Valentino's Pregnancy Bombshell by Amy Andrews Page A

She couldn’t be. Surely?
    Nat watched a procession of emotions march across her friend’s face. ‘Are you sure? I thought you and Valentino might be getting—’
    â€˜Quite sure,’ Paige interrupted, her heart booming like church bells in her chest.
    Nat didn’t think Paige looked overly convinced. She reached into her handbag. ‘I just happen to have an extra one of these.’ She placed a packaged pregnancy test on the desk and pushed it towards Paige.
    Paige looked at it like it was a venomous snake. She could not be pregnant. Could not. An image rose unbidden in her mind. Daisy’s tiny white coffin covered in pale pink roses.
    Even now it had the power to paralyse her.
    â€˜You know it’s the first thing the GP’s going to do anyway,’ Nat murmured. ‘Might as well save her the effort.’
    Paige nodded, knowing Nat was right. She looked at the test again, a sudden thought occurring to her. ‘Just happen to have this huh?’
    Nat shrugged. ‘I bought one of those two-in-ones…in case.’
    Paige could tell from her friend’s face that she’d already used the first one and was trying really hard to be sensitive to Paige’s situation in the face of her own good news. ‘Does this mean congratulations are in order?’
    Nat nodded and then grinned. ‘You’re the first one to know.’
    Paige grinned back, even though inside she felt bleaker than a Bronte moor. ‘That’s fabulous, Nat.’ She leaned forward and gave her friend a big hug. ‘Alessandro and Juliano will be over the moon.’
    â€˜They’ll be ecstatic,’ Nat agreed. ‘I’ve been trying to get hold of Alessandro for the last two hours but he’s not answering. I just had to tell someone.’
    Paige smiled. ‘I feel honoured.’
    They chatted for the next few minutes about due dates and morning sickness until Nat’s phone beeped with a message from Alessandro. ‘He’s at home.’
    â€˜Well, what are you waiting for? Off you go,’ Paige teased. When Nat hesitated she said, ‘I mean it, go. I’ll be fine.’
    Nat stood. ‘You will do the test, won’t you?’
    Paige eyeballed it, remembering the last time she’d done a pregnancy test. The joy. The hope. She looked away. ‘Yes.’
    â€˜I’m going to ring in the morning and check on you.’
    Paige rolled her eyes. ‘Yes, ma’am.’
    Nat leaned down and gave her friend a quick squeeze. ‘I’ll see you tomorrow.’
    The room seemed preternaturally quiet after Nat left. There was just Paige and the test and her heart beat ticking loudly in the silence like the doomsday clock.
    Her fingers trembled as she picked it up and turned it over and over. She couldn’t do pregnant again. After Daisy had died she’d vowed to never make herself vulnerable like that again. She couldn’t stand nine months of living on the edge, being paranoid about things going wrong, demanding scans every week, thinking the worst should there be no foetal movements for a minute, an hour, a day.
    Giving birth in a haze of anxiety, constantly testing the baby’s hearing, driving herself insane at the slightest sniffle.
    Oh, God. What if it was twins again?
    And what about McKenzie? Her child, the one she already had, needed her. There was no time for another. Certainly not for two. There was no spare time to give at all.
    She just couldn’t do it again.
    â€˜Are you going to take that or just stare at it?’
    Paige didn’t have to look up to know Valentino was standing there. He sounded annoyed.
    He could get in line.
    â€˜I have a UTI,’ she said, raising her face defiantly.
    Even glowering at her from the doorway he looked magnificent and her breath caught in her throat. His hair was all messy from the cap and his top two buttons were undone. In another time and place, having his baby