The Secret Baby

by Harper, Leddy

  “Well, if you weren’t rushing me, I wouldn’t have dropped the spoon,” she argued from the floor. “I never claimed to be a cook. You should’ve called your friend’s wife. Isn’t she good at this kind of crap?”

  “Tatum? Yeah. She used to be a chef. Now she writes cookbooks. But I can’t ask her, because she’d want to know why I’m doing this, and I can’t tell her what I’ve done with Kelsey.”

  “You seriously think Kelsey hasn’t already told her? Aren’t they best friends, too?”

  “Yes, but she’s also married to Kelsey’s cousin . . . so I can almost guarantee that she hasn’t told her anything. If she has, I would’ve gotten a phone call from Jason by now. And he hasn’t said anything to me about it.”

  Noel finished wiping off the tile, sat back on her haunches, and pointed to my pants. “You might want to take those off and throw them in the wash. You’re only making it worse.”

  Glancing down, I took note of the wet spot near the zipper where I’d scrubbed the material with a damp paper towel. She was right; it looked bad. But before I could concede and change into something clean, the front door opened.

  I whipped my head around to find Kelsey walking in, but Noel didn’t move until the door closed. Noel popped up in my peripheral, but with my eyes on Kelsey, I didn’t miss the transformation from surprised to pissed.

  “You’re home early.” And I sounded guilty as fuck. Then again, I was—she’d specifically asked me not to bring anyone over, yet I had, even if my intentions were good. “We were, uh . . . just making dinner.”

  Kelsey didn’t say anything. She just stood near the door and nodded.

  “Hi, I’m Noel. It’s so nice to meet you.” Noel tossed the sponge into the sink and then walked around the breakfast bar with her hand out to greet Kelsey.

  “N-Noel?” Kelsey glanced from the woman in front of her to me, then back to Noel again.

  “Yes, and you’re Kelsey, right? Aaron’s . . . roommate?”

  She once again turned her eyes to me. “Yeah. Something like that. His parents finally kicked him out of their house, so he needed a place to stay for a couple of months. I have a tendency to take in strays. Although, I’m starting to feel like this one won’t ever leave.” She took Noel’s hand and shook it hard. “And how do you know him?”

  “Oh, I’m his receptionist.” Noel giggled—a sign of her discomfort. “I’m basically his right-hand man at the office. He’d be lost without me.”

  “I bet he would. Maybe I should just start sending you the listings of houses I find for Aaron. Maybe you could get him to find a place relatively soon.”

  I prayed I wasn’t about to get evicted . . . for a second time in less than two months.

  Picking up on Kelsey’s resentment, Noel glanced at me from over her shoulder. “I should probably get home. You’ve, um . . . you got it from here, right?”

  “Yup. I sure do. Thanks for all your help, Noel.” I walked out of the kitchen and met both women near the door, fully aware of the daggers Kelsey launched at me from her heated glare. “Let me walk you out.”

  “It was nice meeting you, Kelsey,” Noel called out after Kelsey had walked away, heading toward her room to likely lock herself in there for the rest of the day. Once we got outside, Noel stopped me cold with wide eyes. “I think you drastically underestimated her anger, Aaron. I doubt dinner will be enough to warm her back up. She’s like a block of ice in a freezer.”

  “Now do you see why I asked for help?”

  She laughed and patted my arm. “Oh, honey . . . you need more than help.”

  “I don’t know what else to do.”

  “Find a house and get out as fast as you can. Stop being picky about what you buy. Anything can be fixed up. And if it’s in a bad neighborhood, just get a security alarm for the doors and bars for the windows. I’m sure that’ll be safer than staying here.”

  “Thanks, you’re a lot of help.”

  “Sorry, but you’re on your own with this one. Without knowing what her deal is, I can’t possibly begin to offer advice or suggestions on how to make it right. It seems she’s pissed about something, and without knowing what it is, there’s nothing you’re gonna be able to do about it.”

  I nodded, not wanting to concede her point but knowing she was right. “Thanks anyway, Noel. I’ll let you know on Monday what happens.”

  “If you don’t show up, I’m calling the cops and sending them here.” She stepped away and waved. As she headed down the hall, she called over her shoulder, “Good luck, my friend. Good luck.”

  I’d need more than that to get Kelsey to talk to me.

  If this was how relationships were . . . I no longer wanted one.

  It was far too much work, only to be left feeling like the ball in a world-championship game of Ping-Pong. I couldn’t keep up. It was impossible to fix something or apologize for doing something wrong if I didn’t know what the issue was.

  It’d been twenty minutes since Kelsey had come home from work, and she’d spent the entire time in her room. Rather than knock or try to talk to her, I’d finished making dinner. But now that it was time to eat, I wasn’t sure if I should bother her or just let her know her plate would be in the microwave when she was ready to come out.

  In the end, I chose to call her out, refusing to let this go on any longer. “Kelsey,” I said while rapping my knuckle against her closed door. “Dinner’s ready. Come eat before it gets cold.”

  “I’m not hungry.”

  “Yeah . . . this from the girl who could eat a horse and then wash it down with a bucket of ice cream. I made you a plate; just come eat it, and then you can go back to locking me out as if I’ve done something wrong.”

  Apparently, that was all I had to say to get her to leave her room. She whipped the door open and stood before me in a long, oversize T-shirt and yoga pants that didn’t reach her ankles. “As if you did something wrong? Are you kidding me right now, Aaron?”

  I held up my hands in surrender, though I wasn’t about to back down that easily. “No, I’m not. I get that you’re pissed about Noel being here without your knowledge, and I’m sorry for that. I asked her for help because I wanted to make you something other than Hamburger Helper for dinner, and I don’t know the first thing about cooking a real meal. I honestly didn’t think about it, and for that, I’m truly sorry.”

  She crossed her arms over her chest and leaned into the doorframe. However, she didn’t utter a word or even make a gesture that would offer any clue to what went through her mind. She gave me nothing to go on other than heated anger pouring off her rigid body and pain emanating from her sad, confused eyes.

  “But”—I took a step forward—“this has been going on for over a week. Your resentment toward me didn’t start today. It’s not about me having someone at the apartment without your consent. And it’d be nice if you offered me something so that I knew what the hell I’ve done wrong.”

  “You’re an idiot.” She wasn’t wrong, though I would need more specifics. Eventually, she caved and gave me what I sought—kind of. “You must think I’m stupid. That I don’t know what I walked in on.”

  Yeah, that didn’t help. Like . . . at all. “You walked in on us making you dinner. What am I missing here?”

  She pointed to my pants, the same pair of khakis I’d worn earlier with the mess still decorating the crotch. “If you want your right-hand man to suck you off, fine. Go for it. You do you and all that. But don’t you dare disrespect me by having her on her knees in my fucking kitchen.”

  “Whoa.” It took a few seconds for me to form coherent words after that accusation. “What? No. Baby, that’s not what she was doing.”

  Kelsey balked, eyes wide and mouth dropped open. Every emotion that had coursed through her a minute ago amplified. The heated anger began to boil, and the pain intensified into a deep ache that would bring the strongest man to his knees. “Don’t ever call me that again. I’m not your baby. I have a name, and if it’s too hard to keep
all your women straight, then mark me off that list. Get the hell out and don’t ever talk to me again. That way, you won’t have to remember what to call me.”

  I had no idea what I’d walked into, but now there was no way out. I had to see this through, no matter how confusing and muddled it had all become in a matter of seconds. “I’m sorry, Kelsey. I didn’t mean . . .” I shook my head, realizing she didn’t care about my excuses. “It won’t happen again. I swear. But that’s not what Noel was doing here. My God . . . she’s married.”

  Her top lip curled, disgust radiating off her in waves. “That’s even worse.”

  “No. That’s what I’m trying to tell you. Nothing happened with her. Ever. She’s like a little sister to me. She’s worked for me for years. I was at her wedding. Her husband is a great guy. I would never . . .” I eventually stopped talking when I realized she wasn’t listening to a word I said.

  “You could at least come up with better ways to lie. They’re always like a sister, aren’t they? Which, if you think about it, is really fucked up. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve heard a guy refer to a woman as a sister yet sleep with her anyway.”

  “That’s just it, Kelsey. I’ve never slept with her. I have no desire to. Where is this coming from?” I glanced down at my pants again, following her line of sight. Shit. Noel was right . . . this looked way worse than it was. “This is alfredo sauce.”

  “And she was on her knees . . . why?”

  “She was cleaning up the mess—the alfredo sauce. The spoon fell and splattered all over me. She was wiping up the floor while I was trying to clean it off my pants. That’s when you walked in. We weren’t doing anything.” I’d never thought I’d have to defend myself where Noel was concerned.

  “Whether or not that’s true, it doesn’t mean you aren’t sleeping with her. I caught you, Aaron. I went into your office last week to talk to you, and you were bending her over your desk.”

  That stunned me silent for far longer than an innocent man should be. Finally, I shook off the shock and attempted to make sense of this. “When? I’ve never had sex with her, let alone bent her over my desk for any reason.”

  “It doesn’t matter when. The point is . . . you did. And then you brought her here, after I’ve asked that you don’t have anyone over aside from Jason.” She dropped her arms and closed her eyes for a moment. When she opened them again, a softer side shone through. “I just don’t like to be disrespected, Aaron. That’s all. And that’s exactly how I feel right now.”

  “But I’m telling you . . . nothing happened.”

  “And my ex told me his wife was a horrible person.” She shrugged, the will to fight no longer present in her posture. “I don’t put much stock into what guys say anymore. You’re all the same. You all must share tips on how to lie or what to say to pull on a woman’s heartstrings. Unfortunately for you . . . it no longer works on me.”

  I didn’t know what to say or do. It seemed nothing would make this right. I doubted even the truth from Noel would make Kelsey second-guess her assumptions. And that’s exactly what they were—assumptions. The same thing I had to battle with every other female I’d ever encountered.

  Silly me for thinking Kelsey was any different.

  “I’ll go through the listings you gave me this week. And if I don’t find anything, then I’ll figure something else out. You won’t have to worry about me disrespecting you anymore.” I grabbed her plate off the counter and took it two steps to the kitchen table. “I tried to make the asparagus the same way it was done at the wedding. I remember you saying you liked it.” Then I took my plate, tossed it into the sink, and went to my room, disregarding the silence that came from Kelsey the entire time I was walking away from her.

  I spent the rest of the evening and night looking at houses—some on her list and others I’d come across while searching online. One stood out above the rest, though. It had been at the bottom of Kelsey’s email, a note attached to it pointing out how it was big enough for a family and how the front room could be a nursery or a home office.

  After a few emails back and forth with the Realtor, I made an appointment to check it out the next day, as well as others he thought I might be interested in. But rather than the excitement I’d felt when walking through houses with Kelsey, I felt empty. And I couldn’t begin to understand why. Maybe Noel had been right that I was in love with the idea of love.

  Too bad that wouldn’t keep me warm at night.

  My mood had progressively deteriorated since Friday night, and come Monday morning, I walked into my office a zombie—or that character from Oz without a heart.

  “I take it your weekend didn’t get any better?” Noel asked from her desk. Based on the purse that still hung on her shoulder and the way she sat almost sideways in her chair, I assumed she had gotten there a minute or two before me.

  Normally, I’d hang around the front for a few minutes, chatting with Noel. Especially on a Monday, when we had more to catch up on. But this time, I didn’t care to hang out or fill her in on anything. Instead, I passed by her with a simple, “I bought a house.”

  “Wait up.” She chased after me, her purse still on her shoulder. “You bought a house? Why aren’t you excited? Why are you walking around like someone killed your cat?”

  “Why do I have to be a cat person? Why can’t I be a dog owner? Or maybe a beast like a lion or a tiger?”

  “Oh my.” Sarcasm didn’t look good on her—it looked much better on Kelsey. “Let me rephrase. Why are you walking around like someone killed your abominable snowman?”

  I glared at her, not in the mood for her mockery this morning. “I’ve had a really crappy weekend, Noel. No thanks to you. So if it’s all right, I’d like a little time to get my day started so I don’t scare off my patients.”

  She stood motionless, only blinking rapidly for a few moments before shaking it off, revealing her utter confusion. “No thanks to me? What’s that supposed to mean?”

  “For some reason, Kelsey is under the impression that you and I are sleeping together. She went off on me Friday night about how I disrespected her by bringing you to the apartment. Then she accused us of having sex, saying she caught me bending you over my desk. I don’t even know what the hell she’s talking about, but I’m fucking sick and tired of everyone making assumptions, acting like they know the first thing about me, and then holding it over my head as if I’ve done something wrong just because they think I did something that I didn’t.” I leaned back in my seat and took a deep breath, needing to calm down before I had a heart attack.

  Noel was quiet for too long, only to come back with, “She said she caught us having sex in here?”

  “Really? That’s the only thing you have to say?”

  “Did she, uh . . . did she happen to mention anything else about it? Like, perhaps, when?”

  I was over the women in my life, ready to take a vow of celibacy and silence, surrounding myself with nature, as that seemed to be the only way to avoid this mess. “I didn’t exactly question her, Noel. It never happened, so why would I press a nonexistent issue? She’s clearly crazy.”

  “Well . . . what if she’s not?”

  “Not what? Not crazy?” I laughed, even though I found none of this funny. “Am I missing something here? Did I somehow fuck you and block it out? Do I need to perform a neuropsych eval on myself?”

  She fell into a chair across from my desk, fear staring back at me. “So . . . do you remember that day last week when you asked to borrow my car and I had to have Pete pick me up from work?”

  “Yeah.” I already didn’t like where this was going.

  “Well, you see . . . the doctor said we shouldn’t let sex become clinical.”

  “That makes no fucking sense at all.”

  She huffed and hung her head. “The doctor said there’s nothing wrong with Pete or me and that we should just stop worrying about it, lose the stress of it all, and have fun with each other. Rather than pay attention to ovul
ations and periods and positions—”

  “I don’t need to hear any more. Really. I think I understand.”

  “No one was in the office that day, it was after hours, and I thought it wouldn’t hurt if we tried to spice it up a little.”

  It took too much effort to get the words out, but eventually, I was able to say, “Are you saying you had sex with Pete in my office?”

  “I could’ve sworn the front door was locked. I don’t know how she could’ve caught me unless she was looking through the window, but honestly, you keep the blinds—”

  “That’s enough, Noel.” I ran my hands through my hair and gripped the overgrown strands until my scalp ached. “It doesn’t matter how she caught you or what she saw, because she thinks it was me. And that was the day after I’d spent the night with her. No wonder she thinks I disrespected her. What the hell were you thinking?”

  “I was thinking I want a baby with my husband, and after over a year of trying with no luck, I guess I got desperate. I saw an opportunity and I took it, not thinking about how it could affect you. I’m sorry. If you’re going to fire me, I understand. Just let me finish getting the files ready for the day, and then I’ll be gone.”

  “Noel . . . wait.” I caught her before she exited the room. “I’m not firing you. But that doesn’t mean I’m okay with what you did. For your sake, I really hope it worked. I’d feel better if one good thing came out of it.”

  “It’ll work out for you, too. I just know it.”

  I didn’t believe it. My luck had always been shitty, and I didn’t see it ever getting better.

  “At least you have a house now.”

  “Yeah, there’s that.”

  And in a month, I’d move into that house alone. Live there alone. And fill the room at the front with a desk and office supplies, knowing it’d never be the nursery Kelsey had suggested.

  Chapter 15

  Kelsey

  For the first time in eight years, I played hooky.

  Unfortunately, I couldn’t blame it on alcohol, the pregnancy, a death in the family, or even an emergency such as a car accident on the way to work. The reason I chose to stay home today was purely selfish—I needed a little best friend time. So rather than drive to the office this morning, I headed straight to my cousin’s house.