Logan didn’t get a chance to ring Bella’s father the next day and talk to him about Bella coming to live in Brisbane.
Graham Tucker rang him.
Bella had told him about the phone call with her parents and he’d planned to ring Graham on his lunch break but his phone rang at nine on the dot and he recognised the number from when he’d rung the law firm all those weeks ago.
“Graham,” he said as he tapped the answer button on the screen, mentally preparing himself for whatever the hell was about to unfold.
“I hear you make my daughter happy.”
Graham made happy sound like a particularly virulent form of herpes and Logan felt absurdly like laughing.
He didn’t. “She makes me happy too.”
The short silence that followed left Logan in no doubt that Bella’s father didn’t give one fuck for his happiness.
“She seems determined to turn her back on everything she knows and loves to move three thousand kilometres away.”
Logan shut himself away in an office. Privacy around the station was impossible. “She’s moving to Brisbane. Not the moon.”
“She’s rewinding nine years of her life, that’s what she’s doing.”
“She’s not nineteen anymore, Graham.”
“And, yet, still as impulsive.”
“I thought you weren’t interested in controlling her life these days?”
“I’m not. But I want her to make considered decisions, not rash, reckless ones as befitting her not nineteen-year-old self.”
Logan sighed. He supposed, no matter his age, he was always going to be some punk who was taking away Graham’s daughter and, maybe, no matter what he did, the old man would never forgive him for it.
“Look, I’m sorry.” And he was. To a point. He could sympathise with Bella’s father much more than he used to. “I know this must be some horrible kind of déjà vu for you but–”
“Why be sorry?” Graham interrupted, his voice dripping with sarcasm. “You won.”
“Jesus, Graham.” Logan ran his hand over his short hair. “This isn’t a competition.”
That seemed to shut him up and for long moments neither of them said anything.
“You’re going to tell her about the baby, aren’t you?”
The weariness and worry in Graham’s voice was more potent than his sarcasm or his anger. Logan closed his eyes briefly.
“I have to.”
“And what if it destroys her all over again?” Graham demanded, not bothering to disguise his anguish. “Are you prepared for that? Are you prepared for what it could potentially do to her?”
No. He wasn’t. Logan dreaded it. The potential consequences of telling her about the baby had played in his head repeatedly for weeks and he hated that Graham could be right. That it could have an adverse effect. On her mental health. On their fledgling reunion.
He wished he didn’t have to tell her but secrets like this had a nasty way of coming out in the end with potentially much worse consequences. What if one day she did get her memory back? How would she take it, knowing he’d been lying to her by omission for years? He was between a rock and a hard place, as her parents had been and it pissed him off enough to lash out.
“You’re just worried about covering your own ass. You know it was wrong to keep this from her and you know she’s going to hate you for it.”
“Well, I’m not going to be the only one, am I?” Graham said. “In case it’s escaped your notice, you’ve been keeping this from her too.”
“Because of you, damn it,” Logan snapped. “The only reason I haven’t told her yet is because you practically begged me not to.”
“Yes. As I’m doing again.”
“God... Graham...” Logan shook his head. This sucked. “I have to tell her. I can’t go into a relationship with her keeping this from her. Lying to her like that. She had a baby. A little girl. Your granddaughter. She died. Now, I know I’m not your pick for Bella but this happened. It’s too big to keep to myself. And you know these things have a way of coming out. She has a right to know this. It’s her medical history. For fuck’s sake, Graham, you’re a lawyer, you should know that.”
A long sigh sounded in his ear. “I just don’t want to see her hurt all over again. She’s already been through so much.”
“Do you think I do?” Logan asked, his voice low, anger and tension seeping from his shoulders at the sincerity in Graham’s voice.
A lengthy pause. “No.”
“I love her.”
“So do I.”
The phone went dead in his ear and Logan stared at it for long moments. Once upon a time, he’d have thought the love between a woman and a man trumped all other kinds. Now he was old enough to know it was just different. Not more or less. Different. And he really did feel for Bella’s parents. Hell, he even understood why they hadn’t told her.
But that didn’t mean he had to like the situation they’d put him in.
I can handle the truth.
That was what she’d told him that first day at Rosie’s. He hoped she was right because he couldn’t put off telling her any longer.
For better or worse, he was going to speak to her tonight.
Logan got home at eight, dread as deep and dark as a mine pit in his belly. His pulse picked up as he neared the apartment door, his hand shook as he inserted the key.
Bella wasn’t in the lounge, neither was Flash. But a slice of light shone from his open bedroom door and low music drifted out. He took a deep breath and made his way over.
The sight of her pulled him up in the doorway. Sitting on his bed surrounded by papers, in one of his old T-shirts, her legs akimbo and mostly exposed, a dozing Flash using one of her feet as a pillow. She was tapping away at her laptop, placed on the bed in the space between her thighs, a frown of concentration crinkling her brows, a pen gripped horizontally between her teeth.
He grinned at the scene despite his heavy heart. If it all ended tonight, this would be the way he wanted to remember her. He pulled his phone from his back pocket and snapped a couple of quick pics. Flash heard the shutter noise a fraction before she did and lifted his head, immediately wagging his tail.
She dragged her gaze off the screen and glanced at him, a big smile breaking over her face as she removed the pen from her teeth. It was like a sledgehammer to his heart.
“God, you look hot in your uniform.” Her gaze travelled over him very thoroughly, heating his blood.
“You look hot in my T-shirt.”
“You really should come over here and do me.”
Logan laughed, snapping a couple more pics as he walked towards her. “Don’t.” She held up her hand in front of her face. “I’m not wearing any makeup. Or a bra.”
He crawled onto the bed, paying no heed to the legal papers crunching under his knees. “Oh yeah,” he said, pulling the yoke of the shirt out and looking down at her deliciously bare breasts, the pale pink nipples hardening before his eyes.
His cock followed suit.
“You’re right.” He tutted and snapped a pic down her shirt.
“Hey.” She laughed around his kiss, pulling out of it way too quickly for his liking. “Give me that phone right now. I’m deleting that.”
Logan kissed her again but handed over his phone. “I’m going to take a quick shower. To be continued.”
If he stayed, he’d have her under him in a blink and he couldn’t make love to her without talking to her first. It felt too dishonest.
But he wasn’t above putting off the inevitable either.
Arabella deleted the pic of her breasts and edited a couple of the other ones he’d taken that were quite good. On a streak of naughtiness she pulled the T-shirt up and posed, bare-boobed for a pic. This was better than the other one. For a start it was more than just a pair of boobs as she pouted at the camera and thrust out her chest.
The dog, whose head was back on her foot, blinked at her as she bared her wares. “Sorry Flash,” she said on a half laugh, pulling the T-shirt down. He flopped his head to one side like his doggy brain couldn’t quite comprehend what he’d just seen.
Quickly, she navigated to the folders in Logan’s camera setting. She didn’t want the picture to be just there for anyone to see. Or him either. She wanted to hide it a little so it was something he’d stumble upon one day when he least expected it.
She smiled to herself thinking about that moment. Thinking about the double take then that secret, dirty smile of his spreading across his mouth.
Arabella started to make a folder but saw there was already one made called Bella. Perfect! She opened it to add the new pic but got distracted by the other pictures. There were a lot from the last couple of months and she smiled at the memories. She’d seen a lot of the others on Logan’s computer that day he’d shown her the Contiki snaps.
There was one she hadn’t seen, though.
One that froze her to the spot.
Her and Logan. Not looking young and happy and in love. Not grinning or kissing or mucking around. Not even looking at the camera. Looking down at a bundle in her arms.
It was a baby. A very small, very lifeless looking baby. Arabella could see a head and a tiny, tiny grey hand she held in her own. She was in a hospital bed, her name on the backboard, a blood pressure cuff around her arm, a drip in the back of her hand.
Logan was crying. So was she.
The abject misery on their faces chilled her to the bone. Bella’s heart thudded painfully in her chest as her brain tried to reconcile the image she was seeing.
Was that their baby? Had she been pregnant?
Had she had a baby?
Involuntarily, her hand slid to her stomach. She’d had a baby?
No. She’d lost a baby.
“Man, that feels better.”
Bella glanced up from the phone to find Logan grinning, walking toward her, a towel slung low on his hips. It didn’t have its usual effect. Her face was frozen, her brain uncomprehending as the discovery played like an old cracked record in her head.
A baby. A baby. A baby.
She didn’t know what she looked like but it must have been bad as Logan’s step faltered and his grin faded.
“Bella?” His voice seemed to come from a very long way away even though he was now standing at the foot of the bed.
“What’s this?” On autopilot, she turned the phone around in her shaking hand.
His eyes fluttered shut briefly and Arabella knew in that moment this wasn’t some sick joke or some weird anecdote that Logan could just explain away. That there wasn’t some easy answer.
He opened his eyes, the grey of his irises smoky with anguish. “That’s our daughter, Faith. She was stillborn at twenty-two weeks.”
Arabella gasped, shocked by the admission, unprepared for his honesty. She’d been desperately hoping it wasn’t what it appeared. She looked at the picture again.
She’d had a baby.
It was too hard to wrap her head around. Too... big.
Her skin crawled, like a thousand ants were marching just under the surface, like it had been set alight. She dropped the phone and scrambled off the bed, pacing to the desk and back, unable to sit still, scrubbing at her arms to stop the mad, tingling of her skin.
“Bella?”
She ignored him and paced some more. Her brain going round and round. She’d had a baby girl.
Faith.
How could she not remember that? How could anything erase that?
“Bella.”
She pulled up short and stared at him. He was standing at the end of the bed still, looking helpless and worried.
“I was pregnant?”
“Yes. It was an accident but... after the initial shock, we were excited about it.”
“I don’t remember,” she said, hugging her arms around her waist.
He nodded. “I know.”
“I don’t remember.” It was louder this time. More demanding. More accusatory.
“I know.”
She paced again, finding it harder and harder to breathe around the block of ice growing in her chest. Just when she’d thought amnesia had delivered its final surprise with meeting Logan, it still wasn’t finished with her.
She’d given birth to a baby and she didn’t remember.
She didn’t remember.
She stopped by the desk chair and hung onto the back. The injustice tore at her heart and sucked away her breath.
“Why?” she demanded, whirling around to face him. “Why didn’t you tell me?”
What the hell had he been playing at? Didn’t he know she’d want to know that?
“I’m sorry... I was going to tell you tonight.”
A sudden, blinding flash of white-hot fury seared her nerve endings. “Tonight?” she yelled. “Tonight? You should have told me at the beginning. Why?” she demanded. “Why didn’t you tell me straight away?”
He took a step towards her. “I wanted to but–” He stopped.
She waited for him to keep going but he shook his head as if he was grappling with something.
“I should have,” he said finally.
Arabella narrowed her eyes. She hadn’t spent years in courtrooms without being able to tell when someone was obfuscating. “You wanted to but what?” she said, her voice low and silky with anger. “Do not piss me around on this, Logan.”
He took a breath. “Your father asked me not to.”
“My... father?”
She blinked, confused. Her father?
Of course, her parents probably knew about it. And they hadn’t said anything either. In fact, it sounded very much like her father and Logan had... colluded over keeping it secret?
“I’m sorry... Have you been talking to my father, behind my back?”
He nodded, looking miserable, like he’d rather be anywhere but here right now. “I rang him that day we first met. To ask him about the amnesia. To... demand to know why they hadn’t told me about your accident. To check what you knew and what you didn’t. That’s when he asked me to not say anything about the baby.”
“And you just... did what he asked?”
Arabella had gotten the distinct impression there was no love lost between her father and Logan and yet Logan had agreed to something so wildly unfair to her?
“Yes.” Logan sighed. “I argued against it. I didn’t agree with it but... yes. Initially anyway.”
“Why?” she demanded, dashing away a tear that was trekking down her face. She didn’t even know she was crying. “I thought you loved me? Why?”
“I do love you, Bella but... he was afraid this would happen. It was... rough... afterwards. For you. Well... for both of us but... your grief was...” He broke off, shaking his head as if he didn’t have the words for it.
“Was what?” she asked, hugging herself again, needing to know. Because she couldn’t remember.
How had she grieved for a baby she didn’t remember?
“It was... deep and dark and I was... so worried and...” He rubbed a hand over his hair. “Inadequate. I didn’t know what to do.”
Arabella could tell by the devastation on his face and the way he was choosing his words that he was leaving a lot unsaid. It sounded like she’d been a real mess.
“Is that why we split? You said when it came to the crunch we didn’t fight for each other. You mean I didn’t fight for us?”
“No.” He shook his head, taking another step towards her, their gazes locking. “No, Bella. It takes two people to make a relationship breakdown. And we were both young and we barely knew each other and suddenly we were dealing with an unplanned pregnancy then a stillbirth and a shit tonne of grief and we didn’t have the skills or enough history together to cope with it all. It was just a really shitty time and your parents came for you and you wanted your mother and... I let you go.”
The ache in his voice twisted inside her gut. The emotions from that time were clearly still as raw as ever for Logan. No wonder he’d been so devastated when they’d first met again and he’d realised she didn’t remember any of what they’d been through. That those memories weren’t reciprocated by the one person in the world who’d been through every miserable one of them with him.
No wonder he’d kept looking at her with hope in his eyes. Like maybe she’d suddenly remember it all. Because how could anyone forget such a devastating experience?
“You let me go?”
God, how hard must that have been for him? If he’d loved her as much then as he did now? While trying to cope with his grief, too?
“Yes. For a month. And then I went to Melbourne to bring you back. But...” He dropped his gaze, looking at his feet.
She nodded, knowing without knowing how it had gone down. “I rejected you.”
“Yes.” He glanced up swiftly, hope in his eyes as he searched her face for signs of the same memory.
His slow dawning that it had just been an educated guess was hard to watch. His raw expression told her what she’d been trying to ignore. That he was still holding out hope where her memory was concerned.
God...
She couldn’t deal with this. Not with this startling information. Not with his expectations. Or his disappointment. Or his grief-stricken memories written plain across his face. Or her parent’s complicity.
It was too, too much.
There were so many questions tumbling around in her head about the baby. She wanted to know it all – every detail – but it was too big to fit inside her at the moment. Her heart hurt and her head was spinning and her lungs felt like they were going to burst out of her chest.
It was too much to take in.
And his face was destroying her. His sexy, stubbly face, twisted in despair and sorrow. She was too mad with him right now to empathise.
She’d had a baby with him and he’d kept it from her. The knowledge had been lost to her and he’d chosen to keep it that way. To withhold it. She’d bared her body and her soul to him. She’d given him everything – she’d fallen in love with him all over again, she was staying here with him – and he’d been holding back.
She felt... betrayed. By someone who was supposed to love her.
Still... she felt an insane urge to apologise. For what she didn’t know. A bubble of hysteria rose in her throat and she swallowed it down. For losing his baby? For her deep, dark grief? For rejecting him.
All those things that she didn’t fucking remember!
He did though. And that was the clincher. He knew everything and she only knew the bits he’d deigned to tell her. And right now, she couldn’t deal with that.
Arabella stepped back one step, two, then turned away, striding to the cupboard, pulling shorts out of the draws and hastily stepping into them.
“Bella.”
She ignored him, whisking his T-shirt off and pulling on one of hers, not bothering with a bra. She shoved her feet into a pair of flip flops, glad she still had a lot of her clothes at the apartment.
“Bella, please don’t go.”
She turned for the bed, grabbed her laptop and shoved it into its bag. She gathered all the papers and shoved them in too. She picked her bag up off the floor and her phone. Her movements were calm and measured, reflecting the iciness that was spreading from her core to all her peripheries.
“Don’t walk out again,” he said as she faced him. “Stay and fight for us this time.”
His words found their mark. “Screw you, Logan. You didn’t fight for me, for my right to know.”
“I’m so, so sorry.”
She believed him, for what it was worth. But that didn’t stop how much she was hurting. “I can’t be here, right now.”
He nodded, the yearning for her to stay was clear in his tortured, grey gaze, but he was ultimately resigned. “Okay.”
Arabella headed for the door, stopping to pat Flash briefly before continuing. She was going to miss him. And his master.
“I’ll call you tomorrow,” he said before she disappeared out the door.
She halted but didn’t turn to face him. “Don’t. I’ll call you. When I’m ready.”
And she walked out of the apartment.