The Perfect Guy: A Romance Novel

by LaCarro, Maria

  James smirked. “No, you didn’t. Your name was never placed in the bowl. I had it in my hand the entire time and I just reached in to pretend to choose.”

  “What happened after I left?”

  James looked down and started to fiddle with his fork. “Uhm, well, I wasn’t there for many days after you left, but the next day, I heard the rumors that you had spent the night in my bed since you weren’t in your own room, but when people realized that you weren’t there anymore, Esme and Carlisle told everyone that you had gone home together with your fiancée. Everyone saw Carter that night so they didn’t question it.”

  We were silent for a few minutes after that as our food arrived and we ate a few bites.

  Eventually, I couldn’t stand it anymore.

  “Tell me something about you that is true,” I said and it sounded almost like a desperate plea. I really needed to start laying a new foundation with him and for that to happen, I needed to get to know him. Right now, I knew next to nothing.

  “Well, I am from Chicago where I grew up with my parents as an only child. My mom got breast cancer when I was fourteen and when I was sixteen she didn’t have the strength to fight it anymore.”

  For a second, I wondered if James would have been a different person if his Mom hadn’t died when he was at such a critical age. You were so easily influenced by others at sixteen.

  “How come you started working with…well, you know.” I had a hard time even saying it. His job title just scared me too much.

  James thought about it and then snorted as if he remembered something before he shook his head. “I had this cousin on my mom’s side who was a sort of prodigy, I guess. Everything I did fell in his shadow, but when we were signed into the same acting class in school in sixth grade, I found there was something I did better. I could fool people to believe almost anything I told them, so I started using it outside of class as well.

  “I was never caught lying, and I could easily weasel my way out of doing any homework as long as I passed the tests, which I did by the hair. Academic work was never my thing, so when I’d graduated, I didn’t have a lot of competence and colleges refused me.

  “It was hard for my dad to see this and eventually I went to a community college, but I suffered through it and I got nothing out of it. I wasn’t able to get a job and that was when Esme stepped in. She remembered my natural talent and she’d gotten a client that was rather difficult. This was outside of the program and she only needed my ability to persuade. When that was a success, she promised to keep hiring me whenever she had the need. I was only twenty-two.”

  It horrified me to hear that Mrs. Kellen had done some manipulating on her own. How she could use her nephew in that way when he was so young was just disgusting.

  “And did your dad agree with it?”

  He shook his head. “Not at all. He’s been begging me for years to try and find a different job.”

  I knew that as long as he continued doing what he did, I would never feel completely comfortable around him, so I went out on a limb with my next question. “Would you ever consider it?”

  He frowned. “What do you mean?”

  “I mean, would you ever consider working as something else?”

  “Like what?” He made a gesture with his hands as if he really had no idea. “It’s not exactly practical to change careers at thirty-four. I don’t have any experience with anything else. I would have to start from scratch. Go back to school.”

  I knew that what he said was the truth and I decided to drop it. I guess working for the Government, or whatever it was he wasn’t allowed to discuss, was better than brainwashing innocent women.

  “I guess not,” I said in agreement and took another bite of the food.

  CHAPTER 25

  DISCOMFORT

  ”Are you mad? Are you certifiably insane? What the hell are you doing going out with that guy? I can’t believe you! And in your condition!” Becca was ranting on and on while she paced back and forth in my living room.

  Her constant movement made me tired and dizzy, so I had leaned back into a lying position on my couch while studying her.

  “I mean, seriously! After everything he did to you? You’re just going to forgive him like that? That’s so stupid! You know he will only screw you over again!”

  On and on she continued, and I knew there was no use in me trying to get a word in because when she had worked up a fire like this, you had to wait and let it burn out on its own.

  I had been out on another lunch date with James, but we had chosen a less fancy restaurant this time. In fact, it had been a simple diner, and since we’d chosen a table near the window, it was a given we would be spotted.

  Becca had seen us from across the street, and at first she had thought I was just out with some guy. It wasn’t until she heard his name that she exploded.

  About fifteen minutes later, after Becca had called me every word for stupid she knew, she finally became quiet.

  “Are you going to let me talk now?”

  She gave me a murderous glare, and I sighed.

  “Look, you could continue calling me every bad word in the entire dictionary, but it’s not going to make me change my mind. I am not exactly welcoming him back with open arms. He’s working hard to make me trust him again, and I thought he at least deserved that chance. Do you really think that’s so wrong?”

  Becca looked away from me defiantly, and I thought she looked more like a petulant child than a thirty-three-year-old woman.

  I stood up and walked up to her. “I promise I am being careful, but Becca, this man tore me down, and I have to see if I should truly move on and put him behind me or take the chance. Otherwise I will always be alone, and I am sick of it.”

  My sissy let that sink in and then she put her arms around me. “If he ever does anything to hurt you again, I will go after him with Solomon’s hunter's knife and chop his balls off before handing them to you on a platter.”

  I smiled into her shoulder. “I wouldn’t expect anything less from you.”

  James was driving me home and talking about something. I think he was telling me how different Seattle was from Chicago, but I wasn’t paying him any attention.

  My hands were on my stomach and my entire focus was on willing Baby to move. He hadn’t moved all day and it worried me. I was always hyperaware of his every movement even though I didn’t react strongly to each time anymore, but I’d had a heavy feeling in my chest ever since I woke up in the morning.

  I was terrified that something was wrong, but I’d tried to tell myself during the day that Baby was just asleep, but now, eleven hours after I got up, I couldn’t ignore it any longer. Something was wrong; I could feel it.

  “James, stop,” I said, and he immediately stopped talking and looked at me questioningly.

  “Something wrong?” he asked with a worried tone. He must have seen my expression, and since he could read me alarmingly well, he knew that I wasn’t all right.

  “Yes, and I need you to take me to Dad’s house.”

  “Your dad’s? Why?”

  I was too scared to explain properly. “Just do it, please!”

  He could hear in my voice that I wasn’t joking around. “Okay, but you’re going to have to give me directions.”

  Not long after, he was pulling into Dad’s driveway, but I was almost in tears. I was so scared for my baby. What if something had happened? What if Baby was hurt? Every worst case scenario went through my head; even the unthinkable one.

  What if my baby was dead?

  I was so into my own head that I didn’t realize that James had left the car to knock on the door and get my dad and Sue to come out to the car where I was still sitting.

  Dad was the one who opened my door, but Sue was the one kneeling next to me and stroking the tears from my cheeks.

  “Jenn, honey, what’s wrong?”

  Everything bubbled up at once. “Sue, I’m so scared! Baby hasn’t moved all day! Something is wrong!
I can feel it. Baby’s dead, right? That’s what this means, doesn’t it?” I was hysterical, and I didn’t even register that James stood a few feet behind, looking rather out of place.

  “Honey, I need you to calm down, okay?” Sue said with her calm voice. “I want you to come inside the house with me so that I can examine you. I’m sure everything is fine,” she assured me, and when she’d helped me get my breathing back under control, she ordered Dad to help me inside.

  “You should come inside, too,” she said to who I assumed to be James.

  Apparently, Dad and Sue had been babysitting for Lilly, and when little Jenn saw me, she flew up from the floor, where she had been coloring, in order to hug me.

  “Aunt Jenn!” she squealed, but before she reached us, Sue stopped her.

  “Sweetie, I need you to be a good girl and help me clear the sofa so that Aunt Jenn can lay down, okay? She’s not feeling very well at the moment.”

  “Okay, Mema!”

  Dante and Juliette, Lilly’s other two kids, barely looked up from what they were doing when Sue led me inside and then helped me lie down on their plush couch.

  “Doll, can I get you anything?” Dad asked while he stood behind a kneeling Sue, twisting his hands.

  “Go fetch a glass of water for her, would you, Charlie?” Sue asked, and he immediately disappeared into the kitchen. “Jenn, I need you to take slow and deep breaths for me while I do this. I am going to feel around on your stomach a bit.”

  I nodded, and another round of tears started to fall from my eyes.

  I felt Sue’s hands press and prod my round stomach, and in order to keep myself calm, I listened to little Jenn blabbering James’s ear off.

  “What’s your name? How old are you? Are you Aunt Jenn’s boyfriend?”

  James took it all in stride. “My name’s James. I am thirty-four, and I guess you could call me Aunt Jenn’s boyfriend because I am a boy and I am also her friend.”

  I could almost hear little Jenn roll her eyes. She could never stand for people talking to her as a child even though she was barely eight.

  “You know what I mean! Are you a couple? Are you in love with her?”

  I didn’t hear his answers because Sue called for my attention. “Jenn, I can feel Baby responding to my touches, so that’s good, but, darling, and I don’t want to alarm you, but I want to take you to the hospital and do another ultrasound. Just in case.”

  I swallowed down the terror that rose inside me again and nodded shakily.

  “I don’t want to be in the way, so I should probably head back to my place,” James said, but I suddenly didn’t want him to leave. I felt an overpowering need for his support.

  “No! Please, come with me to the hospital,” I pleaded.

  “You don’t need me there, Jenn. You’ve got your stepmother,” he insisted.

  “Please?”

  I think the tears in my eyes must have done it for him because he agreed to come with us, but once at the hospital, I had to plead again for him to come with us to the examination room when he said he would wait in the waiting area.

  Sue turned to him. “Young man, my stepdaughter is very stressed right now, and you contribute to that stress by fighting her on this. I am asking you to just do as she says right now, for both her baby’s sake and hers.”

  James went silent after that and followed along willingly.

  Sue quickly prepped everything for the ultrasound and when she had squeezed the cold gel on my stomach and was about to place the stick on it, I instinctively grabbed the closest thing, which was James’s hand, and clasped it tightly.

  The grainy picture appeared on the screen, and when I saw the tiny, almost non-existent movements, as well as the heart beating, I breathed a sigh of relief. Baby was alive, but I still needed an explanation to the lack of movement during the day.

  I turned back to Sue, and she was frowning.

  She made this tiny thoughtful sound before she said anything. “I can see some irregularities in the heartbeat. We’re going to have to monitor that closely,” she said, and continued to move the stick around.

  “What does it mean?”

  She turned to me. “It could mean nothing, or it could mean possibilities of heart dysfunctions, but we’re not going to leap ahead just yet. Let’s hope for the best for now.”

  I nodded because I knew it was the only thing I could do.

  Once I felt calmed down, I became aware of James’s presence again, and I turned my head to face him. What I saw was a man stunned to silence, with wide eyes glued to the black and white screen where my baby was visible.

  “James? Are you okay?”

  “Yeah,” he said with a sort of awe coloring the tone of his voice. “It’s just fascinating that there is actually a human growing inside of you.” His eyes were still stuck to the screen. “It’s quite different seeing it with my own eyes instead of imagining it through your stomach.”

  “Do you feel uncomfortable with it?” I asked and voiced a concern I’d felt for quite some time. I didn’t know if James was prepared for a package deal when he said he wanted me.

  It was one of the reasons I had been taking it so slowly. We were getting to know each other for real, building up my trust for him again, determining if he was ready for such a huge commitment, and even though we had been seeing each other regularly for two weeks now, I had not opened up to him completely yet.

  For now, we were on our way to become good friends at least. He had shown me his honest side again and again, and I didn’t question his every move in my head anymore.

  About a week after our first date, he had actually taken me to the library were he gave me permission to do research on him in the public records, so now I knew for sure that what he had been telling me was true.

  “No, I don’t. I thought I would since you are obviously creating a new life with another man, even though he’s anonymous, but I am actually fine with it,” James replied to my question almost instantly.

  Sue knew the entire history between us, so when she leaned forward to whisper in my ear, I was a bit shocked at what she said. “He didn’t run away screaming, and he’s telling the truth. I think it’s time for the next step.”

  I looked at her with wide eyes, but shook my head when she nodded. She might think it was a good time, but I was nowhere near ready for it.

  The next step would mean going into it and being set on trying to work on the romantic aspect of our relationship.

  It wasn’t difficult to fall in love with James. I had first-hand experience from that area, and until I felt completely safe with him, I kept him at arm’s length.

  “Well,” Sue said and pressed a few buttons on the machine to turn it off. “As I said, I want to monitor Baby’s heart beat a bit closer than before, and I think we need to schedule exams every third week to see how it develops. Otherwise, Baby’s fine.”

  “Why haven’t I felt any movement?”

  “It’s not unusual for there to be days with very little movement during the second trimester, but it’s always good to check it up. Mostly, it’s actually because the baby doesn’t feel like moving,” Sue said with a small smile, and I was sure it wasn’t the first time she said those words to a worried mother-to-be.

  Sue wiped the gel away from my stomach, and I pulled down my top. When I started to sit up, James was immediately of assistance, and he then handed me my jacket.

  The three of us left together—James was walking very close to me as if he was prepared to catch me if I fell—but we separated at the parking lot. James offered to drive me home since that’s where we had been headed in the first place, and Sue promised to assure Dad that everything was all right with me and Baby.

  When James parked in my driveway, I felt that I wanted to thank him for the true support he’d shown me when I was so scared, and I thought of what Sue had said.

  Maybe it was time to at least sniff at the next step. It was where we were going eventually anyway. I just couldn’t see
James as a man that I could keep as my friend only. It was either a romantic relationship with him or none at all.

  I knew that I was so hesitant because I was afraid, because even though I hadn’t been hurting very much after James’s betrayal, I would be completely destroyed if it happened again. I would be unable to show trust toward any man, ever, and it could be directly damaging for my job.

  So there was more than my heart at risk.

  But I decided to take the leap anyway.

  “Do you want to come inside?” I asked and smiled when he accepted the invitation. We had to move forward or else everything would always feel uncertain between us.

  CHAPTER 26

  IT’S NEVER JUST SIMPLE

  I knew that my sexual drive would sky-rocket during my second trimester, but this was just getting ridiculous.

  My heart was beating faster, my inner temperature was rising, and my breathing became shallower simply by watching James talking on the phone in my front yard.

  He was wearing a simple white t-shirt, something I had never seen him wear at the program. He had always worn a long-sleeved shirt on top, so seeing his well-toned arms was surprising, but very nice.

  A week had passed since I decided to take the leap and invited James inside my home, and we hadn’t even attempted a more physical relationship, not even a kiss on the cheek, and I wasn’t completely sure on what I thought about that.

  I was both relieved and kind of disappointed.

  I thought about the passionate and very dominant kiss James had given me at the program in my room. He had been so aggressive when he pressed me up against the wall, and his fingers snaked around my throat.

  I became hot just thinking about it, although if it was my honest opinion or my hormones was hard to determine.

  But even though he had invaded my personal space, it had been a show of how much he’d wanted me, and I knew he was trying to be the nice guy—one I could start to trust, but I felt self-conscious over the fact that he hadn’t tried to kiss me yet.

  Didn’t he think I was attractive anymore? Was it because he thought I was fat? It had to be because I was fat. I hadn’t changed as a person very much. Only my weight was different from before.