Henry and Jean must have been in their late thirties when they’d adopted Hebe. Nick wondered why they had left it so late to decide that was what they were going to do.
The ubiquitous English answer to any occasion, a cup of tea, soon appeared—though Henry was profusely apologetic that they didn’t have any champagne to toast the happy couple with.
Nick saw Hebe flinch at the description. So much for his assurances that he would behave as if they were a happy couple; Hebe looked as if she was about to burst out with the truth at any moment, and damn the consequences…
‘Tea is fine, sir,’ he assured the older man as he took his cup and saucer. ‘Hebe can’t drink champagne in her condition anyhow,’ he added determinedly. ‘Not until after the baby is born, in another seven and a half months or so,’ he added for good measure.
Let her try to talk her way out of that!
Hebe gave Nick an incredulous look as she saw her parents’ stunned reaction to his announcement, but met only glittering challenge in his gaze. His hard, uncompromising gaze.
He was leaving her no way out. That cold blue stare told her so only too clearly. She was his. The baby was his.
She had been wavering, it was true. She had looked at her parents and wondered if perhaps they would understand if she confided her pregnancy to them and asked them to help her. But the relaxed way Nick had made his announcement, the possessiveness in his tone, gave her no opening to do that.
As he had known it wouldn’t…
Damn him!
‘Mum, Dad.’ She turned anxiously to her parents. ‘I didn’t mean to tell you quite as abruptly as that.’ She shot Nick a censorious glance before crossing the room to take her mother’s hands in hers. ‘But Nick and I are expecting a baby, early next year.’
‘Which means the wedding is going to be very soon,’ Nick put in firmly, though his conversation with Hebe the night before had not got that far. ‘My lawyers are working on the paperwork at the moment.’
His lawyers…!
Why on earth were his lawyers working on their wedding arrangements? Unless Nick intended making her sign one of those pre-nuptial agreements, or something equally cold and calculated?
Well, she wasn’t signing anything like that. Not now. Not ever.
But this wasn’t the time to argue that point with him. She was too concerned with calming her parents’ shock at the rapidity of everything to have time to worry about Nick and his Machiavellian plans.
‘Perhaps a small sherry might be a good idea,’ her father said weakly, moving to the cabinet to pour three glasses.
One for himself. One for her mother. And one for Nick.
Who wasn’t in shock at all. Instead he looked as if he were enjoying every second of this.
‘Well, I suppose it’s about time I was a grandmother!’ Her mother was the first to recover from the shock, squeezing Hebe’s hand supportively.
‘You don’t intend taking our little girl away to America, do you, Nick?’ Her father was more practical.
‘No, sir,’ he assured him easily. ‘Hebe has expressed a wish to live in England, and I’m happy to go along with that. Whatever Hebe wants,’ he added, with a challenging raise of his brows across the room at her.
Her father gave him a beaming smile, as if he was quite happy with any man who wanted to want to spoil and look after his ‘little girl’ in the way Nick seemed to want to.
Except that Hebe knew he didn’t.
He wanted the baby she carried. And if he had to concede certain things to the baby’s mother to achieve that, then he would do so. On his own terms, of course.
But she couldn’t let any of her trepidation show in front of her parents. She knew that she had to make them believe she was as happy with the situation as Nick implied he was.
‘We’ll want you and Daddy to come up to London for the wedding, of course,’she told her mother warmly. ‘In fact, you’ll probably be our only guests!’ She had no idea what arrangements Nick had discussed with his lawyers, but she very much doubted they would involve a big wedding.
‘Not at all, Hebe,’ Nick put in smoothly. ‘Your flatmate will want to come, of course. And any of your friends you can think of. And I’ve decided to close the gallery for the day, so that all the staff there can attend too. My own parents will be there, naturally. Along with my younger sister and her family.’ He met her gaze confrontationally.
She couldn’t believe this. She had expected their wedding to be almost a clandestine affair, with as few people as possible knowing it was taking place, and now Nick had announced he was inviting half of London and all of his close family, as well as her own parents.
‘I was keeping it as a surprise, honey,’ he murmured indulgently, and as he moved to kiss her lightly on the lips, his arm moving about the slenderness of her waist.
For her parents’ sake, of course.
As these elaborate wedding plans probably were too.
‘We’ll be having a reception at one of the leading hotels,’ he told her parents, his arm like a steel band around Hebe as he held her tightly—shackled!—to his side. ‘I think it might be better if I were to book you a suite there for a couple of nights too. I’m sure Hebe will want her mother to help her get ready on the day—won’t you, honey?’ Blue eyes glittered down at her with mocking amusement.
Where was all this coming from? Hebe wondered, feeling dazed.
Of course Nick had been married before, so he was probably more cognizant with wedding arrangements than she was, but even so…!
‘We do just have one tiny concern.’ Nick turned back to her parents. ‘Obviously Hebe has told me that she’s adopted. I’m sure she was irresistible as a baby,’he added favourably, as Hebe’s father frowned slightly. ‘We were just wondering if you had any information on Hebe’s real parents?’ He looked at them enquiringly. ‘Obviously with Hebe expecting a baby the medical history of her birth parents would be real helpful,’ he added, with country-boy charm.
Which Hebe, knowing him only too well, didn’t fall for at all.
She wasn’t sure her parents did either. Glancing at her father, she saw he was still frowning and her mother was looking up at him a little anxiously.
‘What sort of thing do you want to know?’ her father prompted guardedly.
Nick shrugged. ‘As I said, just medical history—stuff like that,’ he dismissed easily.
He could feel the sudden tension in the room, and wondered if Hebe had noticed it too.
It was a perfectly legitimate question in the circumstances, surely…?
‘Perhaps you know the name of Hebe’s birth mother?’ he continued lightly. ‘Or her father, perhaps.’
‘No,’
