"I don't know where Kate is."

"I'll see you both soon. Bye."

He drove to his sister's house, his heart beat soaring into triple figures.

Don spent the car journey telling Kate about his business. She didn't listen.

She wanted to ignore what Don had said about Nathan, but he'd planted a seed of doubt. Maybe he hadn't got over losing Alison. What if Don could prove Nathan was using her? She didn't want to believe it. But she carried Jack's baby. Nathan hated Jack so why would he want her? Being a single parent on welfare wasn't exactly the future Kate planned. She leaned her head against the window.

When she opened her eyes, Don had stopped in front of the gates to a large colonial style house. His window went down, and he tapped a code into a keypad on a bollard. The gates swung open, and he pulled through on to the block-paved drive.

"Could I try calling Nathan again? We've already been longer than you said."

"Yes, of course." Don parked and came around to open her door.

Kate thought how different Don was from Jack, how disappointed Don must be. He seemed so desperate to be part of his grandchild's life. Would he still want that after her evidence sent Jack to prison?

Don unlocked the front door and ushered her inside. "Take a seat. I've something to show you."

This was the grandest house she'd ever been in. Everything in it was big, from the huge sweep of the stairs to the over-sized cream couches and enormous paintings on the walls. Her gaze fell on a phone. She picked it up and looked at the number on her palm.

Nathan stopped down the street from his sister's house. There was a Chevrolet Monte Carlo in the drive he didn't recognize. He called Luke Foster and ran through what had transpired from the moment he'd left Kate at her apartment.

"Don't go inside," Luke said. "Leave us to handle this." Did he really think Nathan would listen? "Take it easy when you get here." But before Nathan even got out of his car, he saw Elisa running toward him, her face tearstained. He jumped out and she threw herself into his arms.

"What's wrong?"

"You have to come inside." She tugged him toward the house. "He's got my baby."

Nathan put his arms around her and pulled her to a stop. "Who's got the baby?"

"We have to go in or he'll hurt her."

When they reached the door, Nathan bent to the gun at his ankle and Elisa grabbed his wrist.

"No. Please, Nathan. He has a gun at her head. He'll kill her." Nathan hesitated and left the gun where it was. He let Elisa pull him inside and close the door. Jack stood at the entrance to the living room. He had his arm around the waist of a pale young woman in a nurse's uniform who cradled Elisa's baby. His other arm held a gun at the infant's head. Nathan took a step toward him, and Elisa yanked him back.

"Nathan, stop."

"Come in, sit down, and join the party." Jack grinned.

He moved out of the way, gesturing with his head for Nathan and Elisa to go through. Jack held the Glock he'd taken from Nathan's car.

Nathan's mind whirled through the possibilities.

"Empty your pockets. Pull them out," Jack said.

Nathan dropped his wallet and car keys to the floor.

"Sit on the couch and keep your sister by your side." Jack stood in the doorway with the nurse. "Introduce yourself, honey." He raised the gun from the baby's head to hers and twisted the barrel in her hair.

"Arlene S-Sanders."

"This is Elisa's brother, Nathan, who has not done as he was fucking well told." Jack's voice rose and spittle flew from his mouth. "Where the fuck is Kate?"

"I don't know."

Jack put the gun back to the sleeping baby's head, pressing the barrel into the skull so the child whimpered. "Try again. Where's Kate?"

"Nathan, tell him, please tell him," Elisa sobbed.

Nathan licked his dry lips and weighed up what to say. "Jack, believe me, I don't know. I left her at her apartment, packing up her things, and when I got back she was gone. Put the gun down."

Elisa clutched at his arm. Nathan tried to figure out what to do. The arrival of the police would complicate this. The gun at his ankle was best left where it was.

He wasn't sure whether to tell Jack that Don was the last person Kate had been seen with.

"I'm telling you the truth, Jack, why would I lie? She'd gone when I got there."

"You're lying." Jack glared at him.

Elisa cried louder. Arlene began crying too and the baby woke.

"Shut the fuck up," Jack yelled and both women pressed their lips together.

The baby wailed.

"Why would I lie? I wouldn't risk my sister and her baby getting hurt. If Kate had been with me, I'd have brought her, I swear it."

"So where is she?"

"I have no idea."

Jack pointed the gun at Nathan. "I could shoot you instead." Nathan's heart pounded. He'd be too slow pulling the gun from his ankle to be sure no one would get hurt. He had to talk his way out of this, preferably before the police arrived. As the baby continued to cry, Elisa whimpered.

"Shut her up." Jack rubbed his eye with the knuckle of his thumb, still pointing the gun at Nathan. "I can't think."

Nathan put his arm around Elisa's heaving shoulders. "Try to calm down.

Everything will be okay."

"You're a fucking useless private dick, in more ways than one."

"What game are you playing here, Jack?" Nathan asked.

"No game. Kate's having my baby. She's mine."

Nathan's jaw dropped.

Jack laughed. "You didn't know? Keeping secrets from you already? She'll keep it, you know that? Still want the bitch?"

Elisa clutched tighter at his arm. Nathan put his hand on her knee.

"Let Elisa have the child, Jack, please. They've done nothing to you." Tears streamed down Elisa's face, but Nathan maintained the pressure on her knee, keeping her next to him. His cell phone started to ring.

"Maybe that's Kate," Jack said. "Take a look. Do it carefully." Nathan flipped open his phone. "I don't know the number." Jack pulled the baby out of Arlene's arms and shoved the nurse toward Nathan. "Arlene, you answer it. Find out who it is."

"Her head. Please, you have to support her head," Elisa gasped.

She sighed in relief as Jack adjusted his hold.

"Hello? Who is this?" Arlene asked. She listened and then raised her eyes to Jack. "Kate."

"Find out where she is."

"Kate, where-she hung up." Arlene's trembling fingers dropped the phone and Nathan caught it.

"Tsk, tsk." Jack pointed the gun at Arlene.

Nathan had no choice now. "Don came to Kate's apartment this morning. Her neighbor told me."

Jack's mouth tightened. "Read me that number." Nathan read it out and Jack gave a short laugh. "You women lie face down on the ground. Nathan and I are going for a drive to find Kate. No phoning the police."

Elisa and Arlene lay down.

"Leave the baby," Nathan said.

"With pleasure." He put the baby on the floor. "The little shit just pissed on me."

Don snatched the phone out of Kate's hand and yanked the cord from the wall.

She took a shaky breath and backed into the couch. He handed her a large brown envelope.

"Open it."

Kate's hand shook as she pulled out several photographs.

"My beautiful wife-Elizabeth. I think you know her lover." Kate's father wrapped around a naked woman. Confusion over the woman who'd answered Nathan's cell phone vanished as thoughts tumbled through Kate's mind, rows of dominoes falling faster and faster, while she tried to catch up and stop them.

"The photos were taken ten years ago," Don said. "In those days we spent more time here than in Houston. Elizabeth was a member of the Dean Swift tennis club."

Her father played there. Kate remembered his obsession with the game, how often he'd gone and how one day he stopped and never went again.

Kate had to get out of the house. She knew with absolute certainty Don hadn't called Nathan's cell phone. No one knew where she was.

"Sometimes Elizabeth took Jack with her. While he had a lesson, your father brought my wife here and fucked her in our bed." Kate opened her mouth and closed it again.

"One day, Jack twisted his ankle and when they couldn't find Elizabeth, his coach brought him home. Jack discovered his mother fucking a man he recognized from the tennis club. He told me and I didn't believe him. Later I paid to find out it was true."

"Oh God." Kate's hand crept over her mouth.

"Jack thought she'd leave us. He told her if she didn't stop the affair he'd kill Olivia, the man's daughter."

Kate couldn't take her eyes off Don.

"When Elizabeth died, she was pregnant with your father's child."

Kate took a step backward. Her mind shifted into over-drive. Jack had never said his mother was pregnant. If Don knew, did that mean he was the one who'd killed her and hidden the baby's body?

"I knew it wasn't my child. Not long after she gave birth to Steven, I was diagnosed with cancer and left sterile. I became a patron of a cancer charity. I gave talks about life with cancer, sterility. Everyone knew." He almost snarled the words. "Elizabeth wanted another child. I thought two was enough, especially when one of them was Jack. When she told me she was pregnant, she smiled." Don clenched his fists and Kate trembled. "Smiled when she told me she was having another man's child. Apparently your father made her feel young again." Kate gulped and slid a little farther away. "I'm sorry." She wondered how her own life might have changed if his wife hadn't died, if her father had left her mother and taken Kate with him. Only Kate didn't think she much liked Elizabeth. She'd abandoned Nathan and wanted to do the same to Jack and his brother.

Don stared at her. "Are you frightened of dying?" Adrenaline flooded her bloodstream. Everything said run, but where could she go? Kate tried to swallow the lump in her throat. "There are worse things."

"Such as?"

"Being married to Jack."

He laughed. "You know I quite like you. In your wedding photo you look like a frightened deer. I thought you were like one of the bugs he used to stamp on as a boy, but you have spirit. He likes it when people fight back."

"I think I'd like to leave now," Kate said.

Don gave her a cold smile. "Jack told me it was your idea to steal that child.

You like rough sex. You like to be tied up and beaten. You asked him to cut his name on your back. All lies, I suppose. The one thing he didn't tell me is that you're the daughter of David Evans." His eyes glittered. "I expect he was saving that for some special occasion. Probably after I'd signed away my fortune to the piece of shit you have inside you."

"This isn't my fault," Kate said.

"Your father ruined my life."

"Your son ruined mine."

Don tipped his head on one side. "Unfortunately, that doesn't make us even. It would have, once upon a time, if you'd told your parents you'd been raped, but not now. Jack's upped the stakes. He thought he was being clever, but he was never going to outsmart me. I hope he really does care for you, Kate. Losing you will be so much more painful."

Kate turned and ran.

Chapter Thirty-Nine.