by Teri Wilson
A future.
A family.
Her heart.
The ride home from the urgent care clinic had been excruciating. No one had said a word, which Evangeline took to understand that Ryan wouldn’t argue when she handed him the letter and told him she thought they should go their separate ways. He’d probably be relieved.
Neither of them had planned this pregnancy. Neither of them wanted it. Except now that it was happening, Evangeline did want it. She wanted the baby—her baby, Ryan’s baby—very much. More than she’d wanted anything in as long as she could remember.
She didn’t know a thing about being a mother. Her own mom hadn’t exactly been a stellar example. But if her own childhood had taught her anything, it was that her baby came first. From here on out, all of her focus had to be on her pregnancy. Potentially getting her heart crushed by the bachelor of the year didn’t belong anywhere in the equation.
She took a deep breath as she rounded the corner and walked the remaining steps toward Ryan’s office. She hadn’t set foot inside the luxe space since her first day of work when she’d vowed to keep everything between them strictly business.
Epic fail.
“Ryan, I...” Her voice faltered when she stepped inside, looked around and found the office empty.
Great. He wasn’t there. It had taken her an entire day’s worth of pep talks to bring herself to face the playboy father of her baby, to say the things she needed to say, and he wasn’t even there.
Maybe it was for the best. Maybe fate had finally cut her a break. She wasn’t sure if she could go through with it if she had to look him in the eye while she pretended she wanted to have the baby all on her own.
She didn’t.
But she also didn’t want to end up like her father had after her mother left.
Losing her had broken him. Evangeline didn’t want to be broken like that. She’d spent her entire adult life protecting herself from that kind of pain. It was why she’d stayed with Jeremy as long as she had, even though deep down she’d always known she deserved something different. Something better. Something real.
It was also why she’d been in such a hurry to kick Ryan out of her apartment when she’d woken up with his cuff links on her nightstand and her head on his chest. She couldn’t be broken by the loss of something she’d never really had.
The letter inside her bag seemed like a terrible, living, breathing thing. Evangeline was eager to be rid of it, before she changed her mind. She reached for the crisp white envelope, crossed the spacious office and placed it on Ryan’s chair. Right where he couldn’t miss it.
She paused for a beat, and Ryan’s words from the night outside her apartment danced in her mind, like a magical, mystical snowfall.
I want you so much that the next time I make love to you, there will be no one else in your head. Or your heart.
Just you and me.
But it would never be just the two of them. There were three of them now. Everything had changed.
I can’t do this.
She couldn’t walk away with her typed resignation letter as her only goodbye. That would make her no better than her mother.
She turned back for the envelope, but a voice stopped her in her tracks.
A woman’s voice, calling out, “Knock knock!”
The singsong quality of the greeting turned Evangeline’s stomach. This was obviously someone who was close enough to Ryan to feel comfortable strolling into his office in the middle of the day. And to top it off, she was beautiful—willowy thin and graceful, with a neck like a swan and masses of thick dark hair piled on her head in the kind of casually elegant updo that Evangeline had never managed to master.
“Oh, sorry.” The woman glanced around the office, registering the absence of its occupant. “Ryan’s not in?”
So this stunning person and Ryan were on a first-name basis. Evangeline wasn’t the least bit surprised.
“No, he’s not.” A lump lodged in her throat. She couldn’t have felt more like a third wheel if she’d plopped right down in the lobby with all the other members of the Ryan Wilde fan club.
“Can I give him a message for you?” She hated the way her voice wavered, betraying her emotion. Resigning was the right thing to do. She couldn’t stay here and linger on the fringe like an extra on an episode of The Bachelor.
“Oh my God. You think I’m one of them, don’t you?” The balletic stranger laughed. “You think I’m one of Ryan’s women.”
Evangeline felt sick. Ryan’s women. “You’re not?”
“No.” She rolled her eyes. “God, no. Those women are delusional. Although you have to admire their persistence. And their optimism. As far as I know, Ryan hasn’t even gone out on a date in close to a year.”
Wait...what?
“But he’s New York’s hottest bachelor.” Evangeline’s face went hot. “At least that’s what the magazine cover says.”
She gestured toward the framed issue of Gotham hanging above his desk, but it wasn’t there anymore. The wall was bare.
The dancer followed her gaze. “He took it down a while ago. My husband gave it to him as a joke, but Ryan never found it quite as amusing as Zander did. Men, am I right?” She rolled her eyes.
The pieces were falling into place. Evangeline remembered hearing something about Zander’s wife being a ballet teacher. “You’re Allegra?”
She nodded and extended a lithe arm. “Allegra Wilde.”
Evangeline shook her hand. “Nice to meet you. I’m Evangeline.”
Allegra smiled. “Ah, so you’re the wine director I’ve heard so much about.”
She nodded. She was still the hotel wine director...for now, at least. “I’m not sure where Ryan is at the moment. I need to speak to him myself, actually.”
Allegra’s gaze ventured over her shoulder and landed on the envelope in Ryan’s chair. “I stopped by to have lunch with Zander. I thought I’d poke my head in to tell Ryan hello and see if he’s coming to Sunday dinner this weekend. It was nice to see him last week. He’s kept to himself for way too long. Such a hermit.”
Hermit? Was she serious?
Evangeline probably shouldn’t be having this conversation. Scratch that—she definitely shouldn’t. It felt like prying. And the fact that she was seriously tempted to interrogate one of Ryan’s family members to get more information on his supposedly notorious love life was pathetic.
“That whole bachelor business is just something a reporter for the Vows column at the Times made up because she was looking for another big story after the Bennington Curse was proven to be bogus.” Allegra’s voice softened, and something in her gaze made Evangeline’s heart skip a beat. “Ryan Wilde is no playboy. You know that, don’t you?”
The Bennington Curse. It had been all over the internet a few months ago. Evangeline wasn’t sure about the specifics, other than it had something to do with runaway brides. It had always sounded more like a Julia Roberts romcom than real life.
The story about Ryan, however, she’d bought. Hook, line and sinker.
It was just so believable. He was handsome, charming and kind. Beyond swoon worthy. Weeks after they’d met, he still remembered which eye Olive could see out of. He’d gone out of his way to make her feel special at Mon Ami Jules. If he hadn’t been there, she never would have made it through the first course. And he’d been so desperate to stop her from drinking the Côtes du Rhone in the conference room—desperate to protect her baby. Their baby.
Even his hands were nice. Strong. Manly...as if they’d be perfectly capable of assembling complicated furniture. A crib, perhaps.
Who wouldn’t want to marry him?
She swallowed around the lump that was rapidly forming in her throat.
No.
No, no, no.
She would not start thinking she had actual feelings fo
r him. Because she didn’t. She couldn’t.
“Why are you telling me this?” she asked Allegra in a near whisper.
Allegra smiled. “Because it’s the truth. And because it seems like something you needed to hear.”
Allegra’s attention flitted to the envelope again and then back to Evangeline. She looked her right in the eye for a long, silent moment—a moment in which Evangeline’s heart fluttered wildly in her chest.
Then before Allegra turned to go, her gaze drifted lower...to Evangeline’s hand resting lightly, unconsciously, on her stomach, where Ryan’s child grew inside her.
* * *
Ryan returned to his office after his monthly accounting meeting to find Evangeline standing beside his desk. Her arms were crossed, and she had the same determined expression that she’d worn the last time she’d sashayed into his inner sanctum.
Back then, she’d come to tell him she wanted to keep things between them purely professional. Back then, she’d also been pregnant. They’d just been oblivious to that significant detail.
“Evangeline.” A trickle of worry snaked its way down his spine. He knew that look. “To what do I owe the pleasure?”
He sat down on the corner of his desk and did his best to ignore the clench in his gut that told him she’d come to deliver another unpleasant ultimatum.
She’d been alarmingly quiet on the way home from the clinic the night before. Shell-shocked. He’d thought it best to give her some space—time to absorb the fact that she was going to be a mother. Of course they needed to talk about how they were going to proceed, but he hadn’t wanted to push. After all, they had nearly nine months to figure things out.
Looking at her now, he realized his silence had been a mistake. A big one.
“Why didn’t you tell me?” She looked him up and down, her gaze lingering briefly on his hands. Then she lifted her glittering eyes to his.
She was breathtaking, even in her anger. So beautiful that it took him a moment to respond.
“You’re going to have to give me a hint here, love.” Her cheeks flared deliciously pink at the endearment. “What didn’t I tell you?”
She took a step closer to him, so close that he could feel the heat of her indignation...of the passion that she still didn’t quite believe she possessed. A wave of desire crashed over Ryan. If he hadn’t already been seated, he might have fallen to his knees.
“All this time you let me think you were some kind of womanizer. A swinging bachelor.” She swallowed, drawing his attention to her slender neck, where her pulse boomed furiously at the base of her throat. “And you’re not.”
Swinging bachelor?
Other than Hugh Hefner, had anyone ever used that term nonironically? What kind of cad had she thought he was, exactly?
“You’re upset,” he said evenly.
“Of course I’m upset,” she spit.
“Because I’m a decent guy.” Ryan lifted a brow.
She was so adorably furious, full of fire and light, and she wasn’t making a lick of sense. But it was killing him not to touch her, to take her in his arms and kiss the righteous smirk right off her face.
“Precisely. Yes.” She blinked, then frowned and shook her head. “I mean, no. Not because you’re decent, exactly. It’s just...”
It’s just that she was pregnant. They were having a baby together, and her reaction to the news had progressed from shock to panic.
She’s scared.
She’s scared out of her mind, and she’s pushing you away.
He swallowed, suddenly far more troubled than amused.
Don’t let her.
He stood, closed the distance between them and took her face in his hands. She glanced over his shoulder, toward the opened office door. Anyone in the building could have walked in on them right then, but Ryan couldn’t have cared less. Their days of hiding were numbered. The truth was bound to come out eventually.
Not that he had a full grasp himself on what exactly was happening between them. What was the truth? They were going to be parents, but was that the extent of it?
Not if he could help it.
“What is it that you’re trying to tell me? Talk to me, Evangeline,” he said.
She looked at him for a long, loaded moment, as if he were some kind of complicated puzzle she was trying to understand. Then her voice dropped to a fragile whisper. So fragile that something broke inside Ryan when she finally spoke. “I hardly know a thing about you, and I’m having your baby.”
His baby...
His.
Warmth radiated through Ryan’s body, starting at the center and spreading outward to the tips of his fingers and toes. Mine.
He let his forehead fall against Evangeline’s and ran his thumb in gentle, soothing circles over her cheek. He could have stayed that way all day, breathing her in. The mother of his child. “That’s easily fixable, Eve. If there’s something you want to know, just ask me. I’m right here.”
Her eyes went wide. Glowing. “I can ask you anything. Really?”
“Really.” He pulled back and waited, wondering just how deep she wanted to go.
Evangeline bit her lip as her gaze flitted to the wall above his desk. “When did you take the Gotham cover down?”
“On your first day of work, right after you came in here reading me the riot act.”
She bit her lip. “Why?”
“Because I could tell it upset you, and because I always despised it myself.”
The corner of her mouth tipped into a quiet grin.
“At last, a smile. Right answer?” He raised a brow.
She nodded. “Right answer.”
“What else? I know there are more questions swirling in that gorgeous head of yours.” He reached to tuck a stray curl behind her ear, enjoying the newfound intimacy between them, hoping it would last.
She took a deep breath. “Yesterday on the way to the clinic, when I asked if you’d been through this before, you gave a cryptic answer—yes and no. What did that mean?”
Ryan grew still.
He never discussed Natalie and her baby. With anyone. The Wildes knew what had happened of course, but Ryan resisted Emily’s many efforts to get him to “talk it out.” He wanted to forget. He didn’t want to talk about it, hence his prolonged absence from Sunday dinner.
But Evangeline needed to know, before she jumped to more conclusions.
“Last year, a woman I was seeing became pregnant. She told me the child was mine, but on the day the baby was born, I found out she’d lied. I wasn’t the father. We parted ways afterward.” He tried to keep his gaze locked with hers, but in the end he couldn’t. He didn’t need to look her in the eye to know what he’d see there—pity. And he didn’t want pity from Evangeline.
He wanted more.
Her breath hitched audibly in her throat, and then her hands reached for his. “Oh my God, Ryan. That’s terrible.”
“It’s in the past.” He looked up, and to his infinite surprise and relief, there wasn’t a trace of pity in her expression. Only a promise.
She took his hands and placed them low on her stomach where their unborn child was growing inside her, its heart beating beneath his fingertips. “This baby is yours, Ryan. I want you to know that, without a doubt.”
He was holding life in his hands—a life they’d made together. It may have been unintentional, but it was no mistake. It was fate. Destiny. And he couldn’t shake the feeling that it was another chance, somehow. For both of them.
If only they could find their way back to each other again. “I know. I trust you.”
He did.
Maybe that made him a fool. He preferred to think it made him an optimist, but he believed her. There wasn’t a chance that the baby was Jeremy’s. If it were, she wouldn’t be here, desperately trying to know him better. She woul
dn’t have reached for his hand and gripped it like a lifeline during the strange, silent ride back to her apartment last night.
She wouldn’t be looking at him right now with that wild combination of terror and desire in her eyes.
The yearning between them was palpable. He could feel it in the way she shivered beneath his touch as his hands moved from her tummy to her hips. Pulling her closer...and closer still...until she was nestled neatly between his thighs. Her fingertips brushed against his leg, and that’s all it took. He went hard in an instant. He wanted their baby, but he also wanted her. He’d wanted her for weeks. No amount of doors slammed in his face could change that.
Kiss me.
The words floated between them, as tender and lovely as snow caressing the treetops in Central Park.
“Eve,” he said, clutching the fabric of her pencil skirt in his grip. Desperate. Devoted. “Is there something else you’d like to ask me?”
He’d promised his lips wouldn’t touch hers until she asked for it, and he was keeping his word. The pregnancy didn’t change the fact that he wanted her to be ready. He wanted her to want him as badly as he wanted her. He wanted her to be his.
“Ryan.” Her gaze dropped to his mouth, and his erection swelled.
He took a deep breath and forced himself to focus. To wait for her to ask. Then, in an effort to stop himself from crushing his mouth to hers prematurely, his gaze strayed over her shoulder.
That’s when he finally saw it—a plain white envelope sitting in his chair.
His name had been printed on the front of it in feminine hand. Not just his first name, but his surname as well—Ryan Wilde—as if it had been left there by a stranger.
But it hadn’t. He knew exactly where it had come from, and he was fairly sure he knew what was inside.
His hands stilled on her hips just as her lips parted, poised to say the words he’d been waiting for.
“Evangeline.” His voice was hushed and flat, yet it sliced through the office like a knife. “What is that?”
