Page 18 of Modern Romance Collection May 2024 Books 1-4

‘But—’

Ajax turned around. Steeled himself. ‘Non-negotiable.’

Erin closed her mouth. She obviously sensed that this was not a moment to push it. She’d clearly seen something on his face.

Eventually she bent down and pulled something else out of the briefcase. A small padded envelope. She put it on his desk.

‘This is the DNA self-test kit. You need to take a swab from inside your mouth and package it up, then send it over to my doctor. All the information is there. He has Ashling’s DNA sample already. Once they’re matched, you’re her legal parent.’

Ajax walked back towards the desk. He felt a heavy weight in his chest.

Erin said, ‘So, are you saying...you don’t want to be involved?’

He forced himself to look at her and said, very clearly, ‘That’s exactly what I’m saying.’

CHAPTER THREE

‘BA-BA-BA-BA-BA...’

Erin smiled at Ashling, who was cooing and babbling to herself in the bath as Erin washed her. Ashling loved water.

A small plastic duck went flying. Erin caught it and handed it back so she could throw it again. But her mind kept looping around and around Ajax’s final devastating pronouncement after their meeting the other day.

He didn’t want anything to do with his daughter.

Erin felt guilty. Had she pushed him into a corner where he’d felt he had no choice except to push his daughter away?

Obviously losing his son had had a huge effect on him. More than Erin had appreciated. She got it. The thought of anything happening to Ashling made her feel dizzy with fear. But to let that inhibit any future relationship with a child...? Erin couldn’t understand that.

Maybe it wasn’t just grief for his son. Maybe Ajax had realised that he really didn’t want children. After all, it wasn’t as if Ashling had been planned—as he’d pointed out.

Erin deftly plucked her out of the bath and dried her, dressing her in her nightclothes before giving her her evening milk. Ashling was tired. They’d been in the park for the afternoon with Erin’s father. She went down with only the smallest objection, falling asleep in spite of herself.

Erin traced her daughter’s plump cheek and then let herself out of the room. Evenings like this were rare, and she was grateful after the turbulence of the last week.

Erin hadn’t yet had the heart to tell her father that Ajax had rejected his daughter at the first opportunity. He was just happy that Ajax now knew.

Even though Erin was desperately disappointed with Ajax’s reaction, on some deep level it didn’t surprise her. After all, she knew well the capacity of a parent to leave their child.

When Erin’s mother had left her, she’d also walked away from her husband—Erin’s father. He’d confided in Erin that he’d wanted a family and that her mother had not. But when she’d fallen pregnant with Erin, her father had hoped for the best—only to watch in despair as his highly intelligent and academic wife had become more and more suffocated by the domesticity of having a child.

Eventually she’d left, choosing herself and her academic career over being a mother and a wife, scoring a deep wound inside Erin.

It was only since she’d had Ashling that Erin had felt that wound start to heal. But along with that had come more pain. Because now that she knew what it was to be a mother, and to feel that ever-expanding humbling love, she understood even less how her mother could have abandoned her the way she had.

How cruel was it that she’d unconsciously chosen a man who had the same ability to walk away from a child as her own mother? She smiled at herself humourlessly. No doubt a psychotherapist would tell her she was still playing out her childhood trauma, and looking for someone to heal that wound. Well, she’d failed at the first hurdle.

The DNA test results had been delivered to Erin by courier that morning, confirming what she already knew. Ajax Nikolau was Ashling’s father. He would have received the results by now too, and it obviously hadn’t precipitated a change of heart as she’d heard nothing from him.

Her daughter was destined to grow up—as Erin had—without the love and presence of one of her parents. It would be up to Erin and her father to shower Ashling with all the love and confidence-building support they could.

Erin woke the next morning not to her daughter’s unintelligible babble, but to her phone ringing on her nightstand. She looked at the clock. It was early. She saw the nameAjaxand came instantly awake, sitting up in the bed.

‘Hello?’ Her voice was rough with sleep.

Ajax was terse and to the point. ‘Something has happened. We need to talk. Can you arrange for the baby to be looked after? I’ll send a car for you in an hour.’

Erin struggled to take in what he was saying. Luckily her father lived only around the corner, and he was always up early.

---