CHAPTER ELEVEN
VICTORIA
I stopped walking and took a deep breath in before turning around to face him. Alex was looking at me with those intensely sexy hazel eyes and his brown hair was blowing in the breeze. I watched as his eyes traveled down to the bulge in my belly and back up to my face. His expression didn’t give away what he was thinking, but I would have given a million dollars to find out what it was. He was dressed casually in a white cotton shirt that buttoned up the front and rippled across the muscles in his chest and arms in the wind. He had on blue jeans, which was unusual, but he wore them well.
“Hi,” I said, not knowing where else to start.
“Hello, Vicki.” I loved the way he said my name… still. God, what is wrong with me? This man fired me. He’s suing me. Why does he still give me that warm, tingly feeling all over?
I needed to not be here, with him standing here looking at me. It didn’t help my thought processes at all. It only made me want to kiss him although I should be kicking him instead. “I was just leaving…”
“Please don’t go,” he said. I felt a pain in my chest. I’m not sure if it was fear or excitement. Either way, I was screwed because I knew that I wouldn’t leave. “Sit with me for a few minutes. I’d like to talk to you.” Damn it! My lawyer has strongly advised me against this. I’m positive that his had too. The way that my stomach felt and the pounding in my chest were probably good reasons why. I was already willing to forgive and forget and he’d barely said hello.
“Okay, just for a minute,” I said. We walked silently to a wooden bench in the center of the pier that looked out over the ocean. It was another of my favorite spots when I was a kid.
We sat down and he said, “How are you feeling?”
“I’m doing well,” I said.
“And the baby?”
“He’s good,” I told him, automatically putting a protective arm across him.
“He?” he said. “It’s a boy?” I nodded. I wondered if he was being polite or if he was really interested. “When is he due?” he asked. He seemed genuinely interested.
“In August,” I said.
I heard him sigh heavily and I chanced a glance at his face. He looked sad and I was suddenly overcome with the need to tell him everything that my lawyer told me not to discuss. “Alex?” He looked at me. God, it was hard to think when those eyes were on my face. I swallowed the lump that had built up in my throat and I said, “I didn’t leave that pregnancy test there for you to find.”
He wrinkled his brow and stared at me for the longest time before he said, “Why did you leave it?”
Taking a deep breath I said, “I’d been really sick in the mornings. I thought I just had the flu. My cycles hadn’t been regular and my doctor changed my prescription… my roommate was the one that suggested I might be pregnant. I had woken up that morning obsessing over it. As you know, Jason had just broken up with me and I wondered what I would do and what he would say if I were pregnant. At that point… since you and I had only been together that one time… I just hadn’t considered it may be yours. I bought the test on my way to work. I was a nervous wreck and I thought you were gone for the day so I used your private bathroom so that I wouldn’t get caught. Karen called me away from my work and then you came home early and I was just never able to retrieve it.”
“How do you know that the baby is not Jason’s?” he asked me. It was a fair question.
“For a couple of months before you and I were together, Jason had been really stressed at work… at least that was the excuse he gave me. I was super busy with work and school… It had been at least two months since we’d been together in that way by that day that you and I were. I would have been further along if it was his. I only really realized that later on, after you served me with the papers and locked me out of the mansion.” Okay, the last part was intended to wound. He’d hurt me and I wanted to strike out just a little. It hit its target, he winced.
“So you didn’t intend on telling me at all?” he asked.
“I don’t know, Alex. I didn’t have the chance to get that far. Your reaction was quite unexpected… and frankly, insulting.”
“Insulting?” he asked. Did he really not understand how it could be?
“Of course. Wouldn’t you be insulted if someone accused you of blatantly laying a trap for them and trying to milk money from them?”