Her parents never could have afforded her postgrad studies if Dr. Ray hadn’t helped her obtain scholarships. “I thought of him as a benefactor.”
“Stay here,” Blake said. “I’ll tell my aunt that I’m riding with you.”
Though she obediently slid behind the steering wheel of her hybrid and waited, his attitude irked her. Blake had the arrogant tone of someone who gave orders that must be followed. A military guy. An alpha male. The kind of man who demanded too much and gave little in return. If she ever fell in love, she hoped it would be with a guy who at least pretended to treat her as an equal.
Though she doubted that she and Blake would get along, Eve checked her reflection in the visor mirror. She’d shed a couple of tears, but the mascara around her blue eyes wasn’t smudged. She pushed her bangs into a semblance of order.
In a matter of minutes, Mr. Perfect returned to her car and climbed into the passenger side. “At the exit from the cemetery, turn right.”
Having issued his order, he leaned back in the seat and closed his eyes.
Eve wished there was something she could do or say to comfort him. Her mother was good in these situations; she knew how to show empathy without being too sentimental. Eve lacked those people skills. She could calculate quadratic equations in the blink of an eye, but the art of conversation baffled her. She pinched her lips and remained silent as she drove.
When Blake opened his eyes and leaned forward, he appeared to be completely in control. “What’s your birthday?”
An odd question. “June twenty-second. I’ll be twenty-six.”
“Mine is June thirtieth. Same year,” he said. “And you were born in New Mexico.”
“At an army base near Roswell.”
“Me, too.”
“I guess we have something in common.”
“More than you know,” he said. “Tell me about your relationship with my dad.”
Apparently, Mr. Perfect wasn’t big on idle chatter. This felt like an interrogation. “I communicated with Dr. Ray once a year, every year. On my birthday, I filled out a status report with forty questions. Some of them were essay questions and took a while to answer.”
“Did you ever wonder why?”
“Of course, I did.” His terse questions provoked an equally abrupt response from her. “I’m not a mindless idiot.”
He gave a short laugh. “I’d bet on the opposite. You’re pretty damn smart.”
“Maybe.”
“Tell me what you know about my dad’s status reports.”
What was he getting at? He must already know this information. “Your father told me I was part of a study group made up of children with similar backgrounds and key genetic markers. He monitored potential and achievement, which was why he helped me get scholarships.”
“Take a right at the next light.”
She could feel his scrutiny as he studied her. Though she wasn’t sure that she even liked this guy, she responded to him with an unwanted excitement that set her heart racing. Her brain fumbled for something to break the silence. “There was a good turnout for the funeral.”
“Did you recognize anybody?”
“Not a soul. I kind of expected to see Dr. Prentice.”
“How do you know Prentice?”
“He was the other half of the study your father worked on,” she said. “As I’m sure you already know.”
“Tell me, anyway.”
“Your dad correlated the psychiatric data. And Prentice did medical examinations every few years or so. He contacted me about six weeks ago.”
“The date?”
She pulled up her mental calendar. “It was April sixteenth, the day after tax day. Prentice said he needed to see me right away. There was an issue about possible exposure to radiation when I was a child.”
“And you were scared.”
“Terrified.” There had been a similar scare five years ago that Dr. Prentice treated with a brief course of mediation. “Radiation poisoning isn’t something to mess around with. Turns out that I’m fine. Prentice gave me a clean bill of health.”
“What do you remember about the testing?”
“It was a thorough physical.” She wasn’t about to go into details about the pelvic exam or the part where she’d been under anesthetic. “I went to a clinic after work on a Friday, and I didn’t get home until after ten o’clock. Dr. Prentice’s assistant drove me and made sure I got into bed.”
“Any ill effects?”
Come to think of it she hadn’t been feeling like herself lately. Her stomach had been queasy. A couple of times, she’d vomited. “Do you know anything about the testing?”
“Yes,” he said curtly.
Her fear returned with a vengeance. What did Blake know? Had he pulled her aside because he had bad news? She might have been poisoned by a childhood exposure, might have some awful disease. Her cells could be turning against her at this very moment. “Why did you say that you needed to talk to me?”
“Pull over.”
This had to be bad news. “Why?”
He touched her arm, and she recoiled as if he’d poked her with a cattle prod. She wanted nothing more to do with Mr. Perfect. He was toying with her, asking inane questions and hinting at dire circumstances.
She yanked the steering wheel and made a hard right onto a side street with wood-frame houses, skimpy trees and sidewalks that blended into the curb. Halfway down the block, she parked and turned off the engine. Eve preferred facts to innuendo. She wanted the truth, no matter how horrible.
“All right, Blake, I’m parked. If you have something to tell me, get on with it.”
His eyes flicked as if he was searching her face, trying to gauge her reaction. “It might be better if I gave you more information. Set the framework.”
“Just spit it out.” She braced herself. “Am I dying?”
He cleared his throat. “Eve, I have reason to believe that you’re pregnant.”
“That’s impossible.”
She was a virgin.
Chapter Two
Blake watched her reaction, looking for a sign that Eve Weathers had been complicit in Prentice’s scheme. He saw nothing of the kind.
His
