“You can’t avoid this forever,” Tatum said from the other side of the bed, passing me the bag of cheese puffs. “He has a right to know about his kid, no matter who or how many women he’s sleeping with.”
“I know, but I’m just not ready yet.”
“Well, you’re gonna end up running out of time before you’re ready, Kels. I hate to break it to you, but you can’t put this off forever. That little bean sprout will come in no time, and then you’ll be stuck having to explain why you never told him.”
I shoved a handful of artificially flavored crap into my mouth and spoke around the processed food. “I don’t have to explain shit. He doesn’t deserve it. He’ll be lucky if I even put his name on the birth certificate. I’ll give my baby the last name Pitt and tell everyone its dad is Brad. He’s got a litter anyway; I doubt he’d notice one more.”
“Really? Brad Pitt? I’d go with Tom Hardy.”
I rolled my eyes as I handed her the bag—technically, she snatched it away from me—and grabbed the remote to find something else to watch. Commercials messed with my attention span. Honestly, if TV would cut out the ads, I bet shows would have more viewers.
“These cheese puffs aren’t making me happy,” I said around my orange-colored fingers between my lips. “What kind of pregnant woman doesn’t have ice cream?”
“This pregnant woman. And stop changing the subject. Does this mean you don’t plan to ever tell him? Or did you just put it on the wait list once again?”
“I don’t know why the topic of my baby’s father is so fascinating to you.”
“Because you’re so damn wishy-washy about it. It’s like a soap opera. And now that I’m home way more than usual, I need something to entertain me. Your drama does that.” She popped another orange puff into her mouth. “Plus, you’re the one who came here crying about it. I’d be a shitty friend if I didn’t keep us on topic.”
“There’s nothing more to discuss, Tatertwat.”
She laughed so hard I worried she’d choke on the crap she’d shoved in her mouth. Luckily, she didn’t. If she had, I wouldn’t know how to explain it to Jason, since he was under the impression that Tatum had been on a rather healthy diet since she found out she was pregnant.
I stared at her with a straight face, waiting for her cackles to end so I could finish speaking and, hopefully, put an end to this conversation. “Seriously, though . . . I’ve fully caught you up on all the baby-daddy drama.”
“Don’t lie. There’s still so much more to tell. Such as . . . you still haven’t admitted that you have real feelings for the guy. And that’s why you ran last week instead of telling him about the baby. It had nothing to do with catching him bending some chick over his desk, and everything to do with feeling rejected.”
Rather than look at her—knowing she’d see the truth in my eyes—I kept my attention on the television that sat on her dresser and continued to flip through the channels. I thought if I acted calm, cool, and collected, she’d believe me when I said, “I feel nothing for the heartless, arrogant, lying sack of sperm.”
“Wow, Kels . . . you almost had me. I was this close to taking you seriously.” She held her fingers so close together I couldn’t see through them.
I smiled and shook my head, wondering why I even bothered trying to keep anything from her. “What was it that gave me away?”
“‘Sack of sperm.’ If you truly hated him, you wouldn’t have wasted your time with such colorful words.” She raised one eyebrow, chin tilted to the side.
I must’ve zoned out while contemplating what she said, because I’d stopped flipping the channels without realizing it. It wasn’t until she muttered something about a house that I snapped out of it. “What?”
“Aaron’s new house,” she said, as if I knew what the hell she was talking about. When she realized how confused I was, she pointed to the screen and continued to explain. “That house, it looks like the one Aaron just bought.”
“Yeah . . . I got that part. I guess I was a bit lost at the news that Aaron bought something. Last time I checked, he was still looking.” Then again, it wasn’t like we’d spoken to each other since our big blowout on Friday.
She regarded me with a furrowed brow. “I assumed you would’ve known. He told Jason it was one you had found for him. I think he said his offer was accepted this weekend. Do you not ever see him?”
I shook my head. Because that was about all I could do. I worried that I’d cry if I attempted to form words, and if I did that, there was no way I’d be able to keep this secret from her. As much as I wanted to unload and just tell her everything, spill every buried thought, I couldn’t. No matter how I felt about Aaron, he still deserved to be the first one to know the truth.
That, and there was no way Tatum could keep it from Jason.
And Jason would never keep it from Aaron.
“It’s been hit or miss with him lately.” More miss than hit, though I hadn’t complained until now. I was still angry with him. Well, angry wasn’t the right word. Upset. Hurt. Those were much closer to how I felt about him, yet anger was the emotion I projected. “By any chance, do you happen to know which house it was that he bought? I’ve shown him a bunch.”
She hummed while keeping her eyes glued to the TV. “It’s on Relic Road. That’s all I know.”
My heart sank at the thought of Aaron buying my favorite house, the one I’d imagined us in together. And he’d done this after what had gone down in my kitchen Friday night. Part of me thought he’d done it on purpose, but the rest of me wasn’t stupid—he wouldn’t have purchased a home just to spite me.
He clearly didn’t care enough about me to do that.
I stayed for almost another hour before heading home. I told her I didn’t want to be there when Jason got off, but in truth, I needed a few moments to myself before Aaron walked through the front door. If I didn’t organize my thoughts, this would all blow up in my face.
As luck would have it, I managed to word vomit in my journal before Aaron arrived. Doing so allowed me to zero in on what my real problem was so that I wouldn’t accuse him of things he would never understand—such as purposely taking my favorite house to keep me from buying it. That wouldn’t go over so well.
“Hey,” I said, almost too quietly, when he walked in.
He stilled with his eyes locked on mine, wide with fear, as if I’d just caught him sneaking in after curfew. And when he said, “Hey,” it was hesitant and forced, obvious that he didn’t know how to respond.
“Do you have a few minutes to talk?”
Peace seemed to wash over him in that moment. It started with his eyes, softening them until I could recognize the man in front of me. The tension fell away from his shoulders, and the most relieved sigh filtered past his lips. He nodded and rasped, “Yeah.”
We moved closer to one another—me from the doorway to my room and him from the foyer—and met at the back corner of the couch. His eyes implored me to start the conversation off, so I did. Just after I gulped down my own insecurities.
“I heard you bought a house. Why didn’t you tell me?”
His gaze narrowed just slightly. “I haven’t really seen you to tell you.”
“Oh,” I whispered. It wasn’t a bad excuse, and one I probably could’ve come up with on my own. “Well, I heard it’s the one off Relic? The one I starred on the paper with the office in the front?”
“Yeah, I remember. You noted it could be an office or a nursery.”
I nearly choked when I swallowed, hearing him mention a nursery. “Yeah. That one. Why did you choose that house over any of the others?”
The easiness that he’d worn like a cape began to fall away. His spine stiffened as he stood rigid, his eyes hard and boring holes into my face. And when he spoke, his lips seemed tight, as if he had to hold himself back from saying something else. “You think I had some ulterior motive for it? Like I’d buy something that big for any other reason than I liked it and wanted it?”
&n
bsp; I shrugged. Because apparently, I hadn’t thought this through enough. “No. That’s not what I was getting at.” I blew out a huff and dropped my chin, hoping that when I opened my eyes, I could start over. “I just wanted to make sure you didn’t jump the gun and make an offer simply to move out of here faster.”
“I guess I took the whole thing more seriously after last week, but no. I didn’t buy it just to get away from you. I’ve done that just fine without packing my bags.”
That was a punch straight to the heart.
I nodded while searching for the other words I’d wanted to say. It seemed he’d knocked me off my axis and made me lose my balance. “Well, when’s closing? How much longer are you stuck with me?”
“Four weeks from today—May twenty-eighth. And don’t worry; I’ll get out of your hair soon. You won’t have to deal with me for that whole time. I just have to find somewhere to go in the meantime.”
“Don’t be ridiculous. I think we can deal with each other for another four weeks.”
He opened his mouth but quickly closed it, obviously changing his mind on what he wanted to say. After pulling in a deep breath and briefly closing his eyes, he finally said, “Thanks, Kelsey. But really, you won’t have to worry about it.”
And with that, he turned and headed for the room he occupied.
I wanted to call out to him. Beg him to come back. Tell him everything I’d bottled up inside while screaming at him for breaking my heart. But I didn’t do any of that. In fact, I didn’t do anything, period. I stood there and watched him leave. Then I went to my room, where I cried into my pillow and unloaded my every emotion onto the pages of my leather-bound therapist.
Chapter 16
Aaron
If I hadn’t already known I was a fool, this certainly proved it.
I stood on the dance floor while some hot chick rubbed her body all over me. My hands were on her hips, my eyes set on her lips—lips that promised to do bad, bad things to me. Things I wanted her to do, for no other reason than to get Kelsey out of my head. But my mind . . . well, that wasn’t on her or the things she did. Or the things she wanted to do.
No. My mind was on a certain redhead.
More specifically, on the ache in my chest she’d caused.
“My place or yours?” the woman in front of me asked with her lips to my ear so I could hear her over the music.
I smiled as I grazed her cheek with the tip of my nose and then yanked her closer to my body, her earlobe between my teeth. But I loosened my hold, knowing she’d take off running when I answered her question. “Considering I don’t have a place, I guess yours would be best.”
She didn’t run, but she did push against my chest to stare into my eyes, confusion tugging her thin brows closer together. “What do you mean, you don’t have a place?”
My smile grew larger—proving my point that something was wrong with me. “My parents kicked me out of their house. Said I was too old to live with them anymore. Who does that? I mean, I’m only thirty-two. I’m a spring chicken!” This officially made me a masochist. “Although, I’m currently staying with a friend’s younger cousin. We’ve slept together on occasion. I’ve told her I love her a couple of times. But she’s mad at me right now because she caught me fucking my secretary. Receptionist. Whatever the hell she is. I don’t even know. She’s just Noel to me. Her husband’s Pete. Really great guy. They’re trying to have a baby, but it’s not working, so she thought I could help her out.”
Her eyes grew large, assumptions dancing in the light bouncing off them. And then she ran off, exactly what I’d known she’d do. Then again, I hadn’t made it difficult. I’d almost purposely made my life sound like a fiery train wreck.
There would be others, though.
And as I sat at the bar, tipping my head back while gulping yet another beer, my next victim came to sit next to me. Where the last one was tall and leggy, this one was short and curvy. I was a lover of all types. Some guys were ass men; others cared more about the bra size. Me? I loved every part of the female body, no matter the size, shape, or color. The only part of a woman’s body I didn’t particularly care about was her feet. And this specific lady had heels that hid her toes—just the way I liked it.
“Wanna buy me a drink?” Damn, she was bold.
“Wish I could, sweetheart, but I’m broke. You see—”
And she was gone. Go figure.
“You’re wasting your time, Aaron.” Good ol’ Cheryl, always coming at the right time to say the right thing when I needed it most. “I’ve seen you with four women now, and you’ve struck out with each of them. Not saying that’s out of your skill set or anything, but it’s clear you’re doing this on purpose. Why?”
Setting my beer down, I shrugged. I knew the answer, though I chose to keep it to myself. “It seems I lost my game.”
She leaned against the bar to bring her face closer to mine and laughed. “Aaron, I hate to break it to you, but you’ve never had game. I should know—you tried it on me.”
“And it would’ve worked, too. You said so yourself.”
One brow arched high, matching the one corner of her quirked top lip. There was something she wasn’t telling me, and she had five seconds to spit it out before I’d have to drag it out of her. Finally, she shook her head and dropped her gaze to the counter. “It never would’ve worked. I thought you were a great guy—still do—but you were too nice. That’s your problem. You know that, right?”
“Do I know what? I don’t understand how being nice is a problem.”
“No.” She tucked her pink hair behind her ear and smiled sweetly at me. “Being nice is good. Being too nice is where you go from a contender to a cheerleader.”
I still didn’t understand.
Luckily, Cheryl knew me well, noticing the confusion in my eyes—or all over my face, though it was hard to tell without looking over her head into the giant mirror behind her. “You’re a great friend. And—at least for me—it was hard to see you as anything else because you were too nice.”
“You want an asshole?”
“No, but if you don’t have at least some edge to you, then you kinda come off as weak. And no woman wants to sleep with someone they assume is weak. We want passion, to feel like a guy is crazy desperate for what we have. Nice guys don’t give us that impression.”
All I could do was shrug and tip my bottle back again. She didn’t know how I was in bed because she’d never given me a shot. Much like the others. Assumptions made the world go round. And they made mine stop.
“So are you saying I need to be meaner?”
She laughed. Apparently, she’d mistaken my question for a joke. “I doubt you’ll ever be able to pull that off, Aaron.”
I tipped my chin, taking her words as a challenge. One I’d totally win. “Game on.”
Five or six beers later, I was back at the bar. Though this time, a different girl was next to me. By now, I’d lost track of how many I’d spoken to since taking Cheryl up on her dare. I just knew I’d land one eventually.
She had her hand on my thigh, working her way closer to my crotch. Lust brightened her eyes, which appeared to be purple, but there was no way that could be. Unless she wore contacts. In that case, it was totally possible for her eyes to be purple. It also made me question if she had a little extra in her bra, or if the long blond hair that draped over her shoulders was real or attached by glue. Or thread. I still didn’t know how that worked, but I’d seen my share of fake hair.
Either I’d had too much to drink, or I’d taken Cheryl’s advice too literally, because when she smiled, I found myself saying, “Your teeth are big.”
She pulled her head back and frowned. “Excuse me?”
“Every time you smile, it makes me wonder if you have any gum. Not chewing gum, but the kind that holds your teeth in your head. All I see are these big Chiclet-looking things. Nothing else. I bet you get that a lot, huh?”
“No. Actually, I don’t.”
A
hum vibrated my lips as I nodded. “You probably hang out with people who are too nice to tell ya. I’ve heard the nice ones suck in bed. Weak or some shit like that. But the mean ones, the ones who’ll tell you that you have horse teeth . . . they’ll rock your world.”
“I’m not sure that’s right.”
“Wanna test that theory out?” I wagged my brows, a wide smile burning my cheeks. “I deleted the Uber app from my phone, so it looks like you’ll have to give me a ride . . .” I leaned closer to her ear and added, “Pun intended.”
Her hand vanished from my thigh as she pulled away, repulsion dripping from every pore while she regarded me with pinched features. “I think I’ll pass. But thanks for the, uh . . . the offer.”
“Anytime, sweet cheeks.” I nodded when she slipped off the stool to leave. “She’ll be back,” I said to Cheryl, who’d watched the entire thing from her station behind the bar. “I made sure to let her know just how good I was in bed.”
“Yeah . . . you’re a real rock star, Aaron.”
I had an epiphany. “That’s it. I could totally get laid if I said I was a rock star. Good thinking, Cheryl. Now . . . I just have to find someone willing to believe it.”
“So you’ve resorted to lying?”
“You know . . .” I leaned forward as though I had a secret to share with her. “Tatum says if you don’t make all of it up, it’s called a half truth. Not a lie.”
“She sounds like she’s got it all figured out. Go for it, Aaron. Let’s see how that works for ya.” Cheryl didn’t have much faith in me, but I’d show her. Right after I finished the beer she’d just placed in front of me with a telling smile lightening her eyes.
Before I knew it, I was in a room somewhere inside the club. At least, I assumed it was in the club, considering music thumped through the walls and the couch I was horizontal on smelled like stale cigarette smoke. I’d lost count of how much I’d had to drink, but at some point, I’d taken shots. Lots of shots. And just like they always said . . . beer before liquor, never been sicker.
The Secret Baby Page 18
