“Hi, Kane. We’re almost there. Just wanted to let you know,” she told me.
“Ah. I took the dayshift at the ER. I forgot to text you guys.” I felt bad about forgetting that Fox would be coming home.
“Dad, can I come up there and hang out with you today?” I heard him ask in the background.
“Seems he heard me.” I loved when he came to work with me. “Sure can, buddy. Can you drop him off here, Aunt Nancy?”
“Yeah,” she said. “We’re a few minutes away. I’ll call you when we send him in, so you can meet him in the lobby.”
“’K.” I heard my name called over the speaker system and ended the call.
Hurrying to the ER, I found a nurse waiting in my office. “Hey, Dr. Price. We’ve got a twenty-six-year-old female in room one. She’s got a laceration on her left palm. It’s approximately one inch in length and fairly deep. She said she got it at work last night.”
“Last night?” I asked.
“Yes, sir,” she replied with a nod. “She wants stitches, but I told her that we probably couldn’t do them now. It’s just too late.”
“So, what’s the problem?” I took a seat in my chair, thinking there wasn’t any reason for me to see this patient at all.
Her hands went to her hips, clearly annoyed. “The problem is that she wanted me to ask a real doctor.”
“And you looked at the laceration, right? If you think it’s too late, then go back there and tell her that a real doctor has told you that stitches can only be done within a few hours. After that, all we can do is use butterfly bandages on the wound.” I opened the computer to get back to seeing what had happened the night before.
“Will do, Dr. Price.” She left the office, and I went back to checking things out.
Not five minutes had passed when my aunt called me back, telling me to go to the lobby to meet Fox. Hopping up, I went to get my son, happy that he was back and would be spending the day with me.
When he spotted me, he ran my way. “Dad!”
“Hey, you!” I went to him, grabbing him up and hugging him before putting him back on the ground. “Boy, you got some sun.” More small freckles peppered the top of his nose, and there were some on his cheeks now too.
“Yeah, I did. We played at the beach all day yesterday. It was fun.” He followed me as we headed to the office. “And I saw a shark too.”
“You did?” I asked with enthusiasm. “Up close?”
“Nah,” he said as he waved his hand in the air. “It was really far away. And it was just the fin. Uncle James said it was probably a dolphin, but I was pretty sure it was a shark. I got out of the water to be on the safe side.”
“Good thinking. Better safe than sorry, I always say.” We turned the corner to the ER wing, and I pushed the double doors open.
“I know that.” He laughed. “That’s what I told everyone when they laughed at me. I said, better safe than sorry. What if it had been a shark? Bet no one would’ve been laughing then!”
“Smart thinking.” I noticed a young woman up ahead at the nurses’ desk. Bent over, she looked like she was signing papers. “So, what else happened in Florida, Fox?” I couldn’t seem to take my eyes off the woman.
“Well, I walked on the beach and found lots of seashells.” He tugged at my white jacket to make me look at him. “Don’t worry. I brought them all home to put in our shell collection outside.”
“Great.” I looked away from him to look at the woman again. “We can add them to the garden outside when we get back home this evening. Doesn’t that sound like fun?”
“Yeah, it does.” He tugged my jacket again, and I looked down at him. “Can we maybe cook some hotdogs outside too? I really wanted a hotdog this whole weekend, and Aunt Nancy wouldn’t let me. She says they’re nasty and she won’t feed me nasty food.”
“Well, some of them are. But the ones I buy aren’t. We can make some hotdogs on the outdoor grill.” I looked back at the woman, who had by now straightened up and shook out her hair.
Long dark hair cascaded down her back. Dark blue streaks ran through it.
It’s her.
It had to be the waitress from the bar.
She was talking to the nurse and raised her hands as she said something. There was a bandage wrapped around her left one.
The patient with the cut. The hand she’d cut at work the night before.
It has to be her.
“Dad, the door’s right here!” Fox shouted, as I walked right past it in my distracted state.
The woman turned around at the sound of Fox’s shouting. The world around me seemed to stop as our eyes met.
Zandra Larkin!
Chapter 9
Zandra
Like a deer in the headlights, I stared at Kane Price.
This cannot be happening!
It had to be a dream. Or more precisely, a nightmare.
I had never, ever wanted to see this man again. Not after what I’d gone through because of him.
Not that it was his fault, really. I’d been the one who’d told him there wasn’t any need for him to use a condom, even though I hadn’t been on any type of birth control. I’d never faulted Kane, or myself, for that matter, for what had happened to that baby boy we’d made.
Seeing him again, with his muscular body that showed just how much he’d grown up, sent chills through my veins. I knew that body rippled with every little movement he made.
Kane Price is standing perfectly still, staring into my eyes, and I can’t move or even blink.
My mind went back to the night he’d changed my life.
***
His eyes had been glued to mine as he pushed his hard cock into my virgin pussy. Gasping with the intrusion, pain ripped through me. And that pain would stay with me—not in my pulsing body, but in my heart—forever.
A few small tears fell down my cheeks. He kissed them away, soothing me with his body and his whispered word. “Hush now, Zandra. The hard part will be over soon. It’ll feel good in a minute, you’ll see. You can trust me, baby.”
No one had ever called me baby before. The way he said it stirred something inside of me. “I trust you, Kane.”
“Good girl.” He moved slowly, pulling his cock almost all the way out before pushing it back in with one smooth stroke.
Biting my lip as I tried not to think about the white-hot fire that blazed in my most sensitive parts, I got lost in the green depths of his gorgeous eyes. “Kane, has anyone ever told you that you’re really beautiful?”
The way his lips curved into a sexy smile made my heart pound. “No. No one has ever used that word to describe me. How about you? Has anyone ever told you just how beautiful you are?”
“No.” I ran one hand across his back, feeling the tight muscles there. “Are you telling me that you think I’m beautiful, Kane Price?”
His lips barely touched mine as he whispered, “You are more than beautiful. I’m finding it hard to find the right words to describe the way I think about you, baby.”
I didn’t want to think about Kane and how many girls he’d been with before, but the fact was, he was kind of known as a flirt. “I bet you say that to all the girls.”
Pulling his head up, his lips pressed together, forming a straight line. He moved his cock with ease now, and I was feeling more pleasure than pain. “Zandra, I don’t think about you the way I think about anyone else. You’re different.”
Feeling embarrassed, I closed my eyes. “I know I am.”
Brushing his lips across my cheek, he said, “In a good way. A great way.” He gave me one long kiss that sent electricity through me. Somehow, my body heated up even more, and we moved together now, my body finally having adjusted to his size.
Although I had never been intimate with anyone before, I found myself moving in ways I didn’t know I could. My body just knew what to do. My legs moved to wrap around him, holding him close to me. My hands wandered to every place I could touch.
Moving his mouth a
way from mine, he kissed a line straight up my neck before finding the spot just behind my ear. His teeth grazed my soft flesh before biting down, gently at first and then harder as he moved faster.
With no idea how just a little bite in that place could affect me so much, all I could do was moan with how wonderful it all felt as he moved his hard cock in and out of me.
“Kane!” I gasped as my body began to shudder. “I think I’m about to …”
“Do it, baby,” came his growled words. “I want to feel you come all over my cock. I’m aching to feel your tight pussy clenching all around my hard dick. Give it all to me, baby. Just like you did when I ate your sweet pussy. Give me all you’ve got, Zandra. I want it all. Every last drop. And then I’ll give you mine.”
Shrieking with the release—the second orgasm he’d given me that night—I let it all loose, just like he’d told me to. At that moment, I would have given him anything he wanted. I was his for the taking. As long as he wanted me, I would belong to him. He’d owned me then.
I had no idea just how much he actually would own me—or how much of my past would belong to him, at least. No idea of what was to come for me and the little boy we were in the middle of creating.
With the thought of the baby I’d given away, my memory faded quickly.
On Kane’s left stood a boy. Dark hair covered his head, and green eyes looked at me.
Kane’s eyes.
I watched as the two came closer to me as I stood there frozen in place.
“Is that really you?” Kane asked me.
All I could do was nod. A lump had formed in my throat that made it impossible for me to say a single word. My eyes turned to the boy who walked next to him.
“Hi, I’m Fox.” He waved at me as they came my way.
Light freckles spread across the bridge of his nose, much the same way mine had back before I started using sunscreen every day to keep my skin freckle-free and hopefully wrinkle-free. The boy reminded me of someone, but I couldn’t quite place him.
Swallowing the lump down so I didn’t seem like such a freaking idiot, I tried to smile at the boy, who looked to be about the same age as the one I’d had to give up.
“Hi there, Fox. That’s a cool name.” I looked at Kane. “And is he yours?”
He nodded. “He is.”
Well, wasn’t he just a procreation machine. He must’ve gotten another girl pregnant about the same time he’d knocked me up. And by the looks of Fox, the mother must’ve looked a bit like me too. Seemed I hadn’t been as special as he’d said I was that night—clearly, he just had a type.
Before Kane had fallen asleep that night, he’d held me in his arms. He’d told me he wasn’t about to let me get away from him. But when he’d fallen asleep, I’d gotten up, dressed, and left him there on the bed he’d told me was his best friend Rocco’s. The bed we’d made our son on. The son he had no idea existed.
“Leave it to you to come up with such a cool name, Kane.” I thought better about what I’d said. “Or perhaps it was your wife’s creative thinking?”
“My dad’s not married. He’s never been married.” Fox looked up at his father. “It’s just him and me. That’s the way it’s been for a while now.”
Kane put his hand on his little boy’s shoulder. “Well, it’s not exactly just you and me, Fox. We’ve got Aunt Nancy and Uncle James too, you know.”
“But they don’t live with us,” Fox said as he shook his head.
Kane looked back at me. “I saw you at Mynt last night. The back of you, anyway. The blue streaks in your hair gave you away today.”
“You did?” I asked, acting like I didn’t know. “Why didn’t you come say hello?” I felt a little guilty for lying, but I didn’t know what else to do. I couldn’t tell him that I’d seen him too and had hidden from him.
“First of all, I had no idea it was you.” Kane shifted his weight then crossed his arms over his chest. I could see the outline of some pretty massive biceps and felt wet heat pooling in my nether regions.
“You didn’t?” I asked, as if I hadn’t known that already either. “Well, then no wonder you didn’t say anything to me.”
“But I wanted to.” He smiled at me, and I nearly swooned with desire for him.
Oh, if I could only have one more night with this man!
“You did?” I asked as I clasped my hands in front of me to keep them from shaking. “And why is that?”
That smile turned from charming to sexy with one easy move that I was certain he could make millions off of if he knew how to teach it. “There was just something about you that piqued my interest. But you walked into the back, behind the bar, and never came out. I waited and waited, and then I finally asked the bartender where you’d gone. He told me if you were still back there, then you were with the manager. Like, with the manager.” He paused for a second, looking me up and down, and I felt that look from the tips of my toes to the roots of my hair. “So, are you?”
“Am I what?” I’d gotten a little lost in his eyes while he talked.
That heartbreaking smile got wider. “With the manager?”
“Oh, God, no.” I shook my head. “He’s not my type.”
You know my type, Kane. My type is you.
“No?” he asked, then nodded. “Good to know. So, what brought you back in Charleston? Better yet, where have you been all this time? And why did you leave in the first place?”
I knew he would ask the hard questions!
“Long story.” My brain hurt as I tried to think of what to say. “Another time, maybe.”
“Definitely,” he said with a nod. “Come back to my office with us. I want to catch up. And you’re not getting out of here without giving me your number, either.”
He wants my number!
“I don’t know.” I looked at the clear glass sliding doors that would lead me outside.
I should really get away from him before I blurt out the secret I’ve kept from him and everyone else for nearly eleven years.
“I do.” In typical Kane fashion, he reached out and took my hand, tugging me along with him. “You’re not getting away from me as easily this time.”
Fox trotted right along with us on the other side of his father. “So, how do you know my dad?”
With no idea how to answer that question, I looked at Kane, who helped me out. “School, Fox.”
“Oh, I get it now. You went to school with Dad.” Fox nodded, looking much older and wiser than his young years. “Did you know my mom?”
Kane patted his son on the back. “Let’s not go there, Fox. Not right now.”
Kane had to have gotten another girl pregnant right around the time he’d gotten me that way. I knew that now without a single doubt. And she’d gone to the same school as us too, apparently.
Now I really didn’t want him to know about the son we’d made.
How humiliating!
“Is his mother still in the picture?” I whispered to Kane as we went through a door that took us to a long hallway.
Shaking his head, Kane said, “Nah.”
I found his answer pretty vague. But how could I say anything about that when I was being so vague too? “Oh.”
Fox opened one of the many doors that lined the hallway. “Here’s the office the doctors use when they work here. Dad really works at the clinic next door.”
“I can’t believe you’re a doctor, Kane. That’s such an amazing accomplishment. And you’re still so young, too.” I was thoroughly impressed, and a bit envious, too.
What could I have become had I not been shamed by my own parents, called an evil sinner every day for two hellish years, and made to give up our son?
Kane gestured to a chair, and I took the seat he’d offered. “Well, I found motivation in my son here. He came into my life at a young age, and all I wanted to do was accomplish my career aspirations as fast as I could. That way I could take care of him the way I thought he deserved.”
“I had no idea you were o
n becoming a doctor.” I crossed my legs, bouncing my foot to help release some of the nervous tension that had built up with our meeting.
This was never supposed to happen. Yet there I was, sitting in his office, looking at the little boy he’d made with someone else—and had been able to keep and raise, too.
He could’ve been a father to our son. But my fucking parents had taken it all away from him and me both. He had been a standup guy. He had taken on the responsibility of having a baby. And he’d made something of himself too.
We had both been robbed, and so had our son. And all because my godforsaken parents thought what we’d done was evil, impure, and one of the biggest sins one could commit.
It only served to make me hate them even more than I already did.
“Do you have any kids?” his son asked me as he sat on a sofa, smiling away at me.
“No,” came my quick reply.
Kane took over the questioning, “Married?”
“No.” I shrugged. “No one has ever asked.”
“So, never married.” Kane nodded as he leaned back on the desk, not six inches away from me. My body craved his. Every last part of me wanted him.
“No. And have you ever gotten close to getting married?” I asked as I tried not to look him up and down, very aware that I shouldn’t be looking at him with so much lust in front of his young son.
“Nope.” His reply filled me with the hope that I might get to feel his body all over mine again. How would he feel against me now that he had the body of a man?
“Never?” I asked as I went ahead and let my eyes wander over him.
My God, I want him!
“Not ever.” He reached out, taking my chin in his large hand. “Will you be staying in Charleston long?”
Now that I knew he still lived here, I had no idea if staying in Charleston was a smart thing to do. “I’m not sure. I’m kind of a drifter.”
Furrowed brows only served to make him look even hotter. “And why’s that?”
Because if I’m around you, I might spill the beans and you’ll end up hating me, that’s why not.
But there was no way in hell I’d say such a thing. “Can’t say. I just like to see new places, I guess,” I said instead.
Dirty Little Secret_A Secret Baby-Second Chance Romance Page 7
