Love You, Baby Read online

  “He did try contacting me after,” Mae admitted, “But I ignored him.”

  Honor frowned slightly. “Why? Was the sex bad?”

  The question made her smile, but she hesitated to answer.

  “You asked how Asher was back when we first got together,” her friend pointed out with a sassy grin.

  “I know, but now it just seems weird, being they’re brothers and all.”

  “Oh, no.” Honor’s hand rose to cover her mouth as her eyes rounded dramatically. “It was bad, wasn’t it?”

  “No.” She glanced toward the stairs Asher had disappeared up earlier, then leaned forward and lowered her voice. “It was actually pretty darn great. Like, scream his name multiple times great.” Heat climbed her neck from both the memory and actually saying those words out loud.

  Honor drew back, waving her hands, palms out. “Whoa, no, that’s good enough. Otherwise we’re getting into the same territory as you not wanting to know about me and Asher here in the kitchen.”

  Mae laughed as she recalled that conversation a little over a year ago. Then she marveled at the fact she was laughing again. Nothing had changed in the past hour, but being able to talk to her bestie was exactly what she’d needed.

  “So tell me, if it was that great, why wouldn’t you talk to him afterward?”

  She sat back in her chair with a sigh. “It was only supposed to be one night. He’s a total player, and that’s part of why I went for it. He was supposed to be uncomplicated.”

  “Oops,” Honor deadpanned.

  “Yeah. I know.”

  “So…what if he’s not as bad as you think?”

  She rolled her eyes with a soft snort. “Oh, please. He’s charming as all hell, but we both know he’s as bad as we think.”

  “I don’t know. Sometimes I get the feeling there’s more to Merit than he lets on.”

  She would love to believe her best friend, but couldn’t afford to let her guard down and think only of herself. “I won’t bring someone like that into Ian’s life knowing he’ll dump me the second he loses interest. I’ve worked too hard to provide a stable home for him.”

  Honor nodded. “I totally get that, but…as the baby’s father, he’s in your life whether you want him there or not.”

  “I’m not betting on him being very involved.”

  “Maybe he’ll surprise you.” Her friend gave her an encouraging smile. “He was great with the kids at Halloween last year, and the few times I’ve seen him with Ian, they got along really well.”

  She already knew Ian liked him, but still, she gave a firm headshake at the somewhat hopeful lilt to her friend’s voice. “I’m not looking for a relationship, and I’m certainly not going to involve Ian with Merit any more than I minimally have to. He’ll get too close. I can handle it, but I won’t put him through that.”

  “So, what, you’re just always going to be alone?” Honor challenged.

  “I didn’t say that.”

  “Well, you haven’t dated for the past seven years. You going to wait another eleven until Ian turns eighteen? Or, with the new baby, another eighteen?”

  Mae frowned in confusion and frustration at the direction the conversation had taken. She did not want Honor getting her hopes up with unrealistic expectations. She needed her friend to be the voice of reason. Keep her grounded. Help her protect her heart.

  “This isn’t up for discussion right now.”

  “All I’m trying to say is, don’t completely close yourself off.”

  “Great. Thanks,” she snapped. “Only problem is, the one time I finally decide to open up again—no pun intended—I end up pregnant. Again. So, thanks for the advice, but I’m done. And as of right now, so is this subject.”

  Honor took a breath to say more, but Mae silenced her with a stern glare.

  She huffed out a sigh and sat back. “Okay. Fine. I won’t say anything more about it.”

  “Thank you.” In the tense silence, she fought a cringe as she ventured, “While we’re on the subject of not saying stuff…I have to ask you not to say anything to Asher just yet.” At Honor’s frown, she added, “If it was any other guy, I wouldn’t care. But I feel this is Merit’s news to tell his family, not mine.”

  After a long moment, Honor gave a reluctant nod. “Yeah, I get it. I won’t say anything.”

  “Thank you.” When she met her best friend’s gaze, frustration gave way for genuine appreciation. She leaned forward to grasp both her hands, and a swell of emotion lodged in her throat as she slid off her chair. “And one last thing before I leave. I’m so very happy for you and Asher, and eventually I’ll be happy for me, too. Since I have to deal with this, there isn’t anyone else I’d want to go through it with than you.”

  Honor’s smile returned as tears brightened her green eyes once more. “Same here. Love you.”

  “Love you, too.”

  Chapter 6

  Merit hesitated outside the door of Shelby’s soon-to-be vet clinic a little after nine on Monday morning. Since parking next to Mae’s truck two minutes ago, his pulse had been racing, and the tightness in his chest made it hard to take a deep breath.

  He’d wanted to go after her last night, but had to deal with a pissed off barista. He was an idiot for having called her in the first place, so he didn’t blame Lyssa for the few choice names she called him even after he apologized.

  Sleep had then eluded him most of the night. Not because of her, but because of Mae.

  Pregnant.

  A baby.

  He was going to be a dad. Karma must have laughed her fucking ass off at the irony of him only hours earlier being thankful to not be in Asher’s shoes.

  He could just imagine the questions his family would have when he told them. When is she due? How long have you been seeing each other? When are you getting married?

  Because they would assume marriage was in the cards, whereas he hadn’t even had the chance to find out when she was due before she ditched him again. And the moment they found out it was Mae, he was going to get all kinds of shit from everyone. His parents. Asher and Honor. Even Roxanna and Loyal and Shelby had bonded with Honor’s best friend and her Scooby Doo-loving kid.

  He would be the bad guy. As usual.

  Then there would be the inevitable comparison to Asher, in which he’d come up way short. Unlike his happily married brother who’d planned his first child, his future grandchild contribution was the result of a one-night-stand with a woman who pretty much thought he was a man-whore.

  The thought made him clench his jaw. Mae’s low opinion weighed on his mind almost as much as the pregnancy. He couldn’t deny there was a time he had been carelessly indiscriminate with his choice of bed partners, and the number of them, but it had been more in his early twenties. Since then, he’d mostly been playing it up because it was his thing. Well, it was the thing he was willing to let them see, anyway.

  Not that Mae would believe him after seeing Lyssa, but prior to his night with her, he hadn’t been with anyone since shortly after Honor’s Must Love Frosting bakery grand opening. Finding out Ian was Mae’s son and not her significant other had gotten under his skin, and the one time he’d tried to get her out of his mind with some random hook-up had been a colossal failure. Like he was. Because after he’d had Mae, he didn’t want anyone else.

  And she didn’t want him.

  Not only did she think he was a womanizer, but her opinion would drop to rock bottom when she found out he now had no money to support her or a baby.

  He’d had a brief irrational thought about going to talk to his dad, but he knew exactly what the response would be. “Don’t think I’m changing my mind about your trust fund because you screwed up.”

  Other than that one moment of stupidity, he wouldn’t think anything of the kind—nor would he give him the satisfaction of asking. As if he needed to hear his dad say out loud, “Man up and get your ass to work.”

  So, he’d started looking for jobs online at about midnight. I
n the middle of filling out his first application at three a.m., he realized he needed to have a resume. In the middle of reading the sample resume he looked up, he realized he didn’t have a damn thing to put on one.

  But did Mae really need to know any of that?

  No. Because he’d get a job soon enough.

  Right now, he needed to talk to her, and her work was the only place he could figure she wouldn’t be able to shut the door in his face or walk away from him.

  He reached for the door as he sucked in a deep breath, only to have it shove open and almost hit him. He caught it as he jerked back, and then froze when his gaze locked with Mae’s blue one as she spoke on her cell phone.

  “—without the permit. How—” Her words broke off as she darted a glance around before stepping outside while finishing her sentence. “How did this get missed?”

  Merit released the door and waited silently for her to finish her call.

  After a furtive glance in his direction, she cupped her hand over the phone and whispered to him, “Your sister’s inside.”

  “I’m not here for Bells.”

  Her brow dipped as she returned her attention to her phone and spun away again. “Why was the permit pulled? The inspection passed last week.”

  He stuffed his hands in his jeans pockets and leaned back against the side of the building. As he waited, he couldn’t help trailing his gaze down the length of her petite profile. Red T-shirt with her company logo over her left breast, soft, worn skinny jeans, and a pair of tan, steel-toed work boots that were sexier than they had a right to be.

  He’d memorized her curves over and over in his dreams the past two months. He’d drawn them with his brush on canvas. None of that was as good as tracing the peaks and valleys of her body with his bare hands.

  His fingers twitched with the desire to touch her again. He wanted so badly to hear her breath catch as he stroked her silky skin, to feel the clench of her fingers in his hair as her pleasure exploded and she screamed his name.

  Fucking A, he was getting turned on just thinking about her breathy moans and whimpers.

  Not helping, dipshit.

  When he forced his gaze away from her full breasts, it halted on her belly.

  His pulse sped up for a different reason. His baby was growing inside her. What would happen to all her curves as the baby grew? Instead of freaking him out, an unexpected surge of possessiveness rolled through him.

  “Someone has to know something,” Mae snapped. “See what you can find out and let me know. I sent the rest of the crew over to get the Overland job started instead of having them sitting here doing nothing.” She turned back to face him as she said, “Thanks, Becca,” and hung up.

  Merit straightened and met her gaze. “Hi.”

  “What are you doing here?”

  He frowned at her annoyed tone. “I have questions.”

  “This is my work, Merit.” She reached into her front jeans pocket to pull out her keys before squaring her shoulders. “I don’t care that it’s your sister’s place, it’s still not cool.”

  Well, shit. “I’m sorry, but I did ask you to wait last night.”

  “You really thought I’d hang around to talk while your latest hook-up waited in the wings?”

  “It wasn’t like that.” He cringed inside, because it would’ve been if she hadn’t showed up before Lyssa. Or might have been, if he could’ve worked up the interest.

  Mae snorted her disbelief.

  He decided to get right to the point. “When is the baby due?”

  “Why? So you can do the math?”

  “So I know when the baby’s due.”

  A slight frown marred her brow before she looked away. “January twenty-third. Almost nine months to the day, but if you need actual proof it’s yours besides my word, you have to wait until after the birth.”

  “I don’t need actual proof, Mae. I believe you.”

  Her gaze returned to his. The uncertainty in her blue eyes made his heart skip a beat. He stepped closer, but she halted him with a raised hand.

  “Don’t.”

  “Don’t what?”

  “Whatever you were about to do.”

  He’d been about to pull her into his arms, tell her he was in this with her and once he’d gotten over the shock, was even a little bit excited.

  Her brow furrowed again. “I told you about the baby because I felt you had a right to know, but I meant it when I said I don’t expect anything from you.”

  To keep from disobeying her request, he stuffed his hands in his pockets and hunched his shoulders. “I’m not going to just go away.”

  “You say that now.” She spun around and stalked toward her truck.

  Merit fisted his hands in frustration as he followed her. “I’ll say it again in a month. And in nine months, and a year, and five years. I’ll say it because I mean it, Mae.”

  “I’m sure you believe you do. But babies are a lot of work. And they grow into kids who are even more work.”

  He leaned in to brace his palm on the driver’s side door to keep her from opening it.

  She stepped back in surprise and then lifted her chin to glare at him. “I have to get back to work.”

  “We need to talk about this and what’s all going to happen,” he insisted.

  “Go talk to your coffee girl,” she snapped.

  An unexpected grin tugged the corners of his mouth. “Careful. You sound jealous.”

  She averted her gaze with a roll of her eyes. “Hardly.”

  And yet, she refused to meet his gaze again.

  “Can I take you out for dinner?”

  She frowned and shook her head.

  “Why not?”

  “Because I’m not going to try to make what happened between us into more than what it was.”

  He gave a soft snort. “It’s a little too late for that, don’t you think?”

  “You know what I mean.”

  “Not really.”

  She huffed out a loud sigh. “I can’t change the fact that I’m pregnant, but I’m also not going to set myself up to start something with you that’s guaranteed to end badly for me. I have a son to think about. Ian’s young and impressionable, and he likes you. If you get involved in his life and then leave, it’ll break his heart.”

  Would it break hers, too? Was that what she was afraid of? “Ian’s a great kid. I wouldn’t intentionally hurt either one of you.”

  Her gaze finally rose, and a spark of light in her blue eyes made him think he had her. But then she shook her head. “I have to go. I have work to do.”

  “When can I see you again?” Realizing how damn close to begging he was, Merit stiffened his spine and dropped his hand from the truck.

  “I’ll let you know how things are going.” The ring of her cell phone cut off his next question, and she hurried to look at the screen. “I have to take this. Tell your sister I’ll call her about the permits.”

  She reached for the truck door again, and he forced himself to step back, even though he wasn’t at all satisfied with the results of his visit. She climbed up into her vehicle and left him standing there—without answering her phone.

  After she drove out of sight, he rubbed his hands over his face, then ran his hands through his hair as he spun around toward the door.

  What the hell was the matter with him? Asking her out. Practically begging to see her again when she clearly wanted nothing to do with him. His damn pride had taken a hike with his common sense.

  Chapter 7

  Merit eyed Loyal’s Land Rover on the street in front of Asher’s house as he pulled into his middle brother’s driveway. Hesitation hovered his hand over the gear shift before he slammed it into park. He hadn’t counted on talking to both brothers tonight, but might as well get it over with.

  He rubbed at a speck of Ultramarine blue paint on his jeans as he slid out of his SUV and strode up the walk to ring Asher and Honor’s doorbell. Then again, they probably wouldn’t notice. No one ever
did.

  His sister-in-law swung the door open a few moments later. “Hey, Merit.”

  “Hi.” The odd note in Honor’s voice coupled with the sympathetic tilt of her lips sunk his stomach. “She told you, didn’t she?”

  “Yes.”

  His pulse skipped. “And Asher?”

  She shook her head. “She made me promise to let you tell your brother.”

  “Awesome. This is gonna be fun.”

  The sympathy in her smile grew as she waved him inside. “Look at it as practice for your parents.”

  He grimaced. “Thanks for that reminder.”

  She reached out to pat his shoulder as she headed into the kitchen. “Your brothers are out back. You want a beer?”

  “A couple shots of whiskey, you say? Sure.” Her laugh prompted his own reluctant smile. “Beer’s good. Thanks.”

  He followed her to the kitchen and braced his hands on the counter as she pulled a bottle from the fridge. She twisted off the cap and slid it across the island. “You doing okay?”

  Merit shrugged and took a pull off the beer on their way out to the patio. “I’d be better if Mae would give me the time of day.”

  Asher looked up from his chair with a chuckle. “Man, I can’t believe you’re still pitching to Mae. She’s way out of your league.”

  Loyal grinned but remained silent.

  As Honor sat on the arm of her husband’s patio lounge chair, Merit took a seat across from the two of them and kitty-corner from his oldest brother. “Why is she out of my league?”

  “She’s too nice for you to sleep with her and move on, and you know Honor would wring your neck if you did that. Not to mention, she’s a single mother, and a successful business woman who works harder in a week than you have your whole life.”

  He wasn’t wrong about most of that. Merit took another long, fortifying drink, then shifted his gaze from one brother to the other and jumped in with both feet like Mae had done with him. “She’s pregnant.”