Page 3 of Sharing Forever in Hope Creek (Hope Creek #2)

Jack’s gaze followed Callie’s hand as she rested it on her still-flat abdomen. He kept staring as he tried to absorb the enormity of the situation.

‘Is he?’ Mitchell demanded of Callie. ‘Is Jack the guy you wouldn’t name?’

Hearing the gasps followed by muffled exclamations around the room amid a low whistle from Blue, Jack knew he wasn’t the only one who was shocked.

His brain had screamed in denial as Mitch had uttered the word father, y et, both Callie’s lack of instant denial and her horrified reaction to his discovery answered the question.

Shit.

He’d used protection.

But once— just once, damn it all —Callie had put the condom on him and neither of them had realised it’d torn.

‘Jack? Callie?’ his friend demanded. ‘Just how well do you two know each other?’

‘Mitch.’ Stella tugged at her fiancé’s arm. ‘Let’s give Callie and Jack some time alone.’

Jack raised one hand and pressed it against the perspiration beading on his forehead. He increased the pressure, attempting to block out the persistent words ‘pregnant’ and ‘father’ that ricocheted around his brain like deadly bullets.

‘Dinner smells fantastic and I’m so hungry I could eat an ox!’ Jim Richardson declared as he walked into the house. Built tall and broad, the cattleman threw his dark brown Akubra hat onto an ottoman, then frowned. ‘What’s going on?’

Margaret rallied first. ‘’Bout time, love. It’s almost time to carve the meat.’

‘You’re late, Boss!’ Blue chipped in. ‘I didn’t think we’d need to ring the dinner gong to bring you in. Even the cows in the top paddock can hear my stomach rumbling.’

Nobody laughed at the intended joke.

Even in his shock, Jack saw Stella release her hold on Mitch’s arm and shift to lean against the back of a settee as if she suddenly found it difficult to support her weight after standing for so long.

‘Everything good?’ Jim probed.

Jack’s every muscle stretched taut and he held his breath as he waited for confirmation from Callie as to whether his life was about to change irrevocably.

‘Er, everything’s fine. Let’s go into the kitchen,’ Margaret urged.

Clearly Jim and Margaret had been married long enough for him to know when to follow her lead.

‘Hi, sweetheart.’ Jim planted a kiss on Morgan’s forehead as he walked past slowly, still looking from one person to the next. ‘Glad you made it in time to join us. I take it everyone’s met Jack?’

‘Yes,’ Margaret confirmed hurriedly. ‘Come on, Jim, the roast isn’t going to carve itself.

’ With a glance back over her shoulder she ordered, ‘Morgan, Stella and Mitch, you can all come and help me serve out. Blue, I suggest you go into the dining room and make certain the table has been set properly.’

As the others exited hastily, Mitch remained—despite Stella tugging at his hand. He looked set to speak, but Stella intervened. ‘This is between Callie and Jack, Mitch. Come on.’ When he still hesitated, she said, ‘My leg’s aching. Let’s go out into the kitchen because I really need to sit down.’

Mitch put his arm around Stella’s waist in support but didn’t hold back his parting shot as he pointed his finger at Jack. ‘You and I will talk.’

Jack couldn’t care less what his friend thought at that moment. All he cared about was talking to Callie. When they were finally alone, his gaze flew back to her face and he noticed the vulnerability in her expression. ‘Well?’

Nerves clawed at his gut.

‘I haven’t been with anyone else,’ she answered quietly.

Shit.

Nausea washed through him and he was transported back to the turmoil of emotions that’d hit him a when a former girlfriend, Sasha, had claimed— falsely —that she was carrying his child.

This couldn’t be happening again.

‘You’re claiming the child is mine?’

She gestured helplessly. ‘It wasn’t an immaculate conception.’

He’d been shocked when he’d discovered Callie had been a virgin. He’d been appalled when they’d discovered the condom had torn. But the shock he’d known that night was nothing to the sensations roiling around in his gut right now.

Bloody hell!

As though an unseen wrestler had him in a chest hold, Jack found the pressure on his rib cage was so intense that he could only take shallow breaths.

‘You’re angry,’ she acknowledged. A troubled furrow appeared between her eyebrows. ‘Are you in a relationship, Jack?’

‘Of course not.’

‘There’s no of course not about it.’ She waved her hands wildly in front of her and accused, ‘For all I know you could be married. You could’ve been in a relationship the night we were together or you could’ve become involved with someone since.’

‘I’m neither married nor in a relationship,’ he denied hotly before launching, ‘and if you’d hung around long enough you’d know that.’

When she took a step backwards from him, he forced his diaphragm to work harder to take a deeper breath.

Calm down , he told himself before saying more evenly, ‘Mitch knows I’m not married. And if I’d been in a relationship, I would’ve brought my partner to the wedding.’

All the energy seemed to drain right out of Callie.

Tears formed in her eyes and, as he looked into those deep brown pools of vulnerability, he had to clench his teeth and remember to maintain cynicism against her claim.

He’d been bitten before and he was worth a whole lot more money now than he had been back then.

‘I’m sorry. I don’t know what to say except that the baby is definitely yours.’ For a few seconds she lowered her head and seemed to be studying the intricate pattern of the large rug that covered the polished timber floorboards under the coffee table. ‘I truly haven’t slept with anyone else.’

‘That’s an easy claim to make,’ he bit out tersely, remembering bitterly that she’d bolted while he’d slept.

Her lower lip trembled. ‘You don’t believe me.’

‘If it’s my child, why didn’t you contact me?’ The second he uttered the words he cursed then supplied his own answer. ‘You didn’t know how to.’

She drew her lower lip under her upper teeth as she nodded.

‘We talked about the unlikely possibility that the torn condom could result in a pregnancy,’ he said tightly. ‘We agreed, if it happened, you’d contact me, but you—’ he pointed an accusing finger at her, ‘—were gone the next morning when I woke up, so I couldn’t give you my contact details.’

‘I … In retrospect I realise I should’ve got those details.’ Regret and apology were scored into the faint lines that bracketed her generous mouth.

‘Why did you run off?’

The question had burned in his brain for weeks afterwards.

A wave of red washed the unnatural pallor from her cheeks. She shrugged her shoulders. ‘I’m sorry. I didn’t know how to handle the morning after. I’m not into one-night stands.’

That much had been obvious.

As if he’d ever forget he’d been her first lover. When he’d found she’d gone, he’d been concerned for her. He’d wanted to know she was okay and to make sure she had no regrets the morning after.

All these months later, every single second of the night they’d spent together was etched indelibly into his brain and her moans of ecstasy and whispered sighs of repletion still intruded on his dreams.

He stifled a groan.

‘I didn’t know how to face you … afterwards,’ she ventured when he still hadn’t responded. She moved so she stood behind a heavy leather chesterfield armchair. ‘I was embarrassed and … a bit ashamed of my behaviour.’

Her quiet confession rocked him. ‘Were you seeing someone else?’

‘No! No! Nothing like that.’

‘Then I don’t see you had anything to be ashamed about.’

‘I … You’re right. Awkward would be a better word to use than ashamed.’

Her dark eyelashes were long and they swept downward as she closed her eyes and wrung her hands together in front of her.

Even knowing she could be trying to play him for a fool, he wanted to wrap her in his arms to comfort her. God damn it! He still desired Callie with a depth that shook him.

‘Why did you leave the nightclub with me that night?’

‘Do you really need me to tell you?’ Her incredulity laced every word.

Maybe he did. Maybe he needed to know she’d been as attracted to him as he was to her—that she hadn’t just used him as … an experiment? As a knee-jerk reaction to a bad break-up?

A cynical thought hit hard. ‘Did you set out to fall pregnant that night?’

Her eyes widened. ‘Of course not! I would never do something so irresponsible!’

He damped down his immediate response that he’d been wrong to ask the question. He was a very wealthy man. It wasn’t inconceivable that she’d known who he was all along and had played innocent.

‘There have been instances of women who panic that their biological clock is ticking and they embrace single parenthood, deliberately setting out to fall pregnant by hooking up with men they’ll never see again.’

‘I can’t believe you’d even think that!’ Callie’s spine had straightened. ‘I have a very good career path and I had no plans to become a mother— not ever .’

Jack rocked back on his heels, strangely conflicted by her declaration that she didn’t want to be a mother. ‘Are you considering a termination?’

Was that even possible this far along in the pregnancy?

‘No.’

Why was he relieved?

For God’s sake, Jack, pull it together! You’ve never wanted children and you don’t even know whether this child is yours so get—a—grip.

A whole range of unidentifiable emotions coalesced in his stomach creating a cauldron of confusion as he paced back and forth in front of the chesterfield.

‘Had I wanted a child, I would’ve visited a sperm bank—not picked on an unwitting stranger at a nightclub. I’ve grappled with all sorts of guilt knowing I had no way of contacting you and thinking you had a right to know about this. I realise I should’ve stayed and got your contact details.’

Damned right she should have stayed.

‘You don’t want to be a mother, but you’re going ahead with the pregnancy.’ Then, his upper body jerked back as though he’d touched an electric fence. ‘You’re planning to have someone adopt it?’