wanted you to know that I had some concerns about coming back to Pinehurst now.”
“Because of what happened between us so many years ago?” he asked skeptically.
Her smile was sad. “Is that so unbelievable?”
“Yes,” he said.
“Did you never think of me after that weekend?”
“Sure,” he said easily. “But I didn’t think that one weekend changed anything.”
“It changed everything—at least for me,” she told him. “But when I called, you were already back together with Sara.”
“It’s not like you called a few days later,” he felt compelled to point out in his own defense. “It was more like a few months.”
Actually, two months, three weeks and five days, and during that time, not a single day had gone by in which he hadn’t picked up the phone to call her. But he’d never actually dialed her number, because he knew it would be a mistake. Because after only three days with her, he’d known that he could fall fast and hard for Kelly Cooper, and that was a complication neither of them needed at that point in their lives.
She nodded in acknowledgment. “I know.”
“And Sara and I had a history together,” he continued. “So when she said she’d made a mistake in ending our engagement, I agreed that we should try to work things out.”
“Because you loved her,” she said softly. “And I was just the girl who helped you forget—for a few days—that she’d broken your heart.”
He heard the vulnerability in her tone and he knew that, even after so many years, his reconciliation had hurt her. But the truth was, he’d never thought about Sara—not once—throughout the weekend that he was with Kelly. So instead of nodding and letting her believe it was true, he said, “I wanted you to believe that.”
She frowned at his admission. “Why?”
“Because we’d both agreed, at the end of the weekend that we’d spent together, that it couldn’t ever happen again. And then you called, and I could hear in your voice that you’d changed your mind, that you wanted more.” And in that moment, as much as he’d wanted her, he knew there could be no future for them together. Not at that time and definitely not in light of the conversation he’d had with his brother.
“And you didn’t want more,” she guessed. “Not with me.”
“What I wanted didn’t matter,” he told her. “You were still in school and barely twenty-one years old.”
“You’re right—I was twenty-one years old.” She paused to draw in a deep breath before looking up at him. “And I was pregnant.”
Chapter Three
Jackson stared at her for a long moment, as if he couldn’t quite comprehend what she was telling him. When he finally spoke, his tone conveyed as much confusion as his words. “You were…pregnant?”
She nodded.
He frowned but didn’t say anything else.
“On the way from the airport, you asked how old Ava was. She turned twelve in February.”
“Are you saying…?” His question trailed off, as if he couldn’t bear to speak the words out loud and acknowledge the possibility.
But Kelly had been holding on to the secret for too many years and she wasn’t going to hide the truth for even a minute longer. “She’s your daughter.”
His mouth snapped shut; his face actually paled. But after another pause, which was probably only a few seconds but felt like hours, his gaze narrowed and he shook his head. “Nice try, Kelly.”
She felt her back go up. “What is it you think I’m trying to do?”
“Suck me into paying twelve years of child support.”
“Child support?”
“I know you came back here to work at Richmond Pharmaceuticals, but losing your job in Seattle must have—”
“I chose to leave my job in Seattle,” she interjected.
He shrugged. “Regardless of the reason for your financial difficulties—”
She couldn’t help but laugh at the absurdity of his allegation. Because the truth was, between the inheritance left to Kelly by her grandmother and the trust set up for Ava by her former step-grandmother, she had no immediate financial issues. “You really think this is about money?”
“I can’t imagine any other reason that you would concoct such an outrageous story.”
“Maybe it seems outrageous to you,” she acknowledged. “But it’s not a story—it’s the truth.”
He snorted derisively. “Are you willing to submit your daughter to DNA testing to prove it?”
“Absolutely.”
Her immediate and unequivocal response finally seemed to give him pause.
“Trust me, Jack, if I got to choose a father for my daughter, I wouldn’t have chosen someone who’s made it more than clear that he doesn’t want to be a father.”
He considered that for a moment, then asked, “You really do think I’m her father?”
“You really think I had so many lovers I don’t know who fathered my child?”
“I wasn’t your first,” he said, in an echo of her own statement.
“No,” she agreed. She hadn’t been innocent, but she had been inexperienced. “You were my second.”
He winced. “How the hell was I supposed to know something like that?”
“You weren’t,” she admitted. In fact, she’d done everything she could to ensure he didn’t know. Afraid that her naïveté might put him off, she’d tried to make up for her lack of experience with enthusiasm. She’d been in love with him for so long, nothing had mattered to Kelly except that she was finally going to be with him.
“You told me you were on the pill,” he said now.
“No.” She felt her cheeks flush at the memory of that awkward conversation. “When the condom broke, you asked if I was ‘safe’ and I said yes.”
“But you weren’t,” he said accusingly.
“I thought you were talking about the risk of sexually transmitted diseases.”
Jack scrubbed a hand over his face. “It would have been nice to have clarified that little misunderstanding thirteen years ago.”
“I was young and naive, but even if I could, I wouldn’t change anything that happened back then because it gave me my daughter.”
“Except that you’re now claiming she’s my daughter, too.”
She should have known this would be a mistake. She’d suspected that he would be shocked, and probably more than a little angry. But his disbelief cut her to the quick. She had never slept around and there was no possibility that anyone else was the father of her child.
Of course, Jack had no way of knowing that—especially considering that she’d had no direct contact with him over the past thirteen years. But that didn’t make his accusation hurt any less. She stood up. “I thought you had a right to know. I thought Ava had a right to know. But I’d rather she didn’t know the identity of her father than to know that he doesn’t want to be her father.”
“If I am her father—”
Kelly cut him off with a sharp expletive and turned away, but not before he saw her eyes fill with