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the first time I’ve heard from him since I saw him in Phoenix to tell him about the baby, so stop making it sound as if I’m carrying on with Jake. I’m not. He called to ask about getting the paternity test done now. Of course he wants to know. He’s apparently been doing his own homework, and we don’t have to wait until the baby is born.
    “He wants to get on with his life and not have this unknown hanging over his head, and he’s right. We need to do this now. Pretending this isn’t an issue and not wanting to know is something we have to stop. I was—no, I am afraid of finding out it’s Jake’s and then learning how you’ll really feel, because deep down I’ve always been afraid that you’ll walk away again. I can’t live like this anymore, waiting for the other shoe to drop, hearing you say you want me but living with your moodiness for months, not missing the way you look at me when you think I’m not watching. I wonder if it’s just a matter of time before you’re done with me forever. I’ve been so afraid of that, so afraid to find out.”
    Her voice betrayed how hard she was trying to hold herself together, and then a tear slipped down her cheek. She shut her eyes for a second as if to pull herself together. When she opened them, they were filled with despair and something else, as if she’d lost the will to fight for him. “I can’t do this anymore,” she said. “If you decide to walk away, then just do it. Maybe it’s for the best, because I can’t live with this, knowing I’m responsible for driving a wedge between your family, between your brothers, who didn’t even come to the wedding.”
    Why was she saying this, doing this, now? It had to be the pregnancy, that surge of hormones making her crazy.
    “Jill, you came back to me after bedding my brother. You never should have been with him, never. He was my brother, Jill!” He slammed his fist on the dresser. Before, she’d have probably jumped, but she just watched him, resigned. She was calm now like she’d never been before.
    “I know, Samuel, and you’re right. I shouldn’t have. It just happened. He was there for me after you hurt me. I thought we were past this. When I called you after I left him…we’ve been together ever since, Samuel. You said you loved me, but I’m starting to wonder if it was more that you didn’t want Jake to have me. Do you love me? Me, Samuel.” She touched her hand to her chest.
    “You’re in me, Jill. I knew I made a mistake when you left me, when I was with Deena.”
    “Deena, yes, the one you picked up in the bar while I sat across from you and watched. Your brother was there at the table with us, and it still hurts knowing that Jake was as horrified as I was. It was deliberate, what you did. It was as if you stuck a knife in my heart. That would have been kinder, I think.”
    He could feel his face warm. That was one of the stupidest things he’d ever done in his life, and he’d done some pretty monumentally dumb things that he hoped everyone around him would soon forget.
    The silence between them thickened the air with a tension that couldn’t be good for Jill. He hated it. He should say something, anything. She just stared at him, waiting—for what, he didn’t know.
    “Since you look good, I’m going to head on back to the office. I have notes to go over, a case to prepare.”
    She didn’t even nod as she stared at him.
    “Call me if you need anything,” he said.
    “I’ll be fine, Samuel. I’m a big girl. You go on back to work. I have my own work to do here.” She looked down at her laptop resting on her legs, then picked up the earbuds and put them back in her ears as if dismissing him.
    He glanced once at her rounded belly, at a baby that could be his or his brother’s. Then he backed out of the room, picked up his laptop case, grabbed his keys, and left.
    As he waited at the elevator, he knew in the back of his mind that he should really go back in and talk to