Chapter 12: Come Home

Brent stood in front of me with his hands out, and three hundred people waited to see what I would do.

"No," I said.

It was one syllable, and it carried farther than I meant it to.

He let his hands drop.

"Cor, you're in shock. We both are. We should go home and talk."

"I'm not in shock."

"You've been under so much stress."

"Brent, listen to me."

I shifted Posy higher on my chest.

"I'm not coming home. I'm not going to forgive you. In a month, you'll say you've changed, and I won't be there to hear it."

"I have changed. Tonight I changed."

"You found out the baby wasn't yours. That's not changing, that's losing."

Somebody at a table behind me laughed once and stopped.

Brent's eyes went wet.

He did what I'd seen him do in a dozen showrooms, when a customer got up to leave.

He went down on one knee on the ballroom floor.

"I made a terrible mistake," he said. "I was weak, and I was stupid, and I'd give anything to have that night back. Please. We have a daughter."

"We do."

"She needs her father."

"She has one," I said. "He didn't come to the scan, and he didn't hold her while I was in surgery, and he didn't know her name."

"Cor..."

"Get up, Brent."

He stayed on his knee.

"Please don't do this in front of everyone."

"You did it in front of everyone."

It was quiet enough that I heard the chandelier crystals tick against each other.

He got up slowly.

His mother had come down off the stage, and now she took him by the arm.

"Brent, that's enough. We're leaving."

"Not yet," I said.

She turned her head.

"Two days ago you made me a promise in the dealership lot. If the result named someone else, you apologize to me, and to Ward."

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