Risky Business

the mark, but he only nodded.
    “Then you should understand the rest. We saw each other every night in the library, so it was natural that we began to talk, then have a cup of coffee. He was smart, attractive, wonderfully mannered and funny.” Almost violently, she blew out the candles. The scent carried over and hung in the room. “I fell hard. He brought me flowers and took me for long quiet drives on Saturday nights. When he told me he loved me, I believed him. I thought I had the world in the palm of my hand.”
    She set the wine down again, impatient to be finished. Jonas said nothing. “He told me we’d be married as soon as he established himself. We’d sit in his car and look at the stars and he’d tell me about his home in Dallas and the wonderful rooms.The parties and the servants and the chandeliers. It was like a story, a lovely happily-ever-after story. Then one day his mother came.” Liz laughed, but gripped the back of her chair until her knuckles were white. She could still feel the humiliation.
    “Actually, she sent her driver up to the dorm to fetch me. Marcus hadn’t said a thing about her visiting, but I was thrilled that I was going to meet her. At the curb was this fabulous white Rolls, the kind you only see in movies. When the driver opened the door for me, I was floating. Then I got in and she gave me the facts of life. Her son had a certain position to maintain, a certain image to project. She was sure I was a very nice girl, but hardly suitable for a Jensann of Dallas.”
    Jonas’s eyes narrowed at the name, but he said nothing. Restless, Liz went to the stove and began to scrub the surface. “She told me she’d already spoken with her son and he understood the relationship had to end. Then she offered me a check as compensation. I was humiliated, and worse, I was pregnant. I hadn’t told anyone yet, because I’d just found out that morning. I didn’t take her money. I got out of the Rolls and went straight to Marcus. I was sure he loved me enough to toss it all aside for me, and for our baby. I was wrong.”
    Her eyes were so dry that they hurt. Liz pressed her fingers to them a moment. “When I went to see him, he was very logical. It had been nice; now it was over. His parents held the purse strings and it was important to keep them happy. But he wanted me to know we could still see each other now and again, as long as it was on the side. When I told him about the baby, he was furious. How could I have done such a thing? I. ”
    Liz tossed the dishrag into the sink so that hot, soapy water heaved up. “It was as though I’d conceived the baby completely on my own. He wouldn’t have it, he wouldn’t have some silly girl who’d gotten herself pregnant messing up his life. He toldme I had to get rid of it. It—as though Faith were a thing to be erased and forgotten. I was hysterical. He lost his temper. There were threats. He said he’d spread word that I was sleeping around and his friends would back him up. I’d never be able to prove the baby was his. He said my parents would be embarrassed, perhaps sued if I tried to press it. He tossed around a lot of legal phrases that I couldn’t understand, but I understood he was finished with me. His family had a lot of pull at the college, and he said he’d see that I was dismissed. Because I was foolish enough to believe everything he said, I was terrified. He gave me a check and told me to go out of state—better, out of the country—to take care of things. That way no one would have to know.
    “For a week I did nothing. I went through my classes in a daze, thinking I’d wake up and find out it had all been a bad dream. Then I faced it. I wrote my parents, telling them what I could. I sold the car they’d given me when I graduated from high school, took the check from Marcus and came to Cozumel to have my baby.”
    He’d wanted to know, even demanded, but now his insides were raw. “You could have gone to your parents.”
    “Yes, but at the time Marcus had convinced me they’d be ashamed. He told me they’d hate me and consider the baby a burden.”
    “Why didn’t you go to his family? You were entitled to be taken care of.”
    “Go to them?” He’d never heard venom in her voice before. “Be taken care of by them? I’d have gone to hell first.”
    He waited a moment, until he was sure he could speak calmly. “They don’t even know, do they?”
    “No. And they never will. Faith is mine.”
    “And