Knocked Up by the Wicked Prince: A Secret Baby Romance

by Monroe, Lilian

  She’s trembling. The love of my life puts a hand to her baby bump, taking a shaky breath as she closes her eyes. A tear rolls down her cheek.

  “Dante…”

  “No. Margot, listen to me. Look at me.” I wait until she opens her eyes. I cup her cheeks, hoping that I can make her understand the strength of my emotion. “I love you, Margot. I know you think that I’d be sacrificing too much by being with you, but I’m sacrificing more by being without you. Let me be by your side. Let me love you the way you deserve to be love. Let me choose you.”

  Margot’s bottom lip trembles as she inhales. She stares at me, her brows arching. I can feel the tension inside her ratcheting up, and I stroke her cheeks with my thumbs.

  “Margot,” I whisper. “Let me love you.”

  “I’m scared.” Her voice is a breath. A whisper.

  “Of what?”

  “That you’ll hate me. That you’ll regret it.” Margot sucks her bottom lip between her teeth before letting out a sigh. “That you’ll leave.”

  My heart breaks all over again when I see how much I’ve hurt her. When I pushed her away after finding out about Beckett, I drove a wedge between us that seems almost impossible to overcome. I showed her that I wasn’t strong enough to handle what life would throw at us. I told her that she wasn’t enough.

  I let out a breath, leaning my forehead against hers.

  “I won’t.”

  Those two words don’t seem like enough, but how many words would be? What else can I say, except the truth?

  I won’t hate her. Never. How could I?

  I won’t regret it. The only regret I have is pushing Margot away.

  I won’t leave. Never, ever, ever. Not in a million years. Not even if she pushes me away for the next decade. For the next century. I’m here. Always.

  Margot puts her hands against my chest, pulling her head away from mine to look into my eyes. I meet her gaze, staring into the eyes of the woman I adore.

  “I love you, Margot,” I say. “I’m not going anywhere.”

  Another tear slides down her cheek, but Margot smiles. Her lips stretch, her eyes shine, and her hands curl into my shirt.

  I watch Margot’s throat bob as she swallows.

  Finally, she speaks. “Okay.”

  That one word saves me.

  It’s not poetic. It’s not eternal prose. It’s not a lengthy profession of love…

  …but it’s perfect.

  Okay means yes. It means she’ll let me in. It means all this hasn’t been for nothing.

  Okay means I love you, too.

  My heart flips in my chest as a laugh bubbles up through me. “Okay?”

  She nods, smiling through her tears. “Okay.”

  Pulling me toward her by my shirt, Margot kisses me, and my world is complete. The instant her lips touch mine, I know I’m the luckiest man in the world.

  Her kiss is magic. It’s healing, it’s hopeful, it’s her heart, and it’s all mine. Wrapping my arms around the woman of my dreams, I tangle my fingers into her short hair and kiss her harder. Our tongues dance, our breaths mix, and our hearts beat as one.

  When I drop to my knees and press my lips to her belly, tears start sliding down my cheeks.

  “Hi there,” I say to the baby, putting my hands on her stomach. “I’m your father.”

  A tiny, strangled sob escapes Margot, and she places her hand on my head. I rest my cheek against her stomach, breathing in her scent, her aura, her love.

  Then, the baby kicks me right in the jaw. I jump back, yelping, and Margot laughs. She lifts her shirt up, and I see tiny feet pushing out from inside her. My eyes widen as I stare, on my knees in front of her.

  “He does that when he’s happy,” Margot explains. “He must like the idea of having you as a dad.”

  “He?”

  Margot shrugs, smiling. “I decided not to find out, but I think it’s a boy. He’s always kicking and moving around.”

  I let out a long sigh, putting my hand against my son’s foot. He kicks against me a few more times before settling down, and another lump forms in my throat.

  Vicky lets out a sigh, and we both turn to see her wiping her eyes with a tissue. I’d forgotten she was there. She shakes her head at us, turning away. “It’s too much. Too perfect. My poor heart can’t take this. I need to go call my kids.”

  Blowing her nose into the tissue, she turns and shuffles down the hallway toward the office.

  Margot laughs, her hands still tangled in my hair as I kneel in front of her.

  I look up, my heart overflowing with happiness. I can’t stop smiling. There’s a tingling sensation through my whole body, and my chest feels light.

  I hold the love of my life in my arms, knowing I’ll never let her go.

  Epilogue

  Margot

  Turns out, I was wrong. We didn’t have a boy after all.

  Our baby girl, Hope, was born at 2:36pm on the first of April, after a thirteen-hour labor. She weighed a whopping nine pounds, four ounces. I guess she was enjoying her existence inside me, and didn’t want to come out at all. She entered this world kicking and screaming, like the fighter she is.

  When Dante held her for the first time, he melted into a puddle of fatherly goo on the hospital room floor. I cried, then. Really cried. Maybe it was the hormones of pregnancy and labor. Maybe it was the emotion of seeing my daughter for the first time.

  Whatever it was, I let go of all the nasty feelings that held me back from believing Dante when he said he’d be by my side. I cried, cleansing myself of the past and readying myself for the future with my baby and my soon-to-be husband.

  We were married a year later, when my body was mostly recovered and Dante and I had slipped into a happy life together. Our wedding was in Argyle, in the same place that Ivy married Luca. Ivy was my maid of honor, and she cried during the entire ceremony. Having my sister by my side at my wedding meant the world to me. If I’m completely honest, I cried most of the time, too.

  Hope and Ivy’s twins, Coco and Hazel, acted as flower girls. The three of them were perfect, running down the aisle on clumsy, chubby, one-year-old legs. The three girls were best friends the instant they met when they were a few days old, and they giggled through the wedding, reminding us how much we loved them.

  The royal family of Farcliff attended the wedding, but I invited very few celebrities and socialites. It was an intimate affair, but we did release a few pictures to the public afterward.

  Shortly after the wedding, I retired from public life. Dante and I moved to a small cottage in the Farcliff countryside, away from prying eyes and overzealous photographers.

  It was the peace and quiet we needed to recover from the chaos that our life had been. In that cottage, Dante and I got to know each other again. We made love often, as much as possible, and laughed every chance we got.

  We acquired three dogs and a cat. The cat was a stray that followed Dante home one day, and the dogs came from a rescue in Farcliff run by Queen Elle’s adoptive father. All four animals adored Hope from the instant they met her.

  Ivy and Luca came to see us about once a month to escape the hectic running of Spoonful of Sugar.

  Hunter and Beckett were both imprisoned for life. I never visited either of them, and after my baby was born, I didn’t give them much thought. Neither men deserved my attention, and I was happy to leave them in my past.

  On our two-year anniversary, Dante and I dropped Hope off with her cousins, and Dante took me on a trip to Argyle. King Theo reserved one of the royal islands for us, and we finally had a long-awaited honeymoon weekend.

  I’m not ashamed to say I missed Hope so much that cried on the entire plane ride. In three years, a weekend vacation would be the longest I’d spent away from my daughter.

  What can I say? I’m a mother.

  Once I saw the clear blue waters and the palm trees, and once I felt the feather pillows and the impossibly comfortable bed, though, my mood changed.

&nb
sp; The first night, we just slept.

  When we woke up, Dante and I made love to the sounds of the ocean waves lapping the shore. I came in his arms, and I knew there was no one luckier than me.

  When we lay tangled in the bedsheets, Dante stroked my face and let out a sigh. “I want another kid,” he told me, smiling hopefully.

  My chest tightened, and I gulped down my anxieties. “Dante…”

  “I know,” he interrupted. “It’s too much of a risk with the Huntington’s gene.”

  I nodded, unable to answer. We still didn’t know if Hope had the disease—we had to wait until she turned eighteen and got the genetic testing done for herself. It was a fifty-fifty chance, and I just couldn’t bear the thought of risking it with another child.

  “What about adoption?” Dante asked, trailing his fingers over my skin.

  My eyes widened, and my heart exploded. I kissed Dante, then, and my love for him multiplied. This man had such a big heart that not only did he take Hope on as his own child, but he wanted more kids to love, even if they weren’t his own.

  He also took me, flaws and all, and made it his life’s purpose to love me just as I loved him.

  So, we adopted three more children over the course of the next five years. Our little cottage in the woods soon ran out of space, and we finally moved back to the city to be closer to Ivy and Luca. By that time, media attention around me and Dante had died down to nothing, and we were able to live a normal life.

  The Huntington’s Disease Society of Farcliff grew to support hundreds of people living with the disease as well as their carers. Dante was a champion of the cause, reminding me every day with his dedication to the HDSF that he was doing this for me.

  I never doubted him again. For the rest of our days, Dante never faltered. He was never afraid as my illness progressed, and never fearful of the future. He was by my side, always.

  Even when my tremors got worse. Even when I had trouble walking. Even when my mood swings became more extreme, and I started truly fearing the end.

  He was there beside me, loving me fully and unconditionally.

  Now, eighteen years after Hope’s birth, she sits across from Dante and me with an envelope in her hands. My daughter takes a shaking breath, dragging her eyes up to mine.

  “I’m scared.”

  “I know, honey,” I say, leaning against Dante. “You can do it. Trust me, it’s better to know for sure.”

  When Hope rips the envelope open, my heart falters. If I passed on the disease to my daughter, I know it will be the killing blow. I won’t have the energy to fight much longer if I know I’ve condemned my daughter to an early grave.

  But Hope lets out a relieved breath, lifting her eyes up to mine. “Negative.”

  Tears slide down my cheeks as my daughter throws her arms around me and Dante. The three of us cry happy tears, and I know that we named our daughter appropriately.

  She’s always been the Hope in our lives.

  She gave me hope before she was born, when I was on my own and life was bleak. She gave Dante the courage to come back to me, hopeful that we’d end up together.

  Our daughter is the beacon of hope that will carry on long after Dante and I are gone.

  Then, our three other teenagers come barreling through the door, home from their day at school. They descend on the kitchen and eat everything in sight like a pack of hungry wolves. In just a few minutes, the fridge is picked clean. All three of them give me a kiss and ask me when dinner will be ready.

  Just like that, life is back to normal.

  Dante puts his arm around me, kissing the top of my head. His love for me permeates everything, and I know that I would never have been this happy if we hadn’t found each other. He’s braver, stronger, and more loving than I could ever hope for in a partner.

  He’s my Dante. My love. My husband. My life.

  All four of our kids are healthy. My husband is beside me. I can rest easy, now, knowing that they’ll take care of each other even after I’m gone.

  * * *

  Keep reading for a preview of the original Knocked Up Series: Knocked Up by the CEO

  * * *

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  xox Lilian

  Knocked Up by the CEO

  Knocked Up Series: Book 1

  1

  Harper

  “Coming through!” I call out, balancing a tray of cookies in one hand and a jug of eggnog in the other. I can smell the boozy scent of rum coming off the eggnog and I know it’ll be a big hit this year. My coworkers move out of the way as I crouch down towards the table and slide the tray off my hand onto the table in a smooth motion. The tablecloth is covered the cartoonish drawings of snowmen and snow flakes, with tinsel strewn under the trays of food. The whole office looks like the inside of a Christmas store. I place the jug of eggnog beside the cookies and stand up, putting my hands on my hips and turning around.

  “That should be it,” I breathe, pulling the hem of my sweater down. It’s the ugliest and most amazing sweater I’ve ever seen, a wooly red monstrosity with flashing LED lights all over the front in the shape of a Christmas tree. Perfect for the office Christmas party.

  “Well done, Harper! The place looks amazing,” Rosie says as she walks up beside me. She’s wearing her regular work clothes. In fact, no one except me is dressed up, but I don’t mind. Rosie smiles and raises the plastic wine glass towards me. I grab a glass of my own from the dozens lined up on the table and lift it up it towards Rosie.

  “I can finally start enjoying myself now,” I grin back. We clink our glasses and I take my first sip of wine of the evening. “It’s always so much work putting this party together.”

  “But it’s always worth it,” Rosie replies. “Think of all the gossip that comes out of it every year!”

  She grins mischievously and takes another sip of wine, scanning the room over the rim of her glass. I laugh and nod. She’s right, it’s usually fodder for at least a couple months of water cooler chat. I’ve been in charge of the office Christmas party for the last three years, and they’ve gotten wilder as time has gone on. I’m sure this year will be the same.

  “Nice sweatshirt!”

  I try not to cringe as the screechy voice reaches my ears. The back of my neck prickles with that same uncomfortable feeling I get every time I hear his voice. I already know it’s Greg from accounting. I turn around slowly and there he is, grinning at me with his toothy, slimy smile. I nod, trying not to stare at the stains on his tie or the greasy hair plastered to his forehead.

  “Thanks,” I respond curtly.

  “You like Christmas, hey?”

  “No, not really, I just do this so I can drink at the office.”

  He throws his head back and laughs before shuffling closer, his baggy pants and too-tight shirt sliding in beside me. I inch away as he gets closer. He smells like wet socks.

  “Haven’t seen you around the accounts department lately,” he says to me. I try to avoid his stare and glance at Rosie. She’s got her nose buried in her glass of wine.

  “I got promoted a year ago, Greg. I don’t work in accounts anymore.”

  “Yeah, yeah, of course, but you know, I thought you’d still come around and say hello to me—to the team. I thought we meant something to you!”

  He smiles at me and I resist the urge to shudder. I would rather come across as a cold-hearted snobby executive bitch than to willingly spend time with you, after all the torture you put me through! Greg glances at Rosie and his smile disappears immediately. He almost snarls at her and I grab her arm and point over to the other side of the room.

  “Oh, look, it looks like those decorations need to be adjusted. Excuse me.”

  “I’ll help!” Rosie says. The two
of us speed away towards the huge tree I rented for the party.

  “Is he still following you around? I thought you’d made a complaint.”

  I sigh. “I did, he got a warning from HR and avoided me for a while but it looks like he’s plucked up the courage to talk to me again. Might be the booze.”

  “Isn’t there anything you can do? He followed you to your house! Multiple times!”

  “Don’t remind me,” I say, glancing at her sideways. I push the thought away, not wanting to go back to those months last year when I was constantly looking over my shoulder. I didn’t even know it was Greg until weeks after the whole thing started. I spent weeks and weeks with that same prickly feeling at the back of my neck, feeling like I was being followed and thinking I was going insane.

  The promotion to Commercial Director came with a healthy pay raise and the condition that my complaint about Greg would be satisfied when he got a warning. I never understood why the Human Resources department didn’t take me more seriously, but at the end of the day not many women make it to the Director-level at a top advertising firm at my age. I weighed my options and for the most part, it was worth it. I hardly have to see him anyways.

  Rosie and I get to the Christmas tree and look at all 16 feet of it. The top of it grazes the ceiling.

  “So what do you want us to adjust? I think Greg is still looking over here,” Rosie asks, looking at the massive tree. It was almost too big to fit in the door. I had to beg and plead to get approval for it, saying that it wasn’t a Christmas party without a tree. It’s impeccably decorated and I already know that nothing needs to be adjusted.

  “Uh, let’s just lift this string of lights a bit. We can just move them around till he looks away.”