Her Nine Month Confession

‘She isn’t!’ Lily shot back, furious at the suggestion.

‘You were happy to let her think her father doesn’t love or want her. Did you pause when you were making your unilateral decision to think how she might feel a few years down the line thinking that her father had rejected her? How that might affect her emotional development, her future relationships? You’re willing to deprive her of what you had...what you took for granted... Well, I’m not.’

The statement had more impact because Ben clearly wasn’t canvassing for the sympathy vote; he was simply stating a fact. Despite this, or maybe because of it, Lily felt her own tender heart soften. A child herself at the time, it had never occurred to her to wonder why Ben had come to live with his grandfather. That he had been unwanted had not even crossed her mind.

‘I’m going to make damned sure that my daughter isn’t going to grow up thinking she’s to blame. She’ll have what every kid deserves. What I—’

Didn’t have, Lily completed silently as he paused for breath. She trawled her memory trying to think of a single occasion when she had seen Ben’s parents at Warren Court after Ben had moved in. She came up blank.

‘I’m sorry that you were an unhappy child, but—’

He pinned her with a cold blue stare. ‘This isn’t about me. It’s about what is best for our child. You may feel it’s some sort of badge of honour to struggle financially but—’

‘I don’t!’ she protested, smothering a dangerous wave of empathy along with the image of a sad, lonely little boy. Ben was not a little boy any more; he was a powerful man. A very angry, powerful man. And he was angry at her. ‘You never wanted children...’

‘And you wanted to put your career on hold just as it was taking off?’

‘That’s not the point!’

His brows lifted as his lips tugged into a triumphant smile. ‘Exactly. Even if I was the total rat you think I am, even if I had been given the option and chose not to be part of her life, I have a financial obligation at least.’

‘This isn’t about money!’

‘No, it’s about a hell of a lot more,’ he growled. ‘More than your selfish pride. So save me the poor and proud of it speech. My daughter is going to have all the advantages I can give her, so get used to it.’

‘You think you can just appear out of nowhere and take control?’ She managed to project scorn, but below the surface there was a strong steady pulse of fear feeding into her bloodstream.

He shrugged and gave a wolfish grin that left his blue eyes hard and cold. ‘Now you come to mention it, yes.’

Despite the sun beating down she shivered, suddenly icily cold. She recalled a recent article in which a rival had called Ben Warrender a ‘wolf in designer clothes, who wouldn’t even get a crease in his suit while he casually destroyed your life for profit’