“Then what is it?” I asked, a concerned frown touching my face.
Jack looked over at me. He sat with his hands clasped between his knees, looking completely lost.
My look of concern deepened. “Jack? Jack, sweetie, what is it?”
He got off the couch, coming over to me and kneeling by the side of the bed. He took my hands in his.
“Jillian, I wanted to talk to you about this at the right time. I had a whole plan and everything.”
I rolled my eyes. “Jack, your plans never go the way you expect them to.”
He chuckled. “You're right about that. I was hoping for us to have one last romantic evening together. Before the baby arrived.”
I touched his face, stroking his beard. “Babe, we'll have plenty of nights after the baby is born. Sure, we won't be sleeping most of those nights for a while, but that doesn't mean we won't have any romance at all.”
A small smile crossed his face. “That's not quite what I meant.”
My face scrunched up in confusion.
“Ever since this whole thing started,” Jack said, “I've never known the right thing to do. I know I made some mistakes at first.”
“Babe, that's all behind us now.” I hoped he wasn't still worried about things that had happened months ago. We'd worked our way past all of that, and we were together now. As far as I was concerned, that was all that mattered.
“Not entirely,” he said.
I started to get nervous.
“There's still a mistake I need to rectify,” he said.
“What mistake?” My heart pounded in my chest. I couldn't imagine what he was about to say. My mind raced, trying to figure out what I'd done wrong, how I'd screwed up. Tears welled in my eyes. Maybe the hormones were making me overly emotional, but I felt like I was about to have a breakdown right there in the hospital.
“Jillian,” Jack said, reaching into his pocket. “This isn't where or how I planned to do this, but I think it's the perfect time.”
He held out his hand. He was holding a ring.
Not just any ring. My ring. The wedding ring. The one I'd been wearing when I woke up in that hotel room so many months ago.
I stared at the ring, mute with shock. I didn't understand. “Jack, what is...?”
He took my hand in his, holding the ring in front of my ring finger.
“Jillian,” he said. “Will you marry me?”
My eyes widened. “But...but...but...we're already married!”
It was true that I hadn't been wearing the ring. Even once Jack and I had worked past our issues, even once we'd moved in together, I had kept the ring tucked away in my purse. It hadn't felt right to put it on. Not when our wedding hadn't technically been real. Even with Jack and I living together, and having a baby together, I had never really felt like we were truly husband and wife. I'd been content to think of us just as a couple, as two people in love, who would be raising a baby together. The fact that the law still considered us to be married was another story entirely.
“We're married in the eyes of the law,” Jack said, echoing my own thoughts. “But I haven't been a proper husband to you, and you never got a proper wedding. I want to do this right.”
Tears welled in my eyes, but this time, they were tears of joy.
“Jillian, I want to give you a real wedding. One we can both remember for the rest of our lives. With all of our friends and family there. Including our new baby girl, of course, just as soon as she arrives.”
I let out a joyful laugh, wiping tears from my eyes.
“I want a wedding we can cherish forever. And one we're sober enough to remember, of course.” He chuckled.
“So, Jillian, will you marry me?” He held the ring out, ready to slide it onto my finger.
“Yes,” I whispered, my voice almost escaping me.
He put the ring on my finger. I hadn't worn the ring in months, but it felt like the first time ever. And this time, it felt right. It felt like it belonged there. It felt like it was really mine.
Jack kissed me, while I cried tears of joy. After so long where I thought our marriage would be declared null and void, now instead we were going to have a real wedding, a real marriage. And we would be a happy couple, together forever.
My current and future husband stayed by my side for the rest of the day, until our baby was finally ready to come into the world. Jack was so happy, taking pictures of her from the moment they started cleaning her up. I was physically and emotionally drained by the time the nurse placed my little miracle into my arms. I held her close, planting a small kiss against her forehead.
“Welcome to the world, Claire Elizabeth O'Rourke.”
She looked up at me, her little gray eyes unfocused, but filled with wonder at the new world around her.
I intended to make sure that world was the best and brightest that it could possibly be.
***The End***
Best Friend’s Daddy (Excerpt)
Description
I know it’s so wrong, but my best friend needs to know.
So, how do we say it?
Hey, I’m pregnant with your father’s child! You’re gonna be a big sister! Yay!!!
No, this can’t happen.
She can’t know. No one can know.
I always understood he was off limits,
But I couldn’t imagine my life without him.
In fact, I saved myself for him!
And working at his restaurant was…fun.
My ‘let’s seduce Michael plan’ was working,
And soon he was feeding me chocolate covered strawberries,
And I was tasting whipped cream off of his lips and…you know what…
But we screwed up…big time!
So, time for Plan B now.
Yep, when shit hits the fan, I do the easy thing and run away.
Will my Prince Charming come after me?
Or did I just ruin my only chance at a happily ever after?
Prologue (Stevie)
It was The Day.
I remember that I had written it in all caps on my calendar hanging on the wall of my childhood bedroom. Mom and Dad assumed that I wrote it that way because it was the day of my high school graduation, and I let them keep thinking that. They would have lost their minds if they’d known what it really meant.
The thing was, I knew I was graduating high school. I had always had great grades, I was an active member in the drama club and the field hockey team, my teachers loved me – but in my head, graduation day was more for my parents. They got to see their baby girl walk across the stage and get her diploma. For me, all the hard work had already been done.
So for me - for me, the big day wasn’t about graduating.
It was about the afterparty.
I was finally eighteen, and I was out of high school. Two very important distinctions when you’ve got a huge crush on a man who is old enough to be your father.
Nobody knew about my crush, of course. I wasn’t an idiot and I knew what everyone would think. But all through high school I was just so… done with all the boys my age. Even the college age boys that I met at parties or through my older brother Andy. They were immature, and inexperienced. They didn’t know what they wanted out of life, they were thoughtless and honestly wouldn’t know how to get a girl off if their lives depended on it.
I wanted someone with class, someone who had his life together, someone with maturity and brains and compassion. And someone who knew what he was doing in bed. Someone who could take charge and make me beg for him.
And that man was Michael Madison.
I met Michael through his daughter - my best friend Brooke. Brooke was… not the sharpest knife in the drawer, bless her. But she was kind, so very kind and thoughtful. She had a smile for everyone. She was always one of the most popular girls in our school and not because of any machinations on her part, shockingly, but because she was genuinely such a lovely person that everyone wanted to know her and be her friend.
I was just also lucky in another way.
Michael - he insisted I call him that rather than Mr. Madison—was tall, fit, and so very handsome. He had this light brown hair that curled a little when it got humid or when he’d been working in the hot kitchen all day, and these soulful green eyes that sucked me in, like an ocean. I often found myself accidentally staring into them for too long, just… lost in them.
But more than just being handsome as sin - he was such a good person. He never spoke to me like I was a child but talked to me like I was the same age, like an adult. It was so refreshing, after dealing with everyone still treating me like I had no idea what I was doing with my life. He would teach me how to make fancy dishes when I slept over at Brooke’s house while Brooke watched us, making jokes. He never chastised me when I used swear words - which I used a lot. I’d always had a problem with cursing.
He gave me my love of cooking, my love of food. He was the reason I had decided to go to culinary school instead of a proper four-year college. My parents didn’t mind, thank God. I thought they might protest, but instead they thought a vocational college was an excellent idea and they were grateful to Michael for his mentorship.
If they knew all the things I thought about Michael fantasizing alone in my bed at night, touching myself, whimpering into my pillow as I imagined him inside me, pulling my hair, biting my neck and telling me stay quiet, that’s a good girl.
He was the reason why I hadn’t had sex yet. Oh, sure, I’d fooled around a little, but just a make out session with a guy was enough to tell me that just as I’d suspected, they didn’t have what I wanted. And I listened to Brooke talking about her experiences and… no thanks. I was going to wait for someone who knew what he was doing, who knew how to get me actually turned on and desperate and needy.
Now I was eighteen, legally an adult, and out of high school. Also about to leave for culinary school and be away for three years.
There would never be a better time for me to make a move on the man starring in my fantasies for years.
Of course, all this would be a moot point if he was married, but Michael’s wife left him last month for another man.
That was… that was hard. Brooke cried on my bed for hours. She and her mom had been extremely close. Brooke had always looked up to her, as well as her father, even as she’d admitted from time to time that her mother was focused on the wrong things in life—the material things, money and clothes and objects instead of people. But Brooke loved her and they would go shopping all the time, hanging out, friends as well as mother and daughter. She told her mom everything, and she said her mother was always very patient and understanding about things like high school parties and fooling around with boys.
Then the other shoe dropped, and Brooke was left to wonder if the mother she’d known and loved all this time had been a lie.
Virginia - that was her name, broke her daughter’s heart. I don’t think I would ever forgive her for that.
But hey. It meant that Michael was single and in need of some sweet, sweaty, sexual comfort after the shock of his wife leaving him. Right?
Right.
We even had the perfect setting: my joint graduation party with Brooke at Michael’s restaurant.
Michael insisted on hosting the party and making sure it was perfect for Brooke and me. He went all out, putting up streamers and balloons and getting a big sign. Brooke and I talked for days about exactly what kind of cake we wanted (alternating layers of chocolate and vanilla) and Michael insisted he’d make it for us, don’t even worry about it. I know my parents were grateful not to have to plan anything. I thought it was incredibly sweet of Michael… and I hoped I’d get to reward him the way I wanted to.
For my plan to work—to finally get to have him touching me, kissing me, the way I’d been dreaming of for years—I had to make sure that he saw me as an adult, and not a child. It would be difficult, sure, I was his daughter’s best friend and this was my high school graduation party. But I’d always been told I was mature for my age, and then I had those curves…and moves…I’d like to think so at least.
I wouldn’t lie, I was quite proud of my body. I didn’t go around preening or anything but when I looked at myself in the mirror I thought yeah, nice. Especially if it would help me get Michael’s attention. I hated going to school with my ass and my breasts because the boys were constantly catcalling me and making remarks, as if I was some kind of… piece of meat, ugh. I would wear long pants and long-sleeved shirts at school whenever I could to try and minimize comments.
But for Michael - I was glad of my curves. I wanted to show them off, I wanted him to notice, to look at me with dark, hungry eyes, to get his mouth and hands on them.
I got a dress just for the occasion. White, so that I would look nice and stand out, but tight, really hugging my curves, with a daring leg slit up my thigh and a single, diagonal gauzy shoulder strap that went across my body and wrapped around my waist. It took me forever to find it, to know that it was the right one. And then my hair—oh man, that had taken me hours. My makeup I tried to keep minimal, focusing mostly on my eyes, adding a touch of silver glitter.
Everyone was giving me compliments at the party. “You look beautiful, Stephanie,” was what I got from my relatives, and, “smokin’ look, Stevie!” from my friends.
Personally, I had always preferred Stevie to my full name. Stephanie was sort of reserved for family.
I was just making the rounds, saying hi to everyone, thanking my aunts and uncles and all for their lovely graduation gifts, and trying to keep an eye on Michael without being too obvious about it, when Brooke finally showed up.
“Where have you been?” I whispered, hugging her quickly. “This is your party too!”
“Jake and I got distracted,” Brooke replied, laughing and wiggling her eyebrows so I had no doubt what distracted meant.
Jake was our high school’s quarterback. Brooke was totally into him and he was totally into her, which I suppose made up for the fact that—
“Hey, if it isn’t the woman of the hour!”
My older brother Andy came up, hugging Brooke hello. He was four years older than Brooke and I were, in his senior year UC Berkeley. He was also a massive flirt which was probably why Brooke hadn’t realized Andy had a massive crush on her.
“Your sister graduated too,” Brooke pointed out.
“Ah, yeah, but we all knew that was going to happen. It was a little touch and go with you for a while.” Andy winked at her. “I’m shocked I tell you, shocked that you earned a diploma.”
“Very funny,” Brooke replied, rolling her eyes.
I had to work hard with Brooke to help her pass some of her classes, but I had faith that college would be easier. In college you didn’t have to take a bunch of random math and science classes if they weren’t in your major, and those were Brooke’s weakest points. I’d always been good at numbers, and I loved chemistry once I realized how important it could be to cooking.
“Oh, Jake!” Brooke waved him over.
I grabbed Andy by the arm and asked him to take a selfie with me. I felt bad for him, and I was only glad about Jake because of how happy he made Brooke. My poor brother was pining away for years and Brooke had no idea—and I knew how that felt. It sucked.
But hopefully, for me at least, tonight would change all of that.
After my selfie with my brother, I spotted Michael over by the food table. Okay, this was as good of a chance as any. I’d said hi to everyone, done my duty. Now I could set my plan into motion.
I could practically feel his fingers thrusting inside me already and I shivered as I walked up to him. “Hey, Michael,” I said, giving him my sultriest smile.
Michael kissed me on the cheek and my whole body got warm. “Congratulations,” he told me. “I know you’ve probably heard this from ev
eryone else but graduating is an achievement. You should be proud of yourself.”
“Are you proud of me?” I asked. I wanted to tell him there were so many other ways he could be proud of me - for keeping quiet, for sucking his cock - and that I could keep being a good girl, just for him.
Or a naughty girl, if he wanted.
Michael just grinned at me. God he was handsome. He could’ve had his own cooking show on TV if he’d wanted, with rugged good looks like that. Then his eyes slid over to right over my shoulder, and I smelled - ah, my dad’s distinctive Old Spice cologne.
Call it a result of enjoying cooking, but I was really good at telling who was who by their smell. Not to mention, my mom had never been able to get across to my dad the truth that he wears too much of that damn cologne.
“Robert!” Michael grinned at my father. I could feel my own smile fading, just a little. “You must be so proud of her.”
Well, fuck, I couldn’t very well flirt with Michael - or anyone - in front of my dad. I made an excuse and slipped away, but I kept an eye on Michael all throughout the rest of the party.
When he slipped into his office, I knew I had my chance.
I walked up, putting an extra little sway into my hips to help get myself into the mood. I was fond of these heels, and I thought they looked great with the dress, silver to match my eye shadow.
I got right to the door of his office - thankfully it was in a small hallway where the bathrooms were, so nobody could really see me - and was just about to open it, my hand on the doorknob and everything, when I heard what he was saying.
Oh man. That sounded rough.
“I don’t even care, okay? I don’t care. You can have whatever you want. I just want this over with.”
Okay, I knew it was wrong, but I pressed my ear to the door. I wanted to know what was going on, if Michael was okay.
I heard him sigh. He sounded just… wrecked. Exhausted. “Just keep your damn hands off the restaurant. That’s the only place I’m standing firm.”
Beautiful Mistakes: Contemporary Romance Boxset Books 1-4 Page 64
