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Relishing the moment of quiet, Boston slid his hands into his pockets before he murmured, "She's mine."
And yes, here it came. The flood of words that poured forth about knocked him off his feet. Everyone spoke at once, yet he couldn't hear anything a single person said.
Glowering at his brother standing beside him, Boston hissed, "Couldn't have kept your big trap shut for one more day, could you?"
Monty opened his mouth to defend himself, but Olivia jumped in. "He didn't spread the news. I did."
Whirling toward her, Boston gaped at his cousin's wife. He couldn't rail at her the way he could his brother, but he did send her an irritated scowl.
"And thank God she did," his mother, Diane Kincaid, cut in.
"Who knows when your father and I would've learned we have another grandchild." She paused as if suddenly realizing her own words. Then, setting a hand on her head, she looked like she was going to pass out as she rasped, "Oh my God.
That makes seven. I have seven grandchildren."
Her husband, Lincoln, caught her arm to keep her steady.
As two of her daughters reached out to help her as well, Boston clenched his teeth to keep from apologizing.
"I was going to tell you," he said. "Just as soon as I found out one way or another."
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"Oh, like you told us when this woman got pregnant ten years ago?" Diane asked, straightening from her near swoon.
"Montgomery said you thought she'd had a miscarriage, so you obviously knew you'd gotten her pregnant at one point."
Boston seared an arch look Montgomery's way.
"Hey," Montgomery said, lifting his hands defensively.
"They already knew most of it by then. I just filled in the details."
"What's the girl like?" his sister, Madison, asked.
"Where exactly do they live?" Cameron butted in. "What part of Lawrence?"
"How could you not tell us you'd impregnated someone, Boston?" his mother wailed. "We never met this girl...Ellie whoever. I don't even remember you mentioning her. And why in the world did you not stick around long enough to realize she hadn't had any kind of miscarriage? I don't understand how you could have a child and not even—"
"Look, Mom," Boston cut in wearily, setting a hand on his aching temple. "Can I get a rain check on the lecture tonight?
I just found out I have a daughter, for God's sake. I need..."
Feeling a little woozy himself, his knees buckled slightly.
He caught himself before going down, but a handful of family surged forward anyway, catching him.
"Let's get him inside," his father said, even as his brothers-in-law started to haul him toward the front door.
Shrugging them off, Boston mumbled, "I'm fine." No one seemed to listen until he shouted, "Hey! I can walk by myself."
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A dozen pair of hands eased off, but they all stayed suffocatingly close as if expecting him to topple over any second.
"Let's head inside anyway," Lincoln Kincaid said, taking charge of the situation. "There's no reason to discuss this on the front lawn."
And so, everyone shifted toward the house. Monty's cell phone rang on the way. As soon as he flipped it open, he was already saying, "She's his. She's really his daughter!" Boston could only guess it was some aunt or uncle or cousin on the other end of the line.
Once inside, Madison ushered him toward a chair as his other two sisters, Cheyenne and Helena, hurried off together to get him a drink.
"Now, tell us about the girl," his mom demanded, pacing the floor in front of him. "Her name's Cassie, right?"
Boston nodded. "Cassidy Diane Trenton."
"Diane?" his mother repeated, falling to a stop and lifting her head. When Boston bobbed his head in affirmation, she blinked rapidly. Lifting a hand to her face, she wiped her eyes. "She's named after me?"
"What's she look like?" Olivia asked eagerly.
"Did you get to meet her?" Shannon wanted to know.
"I spent over four hours with her," Boston reported.
The room quieted, everyone eager for the news.
"What's she like?" Monty asked.
"She's...she's...well, she's perfect," was the only description Boston could think to give. "Absolutely perfect."
The room sighed in contentment.
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"She, uh, she's extremely smart," he added. "I saw a math test on the refrigerator, and she was graded a ninety-eight percent."
"She gets that from me," Diane announced, grinning.
"She looks like you too," Boston said.
"Really?" his mother gasped, squeezing Helena's hand when her oldest daughter reached out.
"I mean, she's got Ellie's features: nose, mouth, and the shape of her eyes. And she's got Dad's coloring with his straight black hair and blue eyes...but she still looks just like those pictures of you when you were that age."
"Oh, wow," Diane whispered, fanning her tear-stained face. "This is so amazing."
"She's in a tumbling class," Boston said, mentioning whatever fact came to mind. "And soccer. And her best friend is a boy who lives next door. Ellie says she's his defender when bullies try to pick on him. And she's got a stubborn streak a mile wide. I could tell that immediately when El had her go take a bath. But she's still obedient. Even though she didn't want to do something, she still did what her mom told her to do. And...and..."
As he realized how badly he was rambling, his voice faded.
"That's it," Diane said, "I want to meet her. Right now."
She actually turned toward the exit as if prepared to leave that very moment for Lawrence.
"Whoa!" Boston said, jumping to his feet. "No one bothers them."
Everyone despised that idea, and they all objected...loudly.
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"Hey!" Boston yelled above the roar. "Do you know how intimidating it would be to have fifty strangers invade them all at once?"
"There's not fifty of us. Thirty tops, counting all the aunts, uncles and cousins," someone said just as another person retaliated with, "But we're family."
"They still don't know you," Boston argued. "So stay away for a while, okay? As soon as I work out custody with Ellie, I'll bring Cassidy out and you can all meet her one household at a time."
"Your father and I get to meet her first," Diane inserted before anyone else could call dibs.
"Oh, oh! Cam and me second," Olivia said quickly, lifting her hand and wiggling her fingers.
"So, when will you be working out custody issues?"
Cameron wanted to know.
"I figure I'll whip up a draft tonight and run the basic plan by Helena in the morning to see what she thinks." He glanced at his older sister, who was also a lawyer.
She nodded in affirmation. "Of course. I'll help any way I can."
"Then I'll approach Ellie tomorrow evening when I go out there again," he added. "Cassie wants me to take her to Chuck E. Cheese's."
"Tomorrow?" Diane gasped. "You're seeing her again tomorrow? Well, good. We'll come with you."
"No! No, I already told you, you're going to scare her."
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"Hey, it's a free country. If I show up at the Chuck E.
Cheese's in Lawrence tomorrow, how're you going to stop me?"
Boston sighed, already well aware he fought a losing battle.
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Chapter Six
At five till noon the next day, Nora Young swept into Winston Young's law office where her brother-in-law stood over Ellie's desk, giving her last-minute instructions before he went to lunch.
"But—"
"The girl's going to shrivel up and starve if you keep denying her a break."
Winston had never been able to stand up to his brother's wife, so he frowned in defeat and turned beseechingly to Ellie.
"Well...just make sure this is the first thing you do once you return."
"Of course," Ellie answered and yelped in surprise as Nora grabbed her wrist and tugged her from the office.
In minutes, she found herself seated in the restaurant across the street with Nora, ordering a drink. Blinking herself to the present as she watched the waiter walk away, Ellie suddenly realized her friend had just ordered a cosmopolitan.
"I can't drink alcohol." She whirled toward Nora incredulously. "I have to go back to work after this."
"Oh, honey," Nora murmured and sighed as she reached across the table and patted Ellie's hand in a sympathetic gesture. "That was for me. I ordered you your usual Diet Coke."
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"Oh." Ellie sat back in her booth seat and ran her fingers through her hair, wishing she could have the cosmo instead.
Nora made a tut-tutting sound. "Been a long morning?"
Ellie massaged her temples, pressing hard. A throbbing resistance pushed right back. "I don't know what to do, Nora."
"Well, first of all, you're going to bring me up to date. All I know is that Keller came home last night from your place, saying you kicked him out because Cassie's dad was there."
Ellie swallowed.
"And half an hour before you got home, that tall, dark and hot stranger showed up, lingering around your place, waiting around for you like some lovesick puppy dog." She shrugged.
"He told me he was a relative and hadn't seen you since before Cassie was born. Course I assumed he meant he was related to you, not your daughter. It never occurred to me he might be her father."
Ellie dropped her hands from her temples and gaped at her friend. "Wait. What? You talked to Boston?"
"Boston," Nora repeated, lifting her eyebrows in interest.
"Is that his name? Hmmm. I like it. Very original. Boston what?"
"What'd he say to you?"
"I just told you. He said he was a relative and hadn't seen you in a long time. Oh, and that you were expecting him but he made it to town earlier than he thought he would."
Ellie snorted. "I most certainly was not expecting him."
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"He's really Cassidy's dad?" Nora asked in awe. When Ellie sent her a miserable nod, Nora's jaw dropped. "Wow. Where's he been all these years?"
"Kansas City, I guess."
"And what's he doing there when his daughter's here?"
Nora wanted to know.
Ellie averted her face and bit her lip. "I kind of told him I had a miscarriage."
"You... what?" Nora gaped at her like she'd lost her mind, making Ellie flush. "Oh, now I'm going to have to hear the whole story."
Ellie sighed, giving in. "We'd already broken up by the time I found out I was pregnant. Boston went crazy when I told him, accusing me of trying to trap him, of purposely getting pregnant to get him back. He blamed it all on me."
"The jerk," Nora muttered, falling back in her chair. "Why are men such jerks?" Waving her own question away, she leaned forward and confidentially asked, "Okay. Aside from the fact that he's a guy and all guys are scum, why did it end between you two in the first place?"
The answer came to Ellie in a brilliantly clear memory. "He cheated on me," she murmured, though she was already drifting toward the past, sitting in early American history class and listening to Heather Grimaldi talk with her friends about Boston Kincaid, whom she'd spent the evening with at some wild dorm party.
And suddenly, Ellie was nineteen again, in Boston's dorm room, confronting him.
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"What did you do last Friday when I was working?" she asked, feeling like she had to dive straight to the point or she'd never be able to discover the truth.
Boston wouldn't meet her gaze as he shrugged. "I don't know. Why?"
She shrugged too and had to focus on something else as she said, "So, you didn't meet some redhead named Heather and go back to her apartment with her?"
His silence was the loudest confession he could've made.
Ellie swallowed. "Okay," she said calmly. "I'll take that as a yes."
Boston shoved his hands into his pockets and stared fixedly out his room's single window. A ray of light glimmered in and reflected a blue-black glow over his hair. He looked so beautiful it nearly took her breath away. But thinking about her beautiful lover with another woman killed her.
He was hers.
"Was that the first time?" she asked hoarsely.
Finally, he lifted his face Their gazes met. "Does it matter?"
Ellie's already broken heart crumbled into dust. Tears rushed up her throat, but she choked them back with a fit of stubborn pride. She'd be damned before she let Boston Kincaid see her cry.
"No," she whispered, looking down at her hands. "I guess it doesn't." She blinked a few times. Her eyes burned but remained dry.
Silence grew thick between them. Boston returned to gazing out the window. Ellie stared at his back and swallowed 90
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a lump in her throat that must've been her pride washing down her esophagus because the next words out of her mouth were, "Are you going to do it again?"
His shoulders tensed fractionally. The remaining ashes of her pulverized heart screamed out, begging him to say he was sorry and promise it'd never happen again.
She would forgive him.
In that moment, if he'd repented, she would've forgiven anything.
But he didn't. He hitched a shoulder and softly replied, "I don't know."
Ellie froze. Her blood turned to ice. "So...you're just going to keep cheating on me? Is that what you're saying?"
He whirled around at that question. "Cheating?" he repeated in confusion.
"Yes!" she wailed, throwing her hands in the air. "What do you call it when you're in a relationship with one girl and you go out and—"
"Wait a second," he interrupting, taking a step toward her.
"I never said anything to you to suggest we were in a relationship. I never made you any promises. What made you think this thing between us was exclusive?"
For a moment, she could only stare at him blankly. Was he kidding?
Then she glared and set her hands on her hips. "Oh, I don't know. Maybe the fact that we have been just that for the past seven months. You'd think after that much time, it'd be an unspoken agreement. You didn't have to say anything.
I gave you my virginity, Boston. I gave you—"
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"What does that have to do with—"
"It has to do with everything!" she squawked in growing alarm. "I gave you...I gave you—"
"Yeah, you did," he said. "You gave it. Willingly. I didn't force anything from you. I didn't demand or manipulate. And I never made you any promises. Damn it, Ellie. I thought you understood what was going on here."
She blinked in utter bewilderment. "I don't understand any of this."
Once again, he was unable to make eye contact. He sighed and scrubbed a hand over his forehead until a red mark appeared. "Well, it still doesn't matter," he mumbled more to himself than her. "It's almost May anyway."
"May? What happens in May?" A terrible feeling crept up the back of her neck, making the little hairs jerk to attention.
He lifted his face and sent her an incredulous look. "I graduate," he reminded her. "I leave and go to Yale."
She shrugged. "S
o?"
"So..." He frowned, obviously not understanding her confusion. "You're staying here."
The fear that washed through her had her gazing at him in frozen horror. Suddenly, she understood everything. "Oh, I get it," she murmured on a nod. "You go. I stay. That automatically means it's over, huh?"
"Look, Ellie." He let out an uncomfortable sound. "You have your plans, and I have mine. You've always known what I was going to do. Why're you acting like—"
"I have to go," she said abruptly.
"Whoa," Boston said, reaching out to grab her arm.
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She paused and stared up at him with her dry, burning eyes.
He shook his head in confusion. "That's it, then? You're just going to walk out. No goodbye, no nothing?"
Ellie snorted. She couldn't believe he actually expected her to be cordial. Then again, she didn't know why she was surprised by his assumption. He hadn't planned on trying to make a long-distance relationship work in the first place, which completely blew her mind. So obviously, she didn't know him like she thought she had.
"Gee," she sneered bitterly. "Let me think. You cheated on me and planned on breaking up in five weeks anyway. So, yeah, I'd say that's it." She glanced pointedly down at his fingers on her arm. "Let go."
His grip tightened. "Ellie."
As soon as she looked up, she realized it was a mistake.
The utter panic in his eyes had her melting. If he did anything, said one thing to get her back, she'd crawl into his arms and forget what a snake he was. And wouldn't that make her an utter fool.
"I..." he started and paused to lick his dried lips.
Ellie swallowed, waiting. Her crushed heart obviously didn't know it was broken, because it beat hard and fast in her chest, anxious to hear his words to bring them back together.
He wanted to say them. She could see it in his eyes. He didn't want her to go.
But he surprised them both when he disengaged his fingers and stepped back. "Goodbye then."
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Three weeks later, she was packing her dorm bathroom and preparing to head home for summer break when she came across her supply of tampons and realized she hadn't had her period in a long time...too long. Absolutely freaking out over the thought she might be pregnant, she'd raced to the drugstore and bought a home pregnancy test. When it came up positive, she rushed back out and bought another.