‘Then why wait to tell me until now—when it presents a perfect opportunity to shame me into marriage in front of everyone?’
‘And you think you’re such a prize? No, thank you. I’m quite capable of taking care of myself and my baby.’
‘And if it is my baby as well, as you claim?’
‘It doesn’t matter. You’ve made it more than plain that you’ve no interest in this child, which suits me just fine. You’ve been informed. I’ve discharged my responsibilities. So now you can forget I ever told you. It’s no skin off my nose.’
‘And how am I expected to just forget an accusation of paternity now?’
‘The same way you quite easily seem able to write off all the good work I have done for your business while I was doing Morgan’s job.’
‘Not to mention all the good work you performed on your back!’
Icy claws shredded what was left of her heart. ‘I can’t believe you’re saying these things. Haven’t you learnt anything at all about me during these last few weeks?’
‘Yes,’ he said coldly. ‘I’ve learned you’re a consummate liar. I’ve learned you’re someone not to be trusted, someone who can twist circumstances to what she’d like them to be.’
She reeled back, stunned by the extent of his hostility. She’d been expecting his censure, she’d been expecting his outrage that she’d deceived him for so long, but she’d never expected his total vilification of her character.
Tegan felt the churning in her stomach take a turn for the worse. ‘Oh God,’ she muttered, putting one hand over her belly and the back of the other to her mouth, feeling as if she was about to violently lose the next-to-non-existent contents of her stomach once again. It was hardly sympathy she got from him.
‘Go and do what you have to do,’ he demanded coldly. ‘Then get dressed. I’ll wait in the car for you. But let me warn you now, don’t you dare say a word to anyone!’
Tegan shook her head, not believing, not wanting to believe. ‘You’ve got to be kidding. There’s no way…You can’t expect me to go. Not now…’
‘Just get dressed!’ he ordered. ‘You don’t get out of lunch with my grandmother that easily.’
The restaurant was fully booked, but their table was set in a private room fringed by tall potted-palms, and overlooking a sparkling blue infinity-pool that merged into the sea and azure sky beyond. It was like the Pacific Ocean began and ended at their feet. It was the sort of place that would make you feel good just being there—that is, if you weren’t seated next to the Grinch.
‘Isn’t this nice?’ Nell insisted as she took a sip of her champagne cocktail, oblivious to both her party hat slipping sideways and the simmering tension between two of her lunch companions. ‘I haven’t had so much fun for ages.’
Tegan smiled thinly and sipped her water, just wanting the ordeal to be over so she could go home and be with her sister. They both had plans to make. Morgan had rehabilitation to organize, and ultimately the search for a new job. Tegan had different plans, plans that included being a single mum and somehow raising a child she felt nowhere near prepared for.
She’d bluffed her way past Maverick’s claims, telling him she neither wanted nor needed his help. But she knew her savings wouldn’t last for ever, and, while Morgan would be happy to let her stay as long as she needed, she really needed to find a more permanent arrangement before the baby arrived. A single mother. Never in her life had she imagined that would be her fate. Never in her life had she felt so in need of a plan.
But plans and home-making would have to wait. There was still pudding to come, coffee and port, the mere idea of which threatened to turn her stomach again. But nobody else in the party seemed in any mood to hurry things along. It had been a successful year, and with the go-ahead for Royalty Cove the future looked even brighter. Everyone bar Tegan seemed set to celebrate.
She tried to participate in the party mood, and for a while she chatted, but right now the conversation around her blurred into so much white noise as she looked longingly at the sparkling water. She could be floating weightless out there, with not a care in the world, the cool water at her back, the sun warming her face. She’d just drift away, letting the water carry her along, out over the edge of the pool and away into the endless sea, floating away on the gentle waves to where nothing mattered—not an unplanned pregnancy, not the guilt of weeks of deception and not the fact she was in love with a man whose regard for her was so low it didn’t register.