by Kate Hardy
She waited until they’d both finished their food and had a top-up of tea before saying, ‘Harry, I need to be honest with you. I like you—’ she liked him a lot ‘—but right now I’m not looking to date anyone. Given my circumstances, it isn’t fair to let you think otherwise.’
‘Thank you for being honest with me.’ He took a deep breath. ‘Have any of your memories from the week before your accident come back yet?’
‘No, and it’s been months now so they may never come back,’ she said.
‘Then I need to be honest with you, too,’ he said.
Honest? Why? She looked at him, not understanding. ‘What do you mean?’
‘Quartus—my quartet—played an event just outside Bath a few months ago.’
She frowned. Her accident had happened in Bath. Was he saying...? It felt as if someone had just tipped a bucket of cold water onto her from a great height. ‘Hang on. Are you telling me you played at the ball I had a ticket to but can’t remember attending?’
He nodded.
‘So you saw me there?’ And, if he’d seen her, there was a chance that he’d also seen her mystery man and could help her track him down. ‘And you saw the guy I was with?’
‘You were on your own.’
‘Oh.’ Another blind avenue. Her stomach swooped in disappointment.
He looked really awkward now. ‘Holly, I’m trying to tell you that you met me.’
She frowned. At Beauchamp Abbey, he hadn’t mentioned that they’d met before. ‘Why didn’t you say something when your sister introduced us?’
‘Because when I saw you again at the dig, you acted as if you’d never met me before.’
Now it suddenly made sense. That must be why he’d looked so put out when he’d met her again at Beauchamp Abbey and she hadn’t acknowledged him. He must’ve thought she was playing some sort of game.
But if she’d been on her own when he’d met her...did that mean that he was her mystery man?
Knowing that she might be making a huge fool of herself but needing to know the truth, she asked, ‘Are you saying that you and I did more than just talk? That we spent the night together?’ Which would mean that he was the father of her baby. But she stopped processing that when a really nasty thought shoved it to one side. ‘Were you there at the accident?’ Oh, no. Had he been the man who’d driven the car that had hit her?
‘Yes, you spent the night with me and, no, I wasn’t there when the car hit you,’ he said. ‘I think it must have happened when you were on the way to meeting me.’
That led to a whole new raft of questions. ‘So why didn’t you ring me when I didn’t meet you?’ Had he been sulking, thinking that she’d stood him up?
‘I did ring you. Well, I tried to,’ he amended, ‘but it seems I’d taken your number down wrongly. I got a guy in Scotland instead.’
And that was it? He’d just given up? ‘But you could’ve called the hotel, or tried to contact me through my work—there aren’t exactly a lot of archaeologists in the world called Holly Weston.’
‘But you wouldn’t let me take you back to your hotel, so I didn’t know where you were staying, and we didn’t exchange surnames. I had no idea what you did for a living because we didn’t talk about it. So I had no way of finding you—apart from putting something on social media that would’ve ended up embarrassing us both.’
Which was exactly why Holly had rejected Natalie’s suggestion of using social media.
Shame seared through her, making her cheeks feel scorching hot. What the hell had she been thinking, going off with a stranger who surname she hadn’t even known? Yes, she’d been hurt and angry at Simon’s betrayal, but that didn’t mean she could totally ignore common sense. Natalie hadn’t really been serious in her suggestion that Holly should get over Simon by having a mad fling.
‘So we spent the night together?’ she asked again, just in case this was all some weird mistake.
‘Yes.’
She felt sick. ‘Didn’t we use contraception?’
‘No, we did,’ he said. ‘But no contraception is a hundred per cent reliable.’
‘So you’re the father of my baby.’ It was a deduction rather than a question.
‘Unless you’d slept with someone else that week—’ At her withering glare, he added hastily, ‘Then, yes. The dates tie up.’
No wonder he’d been so adamant that the baby wasn’t an issue. Because it was his baby.
And she’d been feeling guilty about her attraction to him and tying herself in knots over it, while all along he’d known the truth. She’d even told him that she’d lost her memory, but he still hadn’t bothered to enlighten her.
He’d lied to her. By omission, but it was still a lie.
And, after Simon, she’d had enough of men lying to her.
‘Why didn’t you say anything when you first saw me at the abbey?’ she demanded.
‘Because you didn’t appear to recognise me at all. I thought you were...well, a player,’ he admitted.
A player? She wasn’t like that at all, and although she could sort of see where he was coming from, she also didn’t agree. ‘But Jamal told you about my accident and I told you about my memory loss. You could’ve said something then.’
‘In front of your team?’ He raised his eyebrows. ‘Hardly. It was something I thought you’d rather discuss in private.’
‘But you did see me in private. When you asked me to dinner.’ When he’d played her that beautiful music and he’d kissed her and her head had felt as if it were full of rainbows. ‘Why didn’t you tell me then?’
‘Because it was awkward and I didn’t know how to tell you. Plus I’d just found out you were pregnant by me. I was reeling.’ He blew out a breath. ‘I’m trying to tell you now.’
In a public place—which went completely against what he’d just said about thinking she’d rather discuss this in private.
It made her want to cry. Big, fat, ugly tears. Anger and misery and hopelessness, all rolled into one. She’d liked him so much. And he’d turned out to be another man like Simon. A man who’d lied and who’d let her down.
‘I can’t deal with this,’ she said.
And, even though she knew she was behaving badly, she pushed her chair back and walked out of the restaurant, ignoring his soft, ‘Holly, wait! Please.’
Right now, she needed fresh air. And she wanted to be on her own so she could start to process this.
* * *
Harry stared after Holly’s retreating back, frozen by shock.
That really couldn’t have gone any worse.
What did he do now?
He didn’t have time to sit and think about it: he needed to go after her right now if he was to have any chance of salvaging this. He went over to the cash register, emptied his wallet and left more than enough notes to cover the bill, apologised, and dashed out after Holly.
She’d insisted on meeting him here rather than letting him pick her up, so he had no idea where she lived—other than it was somewhere in Camden—or which direction she would take on leaving the restaurant. He gazed around frantically, and saw her stepping into a black cab just down the street.
Where were all the taxis when you needed them? Why wasn’t one coming along the street right now so he could flag it down, jump in and say, ‘Follow that cab!’? Her taxi drove off, and there was no way he could follow her on foot.
Still, he had her mobile number. If her phone was charged. He called her and the connection went straight through to her voicemail. ‘Holly, it’s Harry. I’m sorry. Please call me. We need to talk about the baby,’ he said.
He left his number at the end of the message, even though he knew she had it. Then he started to send her a text to back it up. Even though right now part of him was annoyed that she hadn’t given him a chance to explain and he thought she was being
unreasonable, he had to take into account the fact that she was pregnant and full of hormones, and up until now she’d been dealing with this on her own. Plus she’d had the accident that had robbed her of her memory. His news would’ve been a massive shock. He needed to cut her some slack.
Holly, please call me. We need to talk about the baby.
That sounded threatening, which wasn’t his intention.
And about how I can support you, he added, hoping that she wouldn’t take that the wrong way. That was the problem with words on a screen. It was all too easy to mistake the tone. He would so much rather do this face to face, but she hadn’t left him any choice.
* * *
As soon as her phone shrilled, Holly knew who was calling her without having to check the screen. She ignored it and let the call go to her voicemail. A few moments later, her phone pinged to signal an incoming text.
Right now, she didn’t want to talk to Harry Moran or hear what he had to say. She wanted to get her head around the situation first.
The one person she would have discussed the situation with was Natalie, but her best friend was away for the weekend. And, much as Holly loved her mum and her sister, this wasn’t something she wanted to discuss with them. Part of her was ashamed of having a wild fling with a stranger, and she didn’t want her mum and her sister to think less of her.
She asked the driver to drop her at the next tube station and headed for Regent’s Park. A walk in a green space was what she needed to help her analyse this like the scientist she was, unpicking the layers and working things out for herself. She switched her phone off completely, not wanting anyone to disturb her, and wandered amongst the roses while she pondered the situation.
Harry Moran was the father of her baby.
So why did she still not remember a thing about that night? When he’d kissed her the other night, it had felt like fireworks going off in her head. Had it been the same that night in Bath? And, if so, how could she still have no memories of it?
And why hadn’t he told her about this before? Why had he waited the best part of a week?
Pushing the hurt and anger aside, she tried to think about it from his point of view and piece together what had happened in Bath.
They’d spent the night together. It was out of character for her to have that kind of wild fling, and she had a feeling that Harry wasn’t the sort to sleep around either. She didn’t remember their fling—but she’d felt a huge pull of attraction towards him when she’d met him again at Beauchamp, even when she hadn’t known that he was the man she’d had a fling with. He’d clearly felt it, too, or he wouldn’t have kissed her again.
Harry didn’t know where she was staying, so that meant they must have gone to wherever he was staying after the ball, rather than to her hotel. She still had no idea where that was, but it must’ve been within walking distance of her hotel. And she’d agreed to meet him later that morning—except on the way she’d rescued the little boy and been hit by the car, none of which she remembered.
He hadn’t known about the accident and had obviously waited for her at wherever they’d agreed to meet. When she hadn’t turned up, he’d tried to call her—but he’d got someone else’s number.
According to him, they hadn’t even exchanged surnames. How could she have gone off with someone whose name she didn’t even know? How could he?
Heat flared through her cheeks again. She never, ever got swept away like that. The one grand passion moment in her life, and she couldn’t even remember it. How ironic was that? And yet she’d felt swept away again that night when they’d sung together and he’d played for her. She’d had butterflies in her stomach when she’d got ready to meet him for lunch today.
He’d known nothing at all about her. Not her surname, not where she lived, not what she did for a living. So, realistically, the only way he could have traced her was if he’d put a ‘find the mystery girl’ type post on social media. Why hadn’t he done that? He had a reasonably high profile in the classical music world. People would have picked it up and tried to help.
Then again, looking at it from his point of view: he’d waited for her and she’d stood him up. When he’d called her, it was the wrong number. Logically, he must have believed she’d given him the wrong number on purpose so he couldn’t get in touch with her, that she’d ghosted him.
And then, the next time he’d met her, she’d behaved as if she’d never met him before. From her point of view, she hadn’t met him before. But he wasn’t privy to that information. If it had been the other way round, how would she have felt? She thought about it. She would have assumed he was a player and would’ve been furious with him. It kind of fitted with the way he’d reacted to her, all starchy and cold.
But there was an explanation. One that he’d learned pretty quickly. As soon as Jamal had told him about the accident and she’d filled in the gap, he must’ve realised that was why she hadn’t turned up, and that she had no memory of him.
What would she have done, in his shoes?
How did you tell someone that they had forgotten you—and forgotten your wild fling, too?
For all Harry knew, Holly could have met someone else and fallen in love in the weeks between their fling and then meeting him again—just as he could have done. So his choices would’ve been to pretend their fling had never happened at all, or to choose his time carefully and talk to her about it in private.
Harry had clearly done the maths and worked out for himself that the date of her baby’s conception tied in with the date of the fling she couldn’t remember. Clearly that was why he’d asked her to Sunday lunch in a quiet restaurant, on neutral territory; it was the nearest he could get to talking in private without discussing it at either of their homes.
Had she just been massively unfair to him?
Very probably, she had to admit.
So what were they going to do about it?
As the father of their baby, Harry had had rights. Morally, if not legally, he could share in decisions about the baby’s upbringing, and see the baby.
Would he want that?
Given how she’d seen Harry behave with his nieces and nephews, she was pretty sure he would want to be a hands-on father. But she also knew that his job involved a lot of travelling. The logistics would need to be worked out carefully.
And what about her?
Harry remembered her ‘lost weekend’. He knew what had happened between them—and he’d kissed her again since then. Did that mean he wanted the relationship to continue? And was it because he wanted her, or did he feel obliged because of the baby?
She’d been in a relationship where her partner had settled for her and then discovered she really wasn’t enough for him. She’d learned from the experience, and no way did she want to be in that situation again.
So where did that leave them?
She could hardly avoid Harry, given that the dig she was leading was at his parents’ home. Anyone who had the grit and determination to make a successful career in the arts wouldn’t let something like this just drop. If she refused to speak to him, he’d probably come and sit in her trench and refuse to move until she did talk to him. Meaning the whole mess would become very public and embarrass everyone.
With a sigh, she switched her phone back on. One missed call, one voicemail and one text—and they were all from Harry.
She listened to the voicemail first.
‘Holly, I’m sorry. Please call me. We need to talk about the baby.’
Guilt flooded through her. She’d been the one to walk out and she’d left him to settle the bill, yet he was the one apologising.
She read his text.
Holly, please call me. We need to talk about the baby. And how I can support you.
It was all very calm, very polite, and very reasonable.
And it left her feeling very much in the wrong.
She bit her lip. Right now, she owed Harry Moran an apology. And he was right: they did need to talk about the baby.
She dialled his number.
‘Holly?’ He sounded wary when he answered.
‘Sorry for walking out on you,’ she said. ‘You’re right. We need to talk about the baby.’
‘It’s your decision,’ he said. ‘Tell me where and when.’
He was being so nice that it brought tears to her eyes. ‘I don’t know.’ Which was stupid. For pity’s sake, she had a PhD. She wasn’t stupid. Why couldn’t she answer a simple question about where and when to meet him?
‘When are you going back to the abbey?’ he asked.
‘Tomorrow morning.’
‘Are you free this afternoon?’
‘Yes.’ She swallowed hard.
‘Where are you?’
‘In Regent’s Park, by the roses. Where are you?’
‘Still in Clapham, walking on the Common.’
Walking and thinking, like she was? Even though they had very different backgrounds and very different jobs, they seemed to react the same way to things. Perhaps that was a good sign.
‘I’ll jump in a cab and come to you,’ he suggested. ‘Find somewhere to sit, and text me to let me know exactly where you are. I’ll be there as soon as I can.’
‘All right. I’ll meet you by the waterfall in the Japanese Garden,’ she said.
‘I’m on my way,’ he said, and hung up.
CHAPTER SEVEN
THIS MEETING WAS going to be more crucial than the most important audition he’d ever had in his life, Harry thought. And he really needed to get it right. Holly had agreed to meet him to talk about the baby; if he messed that up, he wouldn’t get a second chance.
He still hadn’t quite got his head round the fact that he was going to be a father. He’d been here before, and it had gone so badly wrong; it scared him that it could go wrong again. Then again, if it went right it would still be scary. He adored his nieces and nephews, playing with them, spending quality time with them and playing music with them; but he’d never had to deal with sickness or tantrums or being so bone-deep tired that he couldn’t think straight, the way his brother and sister had. Babysitting a child for a few hours was a far cry from being completely responsible for a child.