by Sosie Frost
“No.” Her voice sharpened. “The baby deserves parents—not a couple of strangers forced together because of some ridiculous convention. Believe me, cowboy…it’s not healthy. Not for the couple, and certainly not for the child trapped in the middle.”
From the grave, my father aimed the shotgun at me. Convention or not, I was still a man, and I had responsibilities. “It’s what people do, Micah.”
“Not us!”
“Why not?”
“Because I’m pregnant, not an idiot!”
Jesus. I stumbled onto the tractor and caught my breath. Micah paced, her heels clicking against the gravel. Great. First she’d get pregnant, then she’d break her ankle in my driveway. She’d probably blame me for that too.
“Okay, look, Jules,” she said. “I need you to crawl out of the 1950s and join me back in the real world. I’m not marrying you—I don’t even like you!”
“Feelings mutual, princess. So, what the hell do I do now?”
“Nothing,” she said. “I just came here to tell you. I thought you had a right to know.”
“And?”
Her eyebrow perked. “And…what? That’s it. I’m pregnant. You’re the father.”
“That’s not good enough.”
Micah crossed her arms. “Not good enough?”
I was a man of action. Apparently, a fertile man of action. Something had to be done, and it was my responsibility to see it through. Granted, at that point, projectile vomiting seemed to be the optimal solution, but I’d save that thrill for the woman carrying my child.
“We have to do something,” I said. “Get married. Discuss this. Figure out what to do. Don’t you have your life plan or something?”
Micah stiffened, her words clipping like the strike of her heels against the rocks. “A plan? Right. Well, let me tell you a little about my life plan. My plan had been to work in Butterpond for the next three to five years. I’d planned to network with nearby municipalities through various organizations and workshops while amassing enough experience to pad my resume, so I’d look respectable when I applied for a better paying job with more responsibility in a larger community. I’d planned to focus on my work, my health, and my fitness until I was thirty years old, at which time, and only then, I’d schedule myself an opportunity to begin dating.”
“Christ, I knocked up a freak.”
She grimaced. “I hadn’t planned on a child until I was at least thirty-two, though optimally I believed thirty-three to be adequate time to begin my family. So, no. This does not at all jive with my lifeplan, Julian Payne. Right now, I have no plan. I have no plan, no idea what to do, and no clue how I’m going to fit my daily planner into a goddamned diaper bag!”
“You’re not having this baby alone,” I said.
“You want to carry the child for me?” She huffed. “Be my guest. This is the worst time to be pregnant.”
“Did you want me to knock you up at a different time?”
Micah covered her face. “I’m trying to save my job by managing this fair, and getting pregnant is…ugh, I didn’t think it could get any harder!” She stared at me, words frantic. As much panic as she’d ever reveal. “I have a colony of feral cats West Side Storying it at the fairgrounds. There’s no one to help manage the hundreds of vendors who accidentally filled out an incorrect application, misdating the entire fair by a month. My treasurer just broke her hip, the parks board vice-chair is on a cruise, and the only other people on the staff who have organized the festival retired in the last millennium! I have five pizza vendors, no cotton candy, and two clown guilds fighting over the rights to participate. I still don’t have enough bands to perform, and we’re two thousand dollars short for the fireworks.”
Was she insane? “You’re pregnant.”
“And if I want to keep my job to support this baby, then I need this fair to be a success! Don’t complicate this, Julian Payne.”
“Too fucking late!”
“If you’re so eager to solve this problem, then stop proposing and help me.”
I knew it.
Just fucking knew it.
I wasn’t that lucky, and the world searched for a reason to fuck me over.
“You want me to help with the fair?” I asked.
It seemed to bother her as much as it killed me. “I know you want nothing to do with me. And, quite frankly, I don’t want to look at you now, but…” Honesty seemed to frazzle her. Her voice lowered. “The morning sickness is almost incapacitating. The heat is killing me. I have no idea how I’ll react around the food, much less the animals. I’m going to need help. Someone who can…handle the smells.”
She could have gotten a diamond ring. Instead, she asked for a lackey to do heavy lifting at the fair. Micah’s lifeplan had failed to schedule any time for common fucking sense.
“So that’s all I am to you?” I asked. “A nose?”
“Well, previously, you were just the sperm. Consider this a promotion.”
“Great.”
Micah looked away. “I need two favors, actually.”
“What other body part do I get to be?”
“Zipped lips,” she said. “I don’t want anyone to know. Not yet. Not until the fair is done and I know if I have a job. Then we can tell everyone how I got knocked up by a man I’d met twice before.”
Unbelievable. “So, because you don’t want to tell people you’re pregnant, I’m supposed to bend over backwards?”
“Well, this started when you bent me over backwards.”
Had she bitched as much without her panties on as she did fully clothed, we wouldn’t be in this mess.
“What about birth control?” I asked.
“I was on the pill.”
“Take two before you spread your legs next time.”
She huffed. “You are such a pain in the ass.”
“This wouldn’t have happened if you let me be a literal one.”
“I have some class.”
I laughed. “You didn’t when you were panting on my cock.”
Indignity suited her. A little grace. A lot of poise. And the shock of vulgarity that plumped her lips into a surprised O.
Her voice rattled, low and irritated. “Because you’re such a fine example of refinement, grunting like a rutting animal.”
What the hell was it about this woman? Every word out of her mouth boiled my blood and hardened my cock. I sweated, but so did she. The hint of her exposed skin—that rich chestnut darkness—begged for a kiss, a lick, a bite.
So did her pouty lips, though I knew a better way to keep her quiet. An easy, quick, and sexy way to muffle those protests.
“And you were whimpering like a little slut.” I nearly growled, and the rumble parted her lips. “Sweating. Groaning. You couldn’t breathe. Couldn’t speak. Couldn’t even tell me how much you liked that animal fucking you.”
“You were just a means to get me off.”
Not even she believed that. “Then why do I still have your fingernail scratches on my shoulders?”
“Maybe you were too rough,” she said.
“Maybe you liked that.”
“Maybe you really are an animal.”
“Maybe I should mount you again, just to prove it.”
I grabbed her as she lunged for me. Our lips crashed together, and my hands gripped her tight, pulling her to my body, squeezing her curves against the hardness of my chest, my arms, and lower.
My cock ached for this woman. Nothing had ever felt so good, so right and so wrong and so utterly consuming as getting lost inside her.
I needed her again.
Pregnant or not. Pain in my ass or the greatest pleasure I’d ever had. I twisted her, pushing her onto the seat of the tractor. Her hand curled against my chest.
Then flattened.
Slapped.
Panicked.
I released her and was pushed from her path as she dove off the tractor and sprinted a few yards away. She bent over. Heaved.
And the wo
rld kicked me in the balls.
Morning sickness.
Pregnancy.
She was carrying my child.
Jesus.
Getting sick apparently enraged her. She groaned, turning back to face me with a scowl.
“I can’t believe I let you touch me again,” she said. “I can’t believe this is happening! First the mud. Then you thought I was a whore.”
“Then you proved it.”
“You son of a bitch.” She fumed. “You owe me.”
“Yeah, probably eighteen years of child support. What else do you want?”
I expected a slap to the face. Instead I got tears in her eyes.
Goddamn it. Here I thought my cock was the problem. Turns out I was just a huge dick.
I sighed. “Hey, I didn’t—”
She shook her head, forbidding me to approach. Her hand extended, and she sucked in a frazzled gasp of air. “Just forget it. Forget everything.”
“Micah—”
“I take it back,” she whispered. “You owe me nothing. We’re done. No more fair help. No more applications. We’re done. I’ve been on my own for this long, I can handle this myself.”
Now I felt sick. “Look, I’m sorry. Come inside. We’ll talk. I won’t grope you.”
“No.” Her words—her tears—rotted me to the core. “Forget about this, Julian. Forget I said anything. I’ll do it without you. I never want to see you again.”
7
Micah
The only thing worse than keeping a pregnancy secret from the entire municipality?
Keeping it from my father.
It wasn’t as if I owed him any particular explanation. I’d made it perfectly clear years ago that I didn’t owe him any damn thing, especially news regarding my life, career, or, in the current situation, my all-too-crowded womb.
For the past twenty-six years, I’d worked and planned and scrimped and saved to become a better person than my sleaze ball of a father. And, for twenty-six years, I’d been successful. My life plan had offered me a respectable path of professionalism and stability.
Until now. Until this. Until, suddenly, my life paralleled with the turning point in his.
I’d been knocked up by a stranger. And, twenty-six years ago, he’d knocked up his own.
Nothing like an illegitimate child to bond an estranged father and daughter.
I’d binged purchased a dozen baby books, but none of them included chapters on how to handle this sort of stilted conversation with a man I neither respected nor loved.
Nothing in Your Uterus and You—A Modern Woman’s Guide to Hormones, Hemorrhoids, and Awkward Holiday Discussions. And Single Motherhood—The Land Of Milk and Wine was also a bust.
Even my most recent purchase So You’re Having A Bastard – Out-Of-Wedlock Wit and Wonder had very little actionable advice.
The pregnancy was probably better kept secret and revealed only once the child could speak and demand details regarding all the asshole men in my life. But my father’s sudden arrival in Butterpond complicated matters.
What the hell was he doing in the township building?
Shaking the hand of the mayor? Handing business cards to members of the council?
And greeting me outside of the meeting room with as much of a smile as he could stuff into a three thousand-dollar suit?
“Micah, honey.” He offered me a hug. It was better to power through the awkwardness than deny his obligatory affections and embarrass us both. “I was hoping I could see you today. Do you have a minute?”
The committee members had arrived, though it would take time for the senior access van to lower the ramp onto the sidewalk for their wheelchairs.
“What are you doing here?” I adjusted my vest and skirt, feeling for all the world like I was preparing myself for one of his inspections again. No knee-high socks or braids today. Just pregnant. Would have gotten me kicked out of my fancy Catholic private school long ago. “I thought your company only handled properties in the city?”
Dad grinned. “We’ve got our eye on a couple locations outside of Ironfield. Hearing good things about Butterpond.”
From who? “What sort of things?”
“You know your old man.”
I didn’t, but what I had learned about my father meant the residents of Butterpond deserved a fair warning to hide their wallets and lock away the deeds to their properties.
“I’m always looking for a hip, new area that’s begging for some revitalization,” he said.
No. He was looking for a quiet community with lax building codes that would enable him to build hundreds of cheaply constructed, HOA-blighted homes with illegal labor. I knew his game. Hell, he was the one who originally sent me to school to learn building code. What better way for a daughter to help her father find “cost-saving measures” for the betterment of his company?
“There’s nothing hip in Butterpond,” I said. “In fact, most of the populace does all they can to ensure their hips remain healthy and unbroken.”
Dad stroked his goatee. The diamond on his cufflink glittered in the light, entirely too flashy for the humble community. “But there might be one location ripe for the taking. And that’s where I need your help. What do you know about Triumph Farm?”
Oh, God. Could I get fifteen freaking minutes of peace without thinking of Julian?
“The Payne farm?”
His grin widened, a regal, handsome warmth that had bewitched me and Mom while he destroyed our credit and emptied our bank accounts. “Ah, so you do know them.”
“Hardly.” Only that I was carrying the eldest’s child. “They’re a local family. The farm has been here for generations.”
“They have three hundred acres of unused farmland.”
“And?”
“That’s a lot of land in a little town near a highway outside of a major metropolitan center. Are they interested in selling?”
Julian had practically whored himself for a damn barn. Doubted he wanted to share the land with hundreds of mini-mansions and a community pool.
“Why don’t you ask him?” I said.
“I thought with you being the zoning officer and all…” Dad straightened his tie if only to prove its worth to himself. “You might have some insight.”
“You mean, I might know him personally?”
“And you might whisper a little into his ear.”
“No way. I’m not doing anything to Julian Payne’s ear…or any other part of his body. You want the land? You make him an offer. Don’t involve me.”
“Why not?”
I tensed. “Because that’s not my job.”
Dad leaned close. “But we’re family.”
“And the legal definition of my job is only to approve building and development plans as per the community and state’s statues. I don’t create the plans. I simply review them.”
“Well, take my word for it. I’ve reviewed the prospects too. It’d be a lucrative deal for the company.”
“And a conflict of interest for me. I’m not doing anything that will threaten my job.”
Dad gave me his usual placating smile. It’d only ever worked before my parent’s divorce. “Honey, you know you always have a job with me. Say the word, and I’ll get you your own office, your own secretary, your own title.”
And, knowing my father, he’d also offer me all the company’s liability. “I have a job, Dad.”
He leaned in, fingers tapping against the glass meeting room door. “Not from what I’m hearing, honey. Small towns are vicious. You gotta learn to play the game.”
My heart sunk. He hesitated as a parade of walkers and canes burst through the lobby. The metal scraped against the tile floor as the majority of my fair committee shuffled into the meeting room.
Alice Mahoney, one of the oldest members of the Butterpond community, shouldn’t have driven herself to the meeting. She fumbled with the keys to her Buick and squinted through a pair of glasses half inch thick.
A pi
ece of sucking candy rattled around her mouth. “Is this where we play bridge?”
“No, Alice,” I said. “Today is the county fair meeting.”
“Right, right.” She patted my arm. “Well, maybe that zoning girl will forget today too.” She chuckled to herself and wagged a gnarled finger. “Stoic thing. Needs to smile more.”
Dad nodded. “I agree.”
I didn’t. I guided Alice towards the meeting room as Dad watched with either amusement or pity.
“I know my job is on the line,” I said. “And I know Butterpond doesn’t like that I’m enforcing the rules on the books. But once this fair is successful, they’ll love me.” He didn’t deserve the explanation, but it soothed me to reiterate my own damn plan.
“And even if they don’t…” Dad was always the optimist. “There’s a job waiting for you at home.”
Home: the land of shady deals, debts, and betrayal.
No thanks. Not even if I was unemployed.
Not even if I was unemployed and pregnant.
Not even if I was alone.
And I was. Very, very alone.
“I’ll be fine, Dad.”
He tucked a business card in my hand anyway, like I didn’t remember the R&J Developers radio jingle, phone number, and slogan—R&J puts the WEE in Luxurwee Homes!
“You let me know if you talk to that farmer.” He pulled me in for another hug. That filled our quota of physical intimacy for a year. “Tell him…selling his land could buy him another farm and a half.”
A nice sentiment, but I knew the truth. His land was worth three new farms, but Dad would only ever offer enough to tease, not ensure the deal was fair.
I dumped the business card in the trash on my way to the meeting. I hardly made it inside before a woman gave a yelp and unsuccessfully wrangled a black and white border collie that charged my feet.
The dog yipped, rushed around my legs in tight concentric circles, and effectively drove me—and the other seniors—into a tight group on the right side of the room.
“Ambrose!” Gretchen Murphy, clad in a flamboyantly green safety vest, dove over the chairs. Her pig-tailed afro puffs bounced, almost mimicking her dog’s cocked ears. “Don’t herd the zoning officer! It’s not polite!”
