Page 23 of His Best Mistake

“Not nearly enough.”

“Why are you sitting the dark?”

Hearing the click of a switch and sensing she’d turned a lamp on, Jack sighed, opened his eyes and sat up. “Look, if you’ve come to give me a hard time, Cora, would you mind leaving it for another day? I’m not sure I can take it right now.”

His sister frowned and dropped into an armchair. “Are you all right?”

“Not particularly.”

The frown deepened, and concern – which he really didn’t deserve – filled her face. “Are you ill?”

“No.”

“Then what’s wrong?”

What wasn’t wrong? Just about every area of his life had imploded and the weight of it was crushing him. The guilt was eating him up and wrecking his peace of mind and it simply couldn’t continue. However devastating the fallout, he had to come clean. Cora would find out sooner or later anyway because despite the up-in-the-air way things with Stella had been left and however they sorted it out, he was going to be part of this baby’s life.

Aware that he was about to badly hurt someone he loved, feeling sick about it and wishing he was drunker, Jack said, “Stella Grant is pregnant.”

Cora jerked back as if she’d been slapped and she blinked. She swallowed hard and sat up a fraction straighter. “Oh. Right. I see. Gosh. That sucks. Especially for her. I mean, who would ever want a shit like Brad to father their child?”

“It’s not Brad’s.”

Her eyebrows shot up. “Not Brad’s?”

“No.”

“Wow. Well. That’s a relief, I guess. But she really is something else, isn’t she? So whose is it?”

“It’s mine.”

For several long seconds Cora just stared at him, a frown beginning to crease her brow as confusion flickered across her face. “What?” she said, giving her head a quick shake as if to clear it of something that didn’t make sense.

His throat tightened and his stomach turned, the alcohol inside it burning like acid. “The baby’s mine.”

“Yours?”

“Yes.”

“But how –?” she said, utterly bewildered. “I don’t understand…” And then came the moment that realisation dawned and Jack had never hated himself more. “Oh my God,” she breathed. “You bastard. How could you?”

“I’m sorry.”

“When?”

“The day I went to see her in Scotland.”

“You didn’t tell me.”

“No.”

“It’s been a month.”

“I know.”

“Have you seen her since? All this time have you been seeing her behind my back?”

“No,” said Jack. “I haven’t seen her or spoken to her until this morning when she came to tell me she was pregnant.”

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