’ she murmured dismissively once they were in the luxurious comfort of the sitting room in his suite.
Liam moved to the mini-bar, taking out a small bottle of whisky to pour the contents into a glass tumbler. ‘For you,’ he offered dryly, holding the glass out to her as she looked at him warily. ‘You look as if you need it!’
She didn’t like whisky, had never liked strong alcohol, but Liam was right; at the moment she felt in need of it! The first sip made her wince initially, but it was quickly followed by a warming sensation, seeming to settle those quivering butterflies in her stomach too.
‘Let’s sit down,’ Liam suggested gently. ‘At least, you sit down,’ he amended once she had done exactly that. ‘I think better standing on my feet,’ he acknowledged ruefully.
Laura wasn’t sure she wanted him to be able to think better; she would rather he just listened.
‘I realise you haven’t yet told me all you feel you want to,’ Liam said softly. ‘But maybe it will help if I first tell you a few things about my version of what happened eight years ago. What do you think?’
She thought that at the moment she was coward enough to welcome putting off her own version if that was what Liam wanted her to do!’
‘Go ahead,’ she assented, taking another sip of the whisky. It really was quite relaxing.
Liam drew in a ragged breath. ‘Well, I’ve already explained what I thought of you and your emotions eight years ago. What I haven’t told you is that I—Laura, eight years ago I was in love with you! One hundred per cent completely in love with you!’ he stated evenly.
Laura stared at him. He hadn’t—He didn’t—He couldn’t have been!
Liam took in her dumbfounded expression. ‘Sometimes, still, your emotions are so transparent,’ he said. ‘I was in love with you, Laura,’ he repeated firmly. ‘But, as I’ve already explained, I was ten years older than you, felt you had a lot of growing up, a lot of living still to do, before it would be fair for any man to ask you to devote your life just to him.’ His expression was grim now.
Laura moistened dry lips. ‘You said, when we met again last week, that you wished I had been this Laura eight years ago…’ she remembered slowly, that remark perhaps starting to make more sense to her now.
Perhaps…
She gave a firm shake of her head. ‘You couldn’t have loved me eight years ago, Liam,’ she said. ‘You could never have left me in the way that you did if that had been the case. Certainly never have married someone else within weeks of leaving England. And me,’ she added painfully.
He gave a heavy sigh. ‘After that night, when we made love, I knew I had to get out of your life, give you chance to grow up without my influence. I didn’t go straight to America when I left England; I went home to Ireland first. Perhaps you remember my telling you earlier today that my mother isn’t yet aware that you’re the same Laura from eight years ago…? I talked to her about you then,’ he continued at her affirmative nod. ‘Told her everything—’
‘Everything?’ Laura echoed.
‘Everything,’ Liam repeated. ‘My mother agreed with me that your parents’ death must have been a terrible blow for you, that you were bound to still be emotionally immature, that my making a clean break from your life was probably for the best—’
‘I wasn’t too immature to become a mother!’ Laura reminded him tautly. ‘Don’t you think that you—and your mother—should have let me be the one to decide whether or not I was mature enough to know my own mind?’ she demanded impatiently. ‘And heart,’ she added huskily.
‘I always intended to come back, Laura,’ Liam told her gruffly. ‘It was never meant to be for ever.’
She looked up at him disbelievingly. ‘You married someone else, Liam,’ she reminded him.
‘I missed you so much when I got to America, Laura. Drank too much,’ he stated flatly. ‘Sometimes I would lose days at a time,’ he remembered. ‘I’m making no excuses,’ he assured at her sceptical expression. ‘Diana was beautiful, obviously willing. I—It only happened the once. A few weeks later she told me she was pregnant. What can I say? I married her. Only to discover within weeks of the marriage that she had apparently made a mistake, that she wasn’t pregnant, after all. It’s the oldest trick in the book.’ He groaned. ‘And I fell for it!’
How ironic. How utterly, awfully ironic! Because back in England Laura had been genuinely pregnant with Liam’s child.
Her expression hardened.
