Chiara stared at him, slowly shaking her head, before pulling her hands out from under his.

"No. Oh no," she said in a conversational tone of voice.

To Drew, she sounded like she was answering an innocuous question about whether or not to take an umbrella somewhere, or if she'd be having sugar in her tea.

"That's not possible," she continued in the same, strange tone of voice. "For her to be carrying your child, you would have to have had sex with her." She swallowed and looked down at her hands, which were shaking in her lap. "You would have to have fucked her, Drew." She looked up, staring earnestly into his eyes. "You wouldn't, you couldn't have. Could you? Have made love with that creature with the perfect body and nothing inside? She has no soul, Drew! And you've changed, you said so yourself. You don't do that anymore, do you? Do you?"

And now her voice was going up, climbing and climbing, higher and higher, into the upper registers, creeping into the realm of hysteria.

She kept repeating, "Do you?" with her breathing getting faster and faster, her hands shaking in her lap, until Drew felt he had no choice but to slap her, very lightly, just to bring her back down to earth.

She stared at him, her hand going to her cheek.

"Thank you," she said tonelessly.

Drew had risen to sit next to her on the bed, weeping helplessly. He looked at Chiara carefully, but she was back to herself, he could see that.

"So it's true?" she asked, beginning to cry herself. "It's really true?"

He just nodded, unable to speak.

"When did it happen?"

"I don't want to talk about it," he responded in a whisper.

"Can you tell me if it happened more than once? Could you at least tell me that much?"

He shook his head. "Just the once."

"Was I here?"

He shook his head.

She opened her mouth to ask another question, but he cut her off.

"Please, I'm begging you, no more questions, CC--"

"Don't you dare call me that again, ever," she said, her voice deadly.

"Fine, no more questions about the conception," she said evenly. She took a deep breath. "What happens now?"

"Now, I don't see you anymore," Drew said in a dead voice. "I mean, I'm allowed to see you, but I can't be involved with you romantically. And you can live in the cottage, but you're not to live in the house anymore."

Chiara stared at Drew. "How is she going to make you stick to all of this?"

"We have an agreement. That's where I was last night and most of today, at my solicitor's. With her solicitor. And after the baby's born--"

"When's that, then? The blessed event?"

Drew winced at her words, but wiped his eyes and answered her. "Sometime around the beginning of October."

So Chiara thought, she couldn't help it. "That puts conception sometime in early January," she said. She looked at Drew, who didn't disagree. There were days in January when she slept at the cottage, she remembered.

"And?" she finally prompted. "After the baby's born what? What were you going to say?"

"We're to be married, she and I," he said, his voice barely audible.

Chiara took another deep breath.

"Congratulations," she whispered, fresh tears spilling over. "Why are you waiting so long? Doesn't she want to do it now?"

"She does, but my solicitor says we should wait for proof of paternity, which we can't get until after the baby's born."

"Why's that?"

"She did the thing, the amnio-thing, with Sienna, and something bad happened that makes it risky to do it again, risky for the baby," Drew explained. "That's the only way to tell before the baby's born. A regular blood test has to wait until after the birth. But there isn't anyone else it could be, is there?" His chin trembled, so he waited until it firmed up before he spoke again. "She says she was only with me, and she has no reason to lie. There are only three other possibilities, and she says she was only with me. I don't doubt her."

Chiara's hopes rose. "But Drew, you can't just take her word for it!" Surely his solicitor wasn't that stupid? "There are all kinds of tests that prove paternity and all that, Andrew, have you done them? All three of you have to take the test, Drew! Who are they? The other three? Was it when she was in London? Were they the--"

"No, CC-- no, Chiara." Drew looked at her. "Luke, Gars, and Neddy.

"It's none of them, you can see that, can't you?" he asked her. "Of course we're going to do the tests and all that, after the baby's born. I'm not going to marry her without it. But come on. We're out here in the middle of nowhere. It has to be one of us. Luke? No way. And she wouldn't touch Gary with a ten foot barge pole. And Neddy hates her. For now, we'll go on the assumption that it's mine. She has no reason to lie," he repeated.

"It's mine, I have no doubt."

It's mine, I have no doubt.

"Why?" The question came from the bottom of her soul. "Why, Drew? Wasn't I enough?"

He dissolved into fresh tears, shoulders shaking, covering his face with his hands.

"Don't," he begged. "Don't do that to yourself. You're a hundred times the woman, a hundred times the human being that she is, that she'll ever be."

It hit her afresh, and she began to cry again, and this time, there was no stopping.

Drew tried to put his arm around her, but she shrugged off, finally just rising from the bed. She walked to the door and opened it.

"Good bye, Drew."

She walked down the back stairs to the kitchen, from where she could see everyone still sitting in the lounge. She could tell from how they were staring that Drew was right behind her, though he hadn't made a sound.

She looked from one boy to the other, staring intently. She quickly glanced at Mara, mentally apologizing to her. The two American girls she studiously ignored. "Were you ever with LeeAnne?" she asked. "Did you ever have sex with her? Last January?"

All three of them stared at her.

She balled her hands into fists.

"Did you?"

Luke was the first to recover and answer what to him was a ludicrous question.

"No," he responded, taking Mara's hand.

Gary and Ned were shaking their heads.

"Course not," Ned answered, staring at Chiara's tearstained face.

"No," Gary echoed. He was holding Sienna, who was sleeping peacefully.

Ned looked from her to Drew, the truth finally dawning on him.

"You arsehole," he said to Drew, rising from the sofa. "You complete idiot!" He looked over to where LeeAnne sat next to her sister. "You didn't, did you?" His voice grew soft as he advanced on his friend of over ten years. "How could you?"

He gestured behind himself. "How could sleep with that slag when you were with her?" He gestured to where Chiara still stood. She hadn't moved since she'd asked her question.

Chiara sat down and Ned sat next to her, taking her hand in his own, clasping it in a gesture of comfort.

Drew saw this and closed his eyes.

"Hey!" Nicholle sat up. She wasn't exactly familiar with that word, but she got the general idea. "You watch your fucking mouth, fuckface, that's my sister!"

"Watch your own mouth," Ned shot back. "She'd screw anything that stood still long enough, you know it's true!"

"I think I deserve a little respect," LeeAnne put in, putting a hand protectively over her stomach, and the last piece of the puzzle snapped into place for everyone who didn't know.

"Oh no," Mara said, putting a hand to her mouth.

"No fucking way," Ned said, looking again at Drew. "You wanker."

LeeAnne spoke again from her place on the couch.

"Things are going to change around here," she said, her voice confident. "You aren't going to have LeeAnne to kick around anymore, that's for sure." She looked around, eyes flashing. "First, she won't be queen bee anymore, running around like she owns the place." She gestured toward Chiara. "I won't make her leave the property or anything, because I understand she doesn't have anywhere else to go, but no more sharing Drew's bedroom. I'll be sleeping there when I'm not taking care of Sienna. Chiara has her own little house, which is more than generous of us, I think.

"And speaking of Sienna, I'm signing over full custody of her to Gary, though I'll still help take care of her until after he's finished making the album, because I know he'll be busy until then." She looked around like she expected everyone to acknowledge the kindness of this gesture. "Our lawyers are drawing up the papers right now. I mean, I don't expect Drew to raise another man's child, not when we'll be having our own in the fall, and hopefully more after. After the wedding, I mean."

Everyone stared at her in shocked silence.

"Oh, didn't I mention, we're engaged, Drew and I," she added, as if it were an afterthought. She smiled at everyone, as if waiting for congratulations. When none were forthcoming, she continued. "He'll be buying me a diamond ring this week," she added.

"Is that in your contract?" Chiara asked curiously.

"Of course," LeeAnne said with a nod. "I believe in hammering out all the details, everything I can think of, you know?"

"You're getting married?" Mara repeated, unable to process this fact.

LeeAnne nodded matter of factly. "Not until after the baby comes, of course," she said. "I want to look good for the wedding photos, you know?"

"That's not why," Drew said, speaking for the first time. His voice still carried that same, hopeless dead quality. "We can't do a paternity test until after the child's born, but we're going on the assumption that she's telling the truth, because a lie would be so easily disproven." He moved to stand next to her and hold her hand. "I believe her, though. I believe the child's mine."

Mara shook her head. "You miserable excuse for a man."

She rose. "I'm going to bed, I really can't bear the company in this room any longer."

Luke, too, stood, and followed her out, calling out good night to the room.

Chiara, unable to bear anymore, accepted Mara's kiss on the cheek and excused herself as well.

"You'd better not be going upstairs," LeeAnne called out as Chiara was following Luke and Mara into the kitchen. "Remember that you don't live here anymore."

Chiara stopped for a moment, then continued without turning around or saying anything. Moments later, everyone heard the French door open and close as she let herself out.

Ned remained motionless for a second, then followed her without a word to anyone, and everyone heard the French doors open and close again a few seconds later as he followed her outside into the night.