“No!” her sister gasped, her expression horrified. Tears rushed into her eyes, the hazel-colored eyes so similar to Louisa’s own, though her sister was several years younger and her hair was lightened into a luscious light blond color. She swallowed. “I once took away the man you loved. I am trying to make it up to you.”
Louisa blinked at her in shock.
“I’m so sorry for what I did to you,” Katie choked out. “I thought I loved Matthias. I thought you didn’t. But I was wrong. So wrong to sleep with him. And I should have known. A man who would betray one person in his life would betray others…” Her voice trailed off bitterly. She looked up, openly weeping. “You’ve done so much for me. Always. I’ll never forgive myself for taking Matthias away from you.”
Matthias. The truth was that Louisa could barely remember him now. How could she have ever thought she loved the man, when she’d barely known him?
Unlike Rafael, whom she knew so well in so many ways.
The way he played the piano at night when he was lonely, the way he would carelessly eat five of her caramel brownies before dinner. The way he loved the smell of roses in the springtime. The way he ate dinner at three in the morning, then rose for his coffee and newspaper three hours later. The way he ruthlessly cut people out of his life before they could disappoint him.
Louisa shook her head. “You were right all along. I never loved Matthias,” she said in a low voice. Lifting her head, she gave a shuddering breath. “But Rafael…”
“You have to tell him,” her sister said. “He has to know.”
Louisa looked at Katie. “It’s too late.”
“It can’t be,” she whispered. “It can’t be too late. I need to do something, something to make you forgive me…”
Six-year-old Madison, her blond hair in pigtails, reached her arms up anxiously around her weeping mother. “What’s wrong, Mommy? Why are you crying?”
It had been almost two years since her father’s death, and the little girl already had forgotten almost everything about her father.
“Nothing’s wrong, sweetie,” Katie said, wiping her eyes and trying to smile.
But so much was wrong, Louisa thought. She and Katie had had such a happy childhood in northern Florida, beloved and protected by both their parents. Then, all too young, their mother had died of a long, lingering illness, followed by their father six months later when he simply seemed to lose the will to live. They’d lost their parents. Her niece had lost her father. But that had been beyond their control.
Louisa was deliberately choosing to deprive her baby of his father, and though she tried to remind herself why she’d had no choice, suddenly pain ripped through her. She looked down at her baby. What if she’d made the wrong choice?
“Can you ever forgive me?” her sister whispered.
Reaching over, Louisa hugged Katie fiercely with one arm. She realized she was crying, too. “There is nothing to forgive.”
“I love you,” Katie whispered. “And I want you to be happy. Do the right thing while you have the chance. Give your child a father.”
“I can’t tell him,” Louisa said over the lump in her throat as she pulled away. “Rafael would be furious. He might try to take Noah away from me…”
“He wouldn’t!”
“You didn’t hear him last year when he said he would force me into marriage and make my life hell as his wife. If he ever knew I’d had his baby…”
She looked down at Noah. At almost eight months, he was a happy, chubby baby with fat legs and a smiley disposition. Other than his dark hair and the slate-gray color of his eyes, he was nothing like the man who’d fathered him.
“Whatever he said to you, he said in anger,” Katie argued. “He wouldn’t take Noah away from you. You’re a good mother!”
“You don’t understand,” Louisa cried, wiping her tears away fiercely. “If Rafael knew I’d had his baby…he would destroy me.”
The words were still coming out of her mouth when Louisa heard the chiming bell of the door. She froze. Then, with her baby still against her hip, she turned.
Rafael stood in the doorway. He’d been reaching for the bag of caramel brownies that he’d left on the counter. But by the wide look in his eyes as he saw Louisa with the baby in her arms, she knew her worst fears had been realized. He knew everything.
“Rafael,” she breathed. “I can explain.”
He looked at the baby.
“Who is that?” he asked in a low voice.
“Rafael…he is…I wanted to…”
His eyes narrowed. His shoulders straightened, and his body seemed so tall and strong and powerful. His face was dark as he took a step toward her, and it took all of her courage to remain rooted in one spot.
“Is that baby mine?” His voice was cold. Dangerous.
The panicked thought raced through her brain that she should lie, say the baby was her sister’s, or that she was babysitting for a neighbor—but as she looked up into his hard, gray eyes, her heart pounded in her throat. And she found she could not lie.
“Tell me.” His voice was deceptively soft as he took another step toward her. “Who. Is. That. Baby.”
Her teeth chattered. “He is…my son.”
Coming very close to her, looking down at her without touching either her or Noah, he said in a voice low as a whisper and dark as night, “And who is the father?”
Lie! A voice inside her screamed. Lie!
But she could not. Even after everything she’d done, she could not look into his face and deny him the truth that was obvious. Everything about their son looked exactly like Rafael, from his black hair to his beautiful gray eyes.
“Is he my son?” Rafael said in a low voice.
Closing her eyes as if bracing for a blow, she took a deep breath.
“Yes,” she whispered.
The simple, clipped word from her lips—Yes—nearly caused Rafael to stagger back, as if struck by a mortal blow. Even though he’d known the truth from the instant he saw the baby on Louisa’s hip.
But hearing the word, beads of sweat broke out over his forehead. His entire body felt like ice.
She’d had his baby. And she hadn’t told him.
Louisa had caused him to unknowingly abandon his son.
His hands tightened as he stared at her across the warmth of the bakery. A large group of tourists entered the shop behind him with a happy chime of the bell.
With a snarl, Rafael opened his mouth to speak, to accuse. Grabbing his arm, still holding her baby against her hip, Louisa pulled Rafael up the flight of stairs behind the counter.
At the top of the stairs, he looked grimly at the second-floor apartment around him. It was a small, pretty, feminine home. Anxiously tugging on his arm, Louisa pulled him into a bedroom and closed the door behind him.
“Please understand,” she said desperately, turning to face him. “You left me no choice!”
He stared around the small room. It contained a single bed, a crib and a changing table. The bed was covered by a handmade quilt. On the wall over the crib, soft fabric letters spelled out N-O-A-H beside a framed picture of a giraffe that looked like it was from an old children’s book.
There was no lavish luxury here. This apartment wasn’t a palace, but it was homey and cozy. It was bright and warm. The