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difficult staff make such an elementary mistake? His gaze drifted to her waist and his lips thinned.
    She rested her hands on her knees and only then did he notice how unwell she looked. Pregnant women, they threw up a lot, right? He grimaced at the reminder of his own behaviour earlier. ‘Kit, are you going to be sick?’
    ‘Don’t think so,’ she mumbled.
    She straightened. He noticed the way her hand went to the small of her back as if trying to massage away a pain there. He did a rough calculation. If he were the father, Kit would be nearly four months into her pregnancy. He couldn’t remember when Jacqueline had started getting back pain. He was pretty sure it was later than four months. ‘Are you sure you’re feeling all right?’
    ‘I’m pregnant,’ she snapped. ‘I don’t have some disease!’
    He figured he deserved that, but…he really didn’t like her colour.
    ‘And it’s been a great day,’ she continued. ‘The father of my child throws up when I tell him the happy news and now I have a hole not only in my wall but, if what you are telling me is true, in my roof too! You know what, Alex? I’m feeling on top of the world right now.’
    She had a point. Several, in fact. Rather valid points at that. He couldn’t help it. He glanced at her waist again. As far as he could tell, there wasn’t any change there at all.
    Perhaps this could turn out to be a glorious mistake?
    He glanced at the hole in the wall and knew he was grasping at straws. Kit had a hole in her wall and she was pregnant.
    He was in the middle of a nightmare.
    He was going to suffocate. All the plaster dust in the room felt as if it had lodged in his throat. He didn’t do kids. He didn’t do family. He wanted out of here.
    He dragged in a hoarse gasp of air and closed his eyes, concentrating on his breathing. Kit had told him he could walk away.
    He wanted to run, escape, as fast as he could.
    He wanted to stampede for the door. Charge through it and never come back.
    He opened his eyes, glanced at the door and then glanced at Kit, who’d backed up to perch on the edge of the nearest sofa, which was still wrapped in the heavy-duty plastic it had arrived in. He frowned as he looked at her more closely. One moment she was pale, the next she was flushed. Before he had time to think better of it, he reached out and rested the back of his hand against her forehead.
    She slapped it away. Glared. ‘What do you think you’re doing?’
    She was burning up!
    He dragged a hand back through his hair. His retreat was moving further and further out of reach. He could almost feel it slipping through his fingers like water…or plaster dust.
    ‘You’re running a temperature.’ Hell! He couldn’t leave a sick woman to fend for herself. ‘Come on. You need a doctor to check you over. I’ll take you up to the hospital.’
    ‘Don’t be ridiculous!’
    By rights, her glare should’ve withered him to the spot. He sat next to her, he was careful not to touch her. ‘You’re not feeling well, Kit, and you’re running a temperature so you can be excused for making poor judgement calls.’
    ‘Poor judge—’
    ‘But do you really want to take the risk that a high temperature might harm your baby?’
    ‘Oh!’
    Her bottom lip wobbled and one of her hands moved to cradle her abdomen. That action told him exactly how much this baby meant to her. For a moment he had to fight the nausea that punched through him again.
    ‘You really think I’m running a temperature?’
    ‘I know it.’
    ‘Okay,’ she finally whispered. ‘But not the hospital, the medical clinic.’
    ‘Fine.’ He would take her to see a doctor. He would bring her home again. He’d book into a hotel overnight. Tomorrow, he and Kit would discuss what needed discussing and then he would walk out of her life for ever.

CHAPTER FOUR
     
    K IT’S pallor, the way she bit her bottom lip and her down-turned mouth all struck at Alex’s heart, making him forget his own panic. He