way to explaining why Oliver’s mother had been so disapproving about the baby, if the Countess had been in that position before. But as far as Ella knew Oliver didn’t have a child. What had happened?
‘I really wasn’t ready to be a dad,’ Oliver said. ‘I’d been so focused on my studies. But I did the right thing and stood by her.’
‘Like you’re standing by me?’ she couldn’t help asking.
He didn’t answer that, and she went colder still.
‘So we found a nice flat, moved in together, and sorted out a room for the baby.’
Oliver definitely wouldn’t have abandoned the baby. This must have ended in tragedy—or maybe Justine had refused him access to the baby and that was why the Countess had been adamant that Oliver should have custody.
His grey eyes were filled with pain and she squeezed his hand. Clearly the memories hurt him, and she didn’t want that. ‘You don’t have to tell me anything more.’
‘Yes, I do,’ he said. ‘I don’t want there to be any more secrets between us. I should’ve told you about this a long time ago.’ He dragged in a breath. ‘We’d planned to get married after the baby was born. But then one day she accidentally picked up my phone instead of hers and went out. I assumed that the phone on the table was mine and was about to put it in my pocket when a text came through.’ He grimaced. ‘Obviously I didn’t set out to spy on her and read her texts, because I trusted her, but the message came up on her lock screen and I read it before I realised it was a private message for her.’ He looked away. ‘It was from another man, and the wording made it clear they were having an affair. I tackled her about it when she got home and she admitted the baby was his, not mine.’
‘So that’s why—’ She stopped abruptly. Now wasn’t the time to tell him that his mother wanted her to have a paternity test.
‘Why what?’
‘Nothing. I’m so sorry, Oliver. That was a vile thing to do to you. But why would she lie to you like that?’
He shrugged. ‘You’ve been to Darrington Hall and met my family. I guess it was the kind of lifestyle she wanted and the other guy couldn’t give her that.’
Now Ella could understand his mother’s comments about gold-diggers. But did Oliver think she was a gold-digger too—despite the fact that she’d told him she wasn’t? He’d been in that situation before. And now she realised why he’d been so controlling with her when she’d told him about the baby, because Justine had taken all his choices away. Ella had reacted by being stubbornly independent, and they’d been at cross purposes when it needn’t have been like that at all.
‘It’s still horrible for you. And not all women think like that, you know.’
‘I know.’ His fingers tightened round hers. ‘You don’t.’
She was relieved that he realised that. ‘Was the—was the baby all right?’
‘Yes. I moved out and the other guy moved in—but from what I hear it didn’t last.’
And then a really horrible thought hit her. Was Oliver still in love with Justine? Was that why he couldn’t move on? She didn’t want to ask him, because she was too scared that the answer might be ‘yes’.
As if he’d guessed at her thoughts, he said, ‘You’re not Justine, and I don’t have a shred of doubt that this baby’s mine. I’m just sorry I haven’t been able to get my head round things properly and support you the way I should’ve done.’
Relief made her sag back against the bed. ‘Now you’ve told me what happened to you before, I can understand why you reacted the way you did.’
‘Though I did wonder if you were lying to me,’ he said, ‘when you said it was safe and I assumed you were on the Pill.’
‘I thought it was safe,’ Ella said. ‘I honestly never thought I’d ever get pregnant.’
‘That’s what I don’t understand. I haven’t found the right way to ask you because…’ He grimaced. ‘Ella, I didn’t want to fight with you over it. But, once you’d told me you were pregnant, I couldn’t work out why you were so sure that I didn’t need contraception and yet you weren’t on the Pill. I knew there was something, but asking you straight out felt intrusive and as if I was accusing you of something, and I didn’t want that.’
He’d been honest with her, so now she needed to be honest with him. At least she wouldn’t have to explain the medical side too much because it was Oliver’s speciality and he understood it. ‘I have endometriosis. It caused a lot of scarring on my Fallopian tubes over the years, and then I had an ovarian cyst that ruptured during my training. The doctors in London told me that I was infertile.’
‘So that’s why you said I didn’t…’
‘…need a condom,’ she finished. ‘Yes.’
‘I’m sorry. Endometriosis is pretty debilitating, and to get news like that when you’re so young…’
‘Yes.’ She’d cried herself to sleep for weeks afterwards. ‘Worse was that it disrupted my studies.’
‘Didn’t you tell your tutors? They would’ve understood.’
She grimaced. ‘You’ve read my file, so you know I’m dyslexic.’
He nodded.
‘I wasn’t diagnosed with dyslexia until I was fifteen. Everyone just thought I was a bit slow because I had trouble reading and I’m clumsy. I was always the last to be picked for the netball team in PE lessons, because I could never catch a ball, and you really don’t want to see me trying to throw one.’ She shrugged. ‘Anyway, the September I turned fifteen we all knew I wasn’t going to do well over the next two years, so I wasn’t going to get good grades in my exams. But I was good with people and had the gift of the gab, so everyone thought I ought to go and work in the local pub, at first in the kitchen and then in the bar when I was old enough.’
‘Right.’
‘Except I had a new science teacher that year, and she took me to one side after the first week and asked me all kinds of questions. She was the first teacher ever at school who seemed to think I wasn’t slow.’ And it had been so liberating. Suddenly it had been possible to dream. ‘She said she thought I had dyslexia, because I was fine at answering questions on stuff we’d talked about in class but when she looked at my written work it wasn’t anywhere near the same standard, and my writing was terrible. Nobody had ever tested me for dyslexia—they’d never even considered it. So my teacher talked to my parents and the Special Needs department at school and they got me tested.’
‘And it turned out she was right?’
She nodded. ‘They gave me coloured glasses and got my test papers printed on pastel colours instead of bright white, and suddenly bookwork wasn’t quite so much of a struggle any more.’ She smiled. ‘I’d always wanted to be a midwife like my Aunty Bridget, but nobody ever thought I was clever enough to do it. But I got through my exams, I stayed on at sixth form and I actually got accepted at uni. I was already getting help for my dyslexia, because they let me record all my lectures to help me revise, so I didn’t feel I could go to my tutors and say there
