The Gold Collection. Maggie Cox

longer simply a blue line on the pregnancy test, but a new life growing inside her, created by her and the man she loved.

      She caught her bottom lip with her teeth. Would Ramon feel the same way? He had never made any reference to the future, and although he was a wonderful lover who treated her with consideration and respect she did not know how he really felt about her. But he had invited her to dinner tonight to celebrate their six-month anniversary, Lauren reminded herself. Surely that meant something?

      The waiter took their drinks order. Ramon made no comment when she requested fruit juice, because she had told him when they had first met that she disliked alcohol—although not her reasons for being strictly teetotal. The memory of how her mother had regularly drowned her sorrows in gin after her father had left them was something Lauren never spoke about to anyone.

      With impressive speed the waiter returned with their drinks, and Ramon lifted his glass of champagne. ‘I’d like to make a toast—to another successful take-over bid by Velaquez Conglomerates.’

      Lauren froze—until the lengthening silence became awkward, and then she hurriedly snatched up her glass of juice. ‘Oh…yes—to Velaquez Conglomerates.’ She touched her glass to Ramon’s and gave him a tentative smile, which faltered when he made no mention of the other reason they were celebrating.

      ‘So, tell me what you’ve been doing while I was away,’ Ramon said comfortably.

      It was not a question he had been prone to asking his previous lovers, he mused. Usually he was bored to death by the details of shopping and celebrity gossip that most women seemed to find so fascinating, but Lauren was a highly intelligent corporate lawyer, and he enjoyed discussing their respective careers, or the latest political thriller by an author they both admired.

      Lauren could recall little of the past two weeks other than the mind-numbing panic that had swamped her after she had discovered she was pregnant. She could think of nothing to say, and instead fumbled in her handbag and handed Ramon a small gift-wrapped package.

      ‘It’s a present,’ she told him when he viewed the package suspiciously, as if he expected it to blow up in his face. ‘It’s nothing, really.’ She could feel hot colour flooding her cheeks. ‘Just a little token…to celebrate our anniversary.’

      Ramon stiffened, and the sense of impending disaster he had felt when he had spoken to Lauren earlier in the day settled over him like a black cloud. ‘Anniversary?’ he queried coolly.

      ‘It’s six months since we met. I thought that was what we were celebrating—the reason you’d arranged for us to have dinner at the restaurant where you brought me on our first date…’ Lauren’s voice trailed away. She stared at Ramon’s shocked expression and cringed with embarrassment as it became apparent that she had got things very wrong. ‘I thought you had remembered,’ she muttered, wishing that a hole would open in the floor beneath her chair and swallow her up.

      Ramon regarded her in a taut silence. ‘I must admit I did not,’ he said bluntly, frowning as the implication of her words sank in. Six months! How had so much time passed without him noticing it? And how had Lauren insinuated herself into his life so subtly that he had grown used to her being there? Ordinarily he never dated women for more than a few weeks before he reached his boredom threshold. But even though she had been his mistress for half a year Lauren never bored him—either in bed or out—he acknowledged grimly. He hadn’t even been tempted to look at another woman.

      His frown deepened. Dios! He had been faithful to her without realising the longevity of their affair, but now that she had made him aware of it he was shocked that he had allowed what had started off as just another casual fling to continue for so long. He felt as though it was Lauren’s fault. If she had started to irritate him—or, as so often happened with his mistresses, shown possessive tendencies—he would have ended the affair months ago. But she had been the perfect mistress: undemanding, and happy to take a discreet role in his life. Her desire to celebrate an anniversary was like a bolt from the blue. It had overstepped a line in their relationship, Ramon brooded, annoyance replacing his contentment of a few minutes ago.

      ‘I do not set great store by anniversaries,’ he told her curtly.

      Impeccable manners forced him to untie the gold ribbon on top of the package, and he parted the wrapping paper to reveal a striped silk tie in muted shades of blue and grey. It was exactly the sort of thing he would have chosen for himself, but the realisation that Lauren knew his tastes so well did not improve his temper.

      He looked up to find her watching him anxiously, and it struck him that she had seemed unusually tense since he had greeted her at the bar.

      ‘It’s charming,’ he said, forcing a smile as he lifted the tie from its wrapping. ‘An excellent choice. Gracias.’

      ‘I told you it was only a small gift,’ she mumbled, sounding defensive.

      But it was not the size or the value of the present that was a problem. It was the reason why she had given it to him that disturbed him, Ramon mused. Lauren had never seemed the type who indulged in sentimental gestures, and it was disconcerting to think that he might not know her quite as well as he had believed.

      Thankfully the waiter arrived with their first course, and while they ate he steered the conversation away from the contentious topic of their so-called anniversary to a discussion about the mixed reviews for a new play that had opened in the West End.

      The food at the Vine was always superb, but afterwards Lauren had no recollection of what she had eaten. She ordered a camomile tea to end the meal, and sipped it frantically to try and counteract her queasiness induced by the aroma of Ramon’s coffee. Usually she loved coffee, but for the past week just the smell of it had been enough to send her running to the bathroom.

      Morning sickness—which seemed to strike at any time during the day—was a physical indication that her pregnancy was real, and if she was honest she felt scared and uncertain of the future. Tell Ramon about the baby now, her brain insisted. But she could not forget his harsh tone when he had announced that he did not set much store by anniversaries, and the words I’m pregnant remained trapped in her throat.

      Ramon’s reaction to her innocuous gift had been bad enough. He had made her feel like a criminal for wanting to celebrate the fact that their relationship was special to her. Clearly it was not special to him, she thought miserably. But the stark fact remained that she was expecting his baby, and sooner or later he was going to have to know.

      During dinner she’d managed to smile and chat to him as if her humiliating discovery that their anniversary meant nothing to him had never happened. Ramon certainly seemed to have put it out of his mind. But when he draped his arm around her shoulders in the back of his limousine and instructed the chauffeur to take them to his apartment overlooking Hyde Park, anger slowly replaced the hurt inside her. If they did not have a relationship that was worth celebrating, what did they have? she wondered bitterly.

      The car purred into the underground car park beneath his apartment block. Moments later they entered the lift and he pulled her into his arms.

      ‘Alone, finally,’ Ramon murmured in a satisfied voice. Lauren’s perfume tantalised his senses, and his breathing quickened when he took the clip from her chignon and ran his fingers though the mass of silky blonde hair that tumbled to her shoulders. Dios, he was hungry for her. She was like a fever in his blood. With a muttered oath he covered her mouth with his and teased her lips apart with his tongue to plunder her moist warmth.

      The unsettled feeling that had dogged him throughout dinner faded when he felt her instant response. For a few moments he had wondered if he was going to have to end their affair, and he was surprised by his reluctance to do so.

      But once a mistress started to mention anniversaries it was time she became an ex-mistress—because how could you celebrate what was essentially a casual sexual relationship? He had thought Lauren understood the rules, and he was relieved that it seemed now, after all, that she did. She had made no further reference to the amount of time they had been together, and when she pressed