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‘How far?’
‘Less than a kilometre. I live up at the top end of Winter Street. Remember the old strawberry farm? Well, developers bought it, tore down the dump of a farmhouse and turned it into a very nice estate. Greg and I bought a block of land there not long after we got married.’
Nicolas really didn’t want to hear about Serina’s life with Greg Harmon. He was still finding it hard to believe what she’d done. The girl he’d known—and loved—wasn’t capable of such deception. There again, the girl who’d come to him that night at the Opera House hadn’t been that same girl. She’d been engaged to Greg Harmon by then. Madly in love with him, obviously, and ready to do anything for him.
But what she’d done had been downright wicked!
If that was what she did, another voice piped up in his head. One that wasn’t quite so ready to condemn. One that was still connected to reason. You might be wrong, Nicolas. Not about Felicity being your daughter, but about how and why she was conceived. Serina might not have planned anything. Maybe it just… happened.
But if that was the case, then why did she go through with marrying Harmon? Why didn’t she come to me? I would have married her. I loved her.
No, he was right the first time. She’d planned it all right. He knew women could do such things. His own mother had.
His heart hardened once again towards Serina. She had to be made to tell him the truth. Okay, so he probably wouldn’t blackmail her back into his bed. Even he could not condone that kind of outrageous behaviour, much as his dark side relished the idea. That had just been his anger talking and a primal urge for vengeance.
By the time Serina pulled in to the driveway of a cream, cement-rendered, ranch-style home, Nicolas had himself come halfway to reason. But only halfway. He wasn’t in the mood for any bulldust from her.
‘I hope you’re not going to keep on denying it,’ were his first words on joining her on the neat front porch.
She ignored him and went on unlocking the front door.
‘Watch your feet,’ she finally said when she pushed the door open. ‘I have a cat who just loves to wind herself around your legs. Her name is Midnight.’
Nicolas wasn’t one for pets, but he didn’t mind cats. He quite liked their independence.
Not that Serina’s cat seemed to be displaying much of that. She almost tripped both of them up in her rush for attention. Serina eventually scooped the big black cat up into her arms and carried her down the cream-tiled hallway into an open-planned living area that combined the kitchen, dining and sitting rooms.
‘Yes, yes,’ she said soothingly, stroking the cat’s glossy black fur for a while before dropping her onto the kitchen floor. ‘Mummy’s home. I suppose you’re hungry.’ And she turned away to open the refrigerator door.
Nicolas could see that any hope of conversation was nil till the cat was attended to. So he sat down on one of the cane stools that fronted the breakfast bar and shut his mouth whilst he watched Serina fix her pet’s food.
Eventually, however, his eyes strayed to his immediate surroundings.
For a house that hadn’t looked all that large from the street, the inside was extremely spacious, especially this section where there was enough room for a couple of loungers, a huge television, lots of side tables and a large, oval-shaped dining table that would easily seat ten people. The floor was tiled in the same cream tiles as the hallway, but with well-placed rugs for warmth and comfort. The walls were cream, the furniture in various shades of brown and green. It was a well-designed area, perfect for family living and gatherings.
Before he could stop himself, Nicolas began thinking of all the family get-togethers that would have taken place in this room: the birthdays parties, the anniversaries, the Christmases.
He stared at Serina and wondered if she’d ever felt guilty over what she’d done. It seemed impossible that she hadn’t given him a second thought over the years. He was her daughter’s father, for pity’s sake.
There again, this whole situation seemed impossible.
Suddenly, her fussing over Midnight annoyed the hell out of him.
‘If you’ve finally finished with that damned animal,’ he snapped, ‘do you think we might get back to the subject at hand?’
She stood up and glared at him, her shoulders as straight as her gaze. ‘Look, I already told you. Felicity is Greg’s daughter, not yours. I can’t imagine what Bert and Franny told you to make you believe otherwise.’
‘Several things,’ he shot back at her. ‘Firstly, they expressed their gratitude that their son had been lucky enough to have at least one child. It seems having mumps as an adolescent can lead to sterility.’
‘Greg was not sterile,’ she countered quite firmly, ‘and I can prove it. We had tests done when we didn’t conceive another child. He did have a low sperm count. But he could still have become a father.’
‘But not of a musical prodigy,’ Nicolas snapped. ‘Serina, do you think I’m totally blind? How many twelve-year-old girls can play like Felicity did tonight? She didn’t come from some tone-deaf father!’
‘She’s my daughter, too, you know,’ Serina argued, her face becoming quite flushed. ‘I wasn’t half-bad at music.’
‘You were merely adequate.’
Her hands found her hips. ‘Oh, thank you very much.’
‘You can snap and snarl all you like. But I know what I know. Felicity is my daughter.’
‘In that case, how can you explain her birth date, which can also be verified? Felicity was born exactly nine months after our wedding day, ten months after I slept with you that night. Since you’re such a genius, you should be able to do the maths. She couldn’t possibly be your daughter!’
Nicolas had been waiting for this argument to surface.
‘I fell for that argument once before, Serina,’ he retorted, finding calm in the face of her growing hysteria. ‘But not tonight. Bert and Franny also waxed lyrical about how beautiful Felicity looked when she was born. Nothing like their son, who’d been all wrinkly. Not like a newborn at all, Franny said.’
He watched as Serina struggled to find something to say. But failed.
‘She was late being born, wasn’t she?’he charged. ‘Very late.’
‘Don’t be ridiculous!’ she spluttered. ‘No doctor worth his salt would let a mother go that late these days. He would have given me an induction.’
‘The doctor probably didn’t know you were that late. Because you gave him the wrong dates. Now let me guess. You didn’t have an ultrasound during your pregnancy. You made up some excuse about being superstitious about them. Maybe I could ask your mother and verify my suspicions.’
Serina crossed her arms. ‘What you’re saying is just so much rubbish! I don’t know if you’re mad, or just delusional.’
‘If you keep denying it, Serina, I will have a DNA test done and then there will be no further arguments.’
Her arms fell open, as did her mouth. ‘You can’t do that! Not without my permission.’
‘Oh, yes I can. Trust me. All I need is a good lawyer and a court order. Soon, I’ll have what you’ve denied me for twelve years. Proof of my paternity, then access to my daughter.’
‘Don’t do this, Nicolas!’ Serina cried, coming forward to grip the edge of the countertop.
‘Don’t do what?’
‘Don’t destroy your daughter’s life.’
‘So she is my daughter.’
There was a stricken silence from Serina, then a long shuddering sigh as her head drooped. ‘Yes,’ she confessed brokenly. ‘Yes, she’s your daughter!’
Nicolas felt like someone had struck him. It was one thing to suspect something, quite another to hear it from the only person who knew. He was sitting there, stunned, when her head lifted, her eyes flooded with tears.
‘I’m sorry, Nicolas,’ she choked out, ‘so sorry.’
‘She’s sorry,’ he repeated numbly.
‘I never meant to hurt you. I never meant any of it. What I did… it was wrong. But not intentional.’
‘Not intentional,’ he repeated, all the while trying to control the emotions welling up inside him. Not fury so much anymore. In its place was a deep sadness, and a dreadful, dreadful emptiness.
‘By the time I found out I was pregnant,’ she cried, ‘the wedding was upon me and I… I didn’t have the courage to just walk away.’
‘You should have told me,’ he said bleakly.
‘I should have. Yes.’
‘But you didn’t.’
‘No.’
‘You didn’t love me. You loved him.’
Again, she fell silent, shaking her head from side to side.
‘Did you know Harmon couldn’t have kids when you slept with me? Did you do it to give him the child you knew he couldn’t have.’
Nicolas could not deny the shock that filled her face. ‘No! No! I would never do a thing like that. And Greg could have children. I told you. He just had a low sperm count.’
‘If that’s the case, when did you know she was mine?’
‘Oh, God,’ she sobbed, then snatched a handful of tissues from a box on the counter, turning away from him as she blew her nose.
‘I’m waiting for an answer, Serina,’ Nicolas said with barely held patience.
Her sigh was weary, her eyes haunted. ‘I knew all along,’ she confessed. ‘I… I hadn’t slept with Greg during the last couple of months of our engagement. He wanted to make our wedding night special, he said.’
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