by Teri Wilson
Okay, Evangeline Holly!
You. Can. Do. This.
Put that bad breakup behind you. And stop obsessing over the subsequent superhot one-night stand. Focus on your future. It’s the first day of your new job! Just ignore the fact that your boss, Ryan Wilde, was your former one-night lover. (He’s so hot!) Oh, and—surprise!—you’re pregnant with Ryan’s baby. And your job hinges on keeping it secret. You’ve got this! Right?
She crossed her arms—a barrier—and told what might have been the biggest lie of her life.
“We’d be fools to go down that road again anyway, since last time was such a disaster.”
Ryan froze for a second and then frowned. “Disaster?”
“Sure.” She shrugged and feigned nonchalance as best she could. Not an easy task while every nerve ending in her body wanted to lean into him. “I’m sure you agree. It was...”
He lifted an inquisitive brow.
“...awkward.” Her face went hot.
Ryan’s gaze narrowed, and a mesmerizing knot flexed in his jaw. Even enraged, he was one of the most beautiful men Evangeline had ever seen.
“Awkward,” he repeated without a trace of emotion in his voice.
Evangeline couldn’t bring herself to look him in the eye any longer, so her gaze flitted to a blank space over his shoulder. “At best. So it obviously shouldn’t happen again.”
“Don’t worry,” he said through clenched teeth. “It won’t.”
“Perfect.” She nodded.
Her pulse roared in her ears...liar, liar, liar.
WILDE HEARTS:
Letting their hearts loose,
one Wilde at a time!
Dear Reader,
Welcome back to glamorous New York and the third installment of my latest series for Harlequin Special Edition, Wilde Hearts. I hope you love The Bachelor’s Baby Surprise!
This is the third book of the series, but each story can be read as a stand-alone, so if this is your first Wilde Hearts read, don’t worry.
The Bachelor’s Baby Surprise is a really unique book for me. The opening is unlike anything I’ve ever written. I’m not going to spoil it and tell you what happens, but it was a lot of fun to write. It also has two adorable dogs in it that are based on my own Cavalier King Charles spaniels, Bliss and Finn.
The heroine of the story, Evangeline Holly, is a wine expert who is studying to be a sommelier, so I learned a lot about wine while working on this book. The Bachelor’s Baby Surprise pairs well with just about anything, so pour yourself a glass of vino (or coffee...or tea!) and get ready for a romantic, heart-tugging read.
If you enjoy The Bachelor’s Baby Surprise, mark your calendar for the next book in the Wilde Hearts series, coming this Christmas from Harlequin Special Edition. And if you missed the first two books in the series, be sure to look for The Ballerina’s Secret and How to Romance a Runaway Bride at Harlequin.com or wherever books are sold.
As always, happy reading!
Teri Wilson
The Bachelor’s Baby Surprise
Teri Wilson
Teri Wilson is a novelist for Harlequin. She is the author of Unleashing Mr. Darcy, now a Hallmark Channel Original Movie. Teri is also a contributing writer at HelloGiggles.com, a lifestyle and entertainment website founded by Zooey Deschanel that is now part of the People magazine, TIME magazine and Entertainment Weekly family. Teri loves books, travel, animals and dancing every day. Visit Teri at teriwilson.net or on Twitter, @teriwilsonauthr.
Books by Teri Wilson
Harlequin Special Edition
Wilde Hearts
The Ballerina’s Secret
How to Romance a Runaway Bride
Drake Diamonds
His Ballerina Bride
The Princess Problem
It Started with a Diamond
HQN Books
Unmasking Juliet
Unleashing Mr. Darcy
Join Harlequin My Rewards today and earn a FREE ebook!
Click here to Join Harlequin My Rewards
http://www.harlequin.com/myrewards.html?mt=loyalty&cmpid=EBOOBPBPA201602010002
For Cameron
Contents
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Epilogue
Excerpt from Her Lost and Found Baby by Tara Taylor Quinn
Chapter One
“Come quickly... I am tasting stars.”
—Dom Pérignon, at his first sip of champagne
Evangeline Holly was no stranger to guilty pleasures.
Like Audrey Hepburn, she had a fondness for a nice creamy chocolate cake. In fact, she was on a first-name basis with most everyone at Magnolia Bakery’s Bleecker Street location in Greenwich Village.
She was also currently housing not just one, but two special-needs Cavalier King Charles spaniels in her very tiny, very non-pet-friendly apartment. So yeah. She had her vices.
But she also knew where and when to draw the line. Evangeline knew her limits. And for her, those limits included two noteworthy things she’d never once indulged in—bad wine and one-night stands.
Until now.
Her head throbbed. She dragged her eyelids open, and the first thing her gaze landed on was her pair of dogs snoring madly atop a man’s Armani suit jacket that had been discarded on the bedroom floor. Beside it, a pair of trousers and a crisp white Oxford shirt rested in a heap.
Okay then.
She closed her eyes and reminded herself that there wasn’t anything inherently wrong with cheap wine or casual sex. It was just that growing up on a vineyard in Upstate New York simply precluded her from experiencing the former. If she was a wine snob, she’d at least come by it honestly.
As for the latter...
Chalk that up to being involved in a devoted, monogamous relationship with the same man for most of her adult life. Also, no one actually had time for intimacy these days, did they? Evangeline had never quite believed everyone was spending as much time in bed as they cheekily hinted at.
She opened her eyes again. Early morning sunlight glinted off the pair of cuff links on her nightstand. There were cuff links on her nightstand. Cuff links from Tiffany & Co., but still.
She’d been wrong about everything. So. Very. Wrong.
Most notably the assumption that her relationship was in any way devoted. Or monogamous. On her end, yes. On Jeremy’s, not so much. Apparently, he’d been spending plenty of time in bed...with his sous chef. Not Evangeline.
She’d been enlightened three days ago. It was startling how much could change in three measly days. She’d lost her boyfriend. She’d lost her job. Basic truths she’d believed about her life had gone right out the window.
As had Evangeline’s previous avoidance of certain weaknesses.
The pounding in her head was a testament that she’d broken her no bad wine rule the night before. The evidence of her first-ever one-night stand was far more tangible—from the clothes and the cuff links to the startlingly attractive man lying beside her with his eyes closed, dressed in nothing but her nicest bedsheets.
“Good morning.” He spoke without opening his eyes, a
s if he could sense her staring at him. His voice was delicious, low and unfamiliar. Not at all like Jeremy’s.
“Um.” She swallowed. What had she been thinking? She’d brought a complete stranger back to her apartment, and here he was. Naked in her bed.
She blamed Jeremy. This was 90 percent his fault. The other ten percent of the blame fell squarely on the shoulders of the pinot grigio she could still taste in the back of her throat. Pinot grigio, for God’s sake.
“Good morning,” she finally said, even though nothing about it seemed good.
She didn’t know what to say or how to act. She wasn’t even sure where to look, although she couldn’t seem to force her gaze away from the owner of the cuff links. He stretched and rolled onto his back, giving her an eyeful of taut male skin and finely sculpted abdominal muscles.
Her throat grew dry. Where on earth had she found this beautiful person? And how had she summoned up the nerve to flirt with him? Flirting must have happened at some point for him to end up here, right?
Jeremy’s voice rose up from the pinot-drenched fog in her mind. Of course I’ve been sleeping around. What did you expect? You’re not exactly a sexual person, Evangeline. I just need more. Most people need more.
So that’s how she’d found the courage. When your boyfriend insinuated you were terrible in bed, you either curled up into a ball or went about proving him wrong. Two days in the fetal position had been more than enough.
The sound of a deeply male throat clearing dragged her back to the present.
Evangeline’s gaze flitted from the stranger’s trim waist to his drowsy half grin. He’d caught her ogling him. Perfect.
Her face went hot. “Look, um...”
“Ryan,” he said, tucking his arms behind his head, causing the sheet to dip even lower.
Don’t look. Do. Not.
She looked, and a sultry warmth washed over her, settling in the very same areas that Jeremy had called dead just three days prior.
“Right.” She bit her lip and met his gaze again. “Ryan. I knew that.”
“I believe you.” He winked. Clearly he didn’t, even though Ryan had been the first name that came to her once she’d spotted the RW engraved on his cuff links. “Eve.”
Eve?
No one had ever called her Eve. Always Evangeline.
She remembered hearing somewhere that Eve meant living. She tried not to think too hard about that while there was a naked man named Ryan with the body of a Greek god stretched out beside her. “Anyway, Ryan, what I’m trying to say is that I don’t typically do this sort of thing.”
“Yes, I know. You mentioned that last night. A couple of times, actually.” He rested a warm hand on her upper thigh and gave her a smile that seemed a bit sad around the edges. Bittersweet.
She felt oddly transparent, as if the man in her bed knew more about her than was possible after only a handful of hours together. Her thigh was suddenly awash in goose bumps.
“Good. So long as we’re clear—this was a one-night affair. A mistake, probably. I don’t expect you to ask for my number or anything.” She slid her leg out of reach, tucking it beneath the covers.
His smile faded. The dimples which had been barely visible beneath the layer of scruff on his chiseled jaw disappeared entirely. “A mistake?”
She nodded, because of course it had been a mistake.
A man was the very last thing she needed, even for one night. Particularly this man, whose hands she couldn’t look at without imagining them on her skin. And whose mouth made her want to linger in bed and revisit the most wicked portions of the previous evening. “Good grief, how much wine did I have last night?”
She clamped her mouth closed. God, had she actually asked that question out loud?
“Quite a bit.” Ryan’s frown deepened. She couldn’t stop saying his name in her head. Ryan. Ryan. Ryan. “Although you didn’t seem drunk. Not even tipsy. Should I be apologizing right now? Something tells me I should.”
Another perk of having a vineyard in your childhood backyard—an incredibly high tolerance. For wine, at least. Even on the rare occasion when she drank enough to feel like she’d overindulged, it never showed.
“You have nothing to apologize for. Truly.” Memories flitted through her consciousness. The taste of him. The feel of him. The weight of him on top of her as he’d pushed himself inside.
It had been exactly what she’d wanted.
Exquisite.
A shiver coursed through her, and she leaped out of the bed to prevent herself from reaching for him again.
Ryan’s gaze settled on her, and she felt it as keenly as if it were a caress. Her thoughts screamed. Ryan. Ryan. Ryan. She’d cried out his name last night, hadn’t she?
Oh God.
She crossed her arms, and his gaze drifted lower, lingering on her bare breasts. She was every bit as naked as he was, which made perfect sense, given the situation. She’d just been so preoccupied with his nakedness that she hadn’t noticed her own.
“What if I wanted to ask for your number?” he said, making no move whatsoever to evacuate her bed.
How long was he planning on staying? Did Ryan not realize how one-night stands worked?
Ryan. Ryan. Ryan.
Evangeline had repeated the name to herself so many times now that it no longer made sense. She wondered what the W on the cuff links stood for, but she didn’t dare ask. If she knew his full name, she might be tempted to look him up later in another moment of weakness.
Not happening.
She grabbed the quilt off the end of the bed, wrapped it around herself and shook her head. “You don’t want my number.”
A muscle flicked in his jaw. “I’m certain I do.”
“No.” She shook her head even harder. “You don’t.”
If he knew the first thing about her situation, he’d run for the hills. She wouldn’t blame him in the slightest.
“Then I must be an idiot,” he said.
Did he have to be so charming? He probably couldn’t help it. It was probably part of his genetic makeup, like the abs. And the voice. And the fathomless blue of his eyes.
Evangeline had never seen eyes quite so blue.
She averted her gaze from them.
“Honestly, you don’t need to do this. Everything’s fine. I’m fine. This was—” Just what I needed. She swallowed around the lump that had formed in her throat, seemingly out of nowhere “—fun.”
“Fun,” he echoed.
The word sounded oddly hollow, and Evangeline instantly wanted to take it back. She had to bite the inside of her cheek to stop herself from telling him the whole truth—that she was lost; she’d been lost for a very long time and that the real reason she never did this sort of thing was because it scared the life out of her.
Intimacy, in all its forms, involved a level of vulnerability that she couldn’t quite handle. She thought Jeremy had understood that about her. Wrong again.
“Here you go, then.” She bent to retrieve his abandoned shirt and trousers and handed them to him. When his fingertips brushed against hers, the lump in her throat doubled in size.
Leave. Please, leave.
He climbed out of the bed and started to get dressed. Thank goodness.
She glanced at the floor, where Olive and Bee were still sound asleep on top of Ryan’s suit jacket. Olive’s paws twitched. She was chasing rabbits in her sleep again.
Evangeline tugged gently on the wool Armani, trying her hardest to slip it out from beneath the sleeping dogs unnoticed. Like the old magician’s tablecloth trick.
No such luck. Bee was completely deaf, therefore extremely sensitive to movement. She woke with a start, pawing at Evangeline’s shins. Olive let out a squeaky dog yawn and hopped onto the bed, where she stood and stared at Ryan while he zipped up his pants.
He g
lanced up, spotted Olive watching him and then reached to scratch behind her ears.
“Pet her from the left side. She can’t see out of her right eye, so you might startle her,” Evangeline said.
He followed her advice. The little Cavalier’s tail wagged furiously. Bee scrambled up onto the bed to join in the fun.
“Sweet dogs,” Ryan said, and Evangeline’s heart gave a little tug.
He somehow managed to look even more attractive, surrounded by adorable dogs. Because of course.
“Thank you. They technically belong to my grandfather, but he recently moved into an extended care facility, so they live here now.” Why was she telling him this?
“I’m sorry to hear that.” His voice went as soft as velvet, like he really meant it.
If he didn’t leave soon, she’d probably offer to cook him breakfast.
“Here.” She shoved his suit jacket at him. Every inch of it was covered in dog hair.
He pretended not to notice and slid it on, anyway. And that small act of kindness was almost more than she could bear. Maybe last night hadn’t been a mistake after all. Maybe the mistake was happening right now.
Maybe she shouldn’t be in such a hurry to let him go.
“Goodbye, then,” she said in as firm a voice as she could manage.
He came around the bed, and when he was an arm’s length away, he lifted his hand as if to cup her face. She took a tiny backward step.
His hand fell to his side. “Goodbye, Eve.”
And then he was gone.
* * *
Ryan Wilde stood outside Eve’s apartment and watched as the door shut in his face.
Well, he thought, that was different.
He’d never been so summarily tossed out of a woman’s bed before. Then again, he typically didn’t make a habit out of bedding women he didn’t actually know.
Especially lately.
Ryan’s love life had been rather complicated in recent weeks, thanks to the New York Times. He’d been doing his best to avoid romantic entanglements altogether.
He walked down the hall, making his way to the building’s front steps and pulled his cell phone from the inside pocket of his suit jacket—which looked more like a fur coat at the moment—and rang the Bennington Hotel’s driver.
