Accidental Baby: A Billionaire Secret Baby Romance

by Lara Swann

  I should just stay away from him. I should want to stay away from him.

  I end up flopping down on the bed, throwing my head back into the soft mattress and sighing.

  That’s the problem. I don’t feel like I want to do that at all.

  Even after all that, I can still feel the way his hot gaze roamed over my body. I can still feel all the things it stirred in me - all the response I wanted to give. Part of me knows that if we’d gotten any closer…if I hadn’t been quite so sober and awake and aware while he was so totally the opposite…it would have ended very differently.

  And that stupid part of me wishes it had. That I’d had another night of crazy hot sex and mind-blowing orgasms and I’d finally satisfied some of that craving I’ve felt whenever he’s in the room.

  Damn it. I guess this is why people go for those asshole playboy types, right? They’re just damn good at sex.

  My skin still feels sensitized just from the idea of his touch, my core is still aching and empty and wanting the kind of satisfaction I’ve only ever had once.

  I wonder idly whether Vicki feels like this too sometimes, or whether she just goes after - and gets - enough good sex that she never finds herself aching for someone stupid and out of reach. My hand wanders over to my cell phone as I think it, curious about what she’d say to that whole encounter, but then I hesitate.

  For some reason, I don’t feel like telling Vicki.

  Instead, I close my eyes and wonder whether Damien is back in his room, doing exactly the same thing.

  I wonder how much of this he’ll remember in the morning - and whether it will become another awkward thing between us, or we’ll be able to pretend it never happened.

  And for me, it will just be pretending - he might be drunk enough to forget about tonight, but there’s no way I’ll be able to.

  Especially as I turn over and sigh again, far too much of me starting to wish I’d taken him up on the offer as my mind drifts - even if he was drunk, and probably a jerk, and it didn’t feel right even beyond him being my boss.

  It would have given me some of what I’m craving. Right?

  How is it you were fine with intermittent sex for all those years…and now, suddenly, you feel so starved for it?

  Chapter Twelve

  Damien

  I wake up blearily the next morning, my head pounding and my mouth feeling like sandpaper - though I barely notice any of that, as images of the night before flash through my mind.

  I didn’t…

  I groan as I half-remember the night out - the different bars I’d tried, the couple of girls who had been so damn insistent on following along with me - the way that drove me back to the hotel, to the woman I hadn’t been able to stop thinking about…and to that awkward conversation with Ava.

  Not really a conversation. More like a drunken come-on.

  Fuck. You fucking idiot.

  I rub a hand over my eyes, wishing I was misremembering something, but I’m pretty sure I’m not.

  This week has been intense - the discussions with Thompson, the back-and-forth between Prestige and Two-Bit Designs that I’ve been in the middle of, exploring New York City for the first time - and yeah…having Ava right down the corridor in the hotel.

  So close, and so…impossible.

  I’ve felt the tension and desire of that building all week and last night…well, with all the drinks and excitement and adrenaline, last night was something I should have seen coming.

  I groan again, throwing my head back against the pillow and keeping my eyes tightly closed. I don’t want to think about how the daylight is going to hit me when I open them - or when I have to go out there and face what a dick I made of myself last night.

  I don’t even want to consider what she thinks of me now.

  I can’t remember it all, but the snatches of conversation, followed by my own confusion and botched attempts to reassure her that what I was doing last night was something more than a drunken attempt to sleep with her, is enough to have my guts roiling.

  I brought her all the way out here and then did that.

  Talk about a case for sexual harassment. Not that I’m really worried about that.

  No, all Ava is going to want after last night is to be as far away from me as possible - that’s what bothers me.

  Before I can even start to think about how I’m ever going to apologize for all of that, my cell phone buzzes on the bedside table. I reach for it instinctively, used to checking it at all times of day and night, whatever condition I’m in. And besides, I think I want the distraction.

  It’s hard to open my eyes and it hurts when I do, but I try to blink away the remnants of sleep, rubbing at them as my cell phone comes slowly into focus.

  Katy: Meeting at 9am. Where the hell are you?

  I blink.

  Meeting at 9am? What the hell?

  We don’t have anything until midday. Even hungover and half-asleep, I know that. I checked. I would never have drunk so much if I had an early meeting…

  Me: What? Meeting at 12pm.

  The response comes back almost before mine is sent.

  Katy: Do you even check email anymore? It got moved. You’ve got 30 min, dumbass.

  I stare at the message a moment too long, the hangover delaying the surge of adrenaline I should be feeling. Instead, I just get a slow sense of dread.

  I tab over to emails - and sure enough, there it is.

  One of our final negotiation meetings with Thompson, rescheduled to 9am.

  Shit. Oh fucking hell. No-no-no.

  My brain barely gets a chance to come up with the expletives before I’m forcing myself to roll out of bed, on pure instinct alone. The thumping in my head only gets worse, but I ignore it as I try to get my sluggish body to move faster. A wave of nausea rolls through me and I wonder what the hell I drank last night. I’m not usually this affected the morning after.

  The idle thought that I’m kind of glad Ava refused me so thoroughly flashes across my mind - I wouldn’t have wanted to be with her in that state anyway. It wouldn’t have been right. Not if—

  For fuck’s sake. Stop thinking about Ava.

  The internal growl doesn’t do much to help me, but I stumble into the bathroom anyway and then into the shower. It’s not until I turn it on that I realize I’m still in boxer shorts and I try to tug them off as they start to get soaked through. The sudden blast of warm water does nothing to wake me up and it’s not until I’m leaning against the tiled wall and letting it lull me that I realize it’s not going to work.

  With a grimace I turn the dial to cold and then gasp at the sudden change in temperature. Goose pimples break out all along my skin, but I force myself to stand in it and try to wash off any remnants of last night.

  By the time I step back out, I almost feel human again - even if the pounding in my head has turned into a splitting, freezing kind of pain. A quick check of the clock speeds me up and this time I’m actually awake enough to move a little faster.

  Even so, by the time I’m dressed and have everything together, I know it’s going to be tight.

  Damn it. The hotel is close to the office, that was the point of it, but even so it would take almost that long to cross through Manhattan.

  I stop thinking about it and just concentrate on moving - something that, right now, actually does take all my focus.

  By the time I get to the office, I’m running through the main things we need to discuss, trying to remember exactly what all my carefully constructed arguments were and the tumbling-roiling feeling in my stomach is trying to tell me that we’re screwed.

  You’ve done harder things in worse circumstances before. You can do this one too.

  The look Katy gives me when she finally sees me doesn’t do anything to boost my confidence.

  “Oh my god, Damien, you look awful.” She stares at me, obviously aghast. “Please don’t tell me you—”

  “You can come through now.”

  Thompson’s secretary
comes over to us before she can finish the low-pitched comment and instead she just sends me an agitated look.

  I nod to the secretary - Julia, I think her name is - but don’t risk saying anything. Right now, I need all my limited brainpower for the negotiation that’s about to take place.

  Fucking hell, how did this get moved to 9am?! The guy is a tyrant…

  I tell myself that - and it might even be true - but it’s mostly bullshit. There’s only one person to blame for this mess right now.

  “Thompson is going to know the second he looks at you that—” Katy is muttering to me as we walk through the office, stopping anytime someone comes the other way.

  Not helpful.

  “Nothing we can do about it now.” I mutter back, sending her a frown that in no way matches her own.

  We get into the meeting a moment later and any other private words we might have exchanged are delayed. Not ended, that’s for certain - just delayed - because I know this is something Katy is going to continue later.

  I just wish I thought it was going to be a few days later instead of a few hours when yelling will probably still hurt my head.

  God damn it, after all those lectures about exactly this happening as well…

  The next hour and a half is spent furiously trying to defend our position from a team that suddenly seem to be looking to screw us over more than anything. I don’t know whether it’s just my slightly altered state interpreting things differently, but it feels nothing like the mostly amicable negotiations of the last few days.

  Thompson doesn’t even show up - and, from the way things go, I finally have my answer: that’s obviously a bad thing.

  Even worse, from the comments they’re making, it’s pretty easy to guess why the tone has changed.

  ‘We’re just looking for a little…insurance…in case this doesn’t work out, or your team can’t deliver.’

  ‘It’s hard to guarantee anything with a company so…young…and still gaining experience. You can never quite tell with these things - just how…dedicated…they really are.’

  Quickly followed by enough platitudes that they’re just talking ‘in general’ and about ‘good business practice’ so that we can’t overtly take it personally - even if it is absolutely, definitely meant to be personal.

  I’m not quite sure how it all deteriorated so quickly. Even if, as Katy says, I don’t look great today - there’s no way Thompson would have already known that to avoid the meeting, and all these comments and punitive clauses seem prepared.

  Not that that part of it really matters - it doesn’t change that it is happening, and what I had thought would be a meeting about a few final adjustments is turning into a fight to keep the deal alive.

  What it does do, though, is break through the hungover haze of my mind, the adrenaline and sudden challenge spurring my brain into the action it would normally take - until, by the end of it, I feel mostly-alive again.

  A small comfort, but it’s enough that I know I’m giving as good as I’m getting in the meeting - and they don’t seem to expect that, either. Everything they’ve come up with was obviously prepared earlier, but I’m good at fighting in-the-moment, and they don’t have enough good come-backs to throw things off too badly.

  It’s a long, hard-fought meeting and at the end of it we’re in a much worse position than when we started - but the deal is still on the table. Everything is still possible. It’s a hard place to come back from, but not impossible.

  Which means I’m going to do it. By god, I’m going to fix this.

  It doesn’t change the way I can feel Katy fuming beside me throughout the whole meeting - and all her thoughts are obviously directed toward me.

  When we finally get out of there, she practically grabs me as we walk stiffly out of the building, almost as if she thinks I’m about to make a run for it. Which is tempting, but even though the meeting burst through the worst of my brain-fog, it also totally wiped me out. I don’t think I’ve felt so physically and mentally drained since Emily was going through her hormonal teenage stage.

  “We need to talk.” She says brusquely, eyes flashing at me.

  I don’t object - I’m just surprised she waits as long as it takes us to get back to the small office space we’ve hired to work in for the week. It’s only when the door closes behind her that anything comes out of her stiffly-controlled posture at all.

  She rounds on me, the anger and frustration lighting up her face like a beacon as she pokes my chest.

  “Fucking hell, Damien, I told you! What the hell did I tell you?!” She pokes me again and I grab her hand before she can do it a third time, a little irritated. I screwed up and I don’t doubt I deserve some of this, but even I have my limits. She takes it back and shakes it off even though I barely held it, then glares at me and stalks to the other end of the room. “Why couldn’t you listen? For once in your life, why couldn’t you damn well listen!”

  “Katy…” I take a breath. “I don’t know how they knew about last night, but—”

  “Last night?” She raises an eyebrow, staring at me. “Oh, it’s just last night, is it? You think I don’t know that you’ve been drinking and partying every single night we’ve been here? You think they don’t know that?!”

  “What—” I still have a searing pain in my head, and it takes a moment for her words to get through.

  “That—that—whatever that meeting was, it was entirely targeted at you and your complete disregard for what we’re actually supposed to be doing on this trip—”

  I frown, knowing that I’m responding too slowly to keep up with her, but trying anyway and starting to get frustrated by the stream of anger coming in my direction.

  “Katy.” I say again, firmly enough that she actually does pause to listen. “I’ve been working non-stop on all this. Just like you. Meeting after intense meeting with everyone involved here, running between them and making sure everything works. It’s high-pressure, high-intensity - and you can’t deny it’s damn hard work. Don’t you dare accuse me of not pulling my weight here—”

  I missed the change in time for one meeting, on an email sent at 11pm the night before. It was one morning that I was running slightly late - one. I think the dozens of hours I’ve racked up should make up for that.

  She stares at me, the anger slowly replaced by something closer to disbelief.

  “You don’t get it, do you? This isn’t about how hard you’re working, Damien. It’s about the image you’re giving them - the young, hot-shot tech CEO going wild with newly created wealth. Can’t you see what they think of that? The sort of people these guys are?”

  I let out a long breath, irritated. “I’m not going wild, Katy - it’s my first time in NYC and I’ve been making the most of it, that’s all—”

  “Damien.” She grinds out. “Even if I believe you on that - and looking at you right now, I’m not sure I do - none of that matters. It’s not me you need to convince. It’s them. And from what they see, you’re doing the sort of thing their prestigious firm wants no association with.”

  I run a hand through my hair. Some nagging part of me knows that she’s right about this, but it’s frustrating as hell.

  Any other firm would be taking us out, encouraging all of this - expecting us to have a good time while we’re here.

  “That’s why the meeting went sour today.” She continues, her tone relentless. “And now the whole deal is at risk - just because you couldn’t listen to me and actually tone this shit down for once.”

  “Okay.” I say, finally acceding. She has a point and I know it, even if I resent the whole thing. “Look, I’m sorry Katy. Last night…was a mistake—”

  In so many more ways than she’s thinking about.

  “It’s not just last night.” She insists.

  “No, okay, all of it then. I didn’t think it would—” I cut myself off, shaking my head. “Well, I guess I was wrong. But I’m going to fix this, Katy. We’re not screwed yet.”

 
“No?” She raises an eyebrow and I meet her skeptical gaze.

  “No.” I repeat, my voice firm. “I’ve pulled off deals from worse positions than this. I screwed up, sure, but I’m going to work it out.”

  She looks at me for a long moment, assessing, but I can see the way some part of the tension in her shifts. I take that as my cue and step closer, wrapping my arms around her.

  “It’s going to be alright, Katy. I’ll fix it. I promise.”

  I feel her melt into me, her forehead coming down to rest on my shoulder and she sighs deeply too.

  “You sure about that, Damien?”

  “Yeah. I’m sure.”

  And I am. Prestige Trust and Mr. Thompson might be bastards, but I can play their game. I already started in the meeting this morning - and that was while hungover and feeling half-dead. The moment I get past that, well…the challenge will fire me up the way it always does.

  “No more nights out?” She raises her head, squinting up at me doubtfully.

  “Yeah, okay. No more nights out.” I agree, even if it is a little reluctant.

  I can’t blame her for the request - and she’s probably right about it, too. At least I got to have a decent amount of fun in NYC the last few nights.

  Maybe you can come back post-business-deal sometime.

  She squeezes me tight for a moment and I return it before she pulls back. She might have been angry - but we both know this was what we both needed after a meeting like that - the simple reassurance and support.

  After lashing out at each other a little, anyway.

  “It’ll be okay, Katy. Really.”

  She nods. “Okay. Just fix it, Damien. Get us out of this mess.”

  “Yes, Ma’am.” I say softly, then wink at her. “After a decent nap and some terrible food, anyway.”

  She gives an aggravated sigh, but I can see the way her lips twitch upwards. Back on even ground. Mostly, anyway.

  We leave it like that, neither of us entirely satisfied or at ease, but feeling slightly better to be back on the same side at least.