LARA had turned the nanny's quarters, next to the nursery, into a sewing area. On the cutting table lay the squares of fabric she'd chosen for the patchwork quilt, all pretty prints in a variety of colours. A desperate need to block Ric Donato out of her mind had spurred her to spend most of yesterday arranging and rearranging the squares, trying to assess which combination would give her the most pleasing result. The quilt was to be only cot-size and Lara wanted it just right for her baby.
The ultra-scan had confirmed that her pregnancy was perfectly on the track. Amazing, seeing her baby on screen, being able to check that he or she was properly formed. Lara hadn't wanted to know whether it was a boy or girl. If something did go wrong—like last time—she was sure that knowing it was a son or daughter made the loss so much worse. Better to wait. Let it be a surprise.
Meeting Ric again had stirred up an aching desire for the child to be his.
It had been so hard, sitting across from him in the restaurant, not telling him, feeling the blast of his anger and hurt, having to watch him walk out of her life.
It had left her quaking inside, agonising over whether she'd made the right decision. He had felt betrayed, anyhow. But, at least, this way, his involvement with her was something he could move past, free of any responsibility for what she herself had done.
All the same, she hoped the baby would look like him so she'd know. But if it didn't…well, it was her baby, anyway. And she had to get on with her life…without Ric.
Eyeing the quilt pattern on the table this morning, Lara decided she couldn't improve on it. The red border was right for it, too. Everything bright and beautiful. She gathered up the first row of squares and settled herself in front of the sewing machine, bought on her return to Sydney. During her months at Gundamurra, she'd found enormous pleasure in creating and making her own designs. She wanted to keep on with it, maybe develop a business later on.
The buzz of the machine blocked out any sounds from the rest of the house. This room was like a private little world—a world she'd take with her wherever she went after this house was sold. Ric had thought badly of her for staying on here, but the baby was her first concern. Best to move slowly, not get herself into a twist with decisions that made too many waves with the Chappel family.
Gary was gone. He couldn't hurt her anymore. And oddly enough, she felt sorry for Victor, losing the son he'd groomed to take over from him.
He'd laid out a program of settlement with her on the agreement that she didn't publicly blacken Gary's character. Having no wish to give any details of her marriage to the media, Lara had accepted Victor's plan with no argument at all, against the advice of her solicitor who'd insisted she was entitled to a bigger cut of the estate.
The extra money wasn't important. Freedom with no comebacks was.
Once everything was legally wound up, she'd be free to go her own way, financially independent—if she was careful—for the rest of her life. Ric could scorn her for taking the money as much as he liked, but she wanted it for her child—backup security in case she wasn't successful in setting herself up in business. Besides, if Gary was the father, she was certainly entitled to it.
Having finished sewing the first row of squares together, she moved back to the table to lay them down and pick up the next row. Her attention was distracted by Mrs. Keith's voice, raised in protest, clearly speaking to someone else in the hall that led through this section of the house.
'I assure you, this is completely unnecessary!' She sounded upset.
Lara frowned, wondering who was overriding the housekeeper's sense of correct behaviour. Was it the real estate agent, insisting on some further inspection of the house?
The grimly determined voice that replied sent a whiplash through Lara's spine and thumped her heart into stopping dead.
'I will not be parked in some isolating room while Lara skips out a back door.'
Ric!
'Mrs. Chappel is a lady.' Outraged dignity.
'Who lies through her teeth,' came the fierce rejoinder. 'And if you're leading me astray, Mrs. Keith…'
'Don't you threaten me, Mr. Donato! Or Mrs. Chappel. I'll ring the police. It's only because you helped her before that I'm not on the phone to them right this minute.'
'Oh, I don't think Lara will want a fuss. In fact, I'm damned sure of it.' 'Well, we'll see what Mrs. Chappel says.'
The knock on her door kicked Lara out of her shocked paralysis. Her heart leapt into turbulent beating. She sucked in a quick breath. Her mind belatedly grasped that Ric thought she'd lied to him.
About what?
That was the big question!
She didn't have time to say, 'Come in.' The door was thrust open.
'Mr. Donato…'
The shocked cry from Mrs. Keith was totally disregarded by Ric. He stepped inside the room, his savage gaze pinning Lara to where she stood by the table. The room seemed to flood with his anger, swirling around her in a storm of feeling that was just as quickly caught back, brought under control. She could see the effort it took him, his face tightening under the strain, his eyes glittering with fierce willpower.
He wouldn't physically hurt her. Not Ric.
He never would.
But she knew he was hurting badly and she'd done it to him. Though she hadn't mean to. And somehow she had to make it better for him.
'It's all right, Mrs. Keith,' she assured the housekeeper, trying her utmost to make her voice come out with calm confidence. 'You can leave Mr. Donato here with me.'
'He wouldn't wait, Mrs. Chappel.'
Lara nodded to her. 'Don't worry about it. Please leave us alone now.'
With a disgruntled sigh, the housekeeper closed the door on them and left. Ric shifted to stand in front of it, deliberately blocking the exit from the room. His eyes ran mockingly over the clothes she wore—quite a dramatic change from the choice she'd made for their meeting at the restaurant.
Lara's nerves twanged in alarm as his gaze traversed her stomach. The stretch maternity jeans were comfortable around her thickened waist and the loose flannelette shirt hid the pot belly which was still small, certainly
not showing an obvious pregnancy. He couldn't see. He couldn't know, she frantically assured herself.
He was probably thinking these were the kind of clothes she'd worn at Gundamurra. There hadn't been any need to keep up a classy image at the Outback sheep station and Lara didn't feel any need to change that now.
She wasn't going back to the socialite life. The outfit she'd bought for their lunch meeting had been like a coat of armour, deflecting any sense of how vulnerable she'd felt inside. Better for Ric to think she didn't need him for anything. Though that, too, was a lie.
Yet how did he know she'd been lying to him?
His roving gaze returned to hers, still with a hard mocking gleam. 'Have you told Victor Chappel you're carrying his grandchild?'
The words were shot at her like bullets, shredding her defences. She didn't reply. Couldn't. The shock was too great. She stared back at him in a helpless daze, trying to absorb the fact that her attempt to hide the truth from Ric Donato was now a totally lost cause. He knew. He wouldn't be acting like this if he was only guessing.
'Is that why you're still living here, Lara…playing the bereaved widow…making deals with your father-in-law…keeping him sweet so your child will have the chance of inheriting the lot?'
'No!' she cried, appalled that he should think her so calculating and mercenary.
'Then why hide your pregnancy from me?'
She could see how damning that was in his eyes. But the rest of it wasn't true. She shook her head. 'I haven't told Victor. I haven't told anyone. Only my doctor and he has a private practice, not attached to any of the Chappel medical clinics.'
'So…you're worried that the child might look like me,' he shot back at her. 'That would upset the applecart, wouldn't it?'
Lara felt herself shrivelling under the blast of his contempt. She had to swallow hard to work some moisture into her dry mouth. 'I wasn't going to claim Gary as the father,' she stated, but it came out shakily and Ric instantly pounced on it.
'Just let it be assumed…if there are no telltale pointers to me.'
She lifted her hands pleadingly. 'Gary could be the father, Ric. The night before you came to help me escape from him…' She stopped, flushing painfully as shame and guilt washed through her, seeing the sharp leap of realization in Ric's eyes that this was what she'd wanted him to wipe out.