by Lulu Pratt
“What? You’re only sixty, it’s the new forty,” I said, as I laughed and rubbed her leg. “Besides, you don’t look a day over fifty.”
“Well, thank you,” she smiled. “I think when you reach a certain level of stress in your life the aging process reverses itself. I got old and then I got young again. It was magical really.”
“Ladies, I’m grabbing a soda. Anything for you?”
“No thank you, Ryan,” my mom said.
“Actually, there’s a plastic bottle on the top shelf of the fridge, could you grab that for me?”
“Sure,” he smiled.
Ryan walked into the kitchen and I could see him at the fridge. He grabbed a soda from the shelf and almost forgot the bottle. Then he opened the fridge back up and grabbed the plastic bottle, not even looking at what it was. He walked back out to the living room and finally looked down at his hands. He stopped and held the baby bottle filled with milk up in the air. On the bottle there was a sticky note that read, ‘For Daddy,’ on it. His mouth dropped open and my mom turned around, trying to see what I was smiling at. She froze and covered her mouth in excitement.
“Are you — are you pregnant?” Ryan asked, walking forward and standing me up off the couch.
“Yes,” I said, excitedly. “I’m pregnant. Surprise!”
“Are you serious?” he said, laughing happily.
“Dead serious,” I said. “I had my suspicions that I was pregnant the same day that Evelyn asked to come down and do a follow up, so I planned the whole thing to put this in and surprise everyone at the same time, even the people who will be watching. I mean, they did watch the whole first half of our relationship, so I figured they deserved to be in on this, too.”
“Oh my God,” Ryan said, with tears in his eyes. “This is the most incredible news I’ve ever heard. Come here.”
He stepped forward and picked me up, wrapping my legs around his waist. He cupped his hands around the back of my neck and pressed his lips against mine. We were going to be parents, two people who loved each other more than anything, and we were now going to get to share that love with someone else. He leaned back and looked into my eyes, shaking his head.
“You are so amazing, Mira,” he said. “I love you so much.”
“You better,” I joked. “I’m gonna be your baby momma.”
“Mmm, the sexiest one ever,” he chuckled, kissing me again.
He set me back down on the floor and I turned to my mother, who was standing there holding the bottle. She looked up at me with tears streaming down her face and opened her arms, hugging me tightly.
“I am so excited,” she whispered. “Not so long ago, I thought I would gone before this day came for you. I thought I would never hold a little grandbaby in my arms, but because of this amazing man you married, not only will I get to do that, but I will get to do it with energy and excitement.”
“Oh Mom,” I cried out, hugging her. “I love you, Grandma.”
She giggled, hugging me again and pulling back to have a look down at my tummy. She pressed her hand against my belly and closed her eyes with a smile on her face. I put my hand over hers, and Ryan leaned over my shoulder, kissing me on the cheek.
“I can’t even tell you how proud I am to have the two of you, two strong, beautiful, intelligent women here to help me raise this child,” Ryan said. “I have been blessed beyond all measure. I can’t believe I’m going to be a father.”
He laughed and stood up, turning to the camera. “I’m going to be a dad!”
“And cut,” Evelyn said.
Harrison turned off the camera and I was pretty sure I watched him wipe a tear from the corner of his eye. He caught me watching him, my eyebrow raised. He smiled and shrugged his shoulder, coming over and hugging me tightly. He turned to Ryan and nodded, Ryan doing the same, which was all the communication the two of them had ever needed. Evelyn shrieked, clapping her hands over and over and running to Ryan, pulling him in for a hug. I laughed to myself watching him hug her back before she turned and squeezed me as well.
“I am so excited for the two of you,” Evelyn said. “You both deserve the happiest of lives together. And you, Ms. Mira, thank you for being sneaky and throwing that into this follow-up episode. It’s going to be a huge crowd pleaser. The ratings are gonna be—”
“Through the roof,” Ryan and I said in unison.
“Exactly,” she said, laughing.
“You will stay for a bit and celebrate, right?” I asked Evelyn.
“I’d love to,” she smiled. “We don’t catch our flight for hours anyway. Right, Harrison?”
He just nodded, making me giggle.
We spent the evening talking and laughing, eating some appetizers and gabbing excitedly about the new adventure we were about to step into. Parenthood. I knew it wouldn’t always be easy, but I knew with Ryan by my side we could do anything. Evelyn wanted to come back in a year and have an update from us, showing the world the new baby, and while Ryan was a bit apprehensive, already showing his nervous dad side, I thought it would be a wonderful idea. Besides, we would get to celebrate with the people who had really made all of it possible for us. Just then Miles came bursting through the door with a case of beer and a smile.
“Sorry I’m late,” he said, running over and hugging my mother, who he had grown very fond of since Los Angeles. “Did I miss anything good?”
“You want to tell him?” I asked, looking over at Ryan.
“Tell me what?” he said, excitedly.
“We signed you up for next season,” Ryan smiled.
“Wh—” he started to bluster, his jaw slack.
“I’m just kidding,” Ryan laughed. “Actually, the news is, I’m going to be a dad.”
“Oh my God! What?! You?” He put the case of beer down and ran over to Ryan, almost jumping into his arms, hugging him tightly.
“Congratulations! Man, you are going to be the best father ever.”
He walked over to me and put his hands on my cheeks, smiling as he leaned in and kissed me on the forehead.
“And you are going to be Uncle Miles,” I said, with a smile.
“That has a definite ring to it,” he grinned. “I’m honored as hell.”
I smiled and stood back watching the people in my life, so thankful for everything that had happened. It was wild, unexpected, and definitely a shock, but I wouldn’t have had it any other way. I finally got my happily ever after, and there was so much more to come.
***
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Making His Baby
Amazon Top 100 Bestseller
We’re making this baby the old-fashioned way.
With my billions, I’ll pay whatever it takes for her to have my child.
And I’m going to have fun putting it in her.
After the baby’s born, she can go back to her regular life.
But the way she screams my name in bed makes me want more.
For the first time in years I want an actual relationship.
Until I realize there’s something she’s not telling me.
A secret from the past.
And her plan to ruin everything.
***A steamy STANDALONE contemporary romance with a smoking hot hero. No cliffhanger, no cheating and a guaranteed happily-ever-after.***
Chapter 1
BLAKE
High-school reunions. Fuck me. Mine is in my face, and it’s the last thing I want to face, no matter how much better I am now. Too many memories.
“Dude. You still there?” My closest friend Ben’s voice is in my ear, bringing me back from my reverie.
“Yeah, sorry,” I glance around my old stomping ground. “I’m just not looking forward to this shit in the slightest. Why did I let you talk me into
doing this?”
“Because you’re the big shit now, man. Time to show those bitches up.”
“Right. ‘Cause that’s me.” I roll my eyes and try to keep myself from turning on my heel and walking the fuck back to my car.
“Just hang out with some old friends and have a good time, Blake. Find an old girlfriend and tap that ass, brother.”
“You sound like an idiot. I’ll call you later when I’m smashed.” I drop the call and take a deep breath. He’s right though. He usually is. Bastard.
Besides, it will be good to see some of my old friends. And it will be even better to hear about how they’re doing and what they’ve been up to. That is why I’m here, or at least it’s how Ben convinced me to come. With a bit of luck and some conversational leading, I might be able to avoid talking about myself entirely. We’ll see.
“Fifteen years. Damn, I’m fucking old,” I mumble to myself.
It was odd for our class president to decide to do it on the fifteen-year mark. Personal agenda for sure. Five years before, the fucker got busted on a drug charge that took my ex down as well. Now though, he can brag about the successful sporting goods store he opened. My ex wasn’t so lucky.
I walk through the entrance to my old high school, feeling a weird sense of traveling back in time. Almost immediately, someone calls out from behind me as I walk through the hall.
“There he is!” It’s a man’s voice. I am tempted to keep walking and pretend I don’t hear it, but the shout is followed by the sound of rushed footsteps. Whoever it is runs up behind me. “We didn’t know if you were coming, Mr. Doesn’t Reply To Our Messages!”
Turning around, I instantly spot the owner of the voice. It’s Clark, one of my good friends from high school. He was the class clown of our year. As he rushes to me, he wears that same big goofy smile that he was known for, although now, he is about forty pounds heavier.
“Hey,” I say with a forced smile. It’s not that I don’t like Clark. In fact, out of everyone at the reunion, Clark is the person I’ve been looking forward to seeing the most. It’s just that Clark, like everyone else, reminds me of a past I’ve been trying to forget, and once again I struggle to understand why I’m even here. “It’s good to see you, Clark.” I stick out my hand to shake his.
“Me?” He asks. “Dude, it’s good to see you, Blake! Hot damn, what’s it been? Don’t you dare tell me I haven’t seen you since graduation. Don’t you dare tell me that!” He still wears that big goofy grin. I can smell the beer on his breath. He’s got to be a few beers deep at this point.
“Okay,” I say with a grin. “I won’t tell you that.”
“You—!” He smirks, feigning a punch at my gut. “Come on, the whole crew is here! I’ll show you.”
He grabs me by the arm and leads me through the hall to the actual reunion itself. Flashing, multi-colored lights spill from the doors to the gymnasium. Music thumps loudly in my ears as we get closer.
The gym is decorated in typical fashion. Streamers and balloons cover the walls, all blue and white to match the school’s colors. A huge banner reading “Class of 2002” hangs from the ceiling, stretching across the entire length of the gym.
The crowd that has turned up is a mixture of people like Clark, overly excited at the prospect of catching up on old times, and people like me, apathetic to the idea, but still here out of some sort of moral obligation.
“We had bets on whether or not you were going to make it,” Clark slurs. His arm drapes around my neck as he leads me through the masses. Some I recognize, some I don’t. I’m not the only one who has changed since high school.
“Oh yeah?” I say, raising an eyebrow. “How much was I going for?”
Clark throws his head back in an exaggerated laugh. “Not as much as you would like.”
With his arm still hanging on me, he leads me to a large table in the corner of the room. Sitting around the table are eight faces that I recognize all too well.
Five men and three women, they are my collective “friends from high school.” The ones I used to hang out with during the day and drink with at night. When we could find someone willing to buy us alcohol, that is.
A pleasant wave of nostalgia hits me as I look at them. Like most people’s high school experience, mine had its ups and downs, but these were the people who got me through it. We grew up together. A lot of my formative experiences were with these people right here.
Judging from their body language, I guess that most of them, like me, have fallen out of contact with each other, and they are using this night as a means to catch up and trade old war stories. It makes me feel a little less guilty about not having spoken to any of them for the past fifteen years.
“Look who I found,” Clark says as he pushes me onto the seat by his own. “Lurking in the bushes. Classic Blake!”
“Hey,” I say to no one in particular, not knowing who to address. I opt for a group chat instead.
“Blake,” the woman next to me beams.
“Hey, Sally,” I nod.
She has bushy red hair and white, porcelain skin. She was my first kiss, and I’m pretty sure I was hers. “It’s been so long. What have you been up to, Blake? Doing well by the looks of it?”
“Oh, you know, this and that,” I say, keeping it vague.
I was poor when I went here. Dirt poor. I come from a broken home that had more problems than money. It’s something that I don’t like to talk about, and I hate being reminded of it. But now that I’m successful and more than a little rich, I realize that I don’t really want to talk about that either.
I don’t want them fawning over me or grilling me about the specifics of my job. People always find my work a little too interesting, and it grates on a person after a while.
But then it hits me. I don’t have anything else to talk about. All I do is work. Whereas they’re all laughing and talking about their kids.
“Sounds interesting,” Sally continues, holding her smile on me as she does.
“Oh, it’s not,” I say, giving my head a shake. “Trust me. It’s just business crap. Suits, too much coffee and a lot of missed weekends. Nothing to tell really.”
I’m a film producer and getting to be a pretty successful one, too. I made my fortune through a few smart investments in college, and I used that money to open a production company. Ten years later, I’m worth more than I’ll ever admit to anyone.
“My son’s two now, the little bugger,” Clark says to everyone in earshot. “So cute that sometimes I just want to eat him up.”
I sip on my drink and listen.
“My oldest daughter starts school next year. So you never settled down, Blake?” Sally asks with a smile.
“No. No kids, no wife.”
I do my best to smile and nod along, but deep down, my stomach churns. Despite my money and success, the one thing my life is missing is a family of my own. I made a choice when I was younger to pursue a career over family. Lately, I’ve been questioning that decision more and more. I want to be a father, but I’m hardly about to enter into a serious relationship with someone. No fucking way.
“Oh damn, I wasn’t looking forward to this,” Clark says a little too loudly.
I look across the gym to see what caught him off guard. The moment I see it, I feel my heart sink.
A giant screen stands behind the makeshift stage. Projected onto that screen is a video, made specifically for the reunion. We were asked to send in clips of our own for a series of videos that would feature. The one playing right now is to commemorate the people who couldn’t be here tonight. Specifically, those who have passed away.
The reason my heart feels the way it does is that I know one face in particular who would be appearing on that screen. Her name is Lyndsey, and she was my high-school sweetheart. And sure enough, as I watch the few names and faces flash on the screen, Lyndsey suddenly appears.
“Hey, didn’t you used to date her?” Clark asks me. He is slurring even more than he was earlier. I gu
ess the alcohol is really kicking in now.
“Yeah,” I say, my voice flat. “I did.”
Chapter 2
CARRIE
The only thing worse than attending a high-school reunion is having to work at one. As I walk among the tables and chairs and dodge the increasingly drunken attendees, I thank the gods that it isn’t my reunion. That drama is still waiting for me.
What makes the reunion that I’m working at right now even worse than it would usually be, is the fact that it’s at the school I graduated from. Because of this, a number of the faces in the crowd are ones that I recognize. Luckily, they’re all at least five years older than I am, so none of them recognize me. Thank God. I’d hate for anyone I knew to see me catering for them. That’s an encounter that would be too much to recover from.
Unfortunately, I have no choice but to work at the event. I’ve been trying to do it as little as possible lately, but I have bills to pay and my other job doesn’t cover them. My other job barely covers the cup of coffee I buy in the morning.
I took this job purely as a means to pay my bills so I can pursue my passion, but as my expenses grow, so do my hours. Now, I can barely find an hour in the week to work on what I want. I actually managed to squeeze a few hours in last night, but that comes with a price. I’m tired now because of it, and it’s really starting to wear on me.
“Are you finished with this?” I ask a very drunken lady as she leans against a table for support, an empty wine glass in her hand.
“Sure am,” she slurs as she hands me the glass.
Just as I’m about to take it, she lets go. I’m fast and manage to snatch it out of the air before it shatters all over the gym floor. I shake my head, walking on before I snap and say something that might get me fired.
I can’t afford to be fired. I need this job, as much as I hate it. I’m a writer, or at least, I try to be. When I’m not catering, I’m hunched over my laptop. I’m currently deep in a book that I have been working on for some time. I want to say that it’s coming along nicely, but even I can’t lie to myself that convincingly.
