“Great!” Jules sounded braver than before. “We need to get this thing done fast. I have a big deal coming up.”
“Oh?”
“Well, you just said I need to get back to living my life and work is my life. You’ve heard about the privatisation of the Mayberry Hill Family Center.”
“Yes.”
“Well, I’ll be putting in a bid, so the sooner I recover the better.”
“You boys sure have your hands full running a whole lot of companies. I don’t know how you and your family keep up.” Dr. Adeem gave Jules a supportive smile. “I’ll get the tests booked immediately.”
CHAPTER TWO
Six months later…
“I can’t believe you’re back!” Amber Johnson-Murray announced to her elderly customer as she set a plate of scrambled eggs, toast and slices of bacon in front of her. “It’s good to see you up and about again, Mrs. Van Hogen. Here’s your order. Just the way you’ve always liked it. Eggs scrambled and fluffy, two slices of well-done bacon and lightly buttered toast. And it’s on me.”
Amber got a sudden boost of energy despite feeling nauseated all morning. And in fact, it was her first day back at work since she’d been off sick. Her belly knotted up in nerves. She drew in a deep breath. She was well aware of the stares from some of the other patrons. Her midsection had almost doubled in size from the last time she was there.
Some of the regulars at the café knew she’d broken up with her ex six months ago. He’d made a nasty scene at the café that day. The look of pity on their faces didn’t do much to make Amber feel any better. Yeah, he was out of the picture and she was now six-months pregnant. She was going to fight to raise her child—alone.
Mrs. Van Hogen turned to face Amber with a glow on her face. The aged woman’s silver short-cropped hair glistened in the early morning sun as she sat in her favorite seat by the window of the Murray Café.
“Why, thank you, Amber! That’s so kind of you. And it’s so good to be out and about again. Six months is a long time to be housebound after my hip surgery,” she said with a wide smile, patting her right hip, her walker by her side. “But this new hip will get me back in action.”
Amber smiled and tilted her head. Her customers made her day. Most of the diners were older and had been going there over the years. Just listening to them talk about their lives and families and bringing in wonderful stories warmed Amber’s heart and gave her new appreciation for taking it slow.
The Murray Café wasn’t making a profit. It was breaking even after paying the wonderful staff and ensuring they had the best home-cooked meals to give the locals. The cafe was just barely making it. It was a family-owned business that felt the effects of popular chain-store coffee shops opening up in the area over the years.
That was one of the reasons Amber worked two jobs at one point. The other job was at the Murumbian Embassy before she got fired for helping her friend Venus, who was in some serious trouble. But Amber was glad to be back at the café full-time. Sometimes money wasn’t everything.
Mrs. Van Hogen was one of the original customers of the café since Amber’s parents first opened it. Her eyes then drifted to Amber’s enormous midsection.
“I see you’ve been quite busy yourself lately,” Mrs. Van Hogen commented, looking at Amber’s baby bump. “I didn’t know you got married. Congratulations.” The woman’s voice was full of animation.
“Oh, I…didn’t,” Amber said, rubbing the enormous swell of her belly.
“Are you engaged?”
“Um. Well, no. The father’s not in the picture.”
Amber caught the look of sorrow sliding across the old woman’s face like a dark cloud moving in on a sunny day.
Oh, no. Please don’t feel sorry for me. I’ll be okay, really.
From the corner of her eye Amber caught the daggers from her aunt’s piercing glare. Her aunt then swiftly made her way to where Amber was standing as she continued to speak with her customer.
“Hi, Mrs. Van Hogen,” Mavis Murray interrupted the conversation in a boisterous voice. She placed her hand on Amber’s elbow. “If you’ll excuse me I need to speak with Amber.”
“Oh, fine. No problem,” the woman hesitated, looking a bit stunned at the interruption. “Thank you again, Amber. And thank you for those lovely flowers you sent me at the hospital. You’re a darling.”
“Oh, no worries, Mrs. Van Hogen. Enjoy your meal.” Amber tried to keep her calm and hide her annoyance at her aunt’s rude intrusion. She knew what was coming.
“Is everything okay, Auntie? You seem upset.” Amber asked pointedly when the ladies approached the staff area in back of the café. The kitchen wasn’t so busy then. It was just after the morning rush. So things had quieted down. It was a good time for Amber to take her break.
“Must you parade your condition in front of our customers?”
“Excuse me?”
“You heard what I said. Do you have to let everyone know you’re…an unwed mother?”
“Mrs. Van Hogen asked a question and I answered it.” Amber felt her heart pound hard in her chest. It wasn’t her original choice to be a single parent but that was how things worked out. The last thing she needed was someone close to her throwing it back in her face or treating her like an embarrassment.
As much as Amber enjoyed working at the café, working alongside her aunt, who could be a bit overbearing at times, was often a nightmare. But Amber tried to be as understanding as possible. Everybody’s personality was different, right? After Amber’s parents were killed in a car accident when Amber was much younger, her aunt took her in and raised her. The cafe was willed to Amber, but she was too young at the time, so as guardian her aunt Mavis took responsibility and ever since was active in running the business—it was, after all, her aunt who saved the café from going bust.
Amber tried not to focus on negative behaviour and only on good things as much as possible. She had to for the baby’s sake. The last thing she wanted was her blood pressure or anxiety levels to soar.
Amber glanced down at her watch. “I have my prenatal class soon. I’ll be away for about an hour and a half and then I’ll be back,” Amber said, pulling off her white apron and hanging it up on a hook.
Amber rubbed her hand over her swollen belly. She felt a ticklish feeling and a maternal warmth filled her heart. Her little baby had just kicked from inside. At least something was pleasant in her life.
“I’ll take you there,” Mavis insisted. Perhaps she wanted Amber out of there as fast as possible.
“You don’t have to.”
“I know that. But I will nonetheless.”
Moments later, the car pulled up to the front of the Mayberry Hill Family Resource Center. Amber arrived for her first of many prenatal class visits.
“Thanks but you really didn’t have to drop me here,” Amber said again to her aunt Mavis who barely spoke a word since they had driven from the Murray Cafe.
“Nonsense. I’m not going to have you hobbling about town like that, alone. You’re getting bigger every day!”
Amber felt uneasy and rubbed her belly again. Aunt Mavis and Amber never really got along, though Mavis was Amber’s mother’s sister.
Amber knew why Mavis was treating her this way. Mavis was head of the Women’s Reading Group at the Mayberry Hill First Movement Church, and Amber, being unwed and pregnant, just didn’t sit too well with her aunt—or her aunt’s group.
Well, Amber had always been the careful one. She only had one real boyfriend with whom she’d been intimate. Unfortunately, he turned out to be the king of jerks. They had lived together and were supposed to get married. But Amber quickly learned that he wasn’t what he pretended to be when they’d first met. He was cruel, lying and cheating on her and she was all too glad to end her relationship. Sometimes, things didn’t work out the way one intended. But Amber was going to make the best of her life—regardless of what others thought of her.
Amber never wanted to be alone. And it was
n’t her preference to be a single parent. Heaviness and pain swirled through her body at the thought.
“It should be the father of your child here with you. Where is he?” Mavis asked rhetorically, her lips pressed together in a thin line. The expression on her face, as often was the case, was stony. She was never one to mince words. Ever.
“I told you, Aunt Mavis. It’s a nonissue. I’m not getting into it again. He’s not in the picture.”
“It’s obvious he isn’t. You should feel ashamed going to these classes alone.”
Amber rolled her eyes and shook her head. She’d learned to try to ignore her auntie’s criticism and harsh words. She’d read in one of her self-help books that sometimes you can’t control how a person treats you but you can control how you feel about it. Amber thought she was solid in deflecting her aunt’s rude demeanor but there had been times, especially while growing up, when it sank into her soul and tore her up. Who knew if that’s why Amber spent much of her childhood being an anxious basket case with low self-esteem. Amber ended up being cautious of others and afraid of being hurt so she often kept to herself.
Amber was just grateful her aunt took her in when she lost her family or else she would have been forced into an orphanage. Still, that was no excuse for Mavis’s rudeness at times.
“I don’t know if I’ll be alone, Aunt Mavis. I’m sure I’m not the only single parent in this class.”
It was Amber’s first time taking the prenatal class at the suggestion of her obstetrician. But she was okay with that. She enrolled late, though she was fortunate to join at all since another couple had dropped out of the class.
Amber made her way out of the car and slammed it shut. “Thanks again, Aunt Mavis. I’ll catch a bus back to the café when I’m done.”
Amber proceeded into the building and searched the signs looking for Room 15A on the main floor. She found it and saw the orange glossy poster: Mayberry Hill Family Center Prenatal Class. When she made her way towards the door, her heart came to a screeching halt. Standing a few feet away outside another door that was marked Conference Room 16A was a tall, dark and deadly handsome young man looking sexy in his tailored business suit. The man was talking on his cell phone until she came into his view. He promptly told the person on the other end he would have to call back and ended his call to look her square in the face.
Jules Romero.
“Amber?” Jules said cautiously. It was the way her name slid off his smooth tongue, so silky and deep. Oh, his voice got her each and every time. It had been a while since she’d seen Jules. And he looked hotter than Amber remembered. He sported an Italian-designed dark blue suit with a navy blue silk tie and he filled it out so nicely with his broad shoulders. Those Romero men predominantly had athletic builds. Her friend Venus was married to one, Jules’s brother Carl, the youngest mayor to ever run the town.
In fact, it was her friend Venus who had introduced Amber to Jules.
“H-hi, Jules,” she stuttered, caught off guard as she tried to keep her voice from wavering. His sexiness had always overwhelmed her.
Amber’s heart hammered in her chest and a quiver surged through her body at his delightful presence. The man was sexy as hell and always caused that stirring reaction inside her body. The truth was, she’d always been aroused by Jules Romero.
Jules’s beautiful eyes drifted to her bulging baby bump. His dark, sexy, brown eyes widened a fraction.
“I know, it’s good to see me again, right? You just didn’t think you’d be seeing so MUCH of me.” Amber grinned, trying to bring some humor to the situation.
This was Jules Romero. Jules hot-as-heaven Romero. They first became friends when her friend Venus was in trouble, then Amber and Jules were a couple but that didn’t last long enough. Jules wasn’t ready to commit and she wasn’t ready to have sex—yet.
Jules’s sexy lips curled into a sweet grin and Amber’s heart melted. God, he was stunning to behold. Her baby’s feet tickled the inside of her belly with some swift kicking movements just then. Butterflies also tickled her midsection.
“That’s not what I meant,” he answered in his richly deep voice, cocking a brow. “But, you look beautiful, Amber. Congratulations. I didn’t know you got married. How many months are you?”
He said she looked beautiful. What a thoughtful thing to say to a pregnant woman who felt as if she was growing like a gigantic watermelon. That thought was soon squashed by a painful reality. He was wrong about the being married part.
“Oh, I’m…six months.” Amber’s stomach lurched; she felt pain squeeze her heart. “But I…I’m not married.”
“Oh?” He seemed a bit caught off guard, which was unusual for Jules. She remembered how brave and take charge he was when his brother Carl had a hell of a fight running for mayor amid scandal and a dirty campaign by his rivals and then there was that whole mess with her friend Venus who ended up marrying Carl during the scandal—as a diversion at first but then it all worked out for them.
Well, talk about a swift kick in the gut. Jules could not believe his eyes or his ears. Amber was pregnant? And single? Despite the sad look in her eyes, her skin had a healthy glow to it. She stood wearing Lycra exercise pants and long-sleeved t-shirt. The air conditioning in the building was cold so he figured that was why she was dressed covering everywhere. But then again she was always conservatively clad, rarely revealing much skin. Always dressed in long sleeves and long pants or skirts.
Heck, she didn’t even let him go to second base. Which he respected. Though from her kisses, he could tell she was highly sensual and would make a great partner in bed.
God, he could kick himself for not holding on to Amber—for making sex a priority back then. He liked Amber a lot—possibly even loved her—but he just wasn’t into having a serious relationship at the time…and Amber wasn’t ready for sex at the time.
He could not control the heaviness that settled in his body.
“You’re not married?” Jules was stunned. It killed him inside that she’d chosen someone else to get “intimate” with. But the guy didn’t even have the decency to marry her. Call him a bit old-fashioned where babies were concerned, but he’d always been raised that a man should do the right thing and marry the mother of his child. Period. And from the time he’d known Amber, she didn’t seem like the reckless type. She appeared much too prim and proper to get herself knocked up outside of marriage. Heck, had he been wrong about her? He thought they’d had good chemistry for the brief period they were an unofficial couple. Amber was the first girl he couldn’t even get between his bed sheets and now she was with someone else? WTF! Jules was baffled as sin. He’d seen the way her body reacted to his when they were cuddling in the past. She wanted him as much as he wanted her. Yeah, he was baffled all right. But he suspected there could be more to the situation.
“No,” she said quietly, looking off into the distance. He thought he caught the look of pain flashing in her beautiful dark brown eyes. She was a pretty girl and soft spoken, yet hard working. He remembered the time she’d worked her butt off overtime to help his sister-in-law Venus when she was in a heap of trouble. Amber had worked at the embassy but got fired after breaking some rules for the sake of helping her friend. She was a girl with guts when it counted. A woman who put her neck on the line to save a friend. Talk about honor.
“So are you engaged?” Jules probed further. Something in his gut urged him on. He was damned curious. He didn’t see any ring. He really wanted to know if there was a guy in the picture. He hoped the dude that had the honor of impregnating her was at least around. Then a sinking feeling entered his body when he glanced at the door sign again. Why the heck was she going to a prenatal class seemingly alone?
“Why the twenty questions?” she zinged him, arching her brow playfully. He could tell she was trying to be brave but tried not to push it, but damn, he was so fascinated by her, always had been.
“Why the avoidance?” he shot back, a warm amusing smile on his face.
>
“I’m not with the father. I’m single. I…I have a class to go to.”
“Oh, sorry to hear that,” he said, instinctively. Regarding Amber’s delicate condition, he was really sorry to hear that she was alone in all of this. “Do I know the guy?” Jules couldn’t help but ask pointedly. “Your ex?”
“No. I doubt you’ve met Rex. It’s no one you know.”
“Rex? There must be a thousand Rexes around here. What’s his last name?” he asked nicely, arching a brow. He tilted his head to the side.
“It’s not important for you to know, Jules.” Amber grinned and rolled her eyes.
Okay, he wasn’t getting anywhere with this. Amber probably knew Jules well enough to know he could find out if he really wanted to and then he’d give the guy a piece of his mind, leaving Amber pregnant and alone like that.
“Well, I don’t want to keep you. Though, I’m sure they won’t mind you being late this week. You have a good excuse, being with child and all.”
“Well, it’s my first time going to this class. They had a space free up. I’m surprised to see you here.”
“I have a business meeting. I’m in the process of acquiring this place.”
“You are? Congratulations.”
“Thanks but the deal’s not done yet.” A gnawing ache entered Jules’s gut.
What had he missed out on? He could have been the father of Amber’s child. He was foolish for not wanting to commit to her before. Now she’d gone and gotten pregnant by some other dude. He wondered if Rex was really the guy’s first name. Amber seemed so protective about his identity.
“Well, it was nice running into you again, Jules. You’re looking well, as usual.” Amber smiled appreciatively then opened the glass door to the classroom.
And that was that. Door closed. Conversation closed. For now, anyway.
Just as Jules turned to go back to the boardroom across the hall, something pulled his eyes back to the classroom. He swung around, curiosity getting the best of him, and peeked inside the glass door.
The Billionaire's Baby (The Romero Brothers, Book 5) Page 2
