on the company. That theory was a little too close to the truth for Lucas’s comfort.
For a moment, he paused, wondering if there was any way this commenter might actually know the truth. There were sources out there somewhere who were leaking things to reporters. Someone had let them know to expect Lucas on that particular flight home from Albuquerque. Was it possible that one of the mysterious sources knew about Elise’s pregnancy?
But that didn’t make sense. This comment wasn’t from a reporter; it was from a reader. If someone had that information, they would be trying to sell it, not dropping oblique hints in the comments section of someone else’s article. No, this didn’t mean anything. Nobody knew. He was safe.
But that didn’t mean they wouldn’t find out. He was sure all the news outlets were reading each other’s articles, looking for some clue the others hadn’t recognized. What if someone read the comments section of this article, saw that comment, and started digging?
It doesn’t matter. There’s no way they could find out about Elise. Not unless somebody tells.
His board would never tell. They wanted the whole thing kept covered up.
He didn’t think Elise would tell. It was true that he hadn’t known her for long, but he had to trust his instincts about her. They were all he had to go on.
So the only risk was that someone else in her life would see the opportunity to profit off of her situation and would call the papers.
He reached into his pocket and pulled out his phone. As he poured his coffee, he pulled up Elise’s number and stared at it for a few moments.
Then he set the phone down on the counter.
What was he thinking of doing, exactly? Calling Elise and warning her not to let her friends tell anybody about her pregnancy?
He couldn’t do that. The last time they’d talked, he’d been escorting her out of his office. He had promised to call her so that they could discuss their situation.
And then he’d left Albuquerque and flown back to Boston, and he still hadn’t called.
He really had meant to. He had been planning to. But he had gotten distracted by the media frenzy, and he hadn’t been able to really think about his reaction to the news of her pregnancy.
At least, that was what he had been telling himself.
But as he sat there at the kitchen table, hands wrapped around his mug of coffee, he had to admit that that wasn’t the truth. He had been in the apartment for days now, with nothing to do and no one to talk to. It wasn’t as if he was preoccupied with work now that he was on leave.
He’d had plenty of time to contemplate Elise’s pregnancy.
He just hadn’t bothered to actually do it.
And now he wanted to call her out of the blue just to have someone to vent to about the fact that reporters were bothering him.
She would be fully justified if she hung up the phone as soon as she heard his voice.
The problem was that he had nobody else to talk to.
There were no friends he could discuss this with. Lucas had plenty of people in his life with whom he was friendly, but no confidants. And the people he did enjoy spending time with were mostly people he knew through work. He couldn’t speak to them. Not right now.
And then there was his family.
For a moment, he wondered what it would be like to have the kind of family who rallied around you when the going got tough. What would it be like to have parents who took your side when you found yourself in a difficult spot, who could be counted on to defend you or to help cheer you up when everything seemed too much to take?
If he had that kind of family, he would be able to call them right now. He would direct them to the article, and they would help him laugh it off. They would make jokes about the kind of person who had nothing better to do than to sit around coming up with wild theories about other people’s lives, and they would reassure him that nobody could possibly take those things seriously.
But that wasn’t what would happen if he called his own parents.
He hadn’t spoken to them since he’d returned from New Mexico. It wasn’t strange for the Gainsborough family to go long stretches of time without speaking to each other, of course. But Lucas also