CHAPTER TEN
CHAPTER TEN
Sidestepping smoothly past a group of people gazing at a young man and woman playing covers of eighties hits on their guitars, Harris took the incline at a run, closely followed by his security detail.
He was running on the loop around Central Park. Mostly he ran before breakfast. Sometimes he ran this late but not on the street and not when he’d just stepped off a plane.
Jonas, his head of Security, hadn’t said a word when he’d appeared in running gear and told him that he wanted to head out for a jog, but no doubt he was thinking that his boss could just as easily have gone and pounded on the running machine in his gym. Except that would mean staying at the apartment and he couldn’t do that right now. Couldn’t be alone in those beautiful, cavernous rooms.
Their emptiness haunted him.
She haunted him.
Eden.
She had been his paradise, but now he was cast out in the darkness, and it was all his fault.
His foot slid on a stone, and he stumbled.
‘I’m okay.’ He held up his hand as his security men swarmed forward.
He didn’t want to stop, not yet. If he stopped, he would start replaying that conversation on the plane and he didn’t want to have to hear the stupid, insensitive and inaccurate words that had come out of his mouth. All that nonsense about finding common ground and using it to act for the greater good.
The greater good.
His jaw tightened. What a sanctimonious coward.
No wonder he was alone. Each time someone tried to get close to him, he pushed them away. Jessie. Tiger. Eden.
He had let her leave, no, he had driven her to her doorstep, even though she had opened herself up, made herself vulnerable. She had told him the truth and offered her love. She had been honest and brave, but he was too scared to go beyond offering her stability and the trappings of wealth.
As he passed another of the entrances to the park, his body turned as it had done each time he was given the chance to leave. It would be so easy to let his legs take him where he wanted to go. To Eden’s apartment.
It was tempting to do just that, because he missed her so badly that his bones ached.
But there was no point. He had made her feel that she was unimportant to him when the opposite was true and anything he said now would sound forced and fabricated. He had messed up everything, again. Made as many mistakes as he had all those years ago, only this was worse because at some point Eden would find the love she was looking for, and then he would have to endure watching her raise their child with another man.
Only it wasn’t just about that. It never had been, but he hadn’t realised it until now.
It was about Eden. Her smile, her strength, her intelligence, her bravery. And how she made him feel. Strong and certain. And seen and heard.
If only he could prove that to her, but there was no combination of words that would offer such a simple solution.
Yet sometimes actions spoke louder than words, he thought, his legs slowing down to a steady jog.
‘Is everything all right, Mr Carver?’
He turned towards where his head of Security was jogging alongside him. ‘It will be, Jonas. Call Owen, tell him we’ll be home in ten minutes. I need him ready and waiting.’ He knew from the expression on Jonas’ face that the panic punching him in the stomach must be audible in his voice, but he didn’t care. All he cared about was seeing Eden again. And getting her to give him a second chance. To give them a chance.
After the open skies and glittering seas of the Caribbean, the city felt crowded and noisy, and Eden was glad that she was sitting in the limo Harris had sent. She had dithered about taking it, but despite having fallen into a coma-like sleep last night, she still felt exhausted this morning. Too exhausted to make a stand.
She gazed through the glass at the people walking to work. What exactly was she taking a stand against anyway? Not taking his limo wasn’t going to make Harris love her.
Nothing was going to do that.
She hadn’t allowed herself to think about that awful conversation on the plane. Maybe she never would. Her one consolation was that Harris would never bring it up. No doubt, he would keep everything polite and formal.
Thinking that made her want to cry and she must have made some kind of noise because she saw the driver glance up at his rear-view mirror.
‘Don’t worry, Ms Fennell, we won’t have any more hold-ups. I’ll get you there on time.’
She smiled stiffly. On the flight out to St Barth’s, this appointment had felt like the moment she would get her life back, or at least her freedom. But now freedom just meant a lifetime of being the mother of his child. Not the woman he loved or wanted or needed.
The clinic looked more like a boutique hotel than a medical centre. Even the staff looked as if they’d stepped off a catwalk. She sat and waited in a lounge area with expensive leather armchairs and tried to brace herself for the moment when she saw him again. If only she had thought to practise her expression in the mirror.
But had she done so it would have been a waste of time because he didn’t turn up.
The doctor called her into the office and offered her a seat. Smiling apologetically, she told her that Mr Harris’s people had called to let her know that he was unable to attend.
‘I see.’ In other words, he had thought about it and decided to take her claim of wanting space literally. Or maybe he was proving a point.
Reaching down, she began pushing up the sleeve of her blouse. ‘I assume I can still do the blood sample.’
Now the doctor frowned. ‘That won’t be necessary.’
‘Do we have to do it together, then?’ Eden stared at her in confusion. ‘Surely that isn’t necessary.’
‘It isn’t, but that’s not why I’m not going to take your blood,’ the doctor said gently. ‘Mr Carver has cancelled the paternity test.’
She nodded. ‘Because he was unable to make the appointment? Did he say when he wanted to rebook it?’
The doctor cleared her throat. ‘He doesn’t. Apparently, it’s not necessary anymore.’
The room seemed to sway a little. Not necessary. Like her.
She had no idea how she left the clinic. The black limo was hovering by the kerb, and it took every ounce of strength she had to compose her face into a careless smile and get in.
Call him , she told herself. Confront him. Ask him why he doesn’t want to do a test. But even thinking about hearing his voice made her feel queasy.
What was the point of asking him something when she already knew the answer? Which was that he had backed off. Probably she had scared him off with her talk of love. And she couldn’t face another of those awful, lopsided conversations that made the floor feel as if it were undulating beneath her feet.
Either way, she had got her wish, she thought as she walked back into the apartment. She had all the space she wanted.
And time on her hands too.
What with the pregnancy and then going to St Barth’s, she hadn’t booked in another client but, right now, she didn’t need the money.
She needed to think about this baby and the life she was going to give him or her. Harris might have backed off but that didn’t mean her life had to end. She wasn’t going to shut down as she had after Liam. She was a different person now. Not just older, and wiser. She knew who she was, and she was proud of herself and everything she had achieved.
And she was going to keep achieving, keep moving forward in her life. She would even include Harris if that was what he wanted. She wasn’t going to cut him out of his child’s life, but their interactions would be on her terms, not his.
For now, though, she was, if not happy, then content to potter around the apartment. She would buy a bunch of pregnancy books and get prepared and in the meantime she was going to watch every possible vampire drama she could stream. She had lunch, then went out to buy some plants, but that was all she did for the rest of the day except call her mom and grandma and her dad and tell them that she was pregnant. They were all so supportive, and knowing that she was loved and supported unconditionally in her choices helped slightly mitigate the sadness she felt about her baby’s father disappearing off the face of the earth.
Was that why she had agreed to going on this stargazing walk? So that she could scan the night skies for the man who had first shown them to her?
It was her neighbour who had invited her when they’d met on the stairs. Professor Paige Geffen was an archetypal boffin, with her wild grey curls and open-toed sandals, who lectured on astrophysics at various universities around the world, including Columbia University. And when she was back in New York, she ran a monthly walk to Pier 45 on the Hudson River.
They were not a big crowd, but everyone was very friendly and excited, and she was pleased she had gone. With Liam, she had stopped doing things that reminded her of him, but she wasn’t going to do that this time. Why should she limit her life like that? Anyway, it was something she and Harris had shared, and she wanted to be able to share that with the baby too.
She had been spoiled, she realised as she gazed up at the sky. It wasn’t as clear here as it had been from Harris’s office, and certainly not as clear as the sky in St Barth’s. But she could still spot various constellations.
‘Now, can anyone tell me which is the brightest light in the sky?’ Paige was asking.
‘Is it Orion’s belt?’ someone suggested.
‘No, that’s a good answer, but not the right one.’
‘It’s the space station.’
Eden felt her heart flip over. She spun round, her eyes seeking out the owner of the deep, husky voice.
Harris. Lounging against the wooden railings, looking just as he had when she’d walked into that bar. Dark jeans, leather jacket and that beautiful, sculpted face, grey eyes fixed on her face intently as if she were his Pole Star.
As the stargazers moved further down the pier, she stood frozen to the spot as he detached himself from the railing and walked over to her slowly. Even though it twisted her insides, she couldn’t drag her gaze away and, stupid though it was, it was still a joy to see him, despite the pain.
He stopped in front of her, and she stared up at him feeling slightly delirious.
‘Stubble,’ she said hoarsely.
He frowned. ‘What?’ Then he touched his jaw. ‘Yes, I haven’t shaved today.’
It suited him, but so would a bin bag. She should have walked away as soon as she saw him, she realised. Even a couple of feet was too close for comfort. She could already feel her body responding to his…
She cleared her throat. ‘Why not?’
‘I guess I forgot.’
‘Is that why you missed the paternity test? Did you forget that too?’
‘No, that was for a different reason,’ he said and there was an ache in his voice that made her want to step forward and comfort him, but he wasn’t hers to comfort, she reminded herself.
‘So why are you here now?’ She took a step back. ‘How did you know where I was? Are you having me followed?’
That hurt, more than it should. That he didn’t love her was a blow, but that he didn’t trust her was crushing.
‘No, I went to your apartment, and you didn’t answer when I rang so I buzzed the supervisor. He told me where you were.’
‘You still haven’t told me why you’re here,’ she said flatly, because she knew why. ‘Let me guess, you want to rebook the paternity test.’ She shook her head, remembering the shock of his absence, the carelessness of his second-hand apology. ‘Do you know what it felt like being told by the doctor that you’d cancelled it? You didn’t even have the manners to call me or leave a message.’
He took a step forward and she saw that, beneath the stubble, he looked pale and there were dark smudges under his eyes. Once again, she had the stupid, self-harming urge to put her arms around him. Not mine to hold , she told herself.
‘I know.’ He looked wretched, as wretched as when he’d told her about Jasmine. But Jasmine was his daughter, and she was just the mother of his child.
‘And I’m sorry.’ He breathed out unsteadily. ‘I wanted to call you. I wanted to see you, not to tell you about the test but because I missed you so much. But I knew that I was being selfish, that I was only doing it for myself and that if I saw you or spoke to you, I’d hurt you.’
‘You did hurt me.’ Her voice cut across the silent pier, and she felt the stargazers’ eyes move towards her in unison.
‘I know,’ he said again. ‘And I hate that I did that. I hate that I was such a coward.’
‘Well, I hate you.’
He ran a hand over his face. ‘Is that true?’ His voice shook a little as he spoke. ‘I mean, I’d understand if you did.’
She was shaking her head. ‘This isn’t fair of you, Harris, turning up like this, making me feel things I don’t want to feel—’
‘But I want you to feel them, because I feel them too.’
Considering everything that had happened, she had thought she was doing well. Yes, she had thought about him. Worried about him. Wondered where he was and what he was doing, but she hadn’t spent every second weeping or raging. But now she wanted to do both.
‘Don’t do that. Don’t say things you don’t mean.’
‘I do mean them.’ There were shadows as well as stubble on his face. He looked exhausted and heartbreakingly beautiful, but her heart didn’t need to be broken any more.
‘And why would I believe you?’
‘Because I can’t lie to you, Eden. I can lie to everyone else—I have lied. And I can even lie to myself, but I can’t lie to you. It breaks me,’ he said hoarsely.
‘You said I was just the mother of your baby.’
‘I did, but then I got back to the apartment, and I hated it. I hated you not being there, and I hated that I cared but I couldn’t stop myself, so I went out for a run in Central Park. I kept wanting to run to your apartment and tell you that I was wrong, and that I loved you, but I was scared that you’d take me back. I kept thinking about all the people I’d pushed away and all the times I’d been pushed away and I got scared that I didn’t know how to love and that I’d hurt you even more than I already had, and I never want to hurt you.’
His grey eyes were fierce and brighter than any star. ‘And then I realised that there weren’t any words that could prove that I love you. That I needed to show you instead, and that’s why I didn’t turn up for the paternity test. Because I don’t need proof that I’m our baby’s father. I love you and I will love our baby, and I want the three of us to be a family. So, can we do that, Eden? Can we be a family? Will you let me take care of you? Both of you?’
Eden stared at him, her pulse slowing to a heavy thud, her heart spilling over with a love that was equalled if not surpassed by the love in Harris’s voice and in his eyes.
‘I’d like that. I’d like that a lot,’ she whispered. And finally she reached for him.
Sucking in a breath that was spiked with relief, Harris pulled her against his heaving chest, curving his body around hers so that their foreheads were touching. Moments earlier he had felt as though he had been fighting for his life. And he had been, because Eden was his sunlight and his oxygen.
Only now she was looking up at him with those beautiful soft green eyes that made him feel so seen and clutching at him as if she never wanted to let him go.
‘I am still scared,’ he said then, because he couldn’t lie to her. But she didn’t pull away. She just pulled him closer, close enough that he could feel her heart beating in time to his.
‘I’m scared too, but we want to be with each other.’
‘Yes. Yes.’ He nodded, although it wasn’t a question and she smiled.
‘It’s not going to be easy all the time, but we want to make it work, and we’re a good team.’ She reached up and took his hand and pressed it against her stomach.
‘We’re not a team, we’re partners…’ he brushed his lips against her mouth ‘…and lovers…’ he kissed her softly ‘…and soulmates.’ Then he deepened the kiss, parting her lips and kissing her hungrily, both lost and found in her embrace.