Facing Up To Fatherhood

“Sarah was my secretary, I admit. But we did not have an affair.”

Tina folded her arms and practically rolled her eyes at him. “Oh, come now, Mr. Hunter, I didn’t come down in the last shower. I know exactly what happened between you and Sarah. How you can stand there and deny having slept with her is beyond me.”

“I am not the father of that baby, or any other baby. Honey, you’ve got the wrong man.”

Tina actually smiled at him, an icy smile that set his teeth on edge. “You are Dominic Hunter, the head of Hunter & Associates, aren’t you?”

“You know I am.”

“Then I’ve got the right man. But if you insist on a DNA test, I won’t object….”

Facing Up To Fatherhood

Miranda Lee

www.millsandboon.co.uk

CONTENTS

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

CHAPTER ELEVEN

CHAPTER TWELVE

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

EPILOGUE

CHAPTER ONE

TINA glanced up at the towering office block, then down at the pram, and the baby lying within.

‘Here we are, darling!’ she announced to the pretty pink-clad infant. ‘Your daddy’s workplace. Unfortunately, your daddy’ll be in a meeting all afternoon, according to his secretary. Didn’t have time for any appointments. Which is just too bad, isn’t it? Because he’s going to see us today whether he likes it or not!’

Arching a well-plucked eyebrow, she angled the pram determinedly towards the revolving glass doors, hoping for more success than her encounter with the train doors earlier on. Manoeuvring a pram, Tina had found, was as hazardous as one of those wayward shopping trolleys, the kind whose wheels had a mind of their own. Still, she’d only been doing it for a week, so she supposed there were excuses for her ineptitude.

It was a struggle, but she finally emerged unscathed into the cavernous semicircular foyer with its acre or two of black granite flooring. Tina negotiated this pram-friendly surface with thankful ease, bypassing the busy reception desk and skirting several large lumps of marble masquerading as art, finally halting beneath the huge directory which hung on the wall beside the bank of lifts.

Hunter & Associates, she swiftly noted, occupied floors nineteen and twenty. Tina also noted Hunter & Associates carried no description of what services or utilities the company provided, other than to say ‘Management’ was on the twentieth floor.

This might have been a modest oversight, but Tina rather imagined it reflected its owner’s character. Dominic Hunter arrogantly assumed everyone knew his company was one of Sydney’s most successful stockbroking and investment firms.

He had also arrogantly assumed his affair with his secretary last year would never rise up to bite him on his arrogant backside.

But he was wrong!

Sarah might have been a softie. And a push-over where men were concerned. But Tina was not!

Sarah’s daughter deserved the very best. And Tina aimed to make sure she got it. She would give Dominic Hunter a second chance to be a proper father to his beautiful little daughter. If he didn’t come to the party willingly, then he would be made to pay. And pay handsomely. In this day of DNA testing, simply denying fatherhood was a thing of the past.

‘Just let him try it, darling,’ she informed the baby girl as she wheeled the pram into the lift. ‘If he does, we’re going to have his guts for garters!’

CHAPTER TWO

DOMINIC raised his eyes to the ceiling as he hung up the phone.

‘Women!’ he muttered frustratedly, before standing up to gather his papers together for that afternoon’s meeting, almost knocking over a cold, half-drunk cup of coffee in the process. Only a desperate lunge and grab prevented coffee spilling all over his desk.

He righted the mug and plonked it well to one side, his sigh carrying total exasperation. He was having a really bad day.

His colleagues might have thought it was the present economic crisis which was causing his tetchy mood. But that wasn’t the case. Dominic thrived on the challenges the financial arena kept throwing at him, finding great excitement and personal satisfaction in making money, both for himself and all his clients. He’d been called a stockmarket junkie more than once, and had to admit it was true.

No, Dominic could always cope with business problems. It was the opposite sex which was irritating the death out of him.

Frankly, he just didn’t understand the species, especially their obsession with marriage and babies. Couldn’t they see that, in this present day and age, the world would actually be better off with less of both? There certainly wouldn’t be as many divorces, or so many unhappy neglected children!

But, no! Such common sense views never seemed to cut the mustard with women. They went on wanting marriage and babies as though they were the panacea for all the world’s ills, instead of adding to them.

The same thing applied to romantic love. Crazy, really. When had this unfortunate state ever brought women—or men for that matter—any happiness?

Dominic had grown up in a household where that kind of love had caused nothing but emotional torment and misery.

He wanted none of it. Love or marriage or babies—a fact reinforced in his early twenties when a girlfriend had tried to trap him into marriage with a false pregnancy.

The thought of imminent fatherhood and marriage had horrified him. Perhaps his panic had had something to do with own father being a lousy parent—as well as a faithless husband—producing a subconscious fear he might turn out to be just as big a jerk in that department. He’d already looked like the man.

Whatever, Dominic’s relief at discovering the pregnancy had been a lie had been very telling. It had also been his first intimate experience at just how far a female would go in pursuit of that old romantic fantasy called ‘love and marriage’.

After that sobering experience, Dominic always took care of protection personally when having sex. He was never swayed by any female’s assertion that she was on the pill, or that it was a ‘safe’ time of the month. He also always made his position quite clear to every woman he became involved with. Marriage was not on his agenda, no matter what!

His mother found his views on the subject totally unfathomable. With typical female logic, she simply dismissed them as a temporary aberration.

‘You’ll change your mind one day,’ she would say every now and then. ‘When you fall in love…’

Now that was another romantic illusion his mother harboured. His falling in love! He’d never fallen in love in his life. And he had no intention of doing so. The very word ‘falling’ suggested a lack—and a loss—of control which he found quite distasteful, and which could only lead to one disastrous decision after another!

Fortunately for him, his mother had been able to channel her grandmotherly hopes up till now towards his younger brother, Mark, who’d married a couple of years back. Dominic had simply assumed Mark and his wife would reproduce in time, thereby letting him permanently off the hook.

But a few months ago his one and only sibling had unexpectedly arrived home and announced he was leaving his wife to go off to Tibet to become a Buddhist monk! To prove it, he’d promptly given all his considerable worldly goods to his rapidly recovering wife and taken off, his subsequent letters revealing he was happy as a lark living on some mountain-top monastery with only a yak for companionship!

It didn’t take a genius to conclude there would be no imminent hope of a grandchild from that quarter!

Which had brought his widowed mother’s focus right back on him, her only other offspring, and now her only other hope of providing her with a grandchild!

She’d been driving him mad with her none too subtle pressure, inviting all sorts of unattached females home to dinner. All of them beautiful. All of them sexy. And all of them wanting—or pretending to want—the same thing his mother wanted. Marriage and babies.

She’d just rung to check that he wouldn’t be too late home for dinner tonight, because she’d invited Joanna Parsons over.

‘The poor darling has been so lonely since Damien died,’ Ida had purred down the line.

Lonely? Joanna Parsons? Dear God! The woman was a sexual vampire. Even before Damien’s death, in a car crash six months ago, she’d done her best to seduce him. As a merry widow, there would be no holds barred!

Dominic liked his sex, but he liked it unencumbered, thank you very much. And with women who held the same views as he did. His current lady-friend was an advertising account executive whose marriage had broken up because she’d been already married to her job. Dominic saw her two or three times a week, either at her apartment after work or in a hotel room at lunchtimes, an arrangement which suited them both admirably.

Shani was thirty-two, an attractive brunette with a trim gym-honed body. She wasn’t into endless foreplay or mindless chit-chat or sentimentality, the word ‘love’ never entering what little conversation they had. She was also fanatical when it came to her health. If ever Dominic might have been tempted to believe a woman when she said it was safe, it would have been Shani.

But long-ingrained habits died hard, and Dominic maintained a cynical distrust of the female psyche. It would never surprise him to discover that his latest bed-partner, no matter how career-minded, had fallen victim to her infernal biological clock. In his experience, not even the most unlikely female was immune to that disease!

Take the case of Melinda, his invaluable PA, who’d been with him for years and always said she wanted a career, not the role of wife and mother. So what happened? She’d turned thirty and in less than twelve months had married and left to have a baby. On top of that, she’d refused to come back to work, abandoning him totally for the home front.

He’d been most put out!

Naturally he’d had to take steps to ensure such a thing wasn’t going to become a regular occurrence, though at the time finding a replacement for Melinda had been a right pain in the neck. There’d been no question of keeping the girl on who’d filled in during Melinda’s supposedly temporary maternity leave. As efficient and sweet as Sarah was, beautiful, young, unattached females were out—a decision reinforced by what had happened when he’d taken Sarah out for a thank-you meal on the last evening of her employ.

Dominic shuddered to think that even he could become a temporary victim of his hormones, if the circumstances were right. He’d been between women at the time, and had drunk far too much wine with his meal. When he’d taken Sarah home in a taxi and walked her to the door of her flat she’d unexpectedly started to cry. Her louse of a boyfriend, it seemed, had just the day before dumped her for some other woman.

Dominic had only meant to comfort her, but somehow comfort had turned to something else and they’d ended up in bed together for the night. They’d both regretted it in the morning, both agreed not to mention it again.

Sarah had gone back to her normal job as a secretary in Accounts on the floor below his, and he’d met Shani at a dinner party that very weekend.

His new secretary, Doris, had started the following Monday morning.

Thank God for Doris.

Now Doris would never cause him any worries. She was fifty-four, for starters, happily married, with a healthy, undemanding husband and grown-up children who didn’t live at home. She didn’t mind working late when required, and didn’t object to making him coffee at all hours of the day. If his tendency to untidiness bothered her—and he suspected it did—she didn’t say so to his face, just quietly cleaned up after him. A woman of great common sense and tact was Doris.

The intercom on his desk buzzed and he flicked the switch. ‘Yes, Doris?’

‘The others are waiting for you in the boardroom, Mr Hunter.’

That was another thing he liked about Doris.

She called him Mr Hunter, and not Dominic. It had a nice, respectful ring about it, and made him feel older than his thirty-three years.

‘Yes, yes, I’m coming. Hold all calls, will you, Doris? Absolutely no interruptions. We have a lot of work to get through this afternoon.’

The lift doors opened, and Tina steered the pram, along with the now sleeping infant, onto the twentieth floor. Straight ahead was a long glass wall with floor-to-ceiling glass doors upon which was written in gold lettering ‘Hunter & Associates—Management’.

Beyond was another sea of black granite, dominated by a shiny black reception desk.

Tina wondered caustically if the glossy blonde perched behind the desk had been chosen personally by Dominic Hunter himself.

Maybe he had a penchant for blondes. She recalled Sarah saying something about the big boss being present at her second interview for Hunter & Associates, after which she’d swiftly been hired.

Of course Sarah hadn’t just been any old blonde. Though her long fair hair had been her crowning glory, she’d been equally striking of face and figure. Her stunning looks had been a problem all her life, and hadn’t brought her any happiness. Men hadn’t been able to keep their eyes, or their hands, off.

Poor, sweet Sarah had always believed the declarations of love which had poured forth from her current pursuer’s mouth. After she’d become a secretary working in the city, she’d been especially susceptible to the smoothly suited variety of male, especially good-looking ones with dark hair, bedroom blue eyes and a convincing line of patter to get her into the cot and keep her there without actually offering any solid commitment.

Sarah had been a sucker for that combination every time, always believing herself in love. Once in love, Sarah had become her latest lover’s doormat, thinking that was the road to the wedding ring and the family of her own she’d always craved.

Naturally it had never turned out that way, and Sarah had been dumped in the end. It had driven Tina mad to watch her friend being used and abused by one silver-tongued creep after another. Married, divorced or single, it hadn’t mattered. If they’d told Sarah they loved her, she’d been putty in their hands.

Tina had tried to give solace and advice after each break-up, but her patience had worn thin over the years. She’d finally seen red when, shortly after Sarah had been promoted to the plum job of PA to Dominic Hunter, Sarah had confessed to being in love again. When pressed, she’d admitted the object of her affections was her new boss. A terrible argument had ensued. Tina had told Sarah that she’d sleep with any man if he said he loved her, and Sarah had retaliated that Tina had a heart of stone, was incapable of really loving anything or anyone but herself.

They were the last words the two friends had said to each other. That had been just over a year ago.

And now Sarah was dead.

Tina’s chin began to wobble. She had to swallow hard to stop herself from bursting into tears.

‘I won’t let you down, Sarah,’ she whispered as she gazed down at Sarah’s beautiful little baby girl. ‘Your Bonnie’s going to have everything you would have wanted for her. Every possible advantage. There will be no feeling of not being loved or wanted. No hand-me-down clothes. No leaving school at fifteen. As for Welfare and foster homes! Never! Not as long as I’ve got breath in my body!’

Hardening herself for the fray which undoubtedly lay ahead, Tina pushed the glass door open with the pram and forged over to the desk.

‘I’m here to see Dominic Hunter,’ she announced firmly to the glamorous green-eyed blonde. ‘And, yes, before you ask, I do have an appointment,’ came the bald lie.

Faint heart never won fat turkey, Tina always believed. She’d never have gained entry to the most prestigious drama school in Australia if she hadn’t been confident of her acting ability. Admittedly, she’d auditioned for three consecutive years before she’d won one of the coveted positions of entry. But that wasn’t a measure of ability, she’d always told herself. It was as hard to get into AIDA as Fort Knox!

The blonde directed her towards a long polished corridor which led into another smaller reception area covered in plush dark blue carpet. The pram wheels immediately floundered in the thick pile, then came to a rebellious halt.

‘Can I help you?’ came the puzzled but cool query.

Tina

glanced up at the severely suited woman seated behind the now familiar shiny black desk.

Dominic Hunter’s secretary, Tina concluded with much surprise. For the woman wasn’t blonde. Or pretty. Or young.

Tina wondered cynically if Dominic Hunter had finally learned his lesson about mixing business and pleasure.

‘I’m here to see Dominic,’ she returned, just as coolly.

The secretary frowned. ‘Mr Hunter is in a meeting all afternoon. He specifically asked that I not disturb him for anything.’

Tina finally got the wheels straight and bulldozed the pram across the carpet. ‘I doubt he meant me,’ she said, stopping in front of the desk. ‘Or his daughter, here.’

The woman’s eyes widened as she rose to peer over her desk, down into the pram. ‘His…daughter?’ she repeated, startled.

‘That’s right,’ Tina answered crisply. ‘Her name is Bonnie. She’s three months old. Could you please tell Dominic that she’s here and would like to meet her father at long last?’

The secretary blinked, then cleared her throat. ‘Er…perhaps you’d best come into Mr Hunter’s office and I’ll go get him.’

Tina’s smile was icy. ‘What a good idea.’

Dominic Hunter’s office was another surprise. Although the room was huge, the carpet still plush, and the view of Sydney breathtaking, it was an office laid out for working, not impressing. There were several work stations around the walls, each with its own computer, printer, phone, fax and swivel chair. Every computer was still on, winking figures at Tina. Every surface was messy, littered with papers of various kinds. The main desk wasn’t much better.

The secretary made an exasperated sound at the sight of it, shaking her head as she lifted a half-drunk coffee mug from its glossy black surface, Snatching a tissue out of a nearby box, she vigorously rubbed at the stain left behind, muttering ‘truly’ under her breath.

Meanwhile, Tina lowered herself into one of the two empty upright chairs facing the main desk, crossing her long legs and angling the pram closer so she could check that Bonnie was still sleeping.

‘What a good little baby you are,’ she crooned softly as she tucked the pink bunny rug tightly around the tiny feet. When she’d finished, and looked up, it was to find the secretary staring at her as though she’d just landed from Mars.

‘I dare say Mr Hunter will be with you shortly,’ the woman said, and, shaking her head again, left the room, shutting the door behind her.

That same door burst open less than two minutes later, and Tina’s head whipped round to encounter her first view of Bonnie’s father.

Dominic Hunter was even more of a surprise than his secretary, or his office.

Yes, he was tall, as she’d anticipated. And dark-haired. And handsome, in a hard-boned fashion. He even had blue eyes.

But, despite all that, the man glaring at her across the room didn’t fit the picture she’d formed of him in her imagination.

Sarah’s lovers had usually been suave and elegant, perfectly groomed and beautifully dressed. They’d oozed a smooth charm and sophisticated sex appeal which girls of Sarah’s upbringing seemed to find irresistibly attractive.

Dominic Hunter hardly fitted that description.

He marched into the room, a menacingly macho male with his big, broad-shouldered body and close-cropped haircut. The sleeves of his blue shirt were rolled up as though ready for battle, his tie was missing, and the top button around his muscular neck undone. His scowl was such that his dark straight brows momentarily met above his nose.

Frankly, he looked more like a construction site foreman about to bawl out his labourers rather than a successful stockbroker who should have been able to handle even this sticky situation with some aplomb.

Grinding to a halt next to the pram, he glowered, first down at Bonnie and then up at Tina again. ‘I hear you’re claiming this is my daughter!’ he snarled.

Tina refused to be intimidated by this macho bully. She wondered what on earth Sarah had seen in the man. She could only speculate that he came up better in bed than out of it.

‘That’s right,’ she said.

He gave her a look which would have sent poor Sarah running for cover. Tina began to understand why her friend hadn’t approached Bonnie’s biological father for help and support a second time. When this man finished with a woman, he would expect her to stay finished.

But she wasn’t Sarah, was she?

Tina almost smiled as she thought of what Mr Hunter was up against this time. Brother, was he in for a surprise or two of his own!

‘Wait here,’ he growled.

‘I’m certainly not going anywhere,’ she said in a calm voice, and received another of those blistering looks.

Tina didn’t even blink, holding his killer gaze without the slightest waver.

He stared hard at her for several more seconds, then whirled and left the room, slamming the door shut behind him.

Tina sat there, whistling and swinging her left foot. It was to be hoped Mr Macho was out there getting a grip on himself and finding some manners. Or at least some common sense. Because she wasn’t about to go away, not this side of Armageddon!

The minutes ticked steadily away.

Five…

Ten…

Her blood pressure began to rise a little, but she’d been mentally ready for this. She hadn’t expected the man to come to the party willingly, not when he’d already denied paternity, given Sarah money for a termination and sent her on her way.

Frankly, Tina had expected nothing from him, and he was living up to her low opinion of men of his ilk. Obviously she had a fight on her hands to get the financial support she needed to raise Sarah’s daughter in the manner Bonnie deserved.

But she enjoyed a good fight, didn’t she? She was always at her best when her back was against the wall.

The sound of the door finally opening had her swivelling in her chair with an aggressive glint in her eye. How dared he keep her waiting this long?

The sight of two burly security guards entering startled her, then sent her blood pressure sky-high. So that was how he was going to play it, was it?

Gritting her teeth, she stood up and gave the approaching guards a haughty look of disdain. ‘I gather Mr Hunter won’t be returning?’

‘That’s right, ma’am,’ the bigger and older of the two informed her. ‘He said to tell you that next time he’d be calling the police.’

‘Really? Well, we’ll see about that, won’t we? No, that’s not necessary!’ she snapped when the guard who’d spoken forcibly took her by the elbow. ‘I’ll go quietly.’

Despite her protests, the two guards still escorted her till she was outside the building.

She stood there on the pavement for several moments, glaring up at the top floors, struggling to get her temper under control. She imagined the bastard peering back down at her from his lofty position, smug and smirking with triumph.