CHAPTER FIFTY-FIVE

NOLAN POV

Trying to wear Gwen’s defenses down probably wasn't the best game plan, but it was the only one I had. Her answer to the question of whether she still hated me didn't help my confidence in the scheme.

The truth of the matter was that I didn't know what the hell I was doing. I'd always had good luck with women. I'd had good luck with Gwen the night I ran into her just before Christmas. But whereas other women I’d been with were happy with just sex, or in the case of my ex wife, hoping for fortune, Gwen didn't care about either of those.

I’d like to put all the blame for the demise of our marriage on my ex wife, but I had said some pretty heinous things to her too. The difference was she didn't give a shit as long as I was forking over the money. The marriage ended because I wanted it to, not because I was an asshole.

During our marriage, I grew to despair that for the rest of my life, I was going to be miserable. The only time I saw glimpses of contentment was in business, and I had happiness with April. Still, there had to be more to life than being married to a woman who didn’t give a shit about me. If I went broke, she’d have left in a second.

When I finally ended the marriage, for a short time, I wondered if I could find love. Not the transactional kind I had with my ex wife, but the real thing. The type of love the moon goddess wrote about. It didn't take long for me to come to the realization that true love didn't exist in reality. Every woman I met saw dollar signs when they looked at me, and so I decided that love wasn't going to be in my future.

It wasn't just ironic that I had given up on the idea of love and then Gwen literally fell into my life. It was ironic that I would accuse her of being a gold digger when in fact, she had never looked at me as anything but me. She didn’t see my money. She didn’t see my connections. She saw me, the man. Maybe that was why I was so mean to her. Perhaps it wasn’t just that I struggled to deal with the power she had over me, but also that she saw through me. I saw the man I tried to keep hidden.

I recognized now that I was looking at a lifetime of regret and despair if I didn’t get my shit together and earn Gwen’s trust, and maybe her love. In some ways, I was grateful she was pregnant because if she wasn't, I would have no reason to be around her.

Or more accurately, she’d have no reason to be around me. With the baby, I had an excuse to see her. This child was my chance to get everything right this time. The only question was whether Gwen would ever come to believe in my sincerity, come to trust me.

When I got up this morning, I researched and found a therapist and made an appointment to meet with them. To prove to Watt that I wasn't shirking my responsibilities to him, I headed to the gym where we reviewed reports and our game plan for the next quarter. Then I headed downtown to my office, where I took care of my other business.

When I noted that sales of prenatal supplements and nutritional products were on the rise, I realized I could be supplying those to Gwen. Of course, we'd want to check with her doctor first, but I went ahead and ordered a few cases to give to her. She wouldn't like it. She’d tell me to leave her alone. But Gwen was smart. She'd put the baby first, so if the doctor okayed it, she would take them.

Later in the afternoon, Mandy’s voice rose outside my office. She appeared to be trying to keep someone away from my office. This particular person wasn't taking no for an answer.

There was a time I was curious about these people who tried to get past Mandy. Sometimes, I would poke my head out to watch. The problem was, once they saw me, it was hard to make them leave.

Mandy, in particular, got pissed when I did that. So, instead of indulging my curiosity, I stayed focused on my work. Ten minutes later, the commotion ended.

Another five minutes after that, Mandy entered my office.

I smirked. "Did the intruder leave all in one piece?"

She looked at me like I was a petulant child. "I don't much like hearing things about you from gossip. It's one thing if it's not true but something totally different if it is."

I arched my brow. "I don't know what you're talking about." Even as I said it, though, I imagined she'd heard about the pregnancy. All of a sudden, I wondered if it was Gwen whom she had ousted.

I stood up. "Who was that?"

"It was a woman claiming to be the stepmother of the woman she claims you, and I quote, knocked up."

I frowned as I sank back down into my chair. Why would Gwen’s stepmom be visiting me?

Mandy pulled out her phone, scrolling through it and then handing it to me. "Is this the woman you've knocked up?"

I stared down at April’s social media profile that had her and Gwen grinning like two favorite sisters. It occurred to me that if I were on social media, I would have known Gwen’s name and what she looked like.

That would have saved me a great deal of angst. Granted, I couldn’t resist her when I did know who she was, but I felt chances were good that I wouldn’t have seduced her that first night outside the paper shop if I’d known who she was. And yet, I couldn’t help but be grateful that I didn’t know her. As fucked up as everything was, the hope she gave me for something fuller in life was worth it.

I handed the phone back to her. "Yes." It really wasn't her business, except for the fact that she couldn't do her job if I kept important things from her.

She sniffed, glaring at me in annoyance. "That woman, not the one today but the one in the picture, was here."

"Just now?" Fucking hell.

"No. It was several weeks ago."

"And you didn't send her in?" My head was reeling. Gwen had been here? Why?

"She didn't have an appointment."

"Did she say who she was?"

"If you mean did she tell me that you knocked her up? No. She told me she needed to see you and I told her that was impossible. Besides, you weren't here. She left without giving me a name."

My gut burned until I thought I might be sick. Had she come here to tell me about the baby? This news made what I did at her house the other night I was drunk all the worse. I felt justified in my anger if she'd planned to never tell me about the baby. It was the way I'd gone about it that was wrong. But now, it was possible that she had planned to tell me but hadn't been able to see me.