“You’ve been visiting the zoo these past few months?”
I nod. “Yeah, well, I’ve already rewatched like every episode of Planet Earth four times by now, so I had to get my animal fix somehow.”
At the zoo counter I nod to Sandra, who’s at her usual spot at the counter, before going through without paying.
“I have a membership,” I explain to Emma, “They know me by now.”
As we wind our way through the last of the zoo visitor stragglers and past huge cages and pens, Emma finally asks the question that’s been hanging over us since she saw me waiting at her door. “What’s this about, Luke?”
“One second,” I say. And then, a few seconds later, I’ve sat down at a bench in front of a tall wide cage, patting the space beside it.
“This is where I go to sit.”
As Emma sits beside me, I continue. “These guys are my favorite.”
And, as she sits there, her eyes lighting up at the sight, I think she can see why. The two golden lion tamarins are ridiculously adorable. With their bright orange shiny fur and little black-eyed faces, they would’ve been mesmerizing already. As it is, their being crazy in love makes even me fall silent as I watch. They walk hand-in-hand and are constantly grooming and licking and embracing each other. Even when they swing from one branch to the other, each monkey is only one branch behind the other.
It’s a touching sight, but, judging by Emma’s now-falling face, she too finds it a bit depressing. Finally, my gaze on the little creatures’ big love, I say it.
“I’ve been looking for you a long time, you know.”
“What?”
Now I turn to face her. “After that night and your dad showed up, you just disappeared. No note, no text, nothing. You just vanished and, no matter how I searched, I couldn’t find you anywhere.”
She avoids my intent gaze. “I didn’t think you’d go looking . . . I hardly thought you’d care.”
“Me too.” My voice is low, filled with emotion. It almost doesn’t even sound like mine.
“As it turns out, we were both wrong. Every day without you just going through the motions back in my old life drilled it in deeper. The undeniable gap that was there. No one to talk to, to laugh with . . . No one who really got me. Emma, I’ve never felt lonely in my life and, after you, I’ve felt more alone every day for the past six months. And that night . . . that night, you and I in my bed . . . I’m sorry, and yet, I’m not sorry. Because every minute of it, Emma, every second of it – it felt right. For the first time in my life, I don’t know why . . . Every part of it, of being with you, felt completely right.”
“How did you find me?” she asks quietly.
I laugh. “I had just about given up. I’d scoured the internet for you, the phone book, even risked asking a few friends who knew the commander better than I did. But everything turned up nothing. So, expecting nothing to come of it, I hired a private investigator.”
As she gapes at me in disbelief, I laugh again, nod. “That was a few months ago. And, yesterday, he told me where I could find you.”
As I grin at her, her face struggles with a smile she can’t quite allow. She still doesn’t believe what I’m saying. “But . . . why?” she asks.
I shake my head. “You first. Why did you leave?” When she says nothing, I repeat the question: “Why, Emma?”
She keeps her gaze on the tamarins, who are huddled in the corner of their cage in a hug-ball. Then, she gestures at her ballooned-out belly. “You’re looking at why. At first, I just left in a hurry to escape Dad’s rage. I planned to get in touch in a few weeks. But then, my period didn’t come and I took a pregnancy test . . . Well, then this happened. I had seen how you were with the other girls, and so I knew that I was probably just another fun lay that night. I knew you wouldn’t want the responsibility – that it would be better off if I just left you alone. So, I did.”
I nod. “And what do you think now?”
My sidelong glance at her impassive face reveals nothing. “Now, I don’t know. I don’t know what to think. I mean, you went to all this trouble and everything you just said, but―”
Now I turn to her, seize her hand. “But what? I’ve gone through so many girls that by now I’ve lost count? I’ve never had a girlfriend for longer than a few months? I’ve never been in love?”
As she nods dumbly, I continue “All that is true but is missing the point. The point is you, Emma. You are the exception. You. You came into my life unexpected and unwanted – completely unprecedented. I never hoped for this, for these terrifying, overwhelming feelings that haven’t left me alone until now. Until I found you. And you want to know something? I still don’t want them. Yes, I want you, but I don’t want to want you with this desperate inescapable need that makes every new day without you feel empty and hollow. I don’t want Parker to keep asking me nonstop, “When’s Emma coming back?” I don’t want to think about that night we had every time I’m with a new girl . . . To have your delighted, rosy-cheeked face flash in my head every time I spot a cute animal. No, Emma, I don’t want any of this, but I’m stuck with it. I’m stuck with wanting you, with needing you. There’s no choice in any of it, not anymore. Emma, I’m stuck with loving you.”
As she gapes at me, the fear roars up again. Grasping her in my arms, I spill out more words. “So, you’re right if you think I’m not a good prospect, not well-versed in healthy relationships or any real sort of relationship for that matter. You’re right to doubt that I’d be a good father or a good boyfriend or a good anything, really. But I can tell you this” – I put one hand on her belly and the other on her cheek – “I will love you and this baby until the day I die. And I will do anything for you and our child. Anything that it takes for you to be happy.”
Still, she’s speechless, gaping at me with those blue moon eyes, the ones our baby might have too. Taking her hand, I lean in.
“This is when you’re supposed to tell me your answer – to me, my love, this, everything.”
It bursts out of her, in one delighted sort of laugh-cry: “Yes!” She throws her arms around me. “Oh, yes! Luke, of course yes!” She draws back to look at me with teary eyes. “I’ve missed you every day too, spent these last months trying to convince myself that we’d never work, that you’d never cared for me, that there was no point in even hoping, but now . . .” She smiles. “Now I think the least we can do is try.”
As we stare into each other’s eyes, suddenly, her smile falls.
“But what about the base and my dad?”
My smile grows.
“You haven’t heard? Last week he was transferred to another division. Apparently that crazy bitch wife of his exploded on another commander’s wife. So now we can do what we like.”
She nods as if she’s unsure exactly what I said, so I make it clear for her: “We can start packing when we get back to your place tonight.”
A devious look creeps onto her face. “Oh really? And what if I like where I’m staying now?”
I pat her face. “You can have a sheet partition in the attic too.”
Laughing, she rises.
“And for the baby . . . What if I’d already named him Damien?” I grin, pat her belly.
“If Damien’s ok with it then I’m ok with it.”
Now we’re both grinning stupidly at each other, so I ask her “What do you say?”
Her gaze flutters down, then back to mine. Her smile grows. “Ok, I’m in.”
I rise to whisper in her ear: “No, I’m the one who’s going to be in . . . you.”
Her eyes dancing with an aroused fire, she pushes me back a bit. “Luke!”
I step forward, kiss her, whisper in her ear “I can’t help it. I love you.”
We kiss again and, when we break apart once more, she says “I love you.”
*****
THE END
Doctor's Fake Fiancée
Description
I’m the best gynecologist in the world. My job is to
look women in the… eyes. Deep.
If you’re not on my booty call list, you want to be.
But my lawyer says I need a wife. Or I’ll lose my daughter.
And there she is. My new neighbor. The most innocent sweet geek.
I watch her through my window. I can see that she wants to play. With me.
So I make her a deal.
She has only one condition. She wants to wait until the wedding night. Cause she’s a virgin.
Game on, baby.
LUCY
I’ve always had a crush on him. He gave me my first kiss. My brother’s best friend.
But I’m all grown up now. He doesn’t even recognize me.
He proposes the most disgusting deal in the world. One million if I marry him.
Another million for a baby.
But I have no choice. I need the money to re-build my chemistry lab.
He drives me insane with his devastatingly hot abs and gorgeous smile.
And now I’m stuck in the same bedroom with him. For three days. All alone.
This guy is going to be the end of me.
Chapter One – Lucy
I looked around my tiny living room filled with boxes, unsure where I was going to put everything. The apartment was charming, located above the Victorian home of one of the sweetest old ladies I’d ever met in New York. I was lucky to have found it when I needed it most. I carried a box into the small kitchen with a sigh, tackling it first. The window was wide open as Pandora played from my phone on the counter. I tried not to think about the rubble that was now the only thing left of my lab.
I had opened my lab after college with stars in my eyes. My goal was to produce the best green solutions to reduce air pollution.
Living in a big city, I was well-aware of the thick smog that filled the air and how it impacted air quality. I loved combining my ideas and those of my staff to find the best solution. I’d felt that way since I was in school, and I knew that I was the same geek now as I was back then. I was just a slightly broken version of her after the fire three months ago that forced me out of my apartment and into this one while I waited for the insurance company to reimburse me for my losses.
I hadn’t purchased a great policy since I had been just starting out and regretted it now. They were not making this easy, but Mrs. Hastings was looking for a little extra income and offered me the one-bedroom apartment for a great rate.
I was working at a friend’s lab, pursuing the same goals as before, but it wasn’t like being at my own place where I could do things as I saw best. At Grant’s lab, I had to work around his staff. I never felt fully at home there, even though he assured me that I was welcome to anything that I needed. I just didn’t feel like it was mine. That was a familiar feeling after my relationship with Braden Lintier that had ended six months ago. I tried to spend as little time there as possible, only working to pay the little bit of rent and bills that I had while I waited for the money to come through for my lab so I could rebuild and continue with my dream.
Now I had the distraction of moving in, so I organized my stuff with a little bit of false cheer and bravado. I was on my own and making it despite my troubles, acting like a strong woman. I knew that I was smart and had a lot of heart, but Braden’s verbal abuse had stuck with me since we were together. I had low self-esteem now and was struggling with that even more since the fire – something I wouldn’t put past Braden. I changed my name from Lucy Miller to Lucinda Graves to get away from him, but it would not be difficult to find me considering my job. He’d stalked me before, which had driven me to make the name change, but he wasn’t stupid. He could find me. I just wanted a chance to start all over and set Lucy aside – along with all of the mistakes that she made.
I shuddered as I thought about the abuse that he put me through. My mind blocked out a lot of the physical abuse – the way that he tried to manipulate me into having sex with him – but I knew that I needed some time to recover. He had done his damage and hopefully would leave me alone now. I just wanted peace.
I finished the kitchen and moved to the little bedroom that had come furnished for me. That was a big bonus since Braden had owned everything from our place together. I hung my clothes and put out pictures of my family. These touches made the apartment feel like it was mine. I saw some boxes on the floor and clipped back my caramel curls to do a little digging and see what else I had room for.
The first one was all high school memorabilia. I had kept all my yearbooks in this box as well as some old books and notebooks that I used for taking notes. I opened one and cringed at the poem that I found, remembering my brother’s best friend Max Ranlin. It was all about him, as were many of the things I wrote back then – my silly crush on a guy that I’d never have. My brother Cameron moved to Montana after college and hadn’t mentioned Max in a while. Maybe they weren’t friends any longer. I had no idea, but picturing Max in my head made me smile to myself.
He was always good-looking: tousled chestnut hair and bright green eyes with a hint of gold to them. I had a crush on him – so did all my friends in high school. I blushed as I thought back to the party he’d thrown when he was going to college years ago.
It was wild, as Max had so many friends and admirers. I went with Cameron to make an appearance since Max was like a member of the family. I was more than likely the youngest person there, being a freshman, but everybody was kind to me because Cameron was my brother.
They were also terrified to look at me the wrong way since Cameron was so protective of me. Max could be as well. I didn’t think I’d date until they went to college, if I was lucky. I mingled with some of the girls at the party, always aware of where the guest of honor was. I was a nerd in school – interested in science and math. The others were more on the jock side, but we all got on well together for a night here and there.
I had walked outside to get some fresh air and peace after dancing for a while. I was sweaty, and the music seemed to get louder by the hour. I glanced around to see if any of the surrounding houses were lit up, awakened by the party. Max lived in a nice neighborhood in Long Island. His parents were wealthy from his father’s work as a surgeon. There was a lot of space between the houses, but the music was so loud.
“What are you doing out here?” a voice asked. I jumped and turned to face Max. He was grinning drunkenly and holding a red cup in his hand as I glared at him.
“You scared me! I was just getting some air.” I gestured around with my hand. “Don’t any of these people care that you’re having a loud party?”
Max laughed before he finished off whatever was in the cup. “I talked to them in advance. They were cool with it.”
I knew him all too well and shook my head as I wandered back to the koi pond in the back, feeling him moving with me. “You paid them off?”
“Yup,” he admitted as I took a seat, trying to see the fish in the dark. “I’ll only go away to college once, you know.”
“That’s true,” I admitted. I felt sadness passing through me. I saw him so much, him being my brother’s best friend, so it hurt to think of Max being so far away. There would always be holidays and summers, but it wouldn’t be the same. I looked forward to seeing him on a regular basis – my crush on him was so strong.
“Are you going to miss me, Luce?” Max pressed as I gazed curiously at him. His eyes were dark. I couldn’t quite see them, but something about them made me shiver. I licked my lips.
“Of course. You practically live at our house.” I shrugged and sipped the soda that I had carried out with me. “Nobody will be there to give me shit. Even Cam is leaving to go to Harvard.”
“I’ll be back. Of course, you could give me something to remember you by,” he hinted as I raised a brow at him.
“What do you mean?” I asked shyly as he sat down and turned to face me. We were all alone. I froze as he stared into my eyes. Things were different than they had ever been before with him. I glanced towards the house as he reached out to stroke
my cheek.
“I’ve only seen you get more gorgeous by the year, Lucy. I’ve wondered what it might be like to kiss you.” His voice was a whisper, and I felt my heart jump into my throat.
“What?” I was the school nerd and he was a smart football player. What could he want with me?
“Can I?” Max asked as he scooted closer and cupped my face. I nodded slowly and he pressed his lips to mine, tasting of beer and peppermint.
I knew that I’d never enjoy a kiss like this again. I was crazy about him. He tilted his head and ran his tongue against my lower lip as I trembled and gasped against him. I gave in and he swept my mouth with his tongue, meeting mine as his other hand wrapped around my hip. I felt heat wash over me – throbbing deep inside. I blushed as I moved closer. I’d only had a couple awkward kisses before this that steered me away from ever wanting another one, but this was the opposite. This made me want everything.
We kissed harder until the moment passed. Hell, it might have been hours, but I was lost in the feeling of our lips meeting and his hand stroking me over my clothes. He wasn’t pushing for anything more than a kiss, but I wanted him everywhere inside and would give myself up if only he asked.
I was terrified of that truth as he pulled away and kissed my jaw. Someone called his name and Max turned with a low growl to stare at the house. “It’s Cam,” I whispered as he nodded and stared at me for a moment. He stood slowly and looked at me again before running his hands through his hair and walking away.
I blinked as I looked around my messy bedroom, still affected by that kiss twelve years later. What an idiot I am. I kept unpacking until I grew tired, taking a shower before I dropped into bed.
Chapter Two – Max
I looked down at the blonde writhing under me, begging me for more. We met at a bar where I watched a hockey game with some friends and she was willing to leave with me. Riley was with my mom for the night and I didn’t want to be alone, even though I knew I’d be sending her home in a cab when this was over.
Shattered Daddy: A Billionaire Suspense Romance Page 27
