Eight Long Years: A Second Chance Secret Baby Romance (Heart of Hope Book 5)

by Ajme Williams

  She smirked. “Or you protest too much. You want him, but you don’t want to want him. Temptation is easier to deal with when it’s not around. Which again makes me wonder why you’re working for him.”

  “Which is it Petal? I’m avoiding him or wanting to be with him. You have to make up your mind.”

  “No honey, you have to make up yours. In the meantime, you and Maya can stay here with me. You two would have to share a room, but it’s yours. I have toys here for Maya and you know I love having her around.”

  “I couldn’t put you out like that. Plus, living above a bakery, I think the scent would make me gain weight.”

  Petal laughed. “I can’t say if smelling sweet baked goods will cause weight gain, but the invite is sincere. You and Maya are here a lot anyway. Why not move in until things with August blow over or you find another place?”

  “I hate to put you out, but actually, I’d like that. Just for a short time.”

  “Yes!” Petal cheered and then gave me a hug. “It will be like a 24-7 sleepover.”

  I laughed. “I’ll pick up some things for us and be by after work tomorrow.”

  “Perfect.”

  “Maya!” I called. She came running into the kitchen. “How would you feel about us staying with Petal for a little bit.”

  Maya looked at Petal and then me. “Like live here?”

  “Just for a little bit until we find our own home.”

  “I like staying here, but won’t Uncle Auggie miss us?”

  “Uncle Auggie needs to live his own life and we need to live ours.”

  “You can help me in the bakery,” Petal said.

  Maya’s eyes lit up. “Yay!”

  15

  Jude

  I have been pushed to my physical and mental limits by the U.S. military. I’d faced insurgents and carried out missions that had equal chances of ending in my death as my survival. But nothing had challenged me more than working around April and having to hide my feelings and desires. Being with her but not being able to touch her was a unique form of torture that was slowly killing me inside.

  During the day, I admired her smarts and work ethic. At night, she haunted my dreams with her sexy body. I’d have given anything to be able to spend an entire night making slow, sweet love to her.

  “Hey, Jude,” Cyrus poked his head into my office interrupting my inability to focus on my work because of April.

  “Yeah?”

  “I’ve got some things in the conference room. Meet me there?”

  “On my way.” I stood, rolled my shoulders, and checked to make sure I didn’t have a hardon, another casualty of working around April. Nope. He was flaccid. Poor guy.

  I went to the conference room where Cyrus had a box. April was already there, sitting at the table looking professional and sexy, God damn her.

  “These are all the surveillance tapes from Mr. Lassen. There are hours and hours here. I also took the liberty of creating a schedule for us to interview store employees and management,” Cyrus said, taking the lid off the box, and then tossing me a paper with a list of names.

  I scanned the list noting he’d divided it up between us.

  “I figured we’d divide and conquer. The faster we close this, the better,” Cyrus said.

  “What about the surveillance tapes?” I asked.

  “We’ll take turns on that too.”

  “Would you like my help with that?” April asked.

  “I think it would be better if Jude and I did it. You don’t have the experience or training in this sort of thing.” Cyrus pawed through the box.

  She flinched. “I’m not a SEAL but I can be observant.”

  I didn’t think Cyrus was being rude or distrustful, but I did agree with April that watching tapes didn’t necessarily require military training.

  “It could be helpful to have her watch the tapes. She can do the first pass, noting anything that looks suspicious and flagging it for us,” I said.

  “I don’t have much to do now since you only have one client. If you really want to get it done quickly, I have the time to help,” April added.

  Cyrus looked at me with suspicious eyes, but I tried to keep my face impassive.

  “Sure. That would be helpful, April. Thank you. I’m heading out for my first round of interviews.” Cyrus stared at me for a moment, I’m sure conveying the message to keep my hands off her. So far I had, but given the chance, if she was into it, I’d have them all over her in a second.

  “I’ll get her set up on the video,” I said. It was the first time I was alone with her and it heightened my already agitated system. I sucked it up, bringing the box to her desk and setting up the videos for her to watch on her computer, showing her how to load and watch them.

  When I was done, I got out of her chair and she took a seat. Her scent filled my nostrils, and inside I wept that I couldn’t kiss that spot on her neck where she’d dabbed her perfume.

  “Any questions?” my voice was hoarse.

  She gave me a wan smile. “No. I think I have it. But if I need help, I know where to find out.”

  I nodded and stepped back, hoping I’d be out of the cone of April’s attraction. Like that could ever happen. “I’ll be in my office.”

  I closed the door to my office, taking a moment to get my wits about me. Then I went through the list that Cyrus had given me, wanting to do background research on them before questioning them. I’d wanted to know what sort of person I was dealing with, and if possible, know the answers to the questions before I asked them, so I could know if the person was lying or otherwise being deceptive.

  With the basics done, I grabbed my coat and considered rethinking wearing a suit to work. I’d kept up with it because April seemed turned on by my wearing a suit, but clearly that was all she’d felt and she’d only felt it once.

  “I’m heading out to do some of these interviews,” I said as I passed her desk. “Find anything interesting yet?”

  She shook her head. “It’s not quite like TV, is it?”

  “It’s tedious. Maybe I should have warned you about that.”

  She gave me a small smile. “No. I’m glad to do it. It feels important.”

  I frowned wondering if she often felt unimportant. Had August not valued her work? Probably not. That’s why she was here.

  “Well, when you’re done, you can lock up and head out. Have a good weekend.” That last comment was like ash on my tongue as I imagined her with Matt.

  My interviews weren’t tedious, but they weren’t fruitful either. It was after five when I finished, and I considered going back to the hotel, but then decided I’d go to the office and work through some of the video footage April hadn’t. Chances were, the videos were the key to discovering what was going on.

  The door was locked, but there was a light in the back still on. I walked in and went to April’s desk, grabbing some of the disks in the box, and then making my way back to my office.

  April came out of the breakroom, startling me. She let out a yelp. “Oh God, you scared me.”

  “I’m sorry. Why are you still here? It’s late.”

  She blew out a breath. “I got caught up and didn’t realize what time it was.”

  I entered my office to set the disks down. Then I turned to her. She was leaning against the door jamb of my office.

  “Did you see anything?” I asked.

  She shook her head. “Nothing I thought was suspicious.” Her stomach growled, and she laughed as she covered it.

  “You’re hungry. How about I buy you dinner. A reward for staying late?” I wondered if my voice sounded as desperate as I felt.

  “Thank you but I’ve got to get going. I have plans.”

  Inside I went red hot as I imagined her plans. Would Matt fuck her first and then feed her?

  “Matt no doubt,” I said, unable to hide my irritation.

  She scoffed. “You’re being silly.”

  I whirled on her, again, moving into her space. “Is
he the type you wanted all the long, April. Was I just an easy way to lose your virginity?”

  Her eyes widened. “No.”

  “I was a fucking SEAL. I have my own business, but you and August, all you see is some nothing from the poor side of town.” Jesus, I was being a whiner.

  “No.”

  “What does Matt have that I don’t?”

  She shook her head. “That’s not what this is about.”

  “Then what is this about, huh, April?”

  She gave me an expression like my teachers used to give me when they’d had enough of my nonsense. “It’s about knowing when to quit, Jude.”

  I leaned into her, not in aggression, but so she could see my face. So she could see in my eyes that what I was saying was the God’s honest truth. “I never quit, April.”

  She held my gaze, looking a little bit confused and a whole lot stunned. I drew my fingers down her cheek.

  “I can’t quit you,” I said it so low, I wasn’t sure she heard me. Then I leaned in and kissed her trying to hold back the frustration, and hurt and anger, and simply let her know that I still cared for her.

  I expected her to pull away or push me away. But when her hands came to my chest, her fingers fisted in my shirt, and held me to her as she slanted her lips and took the kiss deeper.

  I groaned, the sound of it echoing in my office. Need reared up, hot and wild. I gripped her hips, turning her and pushing her back until she was leaning against my desk.

  My blood was raging inside me, wanting to fuck her hard. To possess her and make her understand what she did to me. My brain was just intact enough to temper all that aggression.

  Our hands were all over each other, crazed and wild.

  “Tell me you want me,” I growled out as I fingered her clit. “I’ll give you whatever you want, April. Just tell me you want me.”

  “Yes.” She gasped as I inserted my finger inside her, and rubbed that special spot that made her writhe. “I want you.”

  I shoved my pants down, and grabbed her hips again, rubbing my dick over her clit. “Say it again,” I managed on a strangled breath.

  “I want you.” Her hands gripped my ass and pulled me to her, my dick sliding inside her sweet, tight heat, making my head spin. Why was this thing between us so hard now, when it has been so easy eight years ago?

  I wrapped my arms around her, and moved slowly, wanting to make her feel more pleasure than she’d ever felt before. “I want you too, April. Can you feel it? Can you feel how fucking bad I want you?”

  “Oh God, Jude…” Her hands went to my shoulders, her fingers digging in like she was about to spin away. But I had her. I’d always have her if she’d let me.

  “Does this feel good?” I plunged in, and ground against her, making sure I hit her clit.

  “Yes.”

  “Do I make you feel good, April? Do I make you come hard?”

  She moaned and her head fell back. I leaned down, and sucked hard on her bra covered tit. She cried out. “Yes…oh God…Jude…”

  Her pussy started pulsing, squeezing, harder, faster as it prepared to seize, and I had to suck in a breath to keep from coming.

  “Come with me, baby.” I said, as I picked up the pace, chasing the release that was just out of reach. “Fuck…come and take me with you.”

  I thrust in and sucked on her tit again, and her entire body went taut.

  “Fuck!” Pleasure blasted through my body. I thrust and thrust, emptying inside her, hoping to hell she understood. She was mine. I was hers. It’s how it always had been. How it would always be.

  16

  April

  There were moments when I could forget our past and simply be as we’d been eight years ago. This was one of those moments. When he was inside me, moving with me, against me, bringing me sweet torture, it was a perfection I’d never had with anyone else.

  In the back of my mind, I knew this was a mistake. Sex with Jude wasn’t going to change the fact that he’d abandoned me. Although to hear him talk, it sounded like he thought I’d been the one to end things. More likely, he was just jealous that he’d lost me. He clearly hated the idea of another man being with me. How messed up was that? He didn’t want me, and yet he didn’t want anyone else to want me.

  But then his lips were on mine, and perhaps because it was late and I was tired, I couldn’t put up the wall and push him away. The truth was, I missed him. I missed this. Not just the sex, but feeing connected to him.

  And that was how I ended up with my skirt hiked up to my waist, my blouse open with his mouth on my breast and his dick doing delicious things inside my pussy. The sweetest pleasure burst out, flooding my blood stream.

  “Fuck!” he shouted, then bucked and filled my pussy with his cum. He withdrew, plunged in again, filling me more, as he drew out my pleasure. This was how we were supposed to be. Him and me. Together. But he’d ruined all that. My heart cried out at the anguish of that.

  Finally, he stopped moving, his dick going flaccid inside me, and then sliding out with the drip of his cum. He didn’t use a condom this time. Fortunately, after having Maya, I’d gone on the pill mostly to regulate my period. This time he wouldn’t be able to leave me with another child.

  But he had left me and Maya, and I was a terrible mother to betray her like that by letting her father fuck me on his desk.

  His breath was harsh as he lifted his head to look at me. For a moment, I thought I saw emotion. Like he wanted me, not just like this, but that he cared. But I pushed that away as I pressed my hand to his chest and pushed him back. I scrambled off his desk and put my clothes back in order.

  “This can’t keep happening,” I said, trying to hold back tears of frustration that he had this pull over me still. “I don’t belong to you, Jude.”

  “I want you to belong to me, April. I want to belong to you. I can’t stand the idea of you with someone else.” He pulled up his pants.

  It was so frustrating that he thought he could waltz in and go back to how we were eight years ago like nothing happened. “Maybe you should have thought of that before you left for the Navy without a look back.”

  “What?” He stopped mid-buttoning his pants.

  “You never answered a single letter. You left and never once contacted me. Now you think you can walk back in and start up where we left off?” As I verbalized it, I got angrier at him and myself. What was wrong with us?

  “What are you talking about?” His hands were on his waist. His brows furrowed into a single line like he truly had no clue what I was saying.

  “You never answered my letters? You never called or wrote or anything.”

  His expression of confusion morphed into anger. “You mean you wanted me to write back after I got the letter where you told me it was over? When you said you didn’t love me and to never contact you again? Is that the letter you’re talking about? You have some fucking nerve, April.”

  It was my turn to be confused. “I never wrote a letter breaking up with you.”

  “Think again, sweetheart.” He pulled out his wallet, opened it, and pulled out a folded piece of paper. It was worn, and partially torn along the fold, like he’d been carrying it there for a while. He handed it to me.

  I looked at him. He nodded for me to read it. My eyes scanned the computer typed letter that said exactly what he’d told me it said. My name was signed at the bottom. It was similar to my signature, but not exact.

  “I figured you meant it when you didn’t add the little heart over the ‘I’ in your name like you used to when you wrote me notes,” he said, his voice filled with restrained hurt and anger.

  “I didn’t write this,” I said, trying to wrap my brain around it as I handed it back to him. “I wrote others. Several others. I even tried to text and email, but they came back.” I kept the content of the letters to myself as I grappled with what he was saying. Of the magnitude of this situation if it was true.

  “This is all I got. And I did text you my new phone and
email, but my messages were blocked. That and this letter told me you were done with me.”

  I sank into the chair in his office, as realization dawned. “August.” The only explanation was August had interfered. He could have intercepted my letters. He managed the cell phone account and would have been able to block anything from Jude. And it appeared that he forged a letter to Jude from me. Of all the things I believed August would do, this never, ever crossed my mind. I felt like I was punched in the gut.

  “Fuck!” Jude paced running his hands through his hair.

  That was my feeling too. But while the origin of our estrangement wasn’t what I’d thought it was, it didn’t change that we were no longer together.

  Right behind the shock of August’s betrayal was the realization that Jude hadn’t ever asked about the baby I’d written him about because he never got the letter. He didn’t know I’d been pregnant. He didn’t know about Maya. I needed to tell him, but I was so emotionally raw that I couldn't manage the words.

  “I should wring his neck,” Jude was saying in a rant about August.

  I swallowed as I worked to bring my emotions under control. “What’s done is done. It’s over now.”

  He turned to me and for a minute, I thought he was going to be angry at me. But then his eyes softened and he came to me. He squatted down in front of me, putting his hands on the arms of the chair as he looked at me. “I don’t want it to be over April. That’s what I’ve been trying to tell you.”

  He looked sincere, and my heart desperately wanted to believe him. I wanted to fall into his arms and take what he was offering. But August’s deception went deeper than Jude even knew, and I had some serious thinking to do.

  “I need to go.” I was glad that Petal had offered to pick up Petal from camp today. At the time, I was appreciative because while watching surveillance tapes was tedious, it felt important and I appreciated that Jude and Cyrus entrusted me with the task. Now I was glad because I’d need time to get my overwhelming emotions in order before seeing Maya.