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Tate was taking her hand in his before he even realised it, squeezing it as if to say, ‘Me too.’

She squeezed right back as a tear slid down her cheek. ‘That’s our baby,’ she said.

‘Sure is,’ Dr Huang agreed, clicking buttons on the keyboard, scanning the screen, then lifting the wand off Sarah’s stomach. She reached for a towel and offered it to Sarah, to wipe away the goop. ‘Looking nice and strong, too,’ she observed.

‘Can you tell what it is?’ Tate asked.

‘Not yet, not with a scan. I presume you’d like to run the full raft of health tests?’

Sarah glanced up at Tate, who nodded, though he’d never given it any thought. It seemed wise to know that everything was tracking smoothly.

‘Is that okay with you?’ he checked with Sarah, uncharacteristically deferential. Tate liked to take charge of whatever situation he found himself in, but this was her body, and their shared baby. Consultation seemed not just appropriate, but necessary.

Sarah glanced at the doctor. ‘What’s involved?’

Dr Huang’s smile was reassuring. ‘Nothing invasive, just a simple blood test.’

Sarah shuddered, but a moment later, said, ‘Okay, yeah. I guess it makes sense.’

‘Great.’ Dr Huang stood up, pushing the ultrasound machine back against the wall. ‘I’ll go get the nurse to draw your sample. Excuse me a moment.’

Sarah finished drying her stomach, then pulled her shirt back down before turning to Tate, her eyes awash with thoughts and feelings he didn’t understand.

‘Did you…want to do a paternity test?’

Old pains launched through him. He shook his head.

Sarah frowned, though. ‘Why not?’

He hesitated. ‘You told me there’s only one possible father.’

‘And that’s true. But I’m curious. What if I’m lying?’ she asked, eyes probing his.

He stuck one hand into his pocket, meeting her gaze without flinching. ‘Are you?’

‘No.’

Silence crackled between them. ‘I believe you.’

But if anything, her frown only deepened.

‘What?’ he pushed, wondering why that apparently bothered her.

‘I could just so easily be making it up. And you seem like the last guy on earth to blindly take this on faith…’

Something shifted inside his chest, a feeling that he’d shown a part of himself he shouldn’t have by so willingly believing her. But also, something else. Something darker. Even considering the possibility that this baby might be someone else’s was like a throb of dark, twisting anger inside him. It had only been twenty-four hours, and yet he’d fully accepted the reality that this child was his.

‘I just think…you believe me, but your brother and sister might not so easily.’ She lifted her slender shoulders. ‘The whole world might not.’

He pulled himself up to his full height. ‘Do you think I care what anyone thinks?’

Her lips parted, her eyes showing anguish. ‘No.’ Her voice was small, though, laced with uncertainty.

He expelled a long breath. ‘Look, Sarah. I told you what it was like for me—the courts, the paternity test, the constant back and forth. I’m not putting you through that; I’m sure as hell not going to risk it getting out there that I required it of you.’

Sympathy shifted her features, and he hated how much that meant to him. How he was aware of the tiniest softening around her eyes. He’d been offered sympathy before, but there was something different about the way Sarah looked at him, as though she recognised all parts of him and accepted what she saw, warts and all.

‘I appreciate that,’ she murmured. ‘But I still think we should do it. So there’s definitive proof.’