a name for the baby. She had imagined amicable discussions about custody arrangements, perhaps even shared vacations. She and Lucas bore each other no ill will, after all. There was no reason all three of them couldn’t spend time together.
But after the way he had thrown her out of his office today, that no longer seemed possible.
And she was humiliated. The way those executives had spoken to her! It had practically descended to the level of name-calling. She knew they thought she was a gold digger for having claimed to be carrying the CEO’s baby.
I didn’t even know he was a CEO, for God’s sake, she thought, furiously punching her pillow into a more comfortable shape. It’s not my fault he’s rich. She didn’t care about his stupid money one way or the other.
She was intimidated by his power, though. How could someone be a CEO at such a young age? It made her wonder all over again what he thought of her. He hadn’t joined in with the board members insulting her—he had tried to stop them—but he hadn’t exactly stuck up for her.
She supposed she would just have to wait until he called.
If he called.
He had said that he would. But he hadn’t seemed particularly pleased with her when he’d said it. He had told her that he needed to process what she’d said—that he’d needed to think about it.
What was to think about? She wasn’t asking him for anything.
I don’t really know him, she realized. As much as she had enjoyed their night together in Rome, it had been a fantasy. There hadn’t been anything real about it. To think that she knew Lucas because of that one night would be a mistake.
Maybe he wasn’t the kind, caring person she had thought he was.
Maybe he had just been trying to get her out of the office so he wouldn’t have to deal with her anymore. Maybe she was never going to hear from him.
It was a terrible thought. She had been content with the idea that he wouldn’t be around while she raised her child. But now, knowing that she had come so close to having her child grow up with a father, the idea of that not happening felt unbearable.
But I’m not going to chase him, she vowed to herself. She knew what company he worked for now, and she had his phone number, but she would not use that information to try and find a way into his life. She wouldn’t try to contact him again. She would never again put herself in a position to be humiliated the way she had been today.
Chapter 16
Elise
Days passed.
Lucas didn’t call.
Elise’s parents had noticed something was wrong with her. “Should we call the doctor, honey?” her mother asked anxiously over supper one night. “If you’re feeling depressed, that’s not something we should ignore.”
“I’m not depressed,” Elise said, knowing how unbelievable she sounded. She had been moping around the house for days.
“Pregnancy hormones cause all kinds of reactions,” her mother said. “It’s nothing to feel embarrassed about.”
“I’m not embarrassed,” Elise said. “And I’m not depressed. Really. I’m just…regular sad.”
“Eat something,” her mother urged.
Elise nodded. Her appetite had been flagging a little, as it always did when she was feeling distressed, but she recognized the importance of keeping herself well-fed. She took a big bite of chicken.
As soon as she felt she could get away without raising further concern, she excused herself from the table and went up to her bedroom. She had developed a bad habit of searching for Lucas’s name on the internet. Perhaps it was unwise, but it kept her from feeling the urge to call him.
For the past few days, there had been nothing much to see. There was a profile written about him by an online publication that described who he was and praised his achievements in business. He had been interviewed a few times about the various products Quadra-Well had produced. Elise’s usual practice was to scan the headlines and then click over to an image search to look at his face, a thing she swore to herself she only did to see what her child might look like.
Today, however, there were a series of new articles. Articles Elise hadn’t seen before.
Quadra-Well CEO Returns Home In Disgrace.
Well, that was a clickbait headline if Elise had ever seen one.
And it worked. She clicked it.
The photo at the top of the article showed a man in an airport. He was trying to shield his face from