They all whooped and clapped and obviously felt enormously pleased with themselves for knowing this should be the right outcome. Lucy called out to a waiter, ‘Champagne, champagne, more celebration over here!’
Tammy said nothing to spoil the happy, ebullient mood. It was right for Lucy’s wedding. The fact that any development between her and Fletcher hung on her pregnancy could be kept to a later date. The only thing she was sure of—and it was a very real comfort—was the gang’s support, regardless of what happened with Fletcher. She wouldn’t be alone with her pregnancy. They’d keep her in a tight loop with them, caring and sharing as they always had.
It was after one o’clock in the afternoon by the time they left the Andretti vineyard the next day, Hannah and Tammy travelling with Jennifer in her car, Celine and Kirsty, of course, leaving separately with their respective husbands.
‘Three weddings down and three to go,’ Hannah remarked as they headed back to Sydney. ‘We’ve got Tam and Fletcher together again, which is very promising.’
‘I think you’re jumping the gun there,’ Tammy quickly warned.
Jennifer threw her a grin. ‘Not from where we see it. The hook is definitely in.’
Tammy winced at that description, knowing it was probably how Fletcher thought of her pregnancy. Needing to divert her friends from pursuing an analysis of her situation, she pushed for a different subject. ‘What about you, Jen? I thought you were really tight with Adam but you didn’t ask him to Lucy’s wedding.’
Jennifer heaved a deep sigh. ‘I did, but he didn’t want to take the time off writing. Everything’s been on hold this past month and will continue to be until the book is done. He’s on a tight deadline for delivering this second one and he’s cloistered himself up in his cottage at Leura to get it written. I only see him when he needs a breather from it. Mind you, I understand…’
She rattled on about the publishing industry, how it was best to capitalise on the reader interest created by a first-book bestseller, the need to produce something just as sensational—pressure, pressure, pressure.
When Jennifer ran out of steam, Hannah confided that she had recently met a man whom she found very attractive. He owned and ran a sports store at Terrigal—a beach resort on the Central Coast where Hannah’s mother had gone to live after the divorce from her husband three years ago. They’d only had minimal contact, since she lived and worked in Sydney, but on her last weekend visit to her mother…
Tammy’s mind drifted away from the conversation. Hannah and Jennifer occupied the front seats of the car, she the back, and they didn’t require any active participation from her, happy to burble on to each other. They probably knew she wanted to think about Fletcher and were leaving her to it. Not that thinking about him would help anything.
She kept remembering his words: ‘There’s nothing you can say that I won’t find a way around.’
Fletcher didn’t like being defeated. He was used to winning.
He saw her as a challenge.
Maybe he would view fatherhood as a challenge, too.
Or he could see the whole thing as calculated entrapment which he would absolutely refuse to be a victim of in any shape or form.
Sunday-afternoon traffic was slow. It was four-thirty by the time they reached North Sydney. ‘Good luck!’ both Jennifer and Hannah chorussed as she alighted from the car in front of her apartment block.
‘He might not come,’ she tossed at them.
‘He’ll come!’ they asserted in unison.
She managed a laugh and waved them off, wishing she had their confidence. Though hope did soar as she entered her studio apartment and heard the telephone ringing. Dropping her bag, she raced to the kitchenette counter and snatched up the receiver, then tried not to sound too breathless as she identified herself to the caller.
‘Tammy Haynes.’
‘You’re finally home. I’ll be there in ten minutes.’
Fletcher’s voice. No doubt about that. Very terse in tone. And he ended the call without asking if ten minutes would be convenient to her. Clearly he was not big on patience, and the word finally suggested he’d already called several times and been frustrated by not getting a reply.
Not that any of those things were particularly relevant.
He was coming.
After all her mental turmoil and heartache about the situation between them, Tammy suddenly felt weirdly numb. In a mechanical daze, she returned to her bag, picked it up, took it into her small bedroom, left it by her clothes cupboard, visited the bathroom, spent a minute or two staring blankly at herself in the vanity mirror before remembering to tidy her hair and refresh her lipstick, then went back to the kitchenette and sat on the bar-stool to wait until Fletcher arrived.
He was coming.
The father of her child.
And he’d tell her what he wanted to do about it.
She didn’t have to think about anything until he gave her that information.
The doorbell rang.
A few seconds later she was face-to-face with the man who had already changed her life with the conception of their child. Somehow whatever other changes he had in mind seemed like relatively minor things to consider.
His eyes seared hers with burning determination. ‘You can’t turn away from me now, Tamalyn.’
‘No,’ she agreed, stepping back to wave him in.
His gaze dropped to her stomach. ‘You don’t look pregnant. Shouldn’t you have a bit of a pot belly by four months?’ he said, frowning at her as though she wasn’t doing things right.
‘It depends on body type,’ Tammy said with calm authority. ‘And some women pile on more weight than they should, giving themselves the licence of eating for two. It’s better to watch your diet, keep fit and healthy.’
‘Well, you should know,’ he muttered, and stepped past her into the apartment.
She closed the door and leaned back against it, staying out of the firing line of the volatile aggression pouring from him as he stalked around, checking out her living space, even poking his head into her bedroom and bathroom. ‘This is a shoebox, Tamalyn,’ he shot at her.
Her chin rose defensively. ‘I’ve managed here quite happily for the past seven years.’
‘It meets a single person’s needs. It will not do for you and the baby,’ he stated emphatically, his gaze dropping to her stomach again. ‘Are we having a son or a daughter?’
‘I don’t know yet. I’m booked in for an ultrasound this week. That’s when…if you want to know…’