with fear. It had been Josh’s bag. She’d known it. This girl had been going out with him. They’d created a life together. Hope leapt in her chest. Her son had gone, but might she still have part of him? A living, breathing part?
‘Sorry,’ Adam said, kneading his forehead as he turned back to the girl. ‘Would you like something? Tea? Coffee?’
‘Thank you. Water would be nice.’ She smiled shyly.
‘Would you like to sit down?’ Cassie asked as Adam left the room. She looked so nervous and awkward, she couldn’t help but feel for her.
The girl glanced at her baby, then to the armchair, and then, offering Cassie a small smile, came to sit on the sofa beside her.
Cassie noted that she was knotting and unknotting her fingers in her lap. Hesitating for a second, she reached to still them. ‘It’s okay. We don’t bite.’ She offered her a reassuring smile. ‘We should probably introduce ourselves. I’m Cassandra, Cassie for short.’
‘Kimberley. Kimberley Summers,’ the girl said. ‘Most people call me Kim. I really wasn’t sure whether I should come, but I thought I should talk to you before…’
Before what? Cassie’s heart stalled. ‘You don’t need to explain, Kim,’ she said carefully. ‘I’m glad you came. I am shocked, though, I have to admit. Josh never mentioned he was in a serious relationship.’
Kim’s eyes flicked down. ‘We hadn’t been going out for long before the baby... We were a couple, though.’ She looked earnestly back at her. ‘We did talk about you a little. Josh said that you and he were working through some things, so I wasn’t sure whether he’d told you about us or not. He said he was going to, but…’
He didn’t feel he could confide in me. Cassie swallowed back the bitter taste of regret as the girl trailed off awkwardly. ‘Was he looking forward to becoming a father?’ she asked, though it pained her, because she knew the answer. He would have been. Even if she hadn’t known about Kim, she knew that much about him.
‘Yes.’ Kim nodded sadly. ‘He was surprised, worried about how to tell you when you’ve been dealing with so much.’ She paused and reached to wipe away a tear that spilled down her cheek. ‘But once he got his head around it, he was really pleased. He would have been a brilliant dad.’
Cassie drew in a sharp breath. He’d obviously discussed her illness with Kim then, as well as the fact that they’d fallen out. ‘He would have,’ she said, her throat catching. ‘He loved children.’
‘I know.’ Kim smiled fondly. ‘That was obvious when he talked about the children he taught on his school placement programme. He would have been a brilliant teacher too,’ she added, causing Cassie’s heart to twist afresh.
‘The thing is,’ Kim went on, her eyes awash with uncertainty, ‘I’m not sure what to do. I mean, if he’d told me he wasn’t interested, I wouldn’t have gone through with the pregnancy. But when he seemed so genuinely happy at the thought of being a dad, making plans for a future together…’ She stopped, glancing away.
‘You can talk to me, you know, Kim,’ Cassie said kindly, though her stomach was knotting inside her. ‘That’s why you’re here after all, isn’t it?’
Kim nodded. ‘I’m not sure I’ll be able to cope on my own,’ she admitted tearfully. ‘I don’t have anything to offer him. I don’t even have a job at the moment. I could end up ruining his life, couldn’t I?’ She looked at Cassie beseechingly. ‘I’m thinking he might have a better future with someone else. Someone who could care for him properly. There are a million people out there who are desperate for a child, aren’t there? People much better off than I am.’
Cassie’s stomach turned over. She couldn’t really be contemplating parting with him? She looked across to the pushchair. He was still sleeping like an angel. Seeing Josh at that age, she stilled an urge to snatch him from his pram and hold him close, breathe in the innocent sweet smell of him and never let him go.
She couldn’t allow Kim to do anything rash. Something she would regret. Something that Cassie too would regret for the rest of her life. She took a breath, about to ask her not to make any decisions before they’d all had a chance to talk it through, just as Adam came back into the room.
‘It’s filtered. We don’t have any bottled,’ he said, scrutinising Kim carefully as