His Secret Wife Walked Away Pregnant novel · Chapter 19 of 24

Chapter 19: On His Knees at My Counter

The bakery had eleven customers at five in the morning, and every one of them turned toward the door.

Gavin stood just inside it in his black wool coat, holding a velvet box.

I was on the stool behind the counter, because the doctor had said I could work if I sat.

Teagan's cousin, who owned the shop, put down a tray of croissants and said nothing.

"Joanna," Gavin said.

"You're five hundred feet too close."

"I couldn't stay away."

"The judge said you had to."

He took three steps, and the line of customers shuffled out of his way.

"I know about the order," he said. "I'm not here to break it. I'm here to fix it."

He got down on one knee on the tile floor, in the flour dust, in front of eleven strangers.

He opened the box.

It was a small diamond, a quarter of what he had bought for Veronica, set in a plain band.

"You asked me for one once," he said. "I said diamonds were tacky. I was a fool."

My hands lay flat on the counter.

A woman in the queue lifted her phone, and I saw its red light come on.

"I'll give up everything," Gavin said. "The company, the money. I'll live in a one-room flat and take the subway. I'll be a father to her. All I want is you and the baby."

"Her," I said.

His eyes flickered.

"You said 'her.' Twelve days ago it wasn't yours."

"I said a stupid thing in shock."

"You said it in front of three hundred people."

"I'm saying this in front of a bakery."

I looked at the ring, and I remembered the shop on Madison Avenue, with a saleswoman carrying away a silver gown because he had nodded at it.

"Gavin, get up."

"Say yes."

"Get up and walk out, and I won't call anyone."

"You'd call the police on your husband?"

"My ex-husband. The papers go through next month."

He stayed on his knee.

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