Grady stared at her, this pretty woman who hadn’t been prepared to attempt fertility treatment nor contemplate childlessness. He hadn’t blamed her for wanting to be a mother but it had still hurt. His voice seemed to buzz in his ears. ‘I presume you’re telling me so I don’t hear it from someone else so … thank you. And congratulations,’ he added.

The fine, blonde eyebrows arched. ‘The pregnancy wasn’t planned,’ she said, as if he should have realised. ‘We met online. We had a few dates. It wasn’t meant to be a “relationship”.’ She made finger quotes. ‘We had a contraception failure. He doesn’t feel the need to be involved. Except financially, obviously.’

For several seconds, Grady couldn’t speak. Then he managed, ‘Sad for the baby.’

‘Exactly,’ she said, her face lighting up. ‘And you and I only split up because we couldn’t have a baby.’

‘I’m not likely to forget.’ The words wrenched themselves from his throat. Surely, she couldn’t be suggesting …? The air hummed with tension.

Pippa uncurled her legs and sat forward, her voice soft, passionate. ‘You wanted to be a dad, didn’t you? This is a heaven-sent opportunity.’

He could only gape. His heart seemed to be using his lungs as a punchbag and his skin burned, as if his organs were working too fast.

‘Grady, listen,’ she coaxed, abandoning the sofa to come and kneel beside him, grabbing his hand with both of hers. ‘It’s such an opportunity. We always got on well, we’re compatible in bed, we still have feelings for each other.’ Her hands tightened when he tried to recoil from her. Urgently, she added, ‘We’ll get back together, then tell people I’m pregnant. Nobody needs to know the baby isn’t actually yours. You can quietly adopt it, so it legally is, and we’ll be a family. It’s our happy-ever-after!’

Grady’s heart almost exploded with pain and outrage. He erupted from his seat, ripping his hands from her grasp. ‘Get out.’ His voice was hoarse, his throat constricting around the words.

Pippa stumbled to her feet, eyes wide and bewildered. ‘It’ll be perfect for us both—’

Deliberately, he turned his back on her. ‘Please leave.’

A silence. Then she murmured, ‘I think you ought to think about it, Grady.’ Her voice was gentle and sympathetic. ‘Face it. You’re never going to have a baby the biological way. If we’d had fertility treatment the baby would have been someone else’s anyway. This is much better because we avoid the actual treatment. You’ll be a father and no one will know the truth apart from us.’

He trembled with anger and humiliation and pain. ‘It’s nice to know that you see me as a fallback position, something you dumped as broken but realise could have a use after all. But no thanks.’