“That’s amazing,” I remarked, and Nathan nodded, still looking down at me with that odd expression on his face.
“Yeah,” he replied, his voice low. “Amazing.”
Chapter Six
Nathan
Okay, what exactly the fuck did I think I was doing?
Because what had just happened there wasn’t okay. It just wasn’t. I didn’t care how personal our relationship was, how intense, I had to keep that girl at arm’s length and make sure I didn’t get too drawn in to this chemistry that I couldn’t deny between us.
It was the week before Christmas, and I had gone to drop off Jen’s check. We could have just wired the money to her, but I wanted to do it in person – I cracked a couple of jokes about being her Santa Claus, but she pointed out that she was hardly the Virgin Mary and we shared a laugh over the phone. That was where it had started. That was the first place I should have shut that shit all the way down and didn’t.
I arrived at her set of dorms – she was in her senior year, so her dorms were a little away from campus. The place was decorated inside with a few Christmas decorations that looked as though they’d been thrown up at the last minute – a bauble or two here, a limp-looking Christmas tree, a few strings of fairy lights strewn about here and there. It was a far cry from the carefully-curated Christmas decorations that Sophia had filled our apartment with, but I had to admit I kind of liked this slightly run-down version a little better; it felt a lot more authentic than the expensive perfection that adorned my home, and I felt a twinge of longing as I looked around the place. I wouldn’t have minded spending Christmas here, or at least somewhere a bit more like it.
Jen was sitting in a chair in the lobby, a textbook propped up on her lap. There was a small furrow in her brow as she read furiously, and I paused for a moment just to take her in – she looked really cute like that, I couldn’t deny it. I pushed that thought from my head and approached, and she looked up at me and a big, broad smile broke over her face.
“Oh, hey!” She exclaimed, leaping to her feet as though she was pleased to see me. “Come on, let’s head down to my dorm room.”
“Can’t we do it here?” I asked, looking around, and she planted her hands on her hips and looked up at me.
“What do you think the rest of the dorm would think if they caught be taking cash from an older man they’d never seen before?” She pointed out, and I held my hands up.
“Fair point,” I conceded, and let her lead me down a set of stairs in the direction of her dorm room. I caught the eye of a girl passing from the corridor through to the kitchen, and quickly averted my gaze.
“Won’t it be weirder that I’m in your actual room?” I pointed out, but we were already inside by then, and she pushed the door shut behind me and flopped down on the bed.
“Like any of them will notice,” she replied cheerfully. “I mean, there as involved in their studies as I am. I’m not sure they’d noticed if this entire building tipped into a fault line.”
“Right,” I nodded, and she gestured to the slightly rickety desk chair behind me. It was draped with a few strands of tinsel, as though she wanted to get into the Christmas spirit and this was the best way she had been able to come up with to do so given her time constraints. I sat down, and reached into my pocket.
“Merry Christmas,” I joked as I handed her the check; she took it, glanced at the number on the paper, and closed her eyes for a moment.
“You have no idea how much of a relief it is to actually be holding this in my hands,” she sighed.
“Just in time for the Christmas break, right?” I grinned. “What are you going to do with it?”
“I’m going to go home and visit my mom for a week or two,” she replied. “And then I’m going to put all of this towards paying my rent in this place and covering my tuition fees for the next semester.”
“And here I was thinking all college kids thought about was booze and parties,” I teased, and she rolled her eyes at me.
“Back when you were studying, maybe,” she shot back playfully. “And how long ago was that?”
“Hey, I’m not that old,” I protested.
“This century, then?”
I laughed. It felt good to laugh – things had been tense at home with Sophia for reasons I couldn’t quite put my finger on recently, and I had been all buttoned-up and out of shape. But being around Jen felt easy. My eyes drifted down to her stomach; she wasn’t showing yet, but it wouldn’t take long.
“How are you doing?” I asked, gesturing down to her midsection. She glanced down and placed her hands on her stomach, smiling slightly.
“I think everything’s going well in that department,” she replied. “I feel kind of funny and I have to keep reminding myself, hey, it’s because you’re pregnant, dumbass. I think I’ll miss not being able to drink over Christmas but I guess I’ll manage for one year.”
“It’ll be worth it,” I assured her, and she nodded, her gaze meeting mine.
“Already is,” she replied, and I found myself staring deep into her eyes – it took me a second to realize it, too, but I was leaning forward, closing the gap between us, making it so we were only a foot or two apart in that small room. Her lips parted slightly and her gaze drifted down to my mouth, and I found myself wondering what it would be like to feel those soft lips against mine-
I blinked and pulled away, and she cast her gaze in the other direction. We had both felt it, and we both knew that we couldn’t indulge it any further than we already had.
“I should get going,” I sprang to my feet before I could spend another second fantasizing about what it would be like to make out with Jen on the very bed she was sitting on. I hadn’t done a whole lot of making out in college – too busy working and focusing on getting the business off the ground – and some stupid part of me was eager to make up for lost time. Well, that part could go fuck itself.
“Yeah, probably,” she nodded, not making eye contact with me as she got to her feet and pulled open the door. “Thanks for dropping off the check.”
“Yeah, not a problem”, I replied, pausing for a moment in the doorway. “Uh, merry Christmas?”
“Merry Christmas,” she finally looked up and into my eyes, her gaze meeting mine, and I felt that pull towards her once more. It felt almost supernatural, that draw to be near her – I wanted to lean down and catch her face in mine and pull her close, to inhale her scent. But instead, I turned and walked out the door, heading back up the stairs and hurrying to my car, putting as much space between us as I could. I shook my head as I slipped into the front seat and pulled away from the building. What the fuck was I thinking?
That was all that was going through my head as I drove home. I needed to get back to my wife, to remind myself and her what we were doing together in the first place. Yes, things had been a little off recently, but with the stresses of the pregnancy and the holiday season backing up on top of one another, that wasn’t really a surprise. I needed to see her, to take her out and romance her like I should have been doing all along. I needed to get that Jen girl out of my head for good.
I arrived back at the apartment, and headed up the stairs, taking them two at a time; I knew I was back a little earlier than she was expecting me, but maybe that would just add to the spontaneity of it. I pushed open the door, and looked around the apartment – at the tree with it’s glossy branches dripping with finery, at the stockings over the fireplace for show.
“Sophia?” I called into the apartment, and marched towards the bedroom, where she usually hung out. “Sophia, where are you?”
And that’s when I pushed open the door, and found myself faced with the sight of my wife in bed with another man.
Chapter Seven
Jen
I headed up the steps to the door of the apartment, and paused for a moment before I knocked. Was this a good idea? Probably not. But I had to take matters into my own hands. I hadn’t heard from either of them since Nathan had dropped off
that check before Christmas, and I had this doomed feeling that they were about to try and stick me with this damn baby.
I placed my hand on my stomach and hesitated for a second. I was just starting to show now, nothing that I couldn’t dismiss as a little bit of overindulgence of my mom’s famous apple pie, but I knew what it really was. I had felt really funny all the over the holiday season, spending most of my time tucked up in bed and pretending that the last few weeks of the semester had just really caught up on me, but I knew it was the pregnancy settling in. It was an odd, unsettling thought, that this pregnancy was actually going down, that there was a little person growing inside of me. But I tried not to focus on it too much; I was going to be giving it away to its real mom and dad as soon as it was born, and I didn’t want to get too attached. I was an incubator, nothing more, and I needed to drill that into my head.
I lifted my hand and knocked on the door. I had talked my way into the apartment building and past the doorman after getting the address for this place from the check Nathan had dropped off the month before; I needed to see them, to figure out what was going on. They’d been so hands-on before that it seemed strange for them to suddenly appear not to give a shit. My mind had drifted back to that argument I’d caught them having in the doctor’s office when I had been implanted, and I had this sneaking suspicion that maybe it was indicative of more than I would have liked it to be.
I heard some movement inside the apartment, and a few moments later Nathan opened the door. But he looked different than the last time I saw him – he had grown out his beard a little and his hair was longer, and he was dressed down compared to the usual suit and tie I saw him in. I raised my eyebrows in surprise.
“Hey,” I greeted him. “I hadn’t heard from either of you in a while, so I thought that I-”
“There’s no “us” anymore,” he shook his head, standing aside so I could enter the room. My heart dropped.
“What do you mean?” I asked, looking up at him nervously; his shoulders sagged and he flopped down on a couch in the center of the room. The place was gorgeous, and still adorned with Christmas decorations – I wondered how long they’d been up, how long he intended to leave them like that. A tree had started to wilt slightly in the corner, and it looked a little ridiculous.
“I mean, Sophia’s gone,” he replied.
“What happened to her?” I pressed, fear flooding through me.
“She tripped and fell on to the dick of one of my senior advisers,” he replied, letting out a mirthless snort as he spoke.
“Oh, shit,” I sighed deeply. “I’m so sorry.”
“Don’t be,” he shook his head. “I’m glad she’s gone. Things weren’t working out between us, she needed to go.”
“And what does that mean for me?” I asked bluntly. I knew that I was jumping straight to the point, but it was the most important part of the equation for me. I needed to know what was going on with the baby in my belly.
“We’re not sure yet,” He sighed. “I need to talk it all out with her. I think we’ll…I think we’ll split custody. But we both still want it.”
“Okay,” I let out a relieved breath. I wasn’t going to be stuck with this thing. And now that was out of the way, I could help but look around at this place with a frown.
“How long has it been since you had anyone over?” I asked, and he shrugged and shook his head.
“I have no idea,” he replied. “Things have been kind of…drifting the last month.”
He raised his gaze and looked up at me, and finally managed a smile.
“Hey, you want me to cook you something?”
My stomach grumbled – I had been studying all day before I came up here, and now I thought about it I was totally starving.
“Yeah, I could go for something to eat,” I nodded cautiously. I knew that now that I understood what was going on I should have been out of there, but I was still drawn to Nathan – and now he was single. I couldn’t help but think back to that moment we’d shared in the dorm room, that second where I had been totally sure that he was going to kiss me and totally sure that I wanted him to. I wondered if he ever thought of that, too. Probably not – he was rich, handsome, and recently single, I was sure he had dozens of eligible young women throwing themselves at him, if he was even looking for something like that.
He got to his feet and headed over to the kitchen, pulling open the fridge to look at what was inside. He ran his hands through his hair, and I glanced over at him again; I had to admit, in some ways, his new look was kind of working for him. I liked the longer hair, even if it wasn’t exactly office-ready, and the beard made him look a little more rugged. Or maybe that was more about the muscles peeping out from beneath the bottom of his t-shirt as he bent over. I bit my lip; maybe it was just pregnancy hormones, but I felt this sudden surge of desire for him that I hadn’t felt for anyone in a long time. I tried to remind myself of Damien, of what happened the last time I let myself fall for an older man, but this was different. So obviously and completely different.
“I could make you some pasta with alfredo sauce,” he called out to me. “Or steak with some potatoes and greens…”
My stomach turned as he spoke, and I felt this wave of nausea course over me. I closed my eyes and waited for it to recede.
“I think I’m going to have to stick with something a bit lighter for now,” I called back. “My stomach doesn’t like the thought of any of that.”
He stood back up, looked over at me, and grinned sympathetically.
“I have crackers?” He offered, and I nodded.
“That sounds perfect,” I replied, and soon enough he had set me up with a glass of water and some crackers to settle my stomach.
“Is that better?” He asked, cocking his head at me as he sat himself down next to me on the couch. I nodded.
“Immeasurably,” I sighed. “Thank you.”
I paused for a moment and found myself looking at him. Those pregnancy hormones felt pretty freaking logical in that second; in fact, I had to fight the urge to lean forward and kiss him right there and then. Good thing he didn’t have pregnancy brain to contend with. One of us was acting sane, at least.
“So, how was your holiday season?” I asked, trying to think of something to talk about, a reason for me to stay. He shrugged.
“Actually, I went back to spend it with my family,” he replied. “It was better than anything we had planned for up in the city, I can tell you. It was kind of nice to get away for a while, gave me time to get my head together after…you know.”
“After everything,” I euphemised. He nodded, but there wasn’t much sadness in his eyes, as though he didn’t care that much that his wife had cheated on him. He looked more angry than upset, that flash of annoyance passing over his face as he was reminded of her once more.
“How about you?” He asked, and I shrugged.
“Oh, it was a little tough keeping all of this quiet from the family, but it was worth it,” I replied. “I ate a lot, which was great. And actually had some time away from studying. But I was thinking about…you know, you guys a lot.”
“I was thinking of you too,” he remarked, and his voice dropped a little, and I could tell from the look in his eyes that he had gone back in his mind to that moment in my dorm room, the one I had so successfully written off as nothing. And I was back there too, the feel of his gaze on me intoxicating, the way his eyes drifted down to my lips heating something up deep inside me and getting me going once more. He leaned over, and he tucked his hand beneath my head, and before I knew it, his mouth was on mine at last.
Chapter Eight
Nathan
As soon as my lips touched hers, I knew that any sense of restraint I might have had up until that point was out the window. I couldn’t hold myself back and didn’t want to – at last, the two of us were finally acknowledging what went between us, and I didn’t want to waste another second pretending that this wasn’t real. I wrapped my arms around her and
pulled her on top of me, and she fell down there with a little squeal and placed her small hands on my chest to steady herself. She smiled down at me, desire flashing in her eyes, before she stroked my hair back from my face and kissed me once more.
There weren’t words for what was happening between us; there were only touches, tastes, sounds, the feeling of her body squirming against my own. I could feel the smallest bump, a little reminder that yes, she was actually pregnant with my baby, and somehow that only made me want her more. I knew it was crazy, but I felt this connection to her, this deep and profound desire that seemed to overwhelm every other part of my logical thinking brain and wipe it clean. It was just the two of us, like this, holding each other and touching each other and needing each other.
I couldn’t remember a time with Sophia that had felt anything like this, not one bit – with her, it had always felt a little perfunctory, even though she was technically gorgeous. I never felt this chemistry, this slightly messy feeling of coming unspooled at her every touch. I liked it. It scared me a little, but I liked it.
We made out for God knows how long – if that’s all she’d wanted to do that night, I would have been more than happy to indulge her, our tongues meeting and our tastes mingling as her lips moved against mine. But soon, she seemed to grow impatient and ache for more, and I found that my cock was rock-hard beneath my jeans. She slid her hand down, a little nervously, pulling back and opening her eyes so that she could look at me, and gripped my erection through my jeans. I sucked in a sharp breath, the feeling of her small hand against my package getting me even harder. I mimicked her motion, sliding my hand down and between her legs, pushing up her skirt and sliding my fingers into her panties and finding her wet and ready and waiting for me. She closed her eyes and bit her lip and ground her hips down, against my hand, her mouth opening as she lost herself to the pleasure of it. I could easily have laid there all night and watched her use me as nothing more than a toy for her orgasm, but she wanted more.
The Holiday Surprise: A Billionaire Surrogate Baby Romance Page 3
