He tried to think of what he’d said to upset her, but nothing came to mind that would cause this reaction.
She set her glass on the coffee table. “You think those days we spent together were special, and they were—until you left and never came back.”
Oh, God, that was it. She still hadn’t forgiven him. He should’ve known.
He turned to her but didn’t touch her. “Emily, I’m so sorry. I tried to explain. I thought you understood.”
She didn’t seem to hear him. “I waited and waited for you to come back, but you didn’t. I waited for a call, a letter, but I didn’t get one of those, either. It was like you’d disappeared off the face of the earth. I needed you terribly, but…”
His chest tightened at the ache in her voice. He never imagined he’d hurt her so deeply, but she had such a passionate nature. They’d confessed their love and made vows to be together—vows he’d broken. It was clear he’d also broken her heart. He cursed himself for his callow youth. Somehow, he had to rectify this.
“Emily, I—”
“No.” She held up a hand. “Let me talk. I have to tell you.”
“Okay.” He settled back on the sofa and everything in him strained to hear her next words.
She clenched her hands in her lap, gaining courage, gaining strength. “After you left, I discovered I was…” The word stuck in her throat and she couldn’t finish the sentence.
After a moment, he asked, “Discovered what?”
She gulped in a deep breath and forced the words from a mouth that felt dry and bitter. “I discovered I was pregnant.” There…the words were out. Now they had to deal with them.
Absolute silence followed. Jackson shook his head. Had he heard her correctly? No, he couldn’t have.
“What did you say?” he asked warily.
Her eyes jerked to his. “I said I was pregnant.”
He shook his head again and tried to assimilate the words. But they didn’t make sense. “No, that can’t be true. We were so careful. We used a condom every time.”
“That last night we ran out and used the same one more than once. It must have weakened—must have torn—and we didn’t notice.”
“Oh, God.” The blood drained from his face. “It’s true. You were pregnant?”
“Yes,” she murmured in a low voice.
He raked an unsteady hand through his hair as he tried to grasp the situation. His eyes delved into hers. “Did you have an abortion?” The words seemed to come from somewhere outside him.
“No,” she whispered.
He swallowed hard. “You had the baby?”
“Yes.”
“Where…where is it?”
She knotted her fingers together until they were bloodless. This was the difficult part. Now she had to tell him what she’d done. And she had to do it before she lost her nerve.
“I was so scared,” she began in a trembling voice. “I tried and tried to reach you to no avail. Then my mother found out and she was furious at my stupidity. It was pure hell and I didn’t know what to do. In the end, I did what my parents wanted.”
“What was that?”
“I—I gave her up for adoption.”
The room spun crazily, then righted itself. So many emotions shot through him, each deep and cutting. I gave her up for adoption. He struggled to concentrate on Emily and her words. Her cruel words. But one thing was torturing his mind.
“We had a daughter?”
“Yes, but I never saw her. I only heard her crying. I asked to hold her, but they wouldn’t let me.” She spoke matter-of-factly, and that angered him.
He got to his feet, his body rigid. “You gave our daughter to strangers?”
“Yes.”
His eyes narrowed. “How could you do something like that? How could you? She was our flesh and blood. Didn’t that mean anything to you?”
“Do you think it was easy for me?” she snapped, her control slipping. “I was seventeen, alone and scared.”
“You weren’t alone. You had your parents.”
“My mother was having problems with her own pregnancy. They couldn’t help me.”
“That’s bull and you know it,” he shouted. “You just wanted to get rid of it as fast as possible so you could get on with your life, your big career.”
She rose to her feet, her eyes enormous with the emotions that consumed her. “How dare you! You weren’t here, so don’t tell me how it was. You didn’t have to live through the horror and pain of hurting your parents. And you have no idea what it was like to give birth all alone in a cold, sterile room and have that child taken from you before you could even see her face. I live with that agonizing memory every minute of every hour of every day. I hear her crying and I ache to hold her. So don’t stand there and act holier than thou—because you are not blameless.”
He paled under the attack and sank onto the sofa with a shattered expression. Emily wanted to say something, but any words she could have spoken were trapped between her need to console and her own desire for some sort of comfort from him.
Jackson thought of all the years he’d wanted a child and all along he’d had a daughter. A daughter! He had a daughter. The words went around and around in his head until he was dizzy with a sensation of loss and despair. He wasn’t blameless, just as she’d said, and that intensified the feeling until he was afraid he might be ill.
“Jackson?” Emily found her voice.
Slowly he raised desolate eyes to her. “How could you give her away?”
She bit her lip, striving to explain, but the only thing that came out was “It’s something I bitterly regret.”
“Then why, Emily, why?”
She turned away, unable to answer. She had asked herself that same question so many times and never found a reason, an excuse, that gave her any peace.
“Why are you telling me now? Is this some sadistic way of getting back at me for what I did?”
She whirled around. “No! I never intended to tell you at all. But last night, when you talked about having kids, I, ah, I wanted to tell you that you had a daughter. I couldn’t do it. Then later the feeling grew—and I have to admit it was purely selfish.” She drew a shuddering breath. “I have this need to share her with you. I’ve never done that with anyone.”
Jackson raked both hands through his hair. “God, Emily, I’m having a hard time taking this in.”
She
