In an attempt to both appease his guilt and ease the tension between them, he backtracked to less volatile territory—at least while they were in a small, enclosed space. “How are you feeling?”
Ally’s eyebrows went up and she seemed poised to attack. Instead she closed her eyes and took a deep breath. “The mornings are pretty rough, and I’m tired a lot.”
“And that’s normal?”
She nodded. “Unfortunately.” Her lips twitched in amusement, and, for a brief moment, he flashed back to Tortola, back to when her inability to hide her reactions had charmed him. But the moment passed quickly, and her amusement faded as rapidly as it had come. “Turn left. That’s me on the corner.”
The two-story Victorian sat gracefully among its historic neighbors, beautiful and well cared for despite its age. He’d been so occupied on the short drive, he hadn’t noticed she was directing him to the heart of Savannah’s historic district. “This is your place?”
Ally didn’t break stride as she climbed the steps to the spacious verandah and slid her key into the lock. “The first floor is. I may not be the heir to a shipyard or have zillion-dollar endorsement agreements, but I do all right.”
So she did know who he was. She may not have known when they met, but at some point she’d done her homework. Which meant she could have contacted him if she’d wanted to. His ire flared up again.
Ally’s sandals slapped against hardwood floors, and the sound echoed off the high ceilings as she moved around the room before settling on an overstuffed red sofa. The apartment suited her—or at least the little he knew about her—old-fashioned around the edges but still modern. The absurdity of the situation hit him at that moment. A woman he barely knew was carrying his child.
“You wanted to talk. Let’s talk.”
The challenge was there; he no longer had the element of surprise on his side, and Ally must feel as though she had the home court advantage now. “How long have you known?”
“That I was pregnant? About three weeks.”
“And in all that time, it never occurred to you that you should tell me?” Agitated, he paced in front of the sofa she sat on, hoping the extra expense of energy would keep him from lashing out again as his temper built.
“To what end? As far as I knew, you lived on a boat somewhere in the Caribbean and hooked up with a different girl every night of the week.”
“And you assumed the swabbie wasn’t worth telling? He was good enough to sleep with on vacation, but not good enough to help you raise a child?”
“Be reasonable, Chris. It’s not a matter of ‘good enough.’ I was just trying to be rational about this.”
“When you found out differently, you didn’t call me because…”
“I only found out about the great Chris Wells twenty minutes ago, so it didn’t affect my assessment of the situation.”
“You expect me to believe that when you found out you were pregnant, you never once tried to find out more about me?”
For the first time in this ridiculous conversation, Ally’s temper seemed to flare. “To be brutally honest, I had enough on my plate to figure out. I wasn’t all that worried about you.”
“Oh, no. I can’t see why the father of the baby would have any impact whatsoever on your plans.”
As fast as it had come, the heat fled from her voice and her tone became conciliatory. “Don’t take it personally. I loved every minute we spent together, but it was just a summer fling. It was over, as far as everything was concerned.”
He gestured at her stomach. “I beg to differ.”
Ally sighed and rubbed her face. “Look. My hormones are a mess right now, I cry at the drop of a hat, I’m so exhausted I can barely keep my eyes open, and I haven’t been able to eat all day. I can’t deal with this level of hostility, and I don’t see much sense in continuing to shout at each other. Let’s just cut to the chase, okay?”
Personally, he felt there was a lot of ground still to cover, but only a true jerk would continue to upset a pregnant woman. It wasn’t good for the baby.
His baby.
While anger had been driving him since Molly unwittingly dropped the news, the magnitude of the situation finally slammed into him. He was going to be a father. Hard on the heels of that realization was the even more shocking understanding that he wanted this baby.
Now he needed to sit down. He chose a chair across from Ally and nodded for her to continue.
Ally took a deep breath before she spoke. “I didn’t try to find you because I didn’t think it would matter. You didn’t strike me as the kind of guy who was looking to be tied down, so telling you about the baby—even if I’d been able to locate you—didn’t seem like a winning situation.” He started to interrupt, but she hurried ahead. “Obviously, Iwas mistaken with that assumption, and for that I apologize. I didn’t set out to get pregnant, but I know I want her. Or him. You don’t have to worry, though. I have a good job, plenty of friends and family, and I can handle this. I don’t expect anything from you.”
Wringing Ally’s neck sounded very tempting at the moment. “What if I expect something? This is my child, too, remember.”
Genuine shock at his statement sent Ally’s eyebrows upward. Had she never once considered that possibility while she was “handling” things?
“Well, um, I’m sure we can work something out. Visitation arrangements or…”
“That’s not good enough.”
“Then what do you want?” There was a beat of silence before Ally laughed. “It’s not like we can get married or anything.”
Actually, that was a possibility he hadn’t considered yet. He hadn’t had three weeks to make decisions. Hell, he’d barely had three hours. “Why not?”
“Be serious.”
“Maybe I am.”
“I’m not looking to get married at the moment.” A shadow crossed her face but disappeared a second later.
“Neither was I, now that you mention it, but the circumstances have changed.”
That seemed to spark something, and her calm facade dropped. She stood and paced, and her hands moved agitatedly as she talked. “But the century hasn’t. We don’t have to get married because I’m pregnant. There are other—”
“I’m not going to be delegated to the occasional weekend.” He’d had enough of that with his own parents in the early days after their divorce. Until his mother had decided not to bother anymore, at least.
“Then what do you want?”
Before he even realized what he was doing, he was on his feet and his hands were gripping her arms. “To be a part of my child’s life. To be his father!”
Ally shook off his grip. “I’m offering you that. We’ll just have to figure something out that works for both of us. Charleston is only a couple of hours away…”
As unbelievable as it sounded, Ally seemed to think he was really going to settle for whatever little plan she had turning in her head. Not likely. “Damn it, Ally—”
She spun on him in a fury. “Don’t even look at me like that. How dare you come storming down here and start making demands? This is my baby, and I’ll be the one making the decisions.”
He