Pursued(17)

Needless to say, he hadn't.

And now, here he was, looking completely shocked by her baby bump  seconds after he'd accused her of falsifying evidence for her article.  Which was total and complete bull. She'd double-, triple- and  quadruple-checked everything in that article, so for him to come around  here beating his chest and threatening her just because he didn't like  what she'd found out … well, that wasn't exactly her problem, was it?

Except the longer he stood there, the more it began to feel as if it  was totally her problem. And when the elevators started dinging, marking  the return of most of the staff, she knew she had to get him somewhere  more private. Standing in the middle of a room of reporters was not  where they needed to hash this out-especially if she wanted to keep  hidden the fact that he was the father of her unborn child.

"Come on," she said, making an executive decision to get them both out  of there before things got even messier than they already were.

She grabbed his arm and propelled him toward the staircase situated in  the left corner of the building. She'd get him outside to the back  parking lot. Since the Times' staff had been cut down to a fraction of  its former size, no one needed to park back there anymore.

He seemed to be somewhat recovered by the time they made it down the  stairs and out of the building. Or at least recovered enough to ask,  "It's mine?"

"Of course it's yours. Otherwise I wouldn't have felt the need to call you and leave you that voice mail."

"I swear, I didn't get the voice mail. If I had, I would have called  you. I would have-" He broke off, shook his head. "So you're eighteen  weeks along, then?"

"You came up with that number pretty quick," she told him, surprised that he remembered exactly when they'd met.

"I'm not the one who walked away."

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"It means, I wanted to see you again. I texted you numerous times  trying to get you to respond. You're the one who chose not to."

He was right. She knew he was right, but still, she couldn't let it go.  "If you were so interested in me, why didn't you call me back when I  called you? Even if you didn't get the voice mail, you had to have seen  that I called."

For the first time since he'd shown up in her office like some kind of  avenging angel, he wouldn't look her in the eye. Which told her  everything she needed to know even before he said, "I erased your  number. If you called-"

"When I called," she corrected him.

"When you called," he conceded, "you would have come up as an unknown number."

Well, if that didn't tell her exactly where she stood with the man who  was the father of her child, nothing else would. She'd spent weeks,  months, obsessively rereading his texts while he'd simply erased her  from his life.

Then again, that was about par for the course with her, wasn't it?  Growing attached when she knew she shouldn't and then being shown, again  and again, that she didn't matter at all.

"Right. Of course." She tried to sound flippant, but from the look on  his face she wasn't carrying it off nearly as well as she'd hoped to.  "That's fine. Perfect, really, just go back to that."

"Go back to what?"

"You living your life, me living mine and never the twain shall meet."

He looked at her as if she'd lost her mind. "I hate to break it to you,  Desi, but the twain has already met. And it made a baby when it did."

"You say that like I'm supposed to be surprised by the consequences of  our one night together. I'm the one who's been carrying this kid for the  last eighteen weeks. And I'm the one who's going to have to deal with  it after it's born. So you can take all your 'we made a baby' crap and  go back where you came from."

"You don't really think it's going to be that easy, do you?"

"I don't see why it has to be complicated. You go about living your  life exactly as you always have and I'll figure out what to do about the  baby."

"As we've already established, you're eighteen weeks along. Which means  you've already decided what to do about the baby. And if you're not  having an abortion-"

"I'm not! So you're out of luck on that front."

Nic made a low, angry sound deep in his throat, shoved a frustrated  hand through his hair. "Are you being deliberately obtuse? I said it was  obvious that you've made up your mind to have the baby and you read  that as I want you to get an abortion? What's wrong with you?"                       
       
           



       

She nearly laughed. If she had a dollar for every time someone had  asked her that question in her life … well, she wouldn't be working a  crappy entry-level journalism job, that's for sure. "Look, I don't even  know why we're having this discussion. It's not your problem-"

"Not my problem?" he squawked.

"Exactly. Not your problem. My job isn't great but it's got good  benefits and my dad's life insurance left me pretty well off when he  died. So you don't have to worry that I want something from you, because  I don't. I know this is my baby and-"

"Your baby?"

She glared at him, totally exasperated by his continued interruptions  when she was trying so hard to get through this conversation without  crying. Since she'd gotten pregnant, the hormones had her emotions all  over the place.

"You know, you're really beginning to sound like a parrot."

"And you're beginning to sound like a lunatic. That baby you're carrying is as much mine as it is yours and-"

"Really? As much yours as mine? Possession is nine-tenths of the law,  Nic, and right now he's inside my body, so … " She gave a little shrug to  underscore her meaning-and to irritate the hell out of him. Judging from  the way he was suddenly grinding his teeth together, it was working.

"It's a he? You know it's a he already?"

She almost lied, almost told him she didn't know. From the time she'd  found out about the baby, but particularly after she'd called Nic and  not gotten a response, she'd begun to think of this baby as exclusively  hers. Someone she could take care of, someone she could love. Someone  who would never go to sleep wondering where she was or when he would see  her again.

And now, Nic was here. Talking about the baby as if he was already  invested in him or something. She didn't trust it … and she didn't trust  Nic.

But lying about it just to hurt him wasn't right, either. And so she nodded, reluctantly. "Yes, it's a boy."

His eyes glazed over at the confirmation and, for long seconds, he seemed dazed. A little out of it.

"Wow. It just got real, you know? We're having a boy."

She really didn't like the sound of that. "I'm having a boy."

"Are we back to that? Seriously?" He looked so disappointed that it  struck a chord deep inside her. Made her squirm a little uncomfortably  under his scrutiny-and under the realization that here was a man who  seemed to take his responsibilities seriously. A man who wouldn't just  run away from his child at the first sign of trouble.

But how did she know that, really? He'd just found out she was  pregnant, so of course he was interested. Of course he wanted to be  involved. But that didn't mean he'd thought it through, didn't mean he  wasn't going to balk once the truth settled in.

Just the thought had her backing up and cupping a protective hand over  the soft swell of her baby. "Back to it? I don't think we ever left it,"  she told him. "This is my son."

"Our son."

"My son. He-"

"God." Nic ran a frustrated hand through his hair in a motion that was  becoming familiar to her, even in the short time they'd spent together.  "Why are you being so obstinate about this?" he exploded. "I don't get  you. I really don't. First you don't answer me when I try to get in  touch with you after our night together. Then you write that  assassination article and try to ruin my family's company based on a  bunch of lies. And now? Now you're trying to cut me out of our kid's  life before he's even born. I don't get it. What did I ever do to you to  make you hate me this much?"

"I don't hate you," she told him as guilt spread through her. She tried  to cut it out, to nip it in the bud, but it wasn't so easy to do when  he was looking at her as if she'd just ruined Santa Claus, the Easter  Bunny and the Tooth Fairy all at the same time.

"Really? Because it sure seems like you do from where I'm sitting." He  shook his head, then turned his back on her and started to walk away.

Her heart dropped. He was leaving already, giving up. Which was fine,  she told herself. Better now than after the baby was born. Or after  she'd come to depend on him.

But it turned out, he wasn't going far. Just to the fence a few yards  away. She watched as he stood there for long seconds, head bowed and  hands shoved in his pockets. The guilt burning inside her got a little  harder to ignore.