Running Back's Baby: A Secret Baby Romance

by Roxeanne Rolling

  “Of course I do!” she says. “I can see fine. They’re going to have to pry it out of my cold dead fingers.”

  “Let’s hope that’s not too soon,” I say.

  Donna laughs at this. She’s not exactly your typical old aunt. She’s… different.

  “I’m lucky I got the good genes,” she says. “Unlike your father.”

  I laugh, but it feels forced. I’ve never quite caught onto Donna’s darker humor. And she can get pretty dark with it sometimes.

  “Maybe that was too much,” she says. “Was that too much?”

  “Donna,” I say, interrupting her. “I’ve got a favor to ask you. Can you come watch Scout tonight? Or I could drop her off at your place.”

  “Sure,” says Donna. “But what are you paying me?”

  That makes me laugh again, because Donna would never accept payment for watching Scout, and we both already know that.

  “Just for a couple hours,” I say.

  “You have a hot date or something?”

  “Sort of,” I say.

  Donna laughs. “I’m happy for you,” she says. “I can’t remember the last time you were on a date. Fact is, I don’t think you’ve been on one since Scout was born.”

  “I don’t think so,” I say.

  We hang up and say goodbye, Donna cracking her usual jokes all the while.

  I finish up the rest of the day, which is really just one more client, say goodbye to Sam, and then head to pick up Scout at school.

  “How was school today, honey?” I say, as she clamors into the car. I start pulling slowly away from the school, and she’s not listening to me because she’s busy waving at her friends and making funny faces at me. That doesn’t bother me at all. In fact, I’m just glad she has so many friends.

  “It was great,” says Scout, launching into a long explanation of what happened at school, what games she played with her friends, and what the teacher taught them.

  I tell her all about how I’m going to have dinner with an old friend. Of course, I don’t tell her that it’s Dan, that he’s a famous football player, or that he’s her father. For this, I feel incredibly guilty.

  I make Scout a quick dinner of macaroni cheese and fried chicken, and then head up to my room to get dressed.

  It turns out I don’t really have any clothes that look appropriate for a date. I try on a couple things that I have left over from six years ago or more, but I didn’t have many nice clothes back then, and these pieces already look incredibly dated.

  The doorbell rings and it’s Donna, winking at me.

  “Have fun, tonight, dear,” she says. “And if it gets really hot and heavy, don’t hesitate to call me and tell me to stay the whole night. I brought my bathrobe and everything.”

  I blush. “That won’t be necessary,” I say.

  “Oh?” she says. “You’re going to just fuck him and then come back right home without spending the night?”

  “Donna!” I say, exasperated. She can be a little much sometimes, despite her age.

  “Aunt Donna!” cries Scout, hearing Donna’s voice, and running in from the other room to give her great aunt a hug. I hope she didn’t hear what Donna was saying.

  I say goodbye to the both of them and head out to my car. Dan’s texted me the address of a restaurant in town that I’ve never been to before. It’s some kind of gastro pub, whatever that is. I’ve passed by in my car sometimes, when, during the summer, I would gaze at the happy couples and happy groups all smiling and joking with each other, clinking their beer glasses together. The feeling of being left out, of being the outsider—it’s only grown stronger with the years. If I didn’t have Scout, I don’t know what I’d do.

  But something’s right. Donna’s been right all along. I need a man, and not just any man, but one who can give me what I need.

  I just ended up wearing old jeans that have a tear in the knee and a somewhat decent top, with my jacket over it, of course. It’s just a regular practical winter jacket that any non-stylish mom like myself would wear. I’m going to look like an idiot, I think to myself, looking at myself in the mirror and doing some finishing touches on my makeup.

  It only takes me a few minutes to drive over to the gastro pub.

  Dan’s not here yet, and the waiter gives me a skeptical look when I tell him that someone’s going to be joining me.

  To calm my nerves, I order a glass of white wine.

  Dan

  She’s sitting there all alone with a glass of wine when I come in, looking as hot as hell, hotter than I’ve ever seen her look before.

  “You look incredible,” I say, swooping down and giving her a kiss on the cheek.

  I notice that a couple people around the gastro pub are giving me looks. Some of them recognize me from football and some of them are just women checking me out.

  “Good to see you,” she says, looking up at me with her beautiful, wide eyes.

  “It feels like we were never apart,” I say, suddenly thinking that’s a stupid thing to be saying. But what’s going on? I’m the famous Dan Cambridge—I don’t second-guess myself. Not now, not ever.

  But she’s making me second-guess myself. She’s making me do this. It’s her beauty.

  Is she going to leave me again, leave me in the dirt?

  I open my mouth but I can’t think of anything to say. Instead, to steal some time away, I call over the bartender with my hand and order a stout, a good thick beer for a day like today.

  We stare at each other in silence. She’s smiling at me, and looking right into my eyes.

  I’m smiling back at her, feeling comfortable, happy but also strangely nervous.

  What the hell’s going on? I don’t feel nervous. I just don’t. I’ve never once felt nervous before or during a game. People have even commented on it. Often my teammates will be vomiting into the bathroom stalls before a big game, and swearing amicably at me because I’m not even breaking a sweat yet.

  “This shit is like bread,” I finally say, when the beer comes and I take a sip of it.

  That was a dumb thing to say.

  Chloe bursts out laughing.

  “What?” I say, probably sounding annoyed even though that’s now how I intend to sound.

  “You look nervous,” she says.

  “I do?” I say. “I never get nervous, though.”

  “Well apparently now you do,” she says.

  I shrug my shoulders.

  “So tell me about yourself,” I say.

  She seems like she’s about to say something, and then changed her mind. I wonder what it could be.

  So many emotions are running through me. I don’t know what to think. My mind feels numb, or more like overtaken completely by emotions that simply floor me. I realize now that there’s a reason I’ve been dreaming about her all these years. She’s not just beautiful—she does something to me, something that I can’t explain, something that I don’t have any power over, something as intense as the stars… something more intense than football.

  We stare at each other, without saying a word. It seems like all the words have already been spoken, even though we’ve barely said anything to each other.

  “Do you want to get out of here?” I suddenly say, blurting out the words far, far earlier in the night than I would have liked to. I’m suddenly feeling all nervous. I’m never nervous on dates, hookups, whatever. Simply never. I laugh nervously. “I guess I said that too early,” I say, as she just stares at me, now a smile working its way across her face. “That’s more like something I’d say at the end of the night, after we’ve had a few drinks. And it’s been a whole five minutes since we’ve been here.” She’s still not saying anything. Just smiling at me. The tension is killing me. “Come on, you’ve got to say something to me.”

  “OK,” she says.

  “OK what?” I say, confused. I feel dazed, bedazzled, a thousand things at the same time. I don’t know what the hell she means.

  “Let’s get out of here,” she sa
ys, giving me a wink.

  I feel a smile breaking across my own face. “Seriously?” I say. “That was easy… And… I don’t mean to say that you’re easy.”

  She shrugs her shoulders and gets up from the table.

  I get up too, trying to not knock my hard, bulging cock against the table as I do so. She looks down meaningfully at it and her eyes widen but she doesn’t say anything.

  I take a few twenties from my wallet and toss them down on the table without paying any attention to how much I’m paying, or for what. At this point, if you asked me, I wouldn’t be able to tell you if we’d eaten or what we’d drank. I feel like I’ve been here for hours and hours, simply stunned and entranced by her radiant beauty, my cock growing ever harder by the minute.

  “Somehow this doesn’t seem strange,” she says, taking me by the hand and walking me through the restaurant.

  I’m not paying the least bit of attention to my surroundings. Everything except the muscular bubble ass in front of me is completely out of my attention span.

  She pulls me along by the hand and my cock is raging hard, threatening to break though my jeans. I can catch a glimpse of the sides of her breasts when she turns briefly, her body moving like water as she navigates through the tables of the restaurant.

  She turns to me, her long hair flowing behind her, flapping, making her look even more beautiful. I want to take her right here in the restaurant, despite all the people, all the chatter. More realistically, I want to take her into the bathroom and plunge my cock deep insider her. Then I’d take her to the car and do the same thing, damn the cops and everyone else. But I can wait. I can take her to the nicest hotel in town.

  “Everyone’s staring at us,” she says.

  “That’s because you’re so beautiful,” I say. “They can’t take their eyes off you.”

  She laughs and shakes her head.

  “They’re all looking at you,” she says. “Are you famous or something?” She says it sarcastically, with a twinkle in her eyes.

  I shrug. “I wasn’t paying attention,” I say. “I was just paying attention to you.”

  Suddenly she’s pulling me along faster and faster, and we’re rushing through the restaurant and giggling like the teenagers we were when we were 19 years old and didn’t know yet what the world had in store for us.

  We don’t give a damn if people are looking at us. We finally burst out of the stuffy, dark atmosphere of the restaurant and head through the doors into the night, which is dark and cool. She shivers and I put my arm around her. We stand here at the entranceway, looking at each other.

  I lean in and kiss her and she kisses me back. It’s a deep kiss.

  Suddenly, we’re pressing against each other, making out heavily. My arms are all around her, massaging her breasts, going up under her shirt now. Her hands are on my ass, my back, running through my hair, going every which way imaginable.

  “I’ve wanted you for so long,” I whisper to her, my voice so low it’s practically a growl.

  “I want you now,” she says, her voice sweet and barely above a whisper.

  “Let’s get out of here,” I say, as the restaurant door swings open and people start to come outdoors, probably for a cigarette break.

  “Where should we go?” she says, giving me another kiss.

  She moves her mouth down toward my neck, sucking at me.

  My cock is raging hard, harder than it’s been a long, long time. Her body feels amazing against mine, so soft and supple, so sexy and hard… so perfect.

  “I’m staying with my parents,” I say. “But what about your place?”

  “Oh… uh…” she pauses, hesitating. A worried look comes over her face.

  “What is it?” I say.

  “I have… a daughter…” she says.

  I can’t concentrate on that now. I can’t even absorb the information properly.

  “We’ll get a hotel, then,” I say. “That’s no trouble.”

  “I know,” she says, suddenly. “I know where we can go. It’s better than a hotel.”

  “Where?”

  “My pool. At least I’ll get some use out of that building?”

  I guess she means that business isn’t going that well, but with my cock threating to break through my pants, and her body against mine, I can’t think about that either now.

  We drive over to the pool. I’m at the wheel, and her hands are fumbling all around my crotch during the entire drive. Her hands are against my cock through my pants, stroking along it.

  “You’d better stop,” I say. “Or I’m going to crash. And then we’re not going to get to have any fun.”

  “I can’t believe we’re doing this,” she says.

  “I know,” I say. “It’s been so long…”

  There’s a silence, and I know we’re both wondering the same thing: why was there such a long pause in our relationship? After how we felt about each other when I was in college, why did it take so long for us to meet again? Why did it take as simple coincidence, a simple turn of fate to throw us together again?

  But now that we’re back together again, there’s nothing that can be done. The cards have been dealt. The die has been cast, and there’s no turning back now, even if I wanted to, and obviously I don’t. And neither does she. I know it. I can hear it in her voice. I can read it in her body. She wants me as much as I want her.

  I pull up to the abandoned parking lot and she kisses me. Our arms are all around each other, our hands touching hot and warm flesh. It’s almost as if I don’t know my hands or my body from her own. We aren’t even naked and the windows in the car are steaming up in the cold weather outside. It’s just like when I was in college… I have a brief flash of what it felt like when she never called me or texted me back, the terrible way it made me felt… and the way I responded by becoming a horrible womanizing piece of garbage who treated women somewhat horribly… in fact, I was famous for it. Well, this time is going to be different. I promise myself that.

  If only she’ll give me a chance this time. I’d throw everything away from her. This is crazy that I feel like this already. But these feelings have been here all along. They’ve just been overshadowed by the wounds that come with falling away from the one you care about so much… the intensity is just hard to recover from.

  Her hair streams down her head, light from the moon glinting off each strand that I can see individually… a thousand little pieces of her beauty radiating out from her.

  “Come on,” she says. “Someone let me have the keys to this great pool. We can sneak in.”

  She holds up the keys that jingle and glint in the moonlight. There’s a mischievous glint in her eyes.

  “So we’re pretending that we’re breaking into the pool?” I say, my lips curling up into a smile.

  I see the twinkle in her eyes and she winks at me.

  “Yeah,” I say. “Let’s break in. Hopefully the security guard won’t catch us.”

  This is like a game we’re playing, and it’s a fun and hot one.

  Giggling and whispering at each other, we get out of the car into the cold and she huddles against my body for warmth. We can’t stop giggling as we rush over to the building, ducking down as if we’re trying to hide from a security guard.

  This is just the sort of thing we could have done for real if we’d both gone to the same college, or if we’d really gone out after that one night. We could have had all sorts of fun as young twenty somethings. Now we’re a little older. We’re still young, but no amount of pretending and role playing is going to change the reality that we’re both adults now with our own responsibilities. I’m a professional athlete, and in a day I’ve got to get back to the team, back to training, back to running for my life and for my money on the hard fake turf field with huge guys barreling toward me, trying to crush me into mush. She’s got a business to run… and a daughter… a daughter. I wonder whose it is? Was she seeing someone after me? How old is her daughter?

  “I got it!” s
ays Chloe, her voice an excited and hushed whisper. “The key worked!”

  This little fantasy of ours snaps me out of my circling thoughts, and I grab her ass and pull her towards me and kiss her deeply.

  She pulls away from me and rushes into the building. The lights are off, and I can smell the chlorine smell of the pool. It doesn’t smell like a harsh chemical, but instead like a thousand summers of missed youth… the sun barreling down…

  “Catch me if you can,” cries out Chloe.

  In the dark, her voice is exactly as it was that night near Thanksgiving so many years ago. It’s as if the years haven’t passed, as if nothing ever changed, as if her dad never died, and as if…

  Chloe

  I’ve become so used to seeing this as a place of business, that it’s incredibly fun to pretend to “break in” here during the nighttime.

  And at my side, giggling along with me, is Dan… Dan, my one night sweetheart that I didn’t have the courage to confront my feelings for… Dan, the father of my daughter.

  He doesn’t know, but that’s not on my mind right now. There are more important things…

  The air is thick and steamy. The heaters in the pool must have been left on overnight. Normally, I’d be worried about how that will affect my electricity bills. But right now, bills are the last thing on my mind. All the worries are gone, and it feels like they’re never going to come back. I feel free and joyous, giddy and excited.

  And not to mention turned on.

  Incredibly turned on.

  I’m intensely aware of Dan’s powerful body next to mine, his heavy breathing, and his rock hard cock that I can’t help but brush my hands up against.

  The air is thick and warm, the smell of chlorine somehow seeming sweet rather than its normal chemical reek that I always despise. The place is full of memories that never existed, but it already feels nostalgic. The lights are off and the pool is warm and inviting.

  “Come on,” I say. “Let’s go in. I didn’t bring my swimsuit, though…”

  “That shouldn’t be a problem, should it?” says Dan, grinning at me.