ATE,DR.COOPER has your test results.”

Kate looked up and smiled at Bonnie Cooper’s receptionist. Bonnie was a friend of Holly’s and she’d been Kate’s gynecologist for years. After examining Kate, Bonnie had ordered a few tests to be done in the office, and she’d asked Kate to wait in the waiting room.

“That was quick,” Kate told Bonnie, sitting down on the opposite side of her desk.

Bonnie Cooper opened Kate’s file. “I don’t have the results of all your tests, but there’s no need to wait for them. This test tells me exactly why you’re feeling queasy and sleepy.”

“What’s the answer?”

“You’re pregnant.”

Kate half rose out of her chair; then she relaxed and smiled. “There’s a mistake, Bonnie. You must have mixed my tests up with another patient’s. I haven’t missed taking a single birth control pill in months.”

“The pill isn’t one hundred percent effective for everyone.”

“It’s been one hundred percent effective for me. Evan—my fiancé—and I have been together for almost four years, and I’ve never gotten pregnant.”

“Have you taken any antibiotics in the last two months? Some of them can interfere with the birth control pill’s effectiveness.”

“I know that, but I haven’t taken any antibiotics. I haven’t taken anything except some migraine medicine a doctor prescribed for me in St. Maarten.”

Bonnie reached for a book lying on the corner of her desk. “I don’t know of any migraine medicine that interferes with the pill. What was the name of it? I’ll look it up.”

“I can’t remember,” Kate said, frowning, “but it’s on the tip of my tongue...”

“While you’re trying to remember, tell me if you had sexual intercourse with anyone other than your fiancé in the last four years.”

Kate hesitated, resenting the fact that she had to acknowledge Mitchell Wyatt’s existence. “Yes, last month. But what difference does that make?”

“There’s always the possibility that you’re one of the tiny percentage of women the pill doesn’t protect, and the reason you haven’t gotten pregnant before last month is that your fiancé’s sperm isn’t viable.”

Kate suddenly remembered the first part of the migraine medicine’s name. “It was butal-something. That’s the name of the prescription the doctor in St. Maarten gave me.”

Bonnie frowned. “It wasn’t butal-bital, was it?”

“Yes, that’s it.”

“Didn’t he ask you if you were taking birth control pills?”

“He asked me if I was trying to have children, and I said no. Actually, the doctor only spoke French, but the cabdriver spoke some English, so he translated for both of us. The doctor told the cabdriver to tell me I was probably having migraines.”

“Why didn’t you go to a hospital instead of to a local doctor?”

“And spend hours waiting for someone to see me? Bonnie, my head was exploding. I’d been throwing up from the pain on the way down to St. Maarten. I just wanted someone to give me something to stop the pain. I didn’t care what language they spoke. Besides, he wasn’t a witch doctor. His office was in his home, but it was very nice and he had well-dressed patients waiting to see him.”

“Well, something got lost in the cabdriver’s translation, then. He must have asked the cabdriver to find out if you were trying not to have children.”

“What difference does all this make?” Kate said defensively, but she already knew. God help her, she already knew...

“Butalbital is very effective at treating, and preventing, severe headaches. However, it also interferes with the effectiveness of oral contraceptives. When a woman taking birth control pills uses butalbital, she needs to add another form of birth control to protect herself while she’s taking it.”

The room started to spin and Kate bent forward, her arms crossed over her stomach, trying to steady herself.

“Do you know for certain who the father is?”

Kate looked up at Bonnie. In the three weeks following her father’s death she hadn’t wanted to make love; that was part of the reason Evan had been so insistent about taking her away for a Caribbean holiday.

She was pregnant with Mitchell Wyatt’s baby.

A wave of hysteria welled up inside her, combining with dizziness and nausea, and Kate clutched the edge of Bonnie’s desk. “Oh, yes,” she said bitterly. “I know who the father is.”