Dared to Love (The Billionaire Parker Brothers Book 3)

by Kayla C. Oliver

  At least she knew for sure where she stood with him—and it wasn’t anywhere good. She could admit to herself that she was angry with Blake. Grateful as she was that he was recovering physically, she was furious that he had led her on, shut her out, and then abandoned her. But she was angry with herself too for letting it happen.

  Her phone rang and she sighed as she dragged herself up and saw the name on the Caller ID. “Hey, Anna.”

  Her friendly immediately began to prattle on and Kelly partially tuned her out, making the rights sounds in the right places as her brain continued to whirl. Yeah, okay, that was also being a shitty friend. But damn it, wasn’t she just a little bit entitled?

  The secretarial job had turned out to be a bust. Her boss had been a predator who’d tried to get handsy from day one, until Kelly had woken up one day and just never gone back to work. Instead, she’d taken a gamble, pulled up stakes, and moved to New York. Not because of Blake. She told herself that repeatedly.

  “Kelly …”

  “I’m listening. Alexi’s a lying, cheating rat’s ass.”

  As Anna went on, Kelly got up and walked into her gym. Yes, her gym. She had arrived in New York with absolutely nothing and, while staying at a hostel that wouldn’t eat up her life savings even if it wasn’t exactly homey or cozy, had taken a gamble with some of her art. It had paid off and she’d been hired as a curator to a local gallery.

  She’d thought she’d done so well on her own, being able to pay for her own nice two-room apartment in decent part of Manhattan, and not having to skip meals, wait tables, or escort anyone to keep a roof over her head. Then she’d found out that—

  “Blake.”

  Snapping back to reality, Kelly asked, “Huh? What?”

  “Caught you,” Anna said dryly. “You’re still pissed that he put in a good word. Aren’t you. Don’t be an idiot, Kelly. He owed you that much. It’s not like he outright gave you the money …” and Anna was off again, while Kelly drifted once more.

  She’d communicated with Hawk while Blake was in the early stages of recovery, and she’d made the mistake of mentioning her secretarial failure and plans for New York. Hawk had been the one to recommend the art gallery. And Blake had been the one, apparently, to give her an outstanding reference which had earned her the job.

  “It didn’t earn you anything,” Anna insisted, reading her mind. “You earned it. He just saw how talented you were and told somebody. Like a job reference.”

  Kelly muttered a noncommittal reply that sufficed to keep Anna talking.

  She was grateful, obviously, but at the same time she resented the fact that Blake apparently thought her career meant more to her than him. Or maybe he never thought she’d found out. Either way, the dramatic change in her life was incredible, but it was all hollow without him in it. She had never wanted him for what he could do for her, but for who he was. The fact that he had apparently not understood that left a bitter taste in her mouth.

  “Kelly!”

  Hearing Anna’s irritation, Kelly apologized quickly. “Sorry. I’m really sorry, Anna. I’m every bit as bad as he is.”

  “No kidding,” Anna muttered.

  “Sorry,” Kelly said again. Anna had been a good friend to her from day one on the new job, and she’d quickly learned that good friends were hard to come by in a city as fast moving as this one, especially if she didn’t go out all that much. Frankly, she’s spent so much time at bars and clubs on Element Island that she’d lost interested in them.

  “So what are you going to do about Alexi?” Kelly asked, trying to make it up to her friend.

  “Forget that,” Anna retorted. “How are you feeling?”

  “Sick as a dog, except I don’t know how sick dogs can be. Hopefully pretty damn sick,” Kelly admitted, sprawling out on the couch with a wastebasket nearby in case she had to make a dive for it, which was often the case these days.

  Anna commiserated for a few minutes before getting interrupted—surprise—by the rat’s ass hammering on her door, so she hung up and left Kelly to her queasiness and rambling thoughts.

  ***

  Kelly stared up at the ceiling of apartment, thinking back to how it had started. She’d initially chalked the exhaustion up to the move. She’d left everything behind and had started in an entirely new city that might as well have been Mars for how different it was from South Caroline. The weather, the food, the people, the subways, the pace of life—it was all an entirely new game, and then there was learning a whole new job. She’d figured being tired came with the territory.

  But then she’d started frequently queasy, not throwing up at first, but never quite sure food would stay in, even if something the previous day had tasted just fine. In tandem with her constant nausea came a bizarre sensitivity to smells, to where she’d had to quit wearing her favorite perfume because she suddenly hated it, and certain whiffs of deodorant on a subway—or other whiffs, for that matter—sent her running for the nearest bathroom or trashcans. And her moods. God. Sometimes she would want to cry for no reason at all. Other times she would get angry over things as insignificant as her usual coffee place running out of the particular sweetener she liked to add to her morning cup of joe.

  Some coworkers suggested that she might be pregnant, but Kelly knew that was impossible. She was on the pill and had taken it with regularity throughout all the time that Blake and she had been sleeping together. There was no way that she could be pregnant, and she was more inclined to think that even the pill itself was maybe making her sick, messing with her hormones or something.

  She planned to go to the doctor and describe her symptoms, but one day when Kelly had to run out of a meeting to find the nearest bathroom stall, Anna chased her down and wouldn’t let her get away.

  Kelly replayed the scene in her mind as her stomach suddenly lurched and she lunged for the wastebasket.

  “Listen,” Anna said, standing outside the stall as Kelly tried to recover from throwing up her lunch. “I know how scary it can be to deal with the fact that you might be pregnant, especially when the father is no longer in the picture. But it’s better to know. Every day that goes by that you’re not taking a prenatal vitamin is a problem. Every cup of coffee or glass of wine you drink—it could be a problem. You have to do the smart thing here, Kelly. It might not be just about you anymore.”

  Kelly groaned, resting her head on her arm that was slung over the base of the toilet. She didn’t want to admit it, but she knew Anna was right.

  “I’m scared,” she said quietly. “I didn’t plan on a baby. I can’t have a baby. The father …”

  “Blake?” Anna guessed.

  “It’s the only possibility,” Kelly whispered, so she wasn’t sure her friend would here, but she did.

  “You’re not alone,” Anna promised her gently. “I’ll go get you a test from the drug store right now and stay here while you take it. How about that?

  Kelly knew it was the best offer she was going to get, and she sat up just enough to tidy her hair a bit. “Yes. Okay.”

  The fifteen minutes that she had to wait for Anna to get back seemed like an eternity, but eventually there was a paper bag hung over the door of the stall and Kelly reached up to take it.

  With trembling hands, she undid the packaging, then used the test and set it aside to wait the requisite three minutes for the result to show.

  It seemed to take hours before the positive result glared up at her from the screen, and Kelly felt sick all over again. There was a strange combination of terror and joy that settled low in her stomach, and for a long moment she simply didn’t know what to say.

  “Well?” Anna demanded, after a full minute had passed. “Anything?”

  Kelly stood up, smoothed down her skirt, and opened the door. Wordlessly, she handed her coworker the test, meeting Anna’s eyes when she looked up from it.

  “Well,” Kelly said, clearing her throat. “I guess I’m having a baby.”

  “Damn it, Blake.” Stomach t
horoughly emptied Kelly sagged onto the floor, reaching for a nearby tissue box and a glass of water to rinse the awful taste from her mouth. Hands slightly shaky, she wiped at her lips and whispered, “Answer my messages.”

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Blake

  “It’s Katie, not Kelly.” The woman turned up her nose and turned to go, ignoring the apology Blake tried to give her.

  “I didn’t mean it. That was just a slip of the tongue, let me assure you,” he said, but she laughed unpleasantly.

  “A slip of your tongue that you made three times. I don’t know who this Kelly girl is, but you better get her off your mind when you are at work and focus on the things that are important. I am not going to invest with a company that can’t even get my name straight.” Miss Jenkins stopped at the door, and Blake followed her, clutching his cane and holding out his free hand to grovel once more.

  “I understand, and I do apologize. It’s not going to happen again, Miss Jenkins.” He went with her last name, knowing that it was going to be safer for him to use without slipping up. She gave him a look, then she turned up her nose once more and walked away.

  “Can we plan on seeing your name on the list?” he called after her. He did his best to give her a warm smile, but the look that she gave him in return told him that she was in no mood to laugh. His smile faded somewhat, but he was still doing his best to be cheerful.

  “I will write my name, but I can’t say that is the name you are going to see when you read it!” she shot back.

  “It’s not going to happen again, Miss Jenkins, I promise,” Blake said. He wanted to follow her and get reassurance that she was going to invest with the company, but he felt it a better idea to just let her go. He had made her angry enough by calling her the wrong name three times throughout the meeting, and he didn’t want to accidentally do it again.

  He limped back to his desk, sat down, and rested his elbows on the table. Placing his face in his hands, he took a deep breath, then let it out again slowly, trying to clear his mind. The only problem was, there was no way for him to effectively clear his mind when the only person he could think about was Kelly. It had been nearly two months since he had last heard from her—by his own choice – and she still would not leave his mind, although she’d finally stopped calling.

  “I’m running out of synonyms for idiot,” Cole drawled from the doorway, and Blake groaned.

  “Go away.”

  “No way. You’re going to torpedo this business with screw ups like today’s,” Cole baldly informed him. “Pull your head out, bro. FYI—I suddenly need this business real bad, since Dana, baby, et al, you know.”

  “So you’re finally invested,” Blake muttered bitterly. “That’s just fucking fantastic. Took long enough.”

  “Invested, and therefore worried that people aren’t going to keep on investing if the boss is a wreck,” Cole went on. “Dude. What is your problem? Push a button. Dial the number. Fix this mess you’re putting everybody in. Are you that much of a wimp? Really?”

  Given the pain of the ongoing rehab, Cole’s last shot made Blake want to beat him over the head with his cane, but refrained.

  “Hawk followed up. He says she got the job and is doing well. I … walked by the gallery the other day,” Blake admitted. “It was raining and I had an umbrella, so it was unlikely she’d see me.”

  Cole snorted. “Yep. Coward is your new middle name. And? What’d you see?”

  Blake shook his head, hating the jealousy that surged through him. “She was talking with a guy. Young. Good looking. Probably artsy.”

  “And … “

  “And I want her to be happy,” Blake muttered. “Obviously, I do. But I want to be the one to make it happen.”

  “PS: Taking her calls might be a start,” Cole informed him. “Have you ever considered that she could be in trouble? Or sick?”Blake frowned and looked up from his desk. “No. I would know that for sure. She was at the gallery. She looked fine. Better than fine.”

  Even 1000 miles from the beach, her skin had still been golden. Her hair had somehow gleamed even when there was no sunlight. Her incredible body had seemed riper and lusher than ever and he’d barely refrained from storming into the building, slamming the kid away, and hauling her into a ferocious kiss.

  “I lie in bed at night and wonder what would have happened if I’d just had the balls to tell her that I loved her.”

  It was the first time he’d said the words, though he’d stopped denying the truth some time ago. To his relief, Cole didn’t mock him. Instead, his brother walked over and dropped into a chair.

  “So why didn’t you?”

  “What you said. Cowardice. I’m a physical cripple now—”

  “Bullshit,” Cole cut him off. “Don’t start with the self-pity. You may regain full use of that leg if you keep doing what you’re supposed to. But I know exactly where you were headed. You’re an emotional cripple, brother. And when she let it spill how she felt, all you could do was run in the other direction.”

  Blake didn’t bother to argue, because it was all true. “Now I’ve run so far that I don’t think there’s any way to get back to her. No matter how much I miss her.”

  “One more thing you’re not fessing up about,” Cole said bluntly. “And I’m guessing it’s the lame—seriously lame. Lamer than your leg, really—reason you haven’t called her back. Because you still don’t know how she’ll ‘fit’ in with your life here. Huh.”

  Hearing it laid out like that made Blake feel like even more of a heel. “It’s … something that I love about her,” he confessed, “but also something that terrifies me, Cole. She’s wild and independent, and she made it clear that she doesn’t feel the need to listen to anyone but herself. She does what she wants, how she wants, when she wants.”

  “Sounds about like the three of us.”

  Blake looked up. “What?”

  “The three us of,” Cole repeated. “You’re afraid she won’t fit in because she’s wild and crazy and has that escort past. Well, you let Hawk and me stick around, in spite of our own ‘activities’ outside of working ours. And you allow yourself to stick around, even though you went through that extended phase with the extreme gambling.”

  Blake winced at the memory of that particularly low point, when he’d gone off the rails a few years back, overwhelmed by responsibility and losing himself completely in a high-risk business that he could have lost a hell of a lot more on, had his brothers not stepped in.

  “This family has no saints, Blake. Dan’s not. Kathryn—” Cole laughed, because they both knew Kathryn was Hawk’s equal in every sense of the world—“I figure your girl will fit right in.”

  As he spoke, the light on Blake’s phone lit up, and he hit the button.

  “Go for it, Sarah,” he said, and his secretary’s voice came through the intercom.

  “There’s another call for you from that Kelly girl on line one,” the voice said.

  Blake bolted upright and Cole rolled his eyes and got up. “Don’t you dare not answer that,” he warned. “Or I’ll shove the cane where the sun don’t shine. I mean it. If you don’t do it for her or yourself, do it for my unborn kid and the business Dad spent his life building.”

  The door clicked shut behind him and Blake continued to stare at the phone. His hand hovered over it for a moment when Sarah’s voice came through the machine once more.

  “Should I put her through?”

  “Yeah, go ahead,” Blake said, making the decision then and there. His heart was pounding in his chest as he lifted the phone to his ear.

  “Hello?”

  “Blake?” Kelly’s voice was as startled as it was still warm and seductive and everything he remembered from those few nights they’d spent together, whispering into each other’s lips as the storm raged outside. “Wow. I—wow. You’re alive.”

  “Kelly! So good to hear from you! I’m sorry it’s taken so long to get connected, but I hear that you’re doing well. I’m s
o glad.” As he spoke, Blake knew exactly how lame he sounded and cringed.

  “You’re sorry, all right.” The warmth in her voice morphed into the steel he also remembered and he realized he loved that side just as much, because she didn’t back down. “Did it ever occur to you that I might have something important to talk to you about?”

  “I—I was just working, as always. I’m sorry, but when I’m here I can’t really make time to do anything else. Just ask my brothers.”

  “You are a fucking asshole,” Kelly informed him. “Working? Really? Give me one reason I shouldn’t hang up, after spending the last two months frantically trying to get in touch.”

  “Don’t!” Blake said hastily. Now that she was on the phone, in his ear, her voice—angry though it was—was the best thing he’d heard in forever. “Please. Don’t. I’m sorry,” he said sincerely. “I’m glad that you were able to get through to me now, though. I’ll do what I can to be more available in the future.” Again, his words didn’t come out at all the way he wanted them to sound. Not even remotely.

  “I’m not your business associate, Blake. In case you forget, you were inside of me. Repeatedly,” Kelly said coldly. “You could try talking to me more like an ex, at the very least. I think I earned that much. As for letting me ‘get through’ and ‘being more available.’ Yeah. I would say you’re going to have to.”

  “What’s going on, Kelly?” Blake said uncertainly, suddenly getting the feeling he was missing something extremely important.

  “What is the one thing we did when we were together more than anything else?” she asked.

  Blake blinked. “Uh … more than anything else? I mean, we talked a lot …”

  “More than that. For four whole nights. One at the hotel, three at my place.”

  He had no idea where this was going, but he definitely wasn’t sure he liked it. “We had sex.”