Forbidden Baby Daddy: A Secret Baby Romance

by Lara Swann

  I’m crying now, tears running down my cheeks, my arm feeling like it’s on fire and his face way too close to me as he yells into it.

  “John—John—stop it.”

  It takes me a long moment to register my Mom’s voice - anxious and desperate - from the doorway, everything else thumping through my head and threatening to drown her out. He twists his head around and glares at her too.

  “Don’t tell me to stop it!” He grinds out. “I tried your way - look where it got us! Now we’re doing it the way we should have from the start. I won’t have that influence around anymore—”

  “Let me go!” I cry again, jerking and pulling even though it’s hurting so much and I’m scared I’m about to pull my arm from its socket.

  “Dad—let go of me—I’m pregnant—” I cry desperately, the terror for my baby overwhelming me. He’s only got my arm, but I’ve never seen him like this and I have no idea what he’s going to do next.

  “Yes, and we all know how that happened, don’t we?” He sneers at me, his eyes angry.

  “John, let her go.” Mom’s voice comes again, and I’m surprised how resolute it is as she steps up to him, putting a placating hand on his arm. “Let. Go.”

  He stares at her for a long moment, their eyes locked together, until at last his face twists up into a disgusted grimace and he throws me away from him. I stumble before catching myself, breathing heavily and my other hand rising to clutch and rub my arm where he’s left a harsh red mark. I don’t check, but I’m sure the outline of his fingers is already appearing.

  I stare at them both for a long minute, my body frozen with complete shock and terror and disbelief as everything turns deathly silent between us, my heart rate through the roof and the pulse in my head threatening to deafen me with its beat.

  Then his head turns toward me again, his finger rising to point as he opens his mouth to say something.

  It’s enough to break my petrification and I take one last look at them - before I turn and run down the stairs and out of the house. I move as fast as my body will let me, panic giving me strength and speed I never knew I had, even though I don’t think anyone is coming after me.

  All I know is I need to get out of there. I can’t spend another moment in that house - with that man.

  Not with my baby. Not for anything.

  One hand clutches my belly as I run, my breathing harsh and heavy in my ears.

  It might be the first and only time that’s ever happened - the first time I’ve seen Dad break his usual cool and collected nature - and I might even be able to understand just how much what I did horrified him. But I know, deep within me, that this time I’m not going back. Sometimes it feels like my whole life has been spent arguing and storming out of that house, but this is different. This isn’t rage or frustration or anything like that.

  This is pure self-preservation. It sickens me to think it, to picture Mom and Dad back there without me and know that this is it.

  I’m never going back.

  I run for a long time, tears streaming down my face, and it’s not until I get halfway that I finally stop and call Ash, asking him to come pick me up.

  I give him clumsy half-information on where to find me - I don’t exactly know where I am myself - but he doesn’t seem to have a problem, showing up faster than I can imagine. I have no idea what he did to that long-distance bike to tear through Baltimore like that, but the moment he jumps off and scoops me into his eyes, I’m just so so grateful.

  “Chloe, Chloe, Chloe…what happened?” His warm voice in my ear makes me shudder and I just stand there for a long moment, inhaling the familiar scent of leather, oil and Ash, unable to say anything.

  All I want is to feel him around me like this - his strength and warmth and that underlying current of danger that has never once scared me the way my Dad just did. If anything, right now, it’s reassuring.

  I start sobbing the moment he strokes my hair, kissing the top of my head, and even though I was sure I wasn’t going to dissolve into tears until we got to his place, I can’t help it. I stand here on the street, sobbing and crying and not even caring who’s around because Ash is here and that’s all that matters.

  He strokes my back, rubbing smooth circles around it as I cling to his chest and slowly—very slowly—manage to get a few of the words out, feeling like I need to say it, like I need to tell someone or it will bury itself deep within me and poison me from the inside.

  “He—he—he grab—grabbed me.” I say, and some distant part of me thinks that sounds stupid, that I’m probably stupid for crying over it like this, but I know that’s not true. I know that everything I just went through was so very wrong. I shudder in his grasp and he holds me tighter, his whole body surrounding me so that nothing else will ever touch me again. “I—I—he found—the drawings. Of—of you—that I did—and he was so—so angry—I’ve never—never seen that.”

  I shudder and shake in his grip, and I can feel some part of him going deathly still.

  “I’ll fucking kill him.” He mutters, eyes dangerous and angry as they take in the ragged state of me. “He’s a tyrant and a bully and he doesn’t deserve you, Chloe. If he’s laid a finger on you, I’ll fucking—”

  He stops mid-sentence as I dissolve in his arms, shuddering and moaning as I shake my head. I don’t want that. I don’t want Ash to go near Dad - or either of them - I just want to be done.

  “No…” I gasp. “Ash…I—I just—”

  “Okay, okay…” His voice softens as he looks at me, the murmur lighter as he kisses me gently. “I’m sorry, I just, fuck Chloe.”

  “I know.” I whisper, feeling it all the way inside me. “I know.”

  He strokes me gently, the love and care in his body a total contrast to the harshness of his words - but then, they weren’t directed at me. I know that. There’s even a part of me right now that desperately wants that feeling of aggressive protection. If there’s anyone I trust to keep me safe, it’s Ash.

  I sink into that feeling and let it wash over me, trying to drown out the feeling of Dad’s hand on me, the feeling of the terror as I stood there and couldn’t do anything.

  He’s still murmuring softly, encouraging me and I clutch him tighter, trying to shake off the sobs as I take several deep breaths in a row.

  “I…I was so scared, Ash.” I whisper. “I was terrified—for me—for the baby—I didn’t…didn’t know what to…I couldn’t…couldn’t stop him.”

  “Shhh, oh Chloe…” He murmurs, his voice sounding torn and ragged.

  “I’ve never—never been—scared like that—before.” I get out again, burying my head into him as he rubs me and warms my shivering body. I didn’t think I was cold, but I can’t seem to stop shivering, either.

  We stand there for a long time as Ash touches me gently, stroking my hair back from my face and telling me how much he loves me. It takes a long time for some of the tension to drain out of me, but Ash seems to notice the moment that it does - he tilts my chin up toward him and for the first time, I see the angry, dangerous glint in his eyes, too. I shudder, but even though I get the feeling it’s a whole lot more potent than Dad’s, it doesn’t scare me.

  “He doesn’t deserve you, Chloe.” He repeats, his tone emphatic.

  “I know.” I say again, my voice feeling hoarse as yet another shudder runs through me. “Ash…”

  His name comes out as a murmur as I look up at him, hesitant. I think I know the answer, but I’m still scared to voice the question anyway. I don’t even know why, except that right now I feel so vulnerable that everything feels fragile.

  “I know…I know we said that this wasn’t the right time to—to be living together. That—that we wanted to do it properly—”

  “Screw that.” He says, with fire in his eyes before I’ve even had a chance to voice the question. “You’re coming home with me, Chloe—you’re not going back there.”

  I shudder again, closing my eyes briefly. “I don’t want to.”


  I don’t say the word ever, but we both feel it anyway.

  He cups my chin, raising my head so I can meet his gaze and see the meaning there as he speaks.

  “Chloe…sure, maybe we wanted to do things differently, in an ideal world - but that’s not the world we live in. It never has been. This might not have been the plan, but that doesn’t mean we can’t make it a fucking awesome reality. We’ll take the hand we’re dealt, Chloe, and make the best of it whatever comes our way.” He leans in and kisses me, long and deep enough to melt away some of the tremors still palpitating within me. “And anyway…living together was always going to be wonderful. This way, we just get to do that earlier…and move toward where we want to be from there. Together.”

  I sigh as I melt into him - everything he is - his words, his kiss, and that endless unfaltering support I’ve been able to rely on from the start.

  The last of the tension washes away from me as he takes me in his arms back to the bike.

  Maybe he’s right - maybe I was dealt a bad hand here - but so long as I have him, it’s hard to feel that way. He’s the best thing that ever happened to me, and at times he still doesn’t seem real - like some fantasy that’s come to life and at any moment will disappear before my very eyes. I shudder at the thought of it and cling to him a little more tightly, reminding myself that all this really does exist, as we ride sedately through the streets and back to his place.

  To our home. Together.

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Ash

  I take Chloe home that night, feeling conflicted and torn about so many things that it’s hard to sort my head out.

  I want to rush after her father, grab him - by something more like the throat - and make sure he never lays another finger on my girl. That dangerous coil of anger is still sitting within me, pushed aside by how much more important her obvious distress was, but there and just waiting for an outlet.

  I’m not going to give it the one it wants - I already know that - not unless he comes here and provokes something. Chloe wants nothing more to do with either of them - she didn’t even want me to go by and pick up her things - and however hard it is, I’m not going to go against that. It’s her choice.

  Just so long as she knows that the moment she did want something like that…

  I try to curb the violent streak in me - that’s not who she is, or the man her or my baby deserve - but it’s hard. Especially at the moment, with the conversation I had with Blake this morning still humming through my veins and bringing that part of me so close to the surface all over again.

  That’s the other thing I feel so mixed about - and it won’t be so easily dismissed, either.

  The idea of Chloe moving in with me is electrifying and wonderful in so many ways…it fills me with the kind of warmth and pleasure that I haven’t felt since that week she stayed here before…but it’s also such a fucking bad idea right now that it fills me with trepidation too.

  If it hadn’t been for that call with Blake, it would have been fine. Sure, I was nervous after the shop got trashed, but then…nothing happened. She lived here for a time, she visited me at all hours and everything was okay. I never saw those two thugs from the Iron Dogs again.

  Maybe it was stupid, but my guard started to slip and that knot of anxiety slowly untangled itself. You can’t remain on full alert for weeks on end, with no sign of activity or threat. It just doesn’t happen.

  I thought that even if things were still ongoing between the two clubs - even if Blake hadn’t worked things out enough to get back to me - that I was out of it, at least. No one was targeting me again.

  And then Blake finally did call - and it wasn’t anything I wanted to hear.

  “Ash.” He spoke as soon as I picked up, concern obvious in his voice. “Can you talk?”

  “Yeah, sure.” I even answered with an amicable tone, despite the way the last two conversations had gone. That anger would still be there if I looked for it, but I was just glad that he’d finally gotten back to me and looking forward to a positive update. “There’s no one in the shop at the moment. Are things finally sorted out?”

  The pause was the first clue something was wrong.

  “No…not exactly, no.”

  “Oh?” I frown, becoming more cautious. “Then why—”

  “Listen, you’re not going to like this, but just listen. I wanted to warn you. Things are quiet at the moment - the wrong kind of quiet - and there’s word in the pipeline that something big is going on behind-the-scenes here—”

  “What do you mean behind-the-scenes? Are you talking about the Slayers or—”

  “Just let me, please. No, it’s not us - we’re just—we’re expecting to be hit by something big in the coming days and we don’t exactly know what—”

  “Why are you telling me?” I asked, immediately becoming more suspicious. Whatever it was, I wanted no part in it - and no details, either. “I don’t want to—”

  “We heard—your shop might be involved.”

  I froze where I stood, dread rolling through me. I’ve only just got things back on track - and for a while there I wasn’t even sure that was going to be possible with all the debts I owed - and if it wasn’t for Chloe, I’m not sure I would have been able to bring myself to start. I was lucky that a couple of customers that lost bikes were from the Slayers anyway, and they weren’t about to grumble too much. The idea of something else happening—I’m not sure I can face doing that again.

  “Blake—what—”

  “I don’t know. We don’t know anything for certain, Ash—it might all just be smoke in the wind—but I thought—I wanted to give you a heads up, at least. Just in case.” He pauses, and I can almost feel the hesitation there before he adds quietly. “I probably shouldn’t be.”

  That was enough to cut off whatever frustrated response I was going to give, as I sense more of the friend I can rely on in that moment than I have in any of our previous conversations. For the first time in a while, I feel like maybe at least he’s with me, even if the club don’t mind screwing me over to move up in the world.

  It was obvious from his tone and the things he didn’t quite say, that he wasn’t supposed to be having that conversation, and I suddenly felt immensely grateful that he was - even if it does put me right back on edge again. He’s right. I should know about this.

  “Okay.” I acknowledged in the same quiet tone. “Thanks, Blake. I’ll keep an eye out.”

  “Do that.” He finished. “I’ll see what I can do from this end - I’m sorry it’s not working out the way we’d hoped, bro.”

  I still don’t know whether ‘we’ meant ‘the club’ or ‘you and me’, but I hope it’s the latter. It would be nice to think he actually was looking out for me in this cluster-fuck situation.

  “Thanks, let me know if anything changes.” I paused, but I had to say it. “After it’s all done, though, we need to have a long conversation. You and me, bro, but also the club. I don’t want to touch them right now, but after…”

  “I know.” He agreed, in that same resigned tone, and I felt like he did actually agree, too. Like he understood where I was coming from. Maybe it’s wishful thinking on my part, but I’ll hold to it for now.

  After that, he signed off and I went back out into the shop, trying to think about what I could possibly do.

  Take a vacation? Buy some security equipment? Get out my old gun?

  Then, only hours later, Chloe called me to pick her up - and that careful thought process disappeared in an instant, the thought of her being here almost too much to deal with right now.

  Stupid fucking timing.

  It’s not like there’s a choice, though - there’s no way I’m letting her go back to her parents after what happened there. At least if something happens with these guys, I know what I’m dealing with - I’m here to protect her - she’s not all alone and defenseless there.

  I tell myself that, but I also know that I’m more likely to get her in the line of fire
than save her from it.

  Damn it. Damn it all to fucking hell.

  I briefly consider suggesting that maybe she go and stay with my Mom, or we rent a motel, or go on vacation - but we don’t have the cash for either of the latter, her art class in Baltimore means more to her than anything else right now and I wouldn’t be able to explain any of it. So, as much as I turn that over in my mind again and again, all of that is out.

  Which means that as much as I want to sink into the pleasures of having Chloe here all the time - the warmth of her curled up next to me at night and the simple contentment of being around her, getting to hear her laugh and talk and see her all the time - I find myself on edge through it all. And then feeling guilty too, because I’m not enjoying it in the way that I really should be.

  It gets worse when, after a few days, it’s obvious she’s noticed too. She keeps checking in with me - asking if I’m okay, if there’s anything she’s doing wrong - and it kills me that she thinks she needs to do things the way I want. I want this to be her home too and I want her to be comfortable here. Living with her couldn’t be easier, except that I’m so worried for her and our baby right now, and I can’t tell her anything.

  Chloe thinks all the issues with the shop being trashed have passed now - just like that. I can’t mention that we need to be worried all over again without explaining far more than it would be a good idea for her to know.

  She gets more and more timid as the days pass, and I hate that I’m the one doing it to her, but no matter how I try to reassure her, it doesn’t seem to work. Eventually she comes right out and says what’s on her mind.

  We’re curled up on the couch, watching some idiotic reality TV show that I zoned out of a long time ago, my mind turning - as ever - to thoughts of the Iron Dogs and what might be going on, when she reaches over and turns it off.

  “Ash…” She starts, and I can tell from the tone it’s going to be this conversation, especially with the way she turns to look up at me, her eyes wide and concerned.