Reparation (The Kane Trilogy, #3)(54)

“I just don't think so. Things here are ..., don't count on it. I don't wanna say sure, and then something happens, and we don't come,” Tate tried to explained, sitting back against the armrest and stretching her legs out.

“I notice you say 'we' more often now,” Nick pointed out, his voice soft. She curled her toes.

“Jameson would have to pay for my ticket, I couldn't not invite him,” she chuckled. There was another snort from behind her.

“I'm never fu-cking going to Arizona,” his voice warned.

She laughed and glanced at the TV screen. Some under-dressed, bleached blonde woman was sitting behind a sort of news desk, the large E! Entertainment logo next to her. When Jameson had put the TV on mute, the closed captioning for the program had immediately started working. The blonde bobblehead was talking about Leonardo DiCaprio vacationing in Brazil.

“What if I bought your ticket?” Nick suggested. Tate snickered, her eyes following the lettering. She swore she had ADD, sometimes.

“Good lord. A year ago, if anyone had asked me if I thought several devastatingly handsome men would ever be trying to pay for everything for me, I would tell them they were cut off and I'd kick them out of the bar,” she joked.

“You're spoiled, that's your problem.”

“I know.”

Nick rambled a little after that, talking about his adventures with his teammates. She laughed at his funny quips, but she was halfway distracted by the TV. Madonna said something else inappropriate on Twitter. Naomi Campbell threw her cell phone at another assistant. Kanye West had offended somebody. Petrushka Ivanovic was pregnant.

Tate sat up so fast, she almost got dizzy. Her eyeballs ate up the words. Paparazzis had caught the Ukranian-Danish model while she had been walking out of a clinic. She was wearing skin tight leggings and a tank top, so it was easy to see her tiny baby bump. E! Entertainment had gotten the official release from Petrushka's publicist. The supermodel was almost three months pregnant. The phone dropped from Tate's hand, clattered to the floor.

Almost three months. November. She got pregnant at the end of November.

She was vaguely aware of Jameson asking her what was wrong. Of Nick's voice squeaking up from the floor. She couldn't say anything, she just kept staring at the screen. Ms. Ivanovic had gotten pregnant in Spain. Yes, she knew who the father was; of course she did. It was her on-again-off-again boyfriend, financial tycoon Jameson Kane.

“Holy shit,” Jameson's voice said from behind her, and the television's sound came on, loudly.

“... Ms. Ivanovic is said to be thrilled, excited to have her first child. It's too early to know the sex, but it has been reported that she is hoping for a boy. We can only hope the little tyke will have his father's striking blue eyes and his mother's stunning good looks ...”

And of course a picture of Jameson was splashed across the screen.

The picture of him beside my bed is better. Our bed. fu-ck. I am so fu-cking stupid.

“Stop fu-cking listening to it, right now!” Jameson demanded, hurrying across the room and opening the door. He hollered for Sanders.

“How can I not?” Tate whispered.

“... Ivanovic and Kane were vacationing in the South of Spain in late November. Reports were flying about an American visiting him on his yacht, the same American he has been spotted with around Boston – Tatum O'Shea, the daughter of Mathias O'Shea, former CEO for Koch Industries. When asked about Ms. O'Shea, Ms. Ivanovic said she was aware of the American, but didn't 'waste much thought' on her ...”

“Tatum, listen to me,” Jameson came around the couch, squatting down in front of her. She couldn't tear her eyes away from the television screen. “She is lying. If she's pregnant – if – it's not mine.”

Aaaaaand cue the ugly truth ...

“... it would be the first child for both twenty-seven year old Ivanovic and thirty-one year old Kane. There were reports of their break up last year, but they have been spotted together several times since then, in New York, and they spent most of October together, in Berlin. Several people report seeing them together in Spain ...”

And there it was, a picture of him and Pet together. In Spain. It was taken from a distance, probably with some huge telescopic lens. They were standing in a parking space, in front of the marina where his boat was docked. They were facing each, obviously in some sort of conversation.

So much for not having contact with her. You got one wrong, Sandy.

“Stop thinking whatever it is you're fu-cking thinking!” Jameson shouted. Sanders walked in the room and Jameson leapt to his feet.

If he would have just said it in the beginning, that he wanted to sleep with her, couldn't not sleep with her, we could've been cool. One conversation. One sentence. There would have been no us. No hurt. No burning. No scars. God, why does this hurt so much? You knew it was coming.

“What's going on?” Sanders demanded.

“I don't know,” Tate managed to say. “He's freaking out.”

They both stared at her like she was insane.

“Tate, stop it. I have never -,” Jameson started, when she barked out a laugh.

“I'm not mad. Why would I be mad? It's not a big deal,” she assured him.

“Shut up, Tate. You're freaking out about something that I -,”