While his heart crashed through the emptiness, the rest of him saw nothing. Heard nothing. Felt even less. And his only thought was, Un-fucking-believable.

Then slowly, oh so slowly, the empty buzz of shock became an internal roar of grief, and he allowed the words to form in his mind: Emma had been with another man. Emma had betrayed him. Emma was not his Emma after all.

"Wow," he said.

There were those blue eyes he'd loved only seconds ago, still searching his face, waiting for him to say somethingmore. But there was no response for this, was there? There was nothing to say.

He got up from the chair.

"Thomas?" Emma's voice sounded shaky and small. When he got to the door, he turned toward her. He could see her chest tremble with each breath and his eyes strayed to her belly, where an impossible baby grew inside her.

He really didn't want to know the answer, but he felt the awful question surge up his throat and spill from his mouth.

"Who's the father?"

Emma left the edge of the desk and took slow, measured steps in his direction. "What the hell kind of question is that, Thomas?"

He knew his laugh sounded cruel, and the remarkable thing was how little he cared. And how much he hurt. "It's the only question there is. Who's the lucky guy?"

"Don't you dare do this to me."

She stepped closer, and Thomas saw that her eyes blazed with anger, with sorrow. For a split second, he wavered. But he regrouped, seeing her suffering for what it was: a fine female performance.

Thomas watched Emma move in slow motion, cupping her hands low on her belly. "I don't understand, either, but that doesn't change the fact that we're having a baby-and you're the father."

The words cut into his heart and gut. They were words he'd convinced himself he'd never hear as long as he lived, yet she'd just said them. And God, how he wished he could believe her.

But there was no way he could believe her.

And the sickening truth was this: he'd been made cretinlike by a woman, his brains liquefied by the lure of sex, connection, love. Move over, Leo Vasilich-the new poster boy for male stupidity has come to town!

"I don't… sorry… I can't even… " Thomas wiped his hand across his mouth in an attempt to stop the trembling in his lips and chin. "I can't talk to you right now."

He turned away from Emma and started down the hallway, every muscle in his body aching with loss and shock. In a few days he'd call her to settle things between them. But for now, all he could do was put one foot in front of the other and get himself out of there, away from her.

Away from the pain.

"Thomas! Don't do this!" She was right behind him. "Talk to me!"

He kept walking.

"Thomas!"

He heard Emma's shout even as he closed the car door and started the engine. She was standing in the doorway to the clinic, her eyes wide, tears streaming down her cheeks.

For just an instant, he recalled how she'd looked in his dress shirt, leaning against the archway of his kitchen, sleepy and well loved and ready for more.

It seemed like some other man's memory.

He pulled out of the parking space.

"Don't do this to us!"

He heard her plea just as he put in a John Coltrane CD and cranked up the volume, wondering, briefly, who the us was.

Herself and the baby?

Or the two of them-Emma and Thomas?

Uh-oh. This is bad. So very, very bad.

"Where the hell is the Tylenol?"

Emma tossed things out of the drawers and cabinets like a crazy woman-paper clips, rubber bands, files, pencils-making a huge mess. Talking to herself. She threw the stapler across the room and Hairy ducked.

I'll just be hiding over here in the corner…

"It's aspirin you shouldn't take if you're pregnant, right? Tylenol's okay, right? Oh… ugh… not again…" Emma stumbled down the hall to the bathroom.

Oh, I wish I could dial the phone. I'd call Bright Eyes or TV Man or that Velvet woman. Because Soft Hands shouldn't be by herself right now, that much is obvious.

Speaking of obvious, you are such a complete idiot, Big Alpha!

Emma staggered out of the bathroom and headed to the spare office, Hairy at her heels, and began throwing things from the new supply closet.

"You stupid, stubborn two-stepper!"

You got that right.

"Shit, Velvet! Where's the damn Tylenol?"

Uh-oh. She's crying so hard now. And there's nothing I can do to help her. Nothing…

A large box tumbled down from a shelf, followed by a rain of medicine samples, and Emma slumped down on her knees in the middle of the mess and sobbed.

"Oh, Thomas! No! This can't be happening!"

Oh, Big Alpha. What have you done? She's practically howling now. Okay-maybe I should go to her, lick her, nuzzle her, wait…wait just a darn minute…

What's that smell? What is it? Who is it?

Uh-oh. It's the bad man.

The bad man has been here! His scent is everywhere … everywhere…

Emma raised her head to the sound of scratching. Hairy had jumped inside the box and tipped it over, and was now frantically digging with his front paws, sniffing, whining, and shaking.

The dog popped out of the box, one of Aaron's old baseball caps in his mouth. Hairy's tail was flipped up between his legs. His eyes were nearly bursting from their sockets.

Then he peed all over the carpet.

Uh-oh. I'm such a bad dog.

Emma wiped her eyes with her palms. "Good God, little man, what's wrong?"

This is it-I've got to make her pay attention. She has to understand this. Okay. Emma, look!

She watched the dog keep the hat in his mouth, stand on his hind legs and spin. Then he did a little roundabout and a back flip, just like one of his dance routines.

Then he howled, louder and higher and with more desperation than she'd ever heard from such a small animal, and she sat up straight. Slowly, she began to tremble with understanding. "Hairy?"

Soft Hands, listen to me! This hat belongs to the man who killed my master!

"Oh, my God, Hairy. Oh, my God, no."

Leelee didn't expect them back this soon. She put aside the book Guns, Germs, and Steel, which Thomas had bought her at the mall, and stood up from the porch rocker. She stretched, waiting to see Emma's old Montero come down the lane first, followed by Thomas's silver-bullet Audi.

Maybe he'd let her drive it again tonight.

Leelee squinted. She didn't recognize the car-some kind of maroon beater Chrysler with a vinyl roof that might have been white at some point in the last century. She couldn't see who was behind the wheel, but the car was making sputtering noises like an old man with a nasty case of bronchitis.

The car skidded to a stop in the gravel and Aaron got out.

Aaron?

"What are you doing here?"

"Where'd Beck go?"

Leelee took a few steps down the porch stairs. "What?"

"I just saw Beck turn out of the drive. Where was he headed, Leelee?"

The hair stood up on the back of her neck and along her forearms. There was something wrong with Aaron. He looked weird. "Beck went to the grocery. What's it to you?"

"When's Emma coming home?"

Leelee shrugged, instinctively stepping back up the steps to get away from him. He followed her. "They should be here any minute and I don't think you're welcome here."

"You know everything, don't you, you little brat?"