Cady looked at the entrance of Bonnets and faked a smile. “Ah, the person I’m waiting for has arrived. It was interesting running into you again, Amy. Nice to meet you, Julia.”
“But—” Amy protested.
“Come on.” Julia placed a hand on Amy’s back and pushed her away. “Let’s find someone else you can practice your CIA interrogation skills on.”
Cady rolled her eyes. Of all the people in the world she’d thought she’d never see again, and whom she never wanted to see again, Amy was at the top of her list. Nearly a decade ago, Beck had tired of Cady and he’d sent her home so that he could sow his wild oats all over the Asian subcontinent. Once Cady left, she was sure Amy had stepped right on into the space, in bed and out, that Cady had occupied in Beck’s life.
Beck had been and still was the honey that female bees flocked to. She watched his subtle flirting, heard him laughing with Amy, and she’d felt like she couldn’t compete with the blonde bombshell.
Cady was long, lanky and not overly blessed, as her boyfriend, Tom, told her often enough, in the “boobage” department. But it was more than that. Beck, Amy and the other backpackers they’d met had been just so together, so effortlessly confident. Of course, there were the stoners and weirdos and the lost, but many of the travelers had their lives sorted. They were street-smart and confident and knew where they were going and what to do when they got there.
Thanks to her protected, insulated childhood, she would’ve been utterly lost without Beck making the decisions for her. Was that why he’d ditched her, because she’d been lacking in self-confidence and because she’d become more of a responsibility than a girlfriend?
Who knew? He’d been long on termination and short on explanations. He’d just handed her a ticket and stood in line with her at Passport Control. When she’d cleared that, she’d turned back to look at him through the glass walls and saw him walking away, taking a fair share of her shattered heart with him.
“Cady.”
Cady looked up and accepted Tom’s quick brush of his lips against her cheek. He sat down opposite her and immediately glanced at his watch. “I have about a half hour before I need to be back in the office. Can we make this quick?”
Wow, nice to see you, too, Tom. “I thought we were having dinner together?”
“Can’t. I have some problems at work, so I need to get back to my desk.”
She was sleeping with her client, and the fact that she was still embarrassed her. Tom dismissed her concerns of their lack of professionalism, saying they were both single and it wasn’t a hanging offense. She’d tried to be okay with it but she’d finally made the decision to call it quits. Fate, however, had other ideas.
“You look like hell, Cady. What’s up with that?”
Tom’s jerk quotient always went up when he was stressed, Cady thought. It wasn’t personal, she reminded herself.
But it sure felt pretty personal. Beck had hurt her when he tossed her away, but he’d never talked to her like this. Then again, Tom Steel wasn’t Beck Ballantyne. Nobody could be.
Gorgeous, super-smart and highly successful, he’d set the bar pretty high and no man could reach it.
Let’s get some perspective here, Collins. Beck kicked you out of his life; he sent you away. You expected it from your parents, but not from the man you loved to distraction. Who you thought might love you.
That had been a very erroneous assumption.
Tom’s flat hand hitting the table jolted her back into the present. “Cady! Just say what you have to say, will you?”
Sure.
“I’m pregnant.”
Tom’s low, vicious curse hung in the air between them. “Get rid of it.”
She’d somehow expected him to say that. “Not an option.”
Her parents had rid themselves of Will by sending him to live at a residential home when he was thirteen, and Beck had sent her away, too, but she was not prepared to do the same to her child. Sure, a pregnancy wasn’t convenient, but neither had Will’s autism or her falling in love with Beck been convenient.
You didn’t just erase the problem because you didn’t like the outcome.
Tom’s face turned paper-white. “I need a drink.”
Cady watched Tom walk to the bar and hoped that her baby didn’t inherit his knock-kneed walk. Or his lack of height. Or the cowlick just above his right ear.
He isn’t Beck...
Damn him for being the entire package, both smart and sexy. A blue-eyed wavy haired blond, Beck looked like he belonged on the cover of a surfing magazine. Long-limbed and muscular, he looked as good in a tuxedo as he did in a pair of swimming shorts. Unlike Beckett, Tom didn’t make her head swim or her heart race and she liked it that way. It was an adult relationship with no teenage hormones and irrationality to cloud her thinking. She certainly never felt short of breath or felt the need to rip Tom’s clothes off.
She’d been careful with Tom; she hadn’t given him any of her heart. She’d given Beckett everything—including her virginity—only to be dismissed when he’d had enough of her.
So, yeah, Tom never set her panties, or her heart, on fire and walking away from him was going to be easy. She’d just prefer not to be pregnant while she did it.
Single and pregnant. Her parents were going to be so proud.
Cady rested her hand on her stomach. There was only one fact of which she was certain: she was keeping her baby.
Tom banged his tumbler of whiskey onto the table and sat down again. He lifted his glass to his lips and sent her a long, cold look.
“Is it mine?”
Cady lifted her hands in the air. “Are you crazy? Of course it’s yours. I haven’t slept with anyone else but you since we started dating.”
Tom shrugged. He turned his head toward the bar, leered at a new female arrival and turned back to her, looking supremely disinterested.
“The baby is yours, Tom,” Cady repeated, enunciating the words.
He pouted. “So you say.”
“Tom, we’ve been seeing each other for the best part of a year.”
“I didn’t think we were dating only each other.”
Cady blinked, utterly astounded. What the hell?
Wait, hold on a second... If Tom thought that they weren’t exclusive then that meant that he had colored outside the lines, so to speak. “Have you cheated on me?”
“Since I didn’t think we were exclusive I don’t consider it cheating.”
“You bastard!” Cady stopped herself from banging the table. “Who?”
“Does it matter?” Tom asked, his voice cool. He motioned to her stomach, and his next words catapulted this exchange from a bad dream into a nightmare. “Get rid of it or you’re fired.”
“You can’t fire me. I have a contract with you!” Cady stated, not recognizing the cold, heartless man sitting opposite her. God, if she lost Tom’s business, as well...
“So sue me.” Tom shrugged, unconcerned. “I’ll win. Cady, I’m not interested in having a baby. If you want child support you’re going to have to sue me for that, as well,” Tom stated after draining his glass of whiskey. “But I should warn you that I’ll sic both sets of lawyers on you—mine and my wife’s.”
What? His wife’s lawyers? He was divorced; he’d been divorced for a little over a year. He’d divorced