The Midwife's Child

‘No?’ His blue eyes were cold as they raked her pale face. ‘Then why didn’t you at least wait around to say good morning? Why slink off like a thief in the early hours without leaving so much as a phone number?’

‘I told you, I panicked.’ She turned to look out of the window again, unable to face the anger in his eyes. ‘I’d never done anything like that before—’

‘Like what? Slept with a man you didn’t know?’ His harsh words made her shoulders stiffen and she turned back towards him.

‘You were there, too, Jed, remember?’ Everything she’d done, he’d done, too. ‘You were hardly an innocent bystander. Whatever you may think of me, I behaved in a way that was so totally out of character that night I scared myself. But I don’t really expect you to understand that.’

He glared at her, the expression in his blue eyes fierce. ‘All right, let’s just suppose for one moment that I understand why you left that morning. That still doesn’t excuse you from telling me that you were pregnant. Whether you panicked or not, I had a right to know.’

She held his gaze bravely, her heart hammering. ‘I can’t talk about this with you when you’re so angry.’

He tipped his head back and muttered something under his breath. ‘Angry? How can you possibly expect me not to be angry?’

‘You don’t understand—’

‘You’re dead right, I don’t understand.’ His icy tone made her wince. ‘I don’t understand what right you think you had to keep this from me.’

‘That’s because you won’t listen to me. You’re so angry you don’t want to hear my point of view.’ She again wrapped her arms around her slim frame and forced herself to stay calm. She hated it when people were angry. ‘Why don’t we have this conversation when you’ve calmed down?’

‘Well, forgive me if my control is not what it might be.’ His voice was raw and he rubbed long fingers over his brow. ‘I’ve just discovered I’ve been a father for the past five years so you’ll have to excuse me if I’m not in the best of tempers.’

‘Jed, what could I have done?’ Desperately she appealed to his sense of reason. ‘We didn’t know each other! I didn’t even know your name and you didn’t know mine.’

His eyes blazed. ‘That’s not the point!’

‘That’s exactly the point,’ she said wearily. ‘We didn’t have a relationship, Jed. We didn’t have anything we could build on. Just one night. Hardly a good foundation for child-rearing.’

She knew that better than most.

‘So that made it all right, did it? That’s how you managed to justify excluding me from his upbringing.’ He was totally unrelenting, so dangerously angry that she turned away from him, but his fingers closed on her arm and he dragged her round to face him. ‘What’s the matter? Can’t you look at me any more? Conscience pricking you, is it, Brooke?’

‘No, it isn’t!’ She jerked her arm away from his grip and rubbed the bruised skin with shaking fingers. ‘My conscience is totally clear. I did the best thing for my son.’

‘Our son, Brooke!’ His voice was a low growl. ‘Toby is our son, and you did not do the best thing for him.’

‘That’s not fair!’ Tears of hurt filled her eyes. ‘You’re being totally unreasonable!’

‘Unreasonable?’ Jed’s voice was soft and menacing. ‘I’m angry because I’ve discovered that I’ve been a father for five years and you think I’m unreasonable?’

She swallowed at the raw fury in his eyes. ‘What I mean is, you’re so wrapped up in your own feelings you won’t listen to me. I had my reasons—’

‘There is nothing—’ he said the word with deadly emphasis ‘—nothing you can say that can justify your actions.’

‘Jed, please—’ Brooke began, but he cut her off, his tone scornful.

‘No. You’re right.’ He closed his eyes briefly and took a deep breath. ‘I’m too angry to talk about this now. But you’d better understand one thing. From now on things are going to change.’

Her heart stumbled in her chest and she bit her lip. ‘What do you mean? What’s going to change?’

‘Well, the way Toby’s brought up for a start.’ His mouth was set in a grim line. ‘I’ve already missed five years of his life. I don’t intend to miss any more.’

‘He— You—’ She swallowed back the lump in her throat. ‘I understand that you’ll want to see him sometimes—’

‘Oh, no, Brooke, not sometimes.’ His voice was lethally soft. ‘I’m not talking about restricted visitation rights. Toby is as much mine as yours and I have as much right to be with him as you.’

She blanched. ‘You can’t want custody of him—’

His anger was unrelenting. ‘I don’t know what I want yet, but when I decide you’ll be the first to know.’