Baby for Brother’s Best Friend: Brother’s Best Friend Book 1

by Summers, Sofia T

  I can have a baby, I thought.

  Now, all I need to do is find the father.

  That night, I was over at Anna’s, spending time with her and Trina. We’d made pasta with pesto and pine nuts for dinner, and watching Trina get it all over her face had nearly made my heart explode.

  “So, sounds like today was pretty good for you, then,” Anna said. She leaned back in her chair, eyed her daughter, and sighed. “Trina, honey, use a napkin.”

  Trina stuck her tongue out at her mother and I covered a giggle behind both hands.

  “And how was your day?” I asked Trina.

  “There was a doggy at day-care,” Trina said carefully. “We got to pet him.”

  “Oh, yeah? That sounds way better than my day,” I replied. “What was his name?”

  “Baxter.”

  “Very cute,” I said.

  Trina giggled and puffed her cheeks out at me.

  “She’s all wound up,” Anna explained. “The lady who brought the dog in had candy and I think someone had a little too much sugar.”

  “I did not,” Trina said. She pouted and looked both adorable and indignant as she gazed at her mother.

  I couldn’t help but smile. Even when Trina was being a little bit of a brat, she was still so incredibly cute, sweet, and smart that I couldn’t help but wish that she was mine.

  “You did, too,” Anna said. She raised an eyebrow. “You don’t want the dentist to see any cavities, do you?”

  Trina solemnly shook her head and went back to inhaling her dish of pasta.

  “So,” Anna said, turning to me with her eyebrow still high on her forehead. “What are you going to do now?”

  “I ... well, that’s the part that I don’t really know,” I admitted.

  Anna mouthed ‘sperm bank’ so Trina wouldn’t hear.

  “Probably,” I said. “Although ... I don’t know. The idea is still kind gross, to be honest. And like, what if the guy lied about his health history or something?”

  “Well, I mean, a boyfriend could just as easily do that,” Anna mused. “Or a husband. Not maliciously, of course, but like, because they don’t know. You know how hard it is to get a man to go to the doctor?”

  I laughed.

  “I guess,” I said. “It just seems kind of distasteful.”

  “Well, it’s probably your best option,” Anna continued. “And besides, guys wouldn’t donate if they didn’t want little versions of themselves running around.”

  “I guess,” I said again.

  “Mommy,” Trina said, tugging Anna’s sleeve. “I need to go potty.”

  “Want company?” Anna asked.

  Trina looked at me and blushed, then nodded.

  “We’ll be right back,” Anna told me as she got up from her chair and took her daughter’s hand. “At least, we’ll be back eventually.”

  I nodded as Anna walked her daughter down the hall to the bathroom. There was still a ton of pasta left on my plate, but I set my fork down and sighed.

  Was I really going to use a sperm donor and have a baby with a stranger? What would I tell my child when he or she got old enough to ask about their father?

  I smiled slightly – I could always tell them that they sprang from me, fully grown, like Athena coming out of Zeus’s forehead.

  But that wouldn’t be fair. I’d heard Trina ask about her daddy before ... and heard Anna struggle to give her child a proper response, something age-appropriate and yet still truthful. Anna had told me (in private, of course) that she was waiting until Trina was older before she really told the truth, but she – and I, for that matter – had no idea when that age would come. Trina was mature for a four-year-old, but she was still a toddler. And as acrimonious as the split with her ex had been, I didn’t think Anna was the type who wanted to paint Trina’s father as a monster.

  “I grew up with a single mom who always told me that my dad had a real mean streak,” Anna had said once. “It made me wonder if there was something bad in me, something genetic that I couldn’t get rid of. I don’t want Trina growing up and feeling the same way, even though I know her dad was a total douchebag.”

  That had made sense to me, even at the time.

  In the end, it made me gladder than anything that I hadn’t chosen to have a child with Curt.

  Or rather, that Curt hadn’t wanted a kid, and I hadn’t accidentally gotten pregnant. He had been so cruel to me, so abusive. I wouldn’t have wanted a child around that, anyway. It sounded crazy and a little stupid, even to me, but it had taken months after leaving Curt before I’d realized how bad things truly had been between us. Being friends with Anna had helped that, a lot.

  But it still made me ashamed. Ashamed that I’d stuck around for so long, ashamed that I’d let him bully me into marrying him at such a young age so that he could control me. Ashamed that I’d begged and pleaded with my parents, who initially had been opposed to the union, to let me marry him even though I was only twenty-one.

  That was the past, I said firmly as I looked down at my plate and sighed.

  The future is going to be different.

  10

  Dan – Saturday

  Saturday morning, I went for a long run in Central Park before going into the office and checking on a few things ... mostly concerning Lyssa. I had tried to make a practice out of not working on the weekends, but I was so preoccupied with her and helping her that it didn’t even matter.

  It didn’t even feel like work.

  The results from the ultrasound tech had come back and I was relieved. Physically, the tech had written, there was no reason why Lyssa shouldn’t be able to get pregnant and carry to term.

  Now, I just hoped that her blood tests would come back with the same good news.

  When my phone buzzed, I looked down to see a text from Steven, inviting me to dinner at his parents’ house in Cos Cob.

  Fuck, I thought. Does he know? Has he somehow sensed it?

  Before Meredith had come around, Steven and I had spent a lot more time together – happy hours almost weekly and dinners at least a few times per month. We’d played racquetball together and even joined an Ultimate Frisbee league. When the two of them had started dating, though, our time together had really dropped off.

  At first, I’d been resentful. But now – and it killed me to admit this – I was almost relieved. Keeping my feelings for Lyssa a secret from her brother, the person who knew me best in the world, was going to be insanely difficult.

  Especially given how protective he was of her. Steven had told me privately (and a little drunkenly) once that while his parents were wonderful people, they were clueless about kids and younger generations. Both Lyssa and Steven had been born later in their mother’s life, and growing up she’d often been more like a grandmother than a parent.

  I texted back that I’d be there. It would have been too much to ask if Lyssa would be there, but I assumed – hoped – that she would be. I had just enough time to go home and shower before changing into a pair of dark jeans and a white shirt. The traffic getting out of New York was murder, and I was almost a full half-hour late.

  “Don’t worry about it, hon,” Joanna, Steven’s mother, said as she pulled me into a hug. “It’s been so long since we’ve seen you!”

  “I know,” I said, feeling a slight pang of guilt. “I’ve been busy with work.”

  “Well, you’re here now,” Joanna replied. “We’re having drinks in the living room, if you want to join.”

  I kicked off my shoes in the foyer and followed the older woman. “Is Lyssa coming?” I asked, trying to keep my tone light and casual.

  Joanna tutted. “No, dear,” she said. “She said that she has some things to do in the city, plans or something like that.”

  I felt an immediate and irrational bolt of jealousy. Like a date, I wondered. Suddenly, I hated being in Connecticut – I wished that I’d stayed in the city, where Lyssa was.

  Was she out with a guy? Had she been online dating, or did
one of her friends set her up? I knew it wasn’t my place or right to be jealous, but I was. I felt so possessive of her, so protective, that the idea of her being with some guy who no doubt wouldn’t appreciate her curves was like acid in my stomach.

  “You’re quiet tonight,” Joanna observed. She handed me a gin and tonic and I took a long swallow.

  “Sorry,” I said. “I’m just kind of preoccupied, that’s all.”

  Joanna nodded. Her husband, Ellis, chuckled.

  “I remember what it was like being busy all the time,” he said.

  “He’s teasing,” Joanna said, playfully tapping her husband on the shoulder. “He misses working. He’d still be working, if I didn’t worry so much about his heart.”

  It was strange – I had been hanging out in the Holms’ house for years, almost my entire life, and I’d always felt so comfortable there. But suddenly I found myself thinking about it in an entirely different way.

  Not as a friend of Steven’s, but as a lover of Lyssa’s.

  “You look upset,” Joanna said. “Is something the matter?”

  I shook my head. Before I could reply, the front door opened and Steven walked in, carrying a large box.

  “Someone gave Meredith a cake and she said that she can’t have it around the house because it would ruin her diet,” he explained. “I thought it might be good for dessert.”

  Joanna and Ellis exchanged a knowing look. I guess I’m not the only one who doesn’t like her, I thought as Steven set the box down on the table.

  “Well, that was very generous of her to give it to us,” Joanna said in a pinched way.

  “Yeah,” I echoed. “Nice.”

  Joanna got up and went to fix Steven a drink. After Ellis followed her, I turned to Steven.

  “How are things going with my sister?” Steven asked, before I could say anything.

  “Fine,” I said.

  “But you can’t tell me anything,” Steven continued. “HIPAA, right?”

  “Uh, right,” I said as I nodded and sipped my drink. “Exactly.”

  There was an awkward silence – made all the more awkward by the fact that I wasn’t used to sharing them with my best friend – and I cleared my throat.

  “So, I have to ask,” I said. “Is Lyssa seeing anyone?”

  “What?” Steven shook his head. “No,” he said. “I mean, not to my knowledge.” A weird look came over his face. “I guess that’s why I thought it was kind of odd that she suddenly decided she wanted a baby.”

  “Well, a lot of women use sperm donors,” I said, feeling even more awkward than before. “It’s pretty common now. I have a lot of patients who aren’t married, who just weren’t interested in it or didn’t find the right person.”

  Even saying that aloud felt like a blatant violation of my patients’ privacy, and I frowned.

  Joanna came back into the room with a drink for Steven. “Good news!” She chirped. “I just heard from Lyssa – she’s coming for coffee and dessert.”

  I spat a mouthful of gin and tonic back into my glass and coughed. Everyone turned to stare at me, and I felt like melting into the carpet and dying.

  “Uh, wrong tube,” I lied. “Sorry about that.”

  Dinner seemed to take forever. I was anxious about seeing Lyssa later and to calm my nerves, I had another drink. Then two more, followed by a glass of wine after dinner.

  “It’s nice to see you loosening up,” Joanna said. She smiled at me, and I wondered if I was visibly drunk. I felt drunk – my skin was hot and I felt like the world around me had gone blurry. But I hadn’t even had that much to drink: Steven and I were famous for putting away entire pitchers at happy hours.

  You’re drunk on the idea of Lyssa, you idiot, I thought, resisting the urge to roll my eyes.

  Just as the clock crept past eight thirty, there was a knock on the door and it opened to reveal Lyssa. She came in, wearing a tight spandex dress that hugged her every curve. Her red hair was twisted into a messy knot at the top of her head and she was wearing mascara and dark pink lipstick that made her luscious little mouth look even more kissable. Her blue eyes lingered on me for a second longer than anyone else in the room, and I felt my cock twitch in my pants.

  God, she looks incredible, I thought as I swallowed a sip of wine. Her curves were practically poured into the tight dress, and I instantly had the fantasy of pulling it down, exposing inch by inch of creamy skin and licking her all over. When she tore her gaze from mine and went to her mother, I nearly groaned.

  “Goodness,” Joanna said as she rose and pulled her daughter into a hug. “What’s all this?”

  “I was out with Anna,” Lyssa explained. She blushed and looked over at me. I felt the air sizzle between us, as if we were alone in her parents’ living room, and suddenly I would have done anything in the world just to touch her, just to kiss her. She still had the same spell over me that she’d first cast so many years ago, and I was breathing hard when I forced myself to look away.

  “Oh, well, that’s nice, dear,” Joanna said blithely. “Your brother brought a cake, isn’t that night?”

  Lyssa giggled – a magical sound, one that I hadn’t heard in what felt like far too long.

  “Steve, when did you learn how to bake?” She teased. “That’s a new one, even for you.”

  “I didn’t,” Steven said. He rolled his eyes. “Someone bought one for Meredith, but she didn’t want to ruin her diet, so I brought it here.”

  “Like who could say no to cake,” Lyssa said. She walked across the room and I had to force myself not to stare at the way her ass shook and bounced under that tight dress. It was so short that I could almost see her panties. Seeing her like this was such a stark change from the way she’d behaved in my office that I wondered what had prompted it.

  I wondered stupidly if she’d worn this just to tease me, then immediately shoved the thought out of my head. There was no way – she probably hadn’t even known that I was going to be here.

  “Wow,” Lyssa cried from the other side of the room. She cut herself a healthy piece of cake and smiled. Her smile was infectious – there was nothing I loved more than seeing her happy – and I grinned back at her.

  “Meredith’s loss is totally my gain,” Lyssa said. “Can I get anyone a piece? I didn’t even eat dinner, but there’s no way I’m skipping this.”

  When no one else said anything, I got to my feet. “Sure,” I said. I crossed the room and Lyssa sliced a piece for me and put it on a plate. When she handed it over, our fingers touched and a spark leapt between us. I stared into her eyes and felt my heart begin to race. We were so close that I could have kissed her, could have put my hands on her delicious body and pulled her close.

  God, I wanted her. There was an aching in my balls, a yearning in my cock to take her. It was obscene: her family was right there! But the alcohol and the lust swimming around in my body were too strong, and I was too weak to fight off the effects. I wanted to yank that plate right out of her hand and run my hands over her tight dress, cup her tits and play with her nipples until her pussy was soaking and she was begging me for more. Fuck, forget that – I wanted to take her dessert in my hands and feed it to her, bite by bite, then kiss her and taste the sugar and frosting on her sweet little plump mouth. Lyssa still hadn’t taken her hand away from mine and I could feel her fingers, soft and silky, brushing against mine.

  “Honey, how’s work going?” Joanna called, breaking my erotic train of thought.

  Lyssa abruptly pulled her hand back and flushed. The pink hue on her cheeks just made her look even more stunning, and she gulped softly as she turned to face her parents.

  “Oh, it’s fine,” she said.

  Was she doing this on purpose? Keeping so close to me, so close that her ass was nearly brushing against my hip?

  “Well, come sit next to me and tell me about it,” Joanna said.

  Lyssa threw me one last smoking glance, then walked over to her mother and sat down on the couch, leaving me al
one with my horny thoughts and hardening cock.

  Fuck, I thought. This was sheer torture – delicious torture, but torture all the same. Just looking at Lyssa out of the corner of my eye and catching the ripe curve of her tits, the way the dress clung to her body like a second skin, was driving me crazy. Seconds ago, we’d been close enough that I could smell her light, floral perfume.

  Now, I would have done anything for more. It was insane, but I suddenly had the image of her carrying my child, looking round and happy and glowing, the way all of my pregnant patients looked.

  I didn’t just want her.

  I needed her, and I had to find a way to make her mine.

  Then, suddenly, an idea popped into my head. It was sinful and taboo, and likely brought on by the combination of my raging hormones and the booze, but it was so strong that I knew I wouldn’t be able to shake it.

  It was a way to make Lyssa mine, to make her happy and give her what she had always wanted.

  Now, I just had to find a way to tell her about it.

  11

  Lyssa – Saturday

  “And tell me about your boss, what’s his name? Brett?” Mom asked.

  “Brent,” I said automatically. Dan was still standing across the room, by the cake, and my attention was almost entirely on him. He looked so fucking sexy tonight in a white shirt that really set off his dark blonde hair and his tan – I could hardly keep my eyes off him.

  It was such a cliché – developing a crush on the handsome doctor who’s promised you the thing you’ve always wanted.

  But I didn’t see how any woman could look at Dr. Dan Andrews and not want him. It was if seeing Dan in his professional capacity had completely changed the way I had always seen him.

  And awakened something inside of me that I never thought I would feel.

  Earlier that evening, Anna had twisted my arm into going out. Trina was with a sitter, and she’d found me this incredibly slutty dress that I’d balked and refused to wear.