How to Have Your Boss's Secret Baby - London Casey Page 0,41
front.
Please open me.
I hooked my finger and flipped the folder open.
I figured this was her creative way of quitting.
Hell, maybe she wrote me a story. About how much of a piece of shit boss I was.
That would only make me laugh.
Inside the folder was a single piece of paper with another note from Maya.
In black marker… in bold letters…
I’m pregnant - it’s yours.
Chapter Nineteen
Maya
All I could do was stand at my desk and wait.
Believe me, this was not the way I wanted to tell Cole I was pregnant.
This was not the way I wanted to tell anyone I was pregnant. Because I shouldn’t have been pregnant. Not by Cole. Not by anyone.
Getting pregnant should have been a celebration.
I should have been happy and excited to tell my significant other about it.
Instead, I stood there at my desk, my nerves bouncing, wondering what was going to happen.
I touched my stomach a few times, telling myself to calm down. No matter what happened, I was pregnant. Panic and stress would only hurt me and the baby.
Me and the baby.
I was already thinking in terms of us.
That us was scary.
I wasn’t alone. I would never be alone.
Everything had suddenly changed.
All because of one night…
I crawled back to that night in my memory.
I had to sift aside the way Cole looked at me, touched me and kissed me. I had to push away the feeling of his tongue between my legs and the thickness of his-
“Stop,” I whispered.
The fact of the matter was that we didn’t use protection and now I was pregnant.
I left the folder on his desk five minutes ago.
I looked at my cellphone.
Nope. Make that six minutes ago.
With my luck, Cole wouldn’t see it for hours. Or maybe he’d just push the folder aside.
Or maybe…
Shit, here he comes.
Cole moved rapidly toward my open office door.
His hands in his pockets.
Stopping two steps into my office.
His face was serious. Gorgeous and serious.
If I gave birth to a baby boy, he was going to be gorgeous like his father. And if it was a little girl, I hoped she grabbed some of her father’s genes but had my girlish face.
Cole stared at me.
I stared back.
My heart raced faster by the second.
He didn’t speak a word, but he looked down at my stomach.
I counted the seconds he stared.
One Mississippi.
Two Mississippi.
Three Missi-
His eyes moved to mine.
I nodded.
Yes, Cole, it’s true. I’m pregnant. It’s yours. I have not had sex with anyone except you. Trust me. The dry spell I had before you and me in the cabin was so bad that the weather app on my phone warned of a drought. And since that night in the cabin, there’s been nobody. Just your memory.
I put my hand to my stomach.
I’m pregnant, Cole.
We’re pregnant.
You’re the father.
I’m the mother, obviously.
We did this together.
When the moment came for Cole to say something, he didn’t.
Instead, he walked away.
He left the office for the day.
I had a rule when it came to Cole.
Well, many rules, but this one pertained to right now.
If Cole left, so did I.
Bad enough there were too many mornings that started out with me getting there early, before him.
Today was different in many ways.
I told him I was pregnant, then he left.
Cole never left the office.
But today he did.
Why?
Shock? Disappointment? Anger? Hate?
Or maybe he was with his lawyer, trying to figure out what to do about the baby. And me.
What was he going to do… offer me money to vanish?
How much…
I grabbed my bag and walked to his office just to be sure he was gone.
I saw the folder on his desk.
I needed to get his attention one way or another.
He thought I was sick or faking sick to quit.
Nope.
It was just morning sickness.
The feeling I had in my stomach as I walked to the elevators was different than the morning sickness.
That feeling stuck with me the entire ride home.
When I opened the door, Bev stood at her computer, clicking her tongue.
She looked at me and pointed. “What’s wrong?”
“Nothing.”
“You’re never home this early,” she said. “What happened? Did you talk to him? What did he say? Tell me he’s not going to be some… cockhead… about this?”
“Bev. Not right now.”
“Yes, right now.”
I shut the door and touched my stomach. “I don’t feel well.”
“Oh, no. Morning sickness all day? That’s the worst. I had a friend who had that. She would throw up morning, noon, and night. And it went into the third trimester.”
“That’s comforting,” I said.
“Yeah, I shouldn’t have said that. Hey, really quick, are carrots funny?”