by Lily Zante
“I’ll get the drinks next time,” said Celine, turning to give the man a good once over. At twenty-seven, she was the youngest of them all. She was still desperately trying to find ‘the one’ and had been single for nearly three months.
“I tried that diet, but it didn’t work for me. Besides, I hate being told what I can and can’t eat,” lamented Jodi.
“Why would you bother trying? You’ll be pregnant soon enough,” said Celine, carelessly.
A silence hushed their carefree chatter.
“I’m not pregnant yet and we’ve been trying for months,” complained Jodi, refilling her glass.
“I bet you’re having fun trying,” sniggered Celine. “I know I would if I had a man.” Her smile vanished just as quickly. Rona rolled her eyes at Jodi. Celine and her endless quest for A Man.
“How come we had to keep rearranging tonight?” asked Jodi. Rona let out a low groan. “Ava,” she reminded them.
“She kept you busy, huh?” asked Celine. “Maybe I need to get myself to Italy and get me a fine specimen of a man just like the one she has.” Her friends knew Ava and they were all fully up to date with her exploits in Italy which had now resulted in a baby on the way as well as an impending wedding to one of the most eligible and handsome men in Verona. She was their icon. All, except Rona’s.
“She’s a slave driver,” complained Rona. Her sister had returned to Denver briefly in order to resolve some of the issues with her online store. It was expanding too fast for her to keep up and now that she was going to live in Italy, she had to come up with a solution for handling her US operations.
Rona picked up her cocktail glass. It wasn’t her problem now. The only problem she had was one called Kim.
The problem being that she wasn’t a virtual assistant anymore.
Mercedes wanted to know. “How’s it working out—this other woman and you? You said she was a pain in the butt.”
“She still is a pain in the butt,” Rona confirmed. She’d suffered while her mother had been in Verona. Carlos could only look after Tori one weekday, and the order numbers had exploded. Some days she’d take Tori with her and put her in the playpen in the kitchen, just so she could get some work done. Other times she’d do the unthinkable: start work at six in the morning and work until around eleven, leaving Tori with Carlos. Since he worked in this family’s restaurant business, he often started work late and finished late. But during Ava’s recent visit, she had employed Kim, who was once her virtual assistant, to help out with order processing, as well as dealing with customer queries.
“Now you’re sharing the work?” Celine asked.
“She does a few days and I do a few days. Different days,” Rona quickly added.
“It’s working?”
“I don’t have to see the woman,” Rona smiled.
“How old is she?” asked Jodi, curious.
“Twenty-seven.”
“And her son?”
“Is eight.”
“No way!”
“She married?”
“Single mom.”
“Wow,” said Mercedes, her eyes wide with admiration. “That must be so hard. I bet she’s really ambitious.”
“Getting knocked up at nineteen doesn’t sound too ambitious to me,” retorted Rona, flicking her nails. “Anyhow, I only have to work two days a week now. It was killing me having to work everyday.”
“I bet,” said Mercedes. She’d given up work the moment she’d had her firstborn and had no intention of returning. “By the way, your haircut suits you. It makes you look younger.”
“I didn’t realize I looked older before,” Rona replied, running her fingers through her light brown hair. Previously long and layered it had now been stylishly cut to just below her shoulders. She couldn’t resist swishing it around—just like the models did in those hair ads.
But Carlos hadn’t even noticed until she’d forcefully stood in his way. “What?” he’d asked, frowning at her.
“Notice anything?”
“You look happier?” he’d commented, clueless.
“Anything else?” she’d asked, giving her head a jiggle.
“It’s colored? And…it’s…shorter,” he cried in dismay. “Aww, baby, why did you go and do that for?” It hadn’t been the response she’d been looking for.
“I loved your hair the way it was before.” He’d told her.
She pushed thoughts of Carlos out of her mind and glanced over at the bar again. The tall stranger had been watching her and he raised his glass to her. She raised hers in return.
“Are you going to encourage him?” said Celine, irritated.
“I’m not encouraging him. He knows I’m married.” replied Rona.
“Some men don’t care,” remarked Mercedes.
“Why don’t you go over and start talking to him if you’re so desperate to meet a guy?” Rona shifted her gaze from the stranger to her friend. Celine couldn’t stomach it when any of the others, all married, got attention she thought she deserved on account of her single status.
“Nice to be noticed,” sighed Jodi.
“What diet was that again?” Mercedes asked. “I can’t diet to save my life. The only time I lose weight is when I stop breast feeding.”
“Yeah,” agreed Rona. “Apparently it’s meant to fall off then. So I heard.” Not that she’d breastfed Tori. Breasts, in her opinion, were for adult use and she was relieved she’d never let a baby near hers. Tori had done just fine with infant formula.
“Don says he wants another one,” said Mercedes, her face contorting.
“Really?” asked Jodi, wincing.
“He wants four,” said Mercedes, matter-of-factly.
“Ouch,” said Rona, pulling a face. “How many do you want?”
“I don’t mind. If he wants more, why not?”
“But do you want more?” asked Rona. It wasn’t as though they were talking about a bag of sweets here. She couldn’t imagine agreeing to another child or three just because Carlos thought it would be nice to have. She couldn’t put her body through nine months of hell to be followed by hours of blood loss, damage to her sensitive parts and months of inconvenience afterwards. Not getting nine hours of uninterrupted sleep for months was bad enough.
“This is when sex gets scary,” remarked Celine. Kids weren’t in her game plan yet.
“He says he comes from a family of three, and that three is an odd number. So he wants two or four. But now that we’ve got two, he kinda likes the idea of having two more. It’ll be even then.”
“But what do you think?” asked Rona, intrigued.
“It’s okay with me. The other two are going to be at school soon enough and it’ll be nice having another one around the house.”
“It would be nice to do nothing while the other two are at school,” remarked Rona. She loved Tori more than she ever thought was possible, but she hadn’t considered baby number two yet. She wasn’t sure she ever would.
“Do you really need to have more poop to clean up?” asked Celine. “It seems that’s all babies do all day long. Be little poop machines.”
The bartender came up to them just then with a round of drinks identical to the ones that Rona had ordered. “Compliments of the gentleman at the bar.” He looked over to Rona’s admirer at the bar and then put down four cocktail glasses: two Margaritas and two Mojitos.
“The evening just got better,” exclaimed Jodi, and grabbed hers.
“Thank you,” said Celine and held her glass up to the guy who was watching them from the bar. She nodded her head appreciatively.
“I really shouldn’t,” said Mercedes. “But, heck, we might end up making more babies soon, so I might as well drink up now.” She gave the man her best smile.
Only Rona could see that he’d kept his gaze on her the whole time. She picked up her glass and walked over to him.
Bam! She slammed it down. “I told you, I’m good. I can get my own drinks. Thank you, anyway.”
He
appeared amused by her response and grabbed her wrist as she turned to go. She raised her chin and stared at his eyes that now sparkled like diamonds. She enjoyed this thrill—the chase, the knowledge that she still had it—the ability to turn heads. It excited her, especially knowing that it would go nowhere, but also to know that she was still desirable.
This easy flirtation warmed her insides.
“Do you mind?” she asked, breaking her arm from his firm grip.
He lifted an eyebrow. “You’re a feisty little one, aren’t you? I’ve seen you here before.”
“You must get out a lot,” she said sarcastically, leaning back against the stool next to him, not quite making herself at home, but not ready to go back to the girls just yet. She wanted to bask in a little sparring banter first. “Because I don’t come here often.”
“I know. Like I said, I’ve noticed you here before. I don’t know if it’s those hooped earrings, or,” his gaze trailed down the length of her body again. “The way your clothes seem to hug that mighty fine body of yours,” his lips parted as he licked them. He was handsome, in a rough cowboy sort of way. Nothing fine boned about him. Rough, and rugged. Kind of what she’d thought about Carlos when they’d first met. He’d rescued her from a fracas that her group of friends had gotten mixed up in. Carlos had dived right in and pulled her away from the fray.
“Do you often pick up married women?”
“We’re just talking,” he smiled. “And drinking. That’s all.”
“You come here alone?”
“I’m meeting some buddies of mine.”
“Well, it’s been nice talking to you and thank you for the drink but—”
“It’s on me,” he said and refused to take it back. “I promise you it hasn’t been spiked. Ask this guy here,” he nodded at the bartender who grinned at her as he wiped a glass.
“Nothing wrong with it I swear.”
She smiled and wrapped her fingers around the ice cold rim. It made her feel good, always being the one to get noticed, especially when she was out with her friends.
Ruben had noticed her too, but she’d been alone then, in Verona. Alone and bored and often forcing a smile at Gioberti’s lame jokes.
“Take it, no strings attached,” the stranger insisted, and dragged her into the present, back in Denver.
“Just so we’re clear: I’m not that kind of girl.”
“If you say so.”
She took the drink and sauntered back to the girls.
“Well?” asked Mercedes.
Rona shrugged. There was nothing to say.
“What’d he say?” asked Jodi, chewing on a cuticle.
“Not much.” Rona twisted a lock of hair around her finger.
“How come you get hit on all the time and I don’t?” wailed Celine. “Maybe I need to try the five-two diet.”
Rona placed the cocktail glass next to her half empty one and smiled. She still had it, she thought, feeling smug with herself.
It Takes Two is out now. Click here for more details.
Booklist
The Billionaire’s Love Story: This is a Cinderella story with a touch of Jerry Maguire. What happens when the billionaire with too much money meets the single mom with too much heart?
The Promise (FREE prequel)
The Gift, Book 1
The Gift, Book 2
The Gift, Book 3
The Gift, Boxed Set (Books 1, 2 & 3)
The Offer, Book 1
The Offer, Book 2
The Offer, Book 3
The Offer, Boxed Set (Books 1, 2 & 3)
The Vow, Book 1
The Vow, Book 2
The Vow, Book 3
The Vow, Boxed Set (Books 1, 2 & 3)
Indecent Intentions: This is a spin-off from The Billionaire’s Love story. This 2-book set consists of 2 standalone stories about the billionaire’s playboy brother. The 2nd story is about a wealthy nightclub owner who shuns relationships.
The Bet
The Hookup
Indecent Intentions 2-Book Set
Honeymoon Series: Take a roller-coaster journey of emotional highs and lows in this story of love and loss, family and relationships. When Ava is dumped six weeks before her Valentine’s Day wedding, she has no idea of the life that awaits her in Italy.
Honeymoon For One
Honeymoon For Three
Honeymoon Blues
Honeymoon Bliss
Baby Steps
Honeymoon Series (Books 1-4)
Italian Summer Series: This is a spin-off from the Honeymoon Series. These books tell the stories of the secondary characters who first appeared in the Honeymoon Series. Nico and Ava also appear in these books.
It Takes Two
All That Glitters
Fool’s Gold
Roman Encounter
November Sun
New Beginnings
Italian Summer Series (Books 1-4)
The Seven Sins: NEW SERIES Standalone romances based on the seven sins. Emotional, and angsty romances which are loosely connected.
The Wrath of Eli
The Problem with Lust
A Perfect Match Series: A Perfect Match Series features the same couple. High-flying corporate executive Nadine has no time for romance but her life takes a turn for the better when she meets Ethan, a sexy and struggling metal sculptor five years younger. He works as an escort in order to make the rent.
Lost In Solo – prequel
The Proposal
Heart Sync
A Leap of Faith
Perfect Match Boxed Set (Books 1-3)
Tainted Love Series: This is a spin-off from A Perfect Match Series and consists of 3 standalone contemporary romances featuring characters who first appeared in the Perfect Match books. Ethan and Nadine also appear in this series
Misplaced Love
Reclaiming Love
Embracing Love
Tainted Love Boxed Set (Books 1, 2 & 3)
An Ordinary Hero
Standalone books:
Love, Inc
An Unexpected Gift
Acknowledgements
I would like to thank my wonderful group of proofreaders who help polish my manuscript and eliminate the errors, typos, weird words and phrases which often find their way into my story. These ladies give me the confidence to release each book and I am eternally grateful for their help and support:
Sherrie Brown
Marcia Chamberlain
Nancy Dormanski
April Lowe
Dena Pugh
Charlotte Rebelein
Carole Tunstall
I would also like to thank Tatiana Vila for creating my awesome covers:
www.viladesign.net
About The Author
Lily Zante lives with her husband and three children somewhere near London, England.
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Copyright © 2016 Lily Zante
Lily Zante
Baby Steps
All rights reserved.
No part of this publication may be copied, reproduced in any format, by any means, electronic or otherwise, without prior consent from the copyright owner and publisher of this book.
The scanning, uploading and distribution of this book through the internet or any other means without the prior written consent of the author is illegal and is punishable by law.
This is a work of fiction. All characters, names, places and events are the product of the author's imagination or used fictitiously and do not bear any resemblance to any real person, alive or dead.
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