Free Gone by Annabel Wolfe Page B

hoped that, if nothing else, it wouldn’t get ugly. Kathy—the one he loved and married—was not a venal person, but he’d been told by just about everyone he knew that there was no such thing as a pleasant divorce.
    “You said you didn’t want the house.” He shrugged out of his jacket and tossed it over a chair, realizing she still hadn’t really looked at him. She wore some kind of a sundress with thin straps, and in the semi-gloom, her shoulders were bare and smooth, her shining dark hair a sleek fall down her back.
    As always, she was one of the most beautiful women he had ever seen.
    “I’ve changed my mind about that. I want it after all.”
    “A simple phone call to tell me that would have sufficed.” He wasn’t irritated precisely, but he was tired and travel worn and a long hot shower followed by a stiff bourbon would be nice. “Why are you sitting here in the dark anyway?”
    “I…” She stopped, and then shook her head. There was a suspicious hint of tears in her voice.
    Suddenly, he didn’t think this visit was about the house at all. Just what the hell was up?
    He went over and switched on the bedside lamp.
    She looked at him for the first time, and he hadn’t been wrong about the tears. There were crystalline drops on her long dark lashes and just a hint of smudge in her mascara. At thirty-two she was as striking as they day he’d met her a decade ago, and his focus strayed to her trembling lips as he remembered what it was like to make love to her…
    Shock rolled over him in a wave then as his gaze dropped lower.
    To the very rounded contour of her stomach, her hands clasped protectively over that conspicuous curve.
    He stared at her, speechless, his arms at his sides, his brain on total lockdown.
    Kathy lifted her chin a fraction and wiped away a stray tear with a finger. “I swear to you, if you ask me if it is yours, I will never speak to you again. I’m almost seven months. Do the math.”
    That was nearly impossible considering he felt as if the whole universe had shifted, but he said in a hoarse voice, “Our trip to Brown County…that little bed and breakfast? Jesus, Kathy, were you ever going to tell me?”
    “I’m telling you now.”
    “Half a year later?” He was incredulous and couldn’t hide it. She was pregnant and hadn’t told him.
    “Have you been here so we could have this discussion?”
    That was hard to argue. And why she’d walked out in the first place. He floundered for a defense and really couldn’t find one. “A big operation,” he said finally. “We had a team trapped behind enemy lines…maybe you saw it on the news. We thought they’d all been killed but then found out they were POWs. I inherited the problem when Rankin retired for health issues… Boy or girl, do we know?”
    We? Wrong choice of words, buddy . For all you know you only get the privilege of the sperm donation and a chance to pay child support for next eighteen years .
    His wife—she was still his wife—managed a tremulous smile. “Boy.”
    What did he say now? They were in the middle of a divorce…this was seriously not an easy moment to manage, and he was used to making decisions that could be life or death for many people.
    But his own life? That was not at all under control.
    He had a million questions…that went without saying. How have you been feeling? Is this an easy pregnancy? The baby is healthy, right? Names, have you thought about names? When exactly are you due, because I’m supposed to fly back to Washington in a few weeks, and…
    He sat down next to her and hesitated for a moment before he reached over and slid his fingers along the curve of her cheek and then touched her mouth briefly. She allowed it, and that was something. “What do we do now?”
    She whispered, “I don’t think I know. That’s why I’m here.”
    Tentatively, he laid his hand over her belly. A child. He was moved beyond words. “I think I understand now why you want to keep the