by Rye Hart
It was the busiest I’d been in a long time. I had five customers come in back-to-back that morning, a rare occurrence I almost thought wasn’t possible any longer. And four of them had ordered things on the spot. The other? She placed a massive wedding cake order that had me excited for the money that would come in. I sat down with her and brought out some samples for her to try before she landed on the one she wanted, then she paid half of the cost up front before she left.
I was dancing on cloud nine. Until a familiar voice hit my ears.
“Well, look at that beautiful woman behind the register.”
“Charlie,” I said as I turned around. “What brings you in here?”
“I was craving a slice of cake, and I thought, ‘who better to go and see than the most beautiful woman in town?’”
“How sweet,” I said as I plastered on a smile.
“So, how are things going here?” he asked.
“What kind of cake would you like?”
“Hmm?”
“The slice of cake. You said you wanted one.”
“Whatever your best is. That’s all I ever ask for,” he said.
I grimaced as I turned my back to him. I sliced him off a piece of German Chocolate cake and then drew in a deep breath. I hated it when Charlie dipped into the shop. He was always looking for a reason to stick around and talk. Even though I’d made it clear to him I wasn’t interested in dating someone, he always tried to corner me.
“That’ll be three ninety-five,” I said as I rang him up.
He handed me a twenty-dollar bill as I opened the cash register. “Keep the change.”
“I won’t do that,” I said.
“Heather, I’m serious. Keep it. I know you need the money.”
“I don’t need the money, Charlie. I’m giving you your change.”
I handed his money back to him before he immediately stuck it into my empty, dusty tip jar.
“There. Now you can’t do anything about it.”
I refused to meet his gaze.
“Be honest with me, Heather. How are things really going here?”
“I’m getting by, Charlie, like I always do.”
“I don’t ever see you advertising around town,” he said.
“Because I don’t need to.”
“That other bakery advertises.”
“Charlie.”
“I could give you the money to advertise. All you have to do is say the word,” he said.
“I don’t need your money, Charlie. We talk about this every time you come in, and my answer never changes. Why do you keep pressing the subject?”
“Because I know you’re lying to me, and I hope one day you’ll be truthful.”
“I’m being serious. I don’t need your money. I’ve got it under control. I’ve already got the ball rolling on something to bring in some income as we speak.”
“Oh, really? Do tell. I like a good story,” he said as he took a bite of my cake.
He moaned and rolled his eyes back like he thought that was going to get him on my good graces.
“This is excellent cake. I don’t know why people aren’t coming in for it,” he said. “Oh. Probably because they don’t know it exists. Let me help you with advertising. You know that’s my specialty.”
“Yes. I know. It’s how you made your money, Charlie.”
“And I wouldn't charge you anything,” he said.
“A far cry from the date you offered me a month ago in exchange for it.”
“I admit, not my finest moment. But you know you’ve stolen my heart, Heather.”
I rolled my eyes as I slung my apron back over my neck.
“Goodbye Charlie.”
I heard the bell above my door ding and breathed a sigh of relief. I hated it when Charlie stopped by. I got to work on replenishing the cupcakes I’d run out of, but no sooner had I gotten all of my ingredients together, my phone rang.
“Hello?” I asked.
“Yikes. Did Charlie come by again?”
“How do you always know?”
“You have that angry bitch tone of voice you only bring out after you’ve talked to Charlie. What the hell did he want this time?” she asked.
“To help, like always. Offered his advertising services free of charge or something like that.”
“Did you take him up on it?”
“No, Nikki. I didn’t take him up on it.”
“You really should consider it.”
“I’m hanging up now.”
“Okay, okay, okay! Sorry. Yeesh. That’s not why I’m calling anyway. I wanted to see how things were going with you. Have you come up with any ideas?”
“Well, I finally got a wedding cake order, so once I see it through, I can officially put that on my resume of things I’ve done here in the bakery. That might help boost customers.”
“That’s good. Have you found any other banks willing to loan you the money?” she asked.
I drew in a deep breath and closed my eyes. I knew bringing up what had transpired the past few days would be a sensitive subject for Nikki.
A few years back, she’d lost her own child at seven months pregnant. It had devastated her and was the real reason I’d stayed behind in Whitefish instead of branching out and taking my idea of a bakery elsewhere. I stayed behind to take care of my best friend, and I wasn’t sure how bringing this up with her would affect her emotionally.
“Heather?”
“Yeah. Sorry. Um, I actually have sort of found a way to get the money,” I said.
“That doesn’t sound good. Did you make a deal with the devil?”
“Not exactly.”
“I don’t like that answer either.”
“I’m just worried about how it’s going to make you feel if I say it.”
“Did you volunteer to put puppies down at the shelter or something?” she asked.
“Not exactly.”
“Okay, now you’re just freaking me out.”
I leaned against the counter and closed my eyes.
“I found this place called SurroPoint. They specialize in surrogacy services for very wealthy clients.”
The phone call went silent, and it made my stomach turn.
“I had a meeting with them and put in an application. I did an intensive health screening with them, and everything came back okay. They’ve already matched me up with someone, a man who wants a child but doesn’t want a relationship, and it could potentially net me eight hundred thousand dollars, Nikki. I can negotiate that over the nine-month span of pregnancy, which would dig me out of debt and give me the money to expand as well as put some back.”
And still, silence.
“Say something,” I said.
“I, uh, don’t know what to say. Didn’t we just talk, like, a week ago?”
“We did.”
“And all of this happened in the span of a week?”
“It did, yes.”
“Heather, this is a shitty idea,” she said.
“I know you think—”
“You don’t have to preserve my feelings, because I know that’s what you’re doing. You’re my best friend, and I’m yours. We can talk about these things without fear of hurting one another. So, I’m going to say it. This is a fucked-up idea.”
“It’s potentially eight hundred thousand dollars.”
“At the expense of giving birth to a child you won’t raise and handing it over to a man you don’t know. You’ll get attached to that child during your pregnancy, Heather. Take it from me. You will get attached, and then you’ll have to hand it over and never see it again.”
“I think I’m capable of doing that,” I said.
“You're the most emotional woman I know. You care, Heather. More than you should. You always have. This is going to break you. It almost broke me. I know it’s not quite the same situation. I was married, we lost the baby, and then that grief forced our divorce. I get it. But Heather, what if the same thing happens to you? What if you get all
the way to seven months, he’s been paying you this money, and you lose that child? What then? Will he ask for his money back? Will he want to get you pregnant again? Have you thought about any of this?”
“Well, no. But I’ve already met with him, and I believe him when he says he’s going to take really good care of this child. He’s already a father, and he says his circumstances don’t allow him to find a woman to have another child with. So he’s taking this route,” I said.
“His circumstances? Do you even know who this guy is?”
“His name’s Andrew.”
“Andrew what?”
I closed my eyes when Nikki sighed.
“You don’t even know the man’s last name, Heather.”
“The agency deals only with high-end clients. High-profile men with a certain type of income that require delicacy and privacy above all else. I’ve talked with people. I’ve done my research. I know what I’m doing.”
“This is a massive risk, Heather. I love you, but you have no idea what you’re about to step into.”
“I know it’s a risk, but I would only go through with something like this if I knew this child was going to have a good life. And I have a good feeling about Andrew. We’re meeting this week to discuss terms and negotiate pay, and at any time, if I get a weird feeling about him, I can pull the plug. I can have him removed from the program. That’s the type of power I wield over the situation.”
“So this place keeps you safe. Will someone be with you?” she asked.
“They have their own personal security that walks by and keeps tabs on the places the women in their care go to. So yes, for this next meet-up someone will be there checking on us as well. He’s required to report everywhere we go and the address on where we’re going, and I’m required to call in a health and identification report after every meeting.”
“Good. At least they’re keeping you safe in all this,” she said.
“I have a strong feeling about him, Nikki. I can tell he’s got a good heart.”
Nikki sighed and I could tell she was really struggling with the idea. “I get the feeling he’s a good man, Nikki. But if that feeling changes, I’m not going to do it. No matter how badly I need the money.”
“Good. I can count on that, at least. But Heather, when you feel your child move for the first—”
“His child,” I said.
She sighed again as I pinched the bridge of my nose.
“Okay. I’ll play that game. When you feel his child move for the first time, this is going to become a different story. When you feel that baby move, when you feel the evidence of your body growing a human, this is going to change.”
“The agency provides extensive counseling for the woman throughout the process to deal with things like that.”
“It’s biological, Heather, not psychological.”
“But the psychological has a lot of bearing on what happens. Look, I love you, and I know you’re looking out for me. I know you’re talking from experience and a place of hurt, but I’m not going to get hurt. You were right; this situation is totally different from yours. This won’t be a child conceived out of a loving relationship. I’ll be okay. If I have this meeting with Andrew and things go well and I feel comfortable with him, then I’m going to do it.”
“And I know you well enough to know I can’t stop you once you’ve made up your mind. Just keep yourself safe, okay? And keep me in the loop. I might not agree with any of this, but that doesn’t mean I don’t want to help you.”
“I will. I love you.”
“Love you too.”
The rest of the day at the bakery passed with almost no customers. I had a couple of people come in and ask for samples, but they didn’t end up purchasing anything. That was the downside to samples. By the time I shut down the bakery, I was fed up and ready to go home. I packed up all my things, locked up the store, and then walked back to my studio apartment a mile up the road. When I entered my apartment, my cell phone rang.
“Hello?” I asked.
“Heather?”
I pulled my phone away from my ear and looked at the number.
Holy shit, it was Andrew.
“Yes. Is this Andrew?” I asked.
“It is. I hope it isn’t too late to be calling.”
“Not at all. Just got in from work. Is there something I can help you with?”
“I know the agency is supposed to set up a meeting between the two of us this week, but I was hoping you would let me take you out for dinner tomorrow night.”
“Um.”
“I’ve already called the agency and told them I’d be placing this call, and you have the option to refuse at any time. We can make it the negotiation dinner if you want, or we can meet up at a separate time to do that. But I do want to thank you for the decision you’ve made to help me. I also want to give you another chance to get to know me, since our coffee shop meeting left you a little flustered.”
“I wasn’t flustered,” I said.
“You were a little bit.”
I could hear traces of a grin in his voice.
“Okay. If I said yes, and then I called the agency, they would know about this phone call?” I asked.
“Every bit of it. I gave them the address of the restaurant I would want to take you to if you agreed,” he said.
I sat down on my couch, and my mind twirled the idea around. It would be nice to get dinner out. It had been a very long time since I’d done something like that. And I didn’t hear any traces of manipulation or anything in his voice. I’d be calling the agency to make sure his words were backed up with proof, but we were meeting this week anyway.
“Sure,” I said. “Dinner sounds nice.”
“Perfect. How does seven o’clock sound? I could pick you up?”
“You want to pick me up?”
“If you’re comfortable with it.”
“Um, sure. Yeah. You can pick me up. That’s fine.”
“So, seven o’clock tomorrow?”
“Sounds great. I’ll see you then.”
“Thank you for letting me do this,” he said.
The sincerity in his voice permeated through the phone and relaxed all tension from my muscles.
“You're welcome, Andrew. I look forward to speaking with you again.”
I went through the motions of my evening routine, replaying our conversation.
There was no framework for the kind of relationship to have between a surrogate and the client.
I felt a little too much anticipation in my blood over what was supposed to be a business dinner.
Because it sure as hell didn’t feel like business.
CHAPTER 7
CAMERON
Keep it together Cameron.
This is a business agreement, just like you wanted.
I knocked on her apartment door and held my breath once she opened it. Those dark, brooding eyes looked up at me.
Her long hair was artfully piled high on her head. She looked exactly like she had in my fucking dream. She was wearing this little black dress that left little of her curves to the imagination but she still looked elegant.
I had to take a step back, trying to put some distance between us. I felt her body radiating heat when she turned around to face me.
“Ready to go?” she asked.
“Wow. You look amazing, Heather.”
She smiled at me, and those beautiful lips of hers parted so I could take in the beauty of her features.
“You look nice as well. I didn’t take you for a suit guy.”
“I’ve got a few tricks up my sleeve,” I said as I offered her my arm. “Shall we?”
I escorted her to my car, painfully aware of how her hand curled around my bicep.
Fuck. My cock was already throbbing at the touch of her skin. I opened her door and helped her into my car, enjoying the way her hand slid effortlessly into mine.
Then, her legs caught my eye. Shit. They slid into my truck and flexed for my viewin
g pleasure as I shut the door.
The drive to the restaurant was silent, and I wasn’t sure what to do. If this were years ago and I was on a date, I would’ve taken her hand or slid my palm over her knee. Maybe I would have worked my way up that delicious thigh of hers and teased her, given her a taste of what was to come later that night.
But this wasn’t a date.
I hadn’t practiced my moves on a woman for so long, although I was confident that if the time came it would come back naturally.
Even so, I didn’t want to make Heather uncomfortable.
What the hell are you doing Cameron?
If I was being fully honest with myself, I was way in over my head for setting the stage for a date in the first place.
We pulled up to the restaurant, and I watched her gawk. It told me she’d never been to a place like this before, and that sent a thrill gushing through my veins. Introducing a woman to something new had always been my kink. I loved watching the surprise and awe of experiencing everything for the first time.
“So,” I said as I pulled out her chair, “what would you like to drink?”
“Water will be fine,” Heather said.
The waitress came by to take our food and drink orders, and then I settled back into my seat.
“How was business today?” I asked.
“I was busier than normal today, so that was nice.”
“Do you get a lot of traffic into your business? Or is it fairly new?”
“It’s not new, no,” she said.
I watched her eyes fall to her lap before she pressed her napkin against her thighs.
“What’s your most popular order?”
“My cinnamon rolls, by far.” There was confidence in her smile when she talked about her baking that made her all the more attractive.
“Oh, my daughter likes cinnamon rolls. She can devour three of them in a sitting.”
“What’s your daughter’s name?”
My heart dropped into my stomach even before I spat it out. “Rebecca,” I said. “I’ll have to bring her by sometime. She loves walking around downtown.”
“Well, it’s Heather’s Bake Shop. It kind of sits on an odd corner, but the front door is right there on the side.”
“I’ve passed by it a few times, though I did ask myself where the front door was. It’s on the side?” I asked.
