‘The decorators are taking a while,’ he’d say, looking into pots and pinching an olive from the salad. And she’d murmur vaguely about paint colours with the wrong tint and conflicting jobs but they’d promised they’d be finished soon and Dominic would disappear a while before dinner down to the workshop.
‘What does he do down there?’ she asked Rosa one night when he’d once again taken himself off to the depths and she was busy pulling off basil leaves to dress the tomato and bocconcini salad. ‘Tinker with those cars he keeps down there?’
The older woman shrugged and passed her the olive oil. ‘Before you came he always used to disappear into his office. Now it’s the garage.’
Before she came? A shiver went down her spine.
‘Really? That’s odd.’
Rosa nodded. ‘And you know something else? Dominic never ventured into the kitchen before, except to say he was home.’ She threw Angie a look that was loaded with meaning. ‘He never dropped in to see what I was doing or to pick up a taste. Now what do you think is going on there?’
Angie didn’t know. She didn’t want to know. Didn’t want to think too much about it.
But as she sprinkled oil over the top of the salad and ground on black pepper, she couldn’t help but think about it.
Maybe whatever he was doing downstairs was giving his appetite an edge?
Maybe he was checking up on her, wanting to be sure she was taking good care of his child? Now that one did make sense.
Or maybe…
Oh, no. She would not go anywhere near that maybe. To entertain that maybe was to invite despair and doom and utter humiliation on herself. There was no way he was attracted to her. No way he visited the kitchen for the pleasure of her company. The kiss had been a mistake. He’d said so. She’d agreed. It wouldn’t happen again and it hadn’t.
Not that knowing that hadn’t stopped her dreaming of it every night.
She gasped when she felt it, so deep in thought that the tiny flutter caught her unawares.
‘What is it?’ said Rosa. ‘Are you all right?’
And a smile found its way to her lips, a sense of wonderment overwhelming her as her palm cupped her bump. ‘I felt it, Rosa. I felt it moving. It must still just be tiny but I felt it move.’
Rosa squeezed her shoulders in a hug. ‘It is a feeling like no other. Your baby is playing. And just wait until he starts with the football. Then you will know you are alive.’
‘I never realised.’ she whispered, still awed by the concept of this tiny baby active inside her. Never realised the magnitude of the emotions she would feel, never realised the sheer wonder at the miracle that was taking place inside her, part of her but not belonging.
Never realised that she would feel this bond with a child that wasn’t hers.
And it terrified her.
‘I’m flying to Auckland tomorrow,’ he revealed a couple of nights later as Rosa served dinner. The instructions were ostensibly meant for Rosa’s planning purposes but Angie hung on to every word. ‘I’ll be there a week.’
So long…
Then again, an entire week? She could put in longer days and have the nursery finished by then. The furniture could be in place. She could show him what she’d done.
She couldn’t wait to show him what she’d done.
‘Simone’s coming with me this time—a couple of functions I have to attend. All good PR. But she won’t be around if you need to contact me urgently so best to call me direct.’
Rosa flashed a glance in Angie’s direction but Angie just smiled, doing her level best to look unconcerned, wondering where this sudden coiling thread of jealousy had come from. And why should she feel jealous?
Simone was his beautiful, elegant PA while Angie was doing nothing more than carrying his child. She was an incubator. She had no claims on Dominic. It wasn’t as if she had any right to feel jealous of the woman spending days and nights away with the father of her child. Not when she was his PA, for heaven’s sake!
She would miss him because of the effort he was making with his baby. She would miss him because his baby would no doubt miss him.
It was hardly as if she were in love with him.
Liar, a small voice sounded.