LITMIR.BIZ

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      “The first time I held our baby in my arms.” Even now, thinking about that moment made her smile. “I wanted you to know about her—our beautiful, perfect little girl.”

      “And?” he prompted impatiently.

      “The number was no longer in service.”

      Her response didn’t even slow down his attack. “Did you call directory assistance? Did you ask my brother? Did you make any effort other than that one phone call?”

      “No,” she admitted.

      “Why, Nic?”

      “I thought I was protecting Carly.”

      “How could you possibly use our child to justify your actions?”

      Our child.

      The words leaped at her, angry, accusing. Reminding Nikki that he had a valid and legitimate claim to the little girl that she’d kept to herself for so many years. It didn’t matter that her actions had been well-intentioned, that she’d given Carly all the love and attention and affection any child could need or want. Carly was his child, too, and she’d hurt all of them by denying it.

      “What did you think you were protecting her from?” Colin demanded.

      Nikki shifted her gaze, tried to keep her own temper in check. But it was hard not to respond in kind to his anger. “From being rejected by her father.”

      He scowled. “What are you talking about?”

      “I’m talking about your damn obsession with hockey.” She practically shouted the words at him, relieved to finally speak them aloud. To finally admit the feelings she’d kept bottled up inside her for so long.

      “Obsession?” Colin echoed.

      “It was all you ever talked about, all you thought about. And I didn’t think a child would fit into your plans. A wife certainly hadn’t.”

      “Hockey wasn’t an obsession—it was my life.”

      “I know,” she admitted, helpless to prevent the bitterness from entering her voice. “And more important to you than anything else.”

      “That isn’t true.”

      “Isn’t it?”

      “Of course not. And we weren’t talking about my career, anyway. We were talking about why you kept my daughter from me.”

      Nikki sighed. “When I first suspected that I was pregnant, I hoped that having a baby would bring us closer again. Then you decided that being married wasn’t what you wanted, and the last thing I wanted was for you to come back to me just because I was pregnant.

      “I loved you too much to use our baby to hold on to you. I didn’t want you to resent me, and our child, for keeping you here when it wasn’t where you wanted to be.”

      She swallowed around the lump in her throat. “And there was a part of me that was afraid it wouldn’t be enough to hold you, anyway. That you would still choose your career over your family.”

      “Did you ever consider a third option—that I might have wanted to be a father to our child?”

      Of course she’d considered it. When the doctor had confirmed her pregnancy, she’d fantasized about telling him. In that fantasy, Colin had been ecstatic to learn she was carrying his child. He’d shouted with joy and kissed her breathless. Then he’d taken her away and they’d lived happily ever after in a house full of children.

      But the reality was that they’d married without ever talking about children. At the time, she’d been so thrilled to be Colin’s wife she hadn’t worried about anything else. She’d known she wanted to have his child some day, and she’d taken it for granted that he wanted the same thing.

      When she’d finally broached the subject a couple of months later, she’d been both shocked and hurt to hear him say he didn’t want a family. But she hadn’t pursued the topic, certain he’d change his mind over time.

      Being served with a petition for divorce had effectively annihilated that fantasy. Still, she knew now that she’d been wrong to blame him for destroying a dream he couldn’t have known about. And after a long minute of agonizing silence, she finally whispered, “I’m sorry.”

      “Sorry that I found out?”

      She shook her head, blinked back tears. “Sorry that I didn’t try to tell you sooner. Regardless of what happened between us, you are her father and you had a right to know.”

      Colin remained silent.

      “I am sorry,” she said, surprised at how good it felt to say those words. “I never meant to hurt you or Carly by keeping my pregnancy a secret. And I’m sorry that’s what happened.”

      “So am I.”

      “What do you want me to do now?” she asked helplessly. “I’ve apologized. I’ve tried to make you understand why I made the decisions I did. Okay, so maybe I screwed up. Maybe I should have done things differently. But it’s too late to change that now.”

      When he finally spoke, his tone was ripe with bitterness and accusation. “I don’t know if I can ever forgive you for this.”

      “We both made mistakes,” she reminded him. “Can’t we just admit that and move on?”

      “I don’t know how to get past your lies, your deception.”

      Nikki again felt the sting of tears behind her eyes.

      “Does Carly know anything about me?”

      “She’s only started to ask questions about her dad,” Nikki admitted. “I’ve told her as much as I can without lying to her.”

      His eyes narrowed. “What have you told her?”

      “That he didn’t live with us because he worked in Texas.”

      He seemed to consider her explanation for a long moment.

      “It’s not a big deal to her,” Nikki explained. “A lot of her friends live in single-parent families.”

      “It’s a big deal to me,” he said.

      “That’s not what I meant. I was only trying to explain that she hasn’t missed not having a father.”

      “Does that help you sleep at night—believing she doesn’t need a father?”

      “I didn’t say she didn’t need a father,” she said wearily. “In a perfect world, every child would have two parents who love her. But this isn’t a perfect world, and I’ve done the best that I can for Carly.”

      “Then where do I fit in?”

      Nikki hesitated, knowing that her response was only going to infuriate him even more. But she’d thought about that question all night, and she was determined to put her daughter’s interests first. “I don’t want you forcing your way into her life if you don’t plan on staying. It would be worse for Carly to find her father and lose him, than never to have a father at all.”

      “Why is that your decision to make?” Colin challenged.

      “Because she’s my daughter and I don’t want her to be hurt.” As soon as the words were out of her mouth, she recognized her mistake. Of course, it was already too late.

      “She’s my daughter, too,” he shot back. “And I want to be part of her life. I want her to know who I am.”

      “You want her to call you ‘Daddy’?”

      “I am her father,” he reminded her.

      “You can’t expect to show up, after five years, and—”

      “I might have shown up sooner,” he pointed out coldly, “if I’d known about my child.”

      “Might

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