Read Online First Comes Baby...: The Loner's Guarded Heart by Michelle Douglas - Free Book Online

much? Life has left them crippled. But...’ She swallowed. ‘I demand joy in my life now, and I won’t compromise on that. If they refuse to get into the swing of this wedding then I’ll know those bridges—the distance between us—can never be mended. And I’ll have my answer.’
    She hauled in a breath. ‘One last chance, Ben, that was what I’m giving them.’ And that’s what she wanted him to give them too.
    Ben didn’t say anything. She cast a sidelong glance at him and bit back a sigh. She wondered when Ben— her Ben, the Ben she knew, the Ben with an easy smile and a careless saunter, without a care in the world—would return. Ever since he’d pulled his bike to a halt out at the front of her house yesterday there’d been trouble in his eyes.
    He turned to her, hands on hips. He had lean hips and a tall, rangy frame. With his blond-tipped hair he looked like a god. No wonder women fell for him left, right and centre.
    Though if he’d had a little less in the charm and looks department maybe he’d have learned to treat those women with more sensitivity.
    Then she considered his mother and thought maybe not.
    ‘When was the last time you felt joyful?’ she asked on impulse.
    He scratched his chin. He still hadn’t shaved. He should look scruffy, but the texture of his shadowed jaw spoke to some yearning deep inside her. The tips of her fingers tingled. She opened and closed her hands. If she reached out and—
    She shook herself. Ben did look scruffy. Completely and utterly. He most certainly didn’t look temptingly disreputable with all that bad-boy promise of his.
    Her hands continued to open and close. She heaved back a sigh. Okay, we’ll maybe he did. But that certainly wasn’t the look she was into.
    Normally.
    She scowled. Darn pregnancy hormones. And then the memory of that long ago kiss hit her and all the hairs on her arms stood to attention.
    Stop it! She and Ben would never travel down that road again. There was simply too much at stake to risk it. Ever .
    She folded her arms and swallowed. ‘It can’t be that hard, can it?’ she demanded when he remained silent. Ben was the last person who’d need lessons in joy, surely?
    ‘There are just so many to choose from,’ he drawled, with that lazy hit-you-in-the-knees grin.
    The grin was too slow coming to make her heart beat faster. Her heart had already started to sink. Ben was lying and it knocked her sideways. She’d always thought his exciting, devil-may-care life of freedom gave him endless pleasure and joy.
    ‘The most recent instance that comes to mind is when I bungee-jumped over the Zambezi River from the Victoria Falls Bridge. Amazing rush of adrenaline. I felt like a superhero.’
    She scratched a hand back through her hair. What was she thinking? Of course Ben’s life gave him pleasure. He did so many exciting things. Did he really think he could give that all up for bottles and nappies?
    ‘What about you? When was the last time you felt joyful?’
    She didn’t even need to think. She placed a hand across her stomach. And even amid all her current confusion and, yes, fear a shaft of joy lifted her up. She smiled. ‘The moment I found out I was pregnant.’
    She was going to have a baby!
    ‘And every single day after, just knowing I’m pregnant.’ Ben had made that possible. She would never be able to thank him enough. Ever.
    She set her shoulders. When he came to the conclusion she knew he would—that he wasn’t cut out for domesticity—she would do everything in her power to make sure he felt neither guilty nor miserable about it.
    Ben shaded his eyes and stared out at the perfect crescent of the bay. ‘So you want to spread the joy, huh?’
    ‘Absolutely.’ Being pregnant had changed her perspective. In comparison to so many other people she was lucky. Very lucky. ‘We know how to do joy, Ben, but my father and Elsie—well, they’ve either forgotten how or they never knew the secret in the first