Pursued(19)

How much did she have to hate him to do something like that? And why?  What had he done to her except give her seven orgasms-not that he'd been  counting-and try to see her again? He'd liked her, really liked her … at  least until she'd done all this.

As he walked, he went over the night they'd spent together, searching  for something he could have done to set her off. She'd freaked out a  little when he'd gotten her phone number, but they'd compromised. He'd  played by the rules she set. And still she'd nearly destroyed him.

It didn't make sense.

"Daddy! Daddy! Push me higher!"                       
       
           



       

The high-pitched squeal got his attention, followed by the sound of  deep male laughter. He glanced over toward the playscape, saw a man  about his own age pushing a small boy on the swings. The kid was  adorable, dark, wild curls and big brown eyes and the biggest smile Nic  had ever seen.

"Faster, Daddy, faster!"

The man laughed again, then did as his son requested.

Nic didn't mean to stare, but he couldn't look away. They both looked  so happy, the kid and the dad, who looked as if there was nowhere in the  world he'd rather be.

Nic wasn't sure how long he stood there, but it was long enough to have  the dad giving him a weird look. Great. He'd gone from human rights  violator to park pervert in under an hour. It was shaping up to be one  hell of a day.

"Sorry," he said, putting a little more distance between him and the  kid. "I just found out I'm … um, expecting … an, uh, boy." What was wrong  with him that he was tripping over his own tongue? That never happened  to him. He was the guy who always had a joke or a story, the one who  could put anyone at ease. And yet, here he was, trying to form a simple  sentence about the fact that he, too, was going to be a father, and he  ended up sounding like a blathering idiot.

But blathering idiot must be the language of fathers everywhere,  because, somehow the guy got what Nic was saying. The suspicious look  disappeared from his face, giving way to a grin that was a tad  sympathetic. "You just found out you and your wife are expecting a boy?"  he said.

Not quite, but it was close enough that Nic was willing to go with it. "Yeah. It's … "

"Intense," the other guy filled in.

"Yes. Exactly. Totally intense. I can't quite wrap my head around it yet."

"Daddy, higher!" the kid said again.

"Any higher and your mother will have my head," the guy responded. But  Nic noticed that he pushed the boy a little bit harder, let him go a  little bit higher. "Yeah, it's crazy. But it's great, too, you know.  Because-" he nodded toward his son "-you get this awesome kid out of the  deal."

"I can see. How old is he?"

"Just turned four."

"He's great."

The guy's chest puffed out a little. "He is, isn't he? A bit of a  daredevil, always wanting to go faster or climb higher. He keeps us on  our toes."

"I bet."

"Slower, Daddy!"

"Slower?" The man looked down at his son in surprise.

"I want to go on the slide now."

"Oh, sure." Nic watched as the man carefully stopped the swing and  helped his son off. "You want to go on that slide over there?" he asked,  pointing to the largest one on the playscape.

"No. I want to do the big one. Over there." The kid pointed to a huge, curved slide obviously meant for older kids.

"Of course you do." The dad rolled his eyes, but he held out a hand for  the kid and the boy took it. "Let's go." He glanced back at Nic as they  started to walk away. "Hey, good luck with the baby."

"Thanks. I appreciate that."

"You'll need it. It's the craziest thing you'll ever do. But also the best."

And then he scooped his kid up onto his shoulders and took off running  across the park while the little boy shrieked in delight.

Nic stood where he was for long seconds, staring after them until they  reached the other playscape. Then as the kid climbed up the slide and  his dad climbed up right behind him, Nic felt himself calm down.  Everything was going to be fine. He might not know anything about  parenting yet, but he had five months to learn the basics. And a  lifetime to learn the rest of it.

Desi had better get on board. He was willing to take a backseat,  willing to do things her way. As long as her way didn't involve cutting  him out completely. Because she was carrying his kid-his son-and while  he was willing to compromise, the one thing he wasn't willing to do was  walk away. The sooner she accepted that, the better off they would all  be.



How had she screwed up this badly? Desi stared at the evidence on the  desk in front of her, sorted through it for what had to be the fiftieth  time as she wrapped her mind around the fact that she had made a  terrible mistake.

Nic had brought all kinds of documentation with him, including page  after page of chemical analysis of the diamonds sold by Bijoux. Diamonds  whose environmental coating and chemical thumbprint matched exactly  those being dug up in Canadian diamond mines. Not African mines.  Canadian. All of which were conflict-free and responsibly sourced.
                       
       
           



       
That wasn't all the evidence Nic had brought, though it was certainly  damning enough considering it was signed by one of the top  conflict-diamond experts in the world. But he'd also brought affidavits  from the foremen at each of the mines, explaining the amount of diamonds  each mine yielded and how many pounds of diamonds had gone to Bijoux in  the preceding three years. Amounts that matched Bijoux's certified  goods received records.

He had done all his homework, had provided the paper with everything he  could possibly need to debunk her story. And maybe she still wouldn't  believe it no matter what he said-documents could be forged after  all-except Malcolm had spent the past few days running her source to  ground. After Darlene had spoken with Nic last week about the article  and he had been so adamant about filing a libel claim if they published  the information, Malcolm had wanted to triple-check her source.

Which she'd done herself after he'd given his information to Desi. But  she must have missed something because early this morning Malcolm had  talked with him. And had somehow managed to get from the man what she  couldn't. An admission that he had forged the documents he'd given  her-from Bijoux and from the two diamond mines in Africa-in order to  make it look as if Marc and Nic Durand were dirty.

All of it, forged. All of it, lies. Pages and pages of forgeries that  she had bought hook, line and sinker. Because she'd wanted the story to  be real-had needed the story to be real so she could write the article  and move her career away from dresses and into real news. And to hell  with whether or not she wrecked the lives of two innocent men. To hell  if she brought down an entire business-and an entire newspaper-with her  mistakes. She'd needed to get the scoop.

How could she have been so stupid? So gullible? So anxious to get the  information that she'd overlooked her source's tells. And now that she  looked back on it, there had been many. She'd just been so caught up in  getting the story and not disappointing Malcolm, in getting the  truth-ha, wasn't that a joke-that she'd looked past them. She'd made  excuses for them in her own mind.

The source was nervous.

The source was a little confused but once he calmed down, he sorted it out.

The source was doing a brave thing coming forward and blowing the  whistle, but he was just an amateur. Of course he hadn't known exactly  what she'd need for the story.

God, she was such a fool. And the worst kind of fool-the arrogant kind  who refused to see, let alone admit, when she was wrong. Just thinking  about what she'd said to Nic when he'd tried to hand her the documents …   She'd had in her hands the proof that he was none of those things but  she'd been too stubborn to look at it. Too stubborn to admit that maybe,  just maybe, she'd been wrong.

And now, the story she'd worked so hard on was dead. Malcolm told her  it wasn't her fault, told her Candace-the more experienced reporter he'd  put on the case to work with her-had missed the same things she had.  Which was true. Candace had.

But Candace hadn't spent the time on this story that Desi had.

Candace didn't know it the way she did.

Candace hadn't been trained at an early age by Alan Maddox, one of the best investigative journalists who had ever lived.

If Candace had made a mistake, it was in trusting Desi, who had assured  her over and over again that the information they had was legit.

Which it wasn't. Not at all. Not even a little bit.

So now, here she was, back in the society pages-for a little while  anyway. Malcolm assured her that her job wasn't in jeopardy, but with a  screwup of this magnitude, how could it not be? If that story had run-if  Malcolm and Darlene had been just a little less conscientious-the paper  would be in really hot water right now. And Bijoux would be under siege  from everyone from the press to human rights organizations to consumer  groups to lawyers bringing civil suits on behalf of clients who'd  purchased Bijoux diamonds … the horrors would have gone on and on.