Special Delivery (The Billionaire's Baby Book 1)

by S Cinders

  That was before she had seen Freddy’s shirt which stated, ‘Can’t stop grinding.’ Or her shirt which said, “Queen of The Grind, and proud of it.’

  “It makes me sound like a fucking prostitute or a nymphomaniac!”

  Freddy had known to stay away when the boss was in this kind of mood. But Nate, he met it head-on.

  “There is nothing suggestive about these shirts,” Nate lied, “And if you see it otherwise, maybe it’s your problem. Are you a little deprived maybe? I know you and your ex-split recently.”

  Some men didn’t know when they were headed for thin ice. Nate went out in steel shoes and started jumping.

  Kim grabbed the closest thing to her and threw it.

  Thank heavens it wasn’t boiling coffee! However, the vat of cream did a fantastic job of coating Nate’s face and chest.

  “Don’t fucking talk about my husband!” Kim wasn’t sad that she lost the cream. She was sad that it hadn’t knocked him down.

  Nate slowly wiped his eyes, flicking the excess liquid to the floor. His eyes narrowed a fraction. Kim began to feel a little nervous at his silence. She swallowed hard but didn’t back down. He had no right to comment about her personal life.

  Nate was constantly picking and picking at her. He wanted to change their uniforms and order board. He wanted her to order nicer napkins and sturdier cups. Spend, spend, spend was all she heard when he came around.

  Didn’t he have a job to go to?

  The cream dripped off his chin onto his soaked chest which was clearly visible now that she had bathed him.

  He continued to eye her without speaking. Kim hated that. She hated the silent treatment, and she hated his knowing eyes that seemed to look into the depths of her soul. Could he see how frightened she was?

  Did he have any idea what was going through her mind? She had a douchebag for a husband that had just walked out on her. Parents that constantly were sucking money from her business. And now she was finally pregnant with a baby that she had always wanted, but her husband didn’t.

  He wasn’t her ex yet, although Kim was doing everything in her power to get the divorce to go through. She was run down, on her last nerve, and this man! This handsome ass hat dared to come into her shop and tear apart the only thing in her life that she was truly proud of.

  She lifted her chin, “I’m not sorry.”

  Nate looked at the woman in front of him. She had a lot more fire than he gave her credit for. He knew he shouldn’t have poked at her about the husband. But he wanted to know where she was at with Andrew and if that was why she was so resistant to change.

  He grabbed the bottom of his t-shirt and ripped it over his head. Then he used it to mop up the rest of his face. He was sticky and needed a shower in the worst way. But the look on her face when he ripped his shirt off had him sticking around for a while longer.

  “You don’t have to be sorry,” Nate said in his deep voice. “It was uncalled for. Sometimes my mouth says things before the brain has a chance to edit. I owe you an apology.”

  Kim had gathered all of her anger to give him a piece of her mind. But standing there in front of a golden Green god with a dusting of blonde curls that started low on his abdomen and disappeared underneath his belt had thrown her off.

  “Right,” she said blinking, “You were an ass!”

  His green eyes met hers, and once again they had that twinkle of mischief that flat out pissed her off.

  “I was an ass,” he agreed. “But I wasn’t wrong about the shirts. They are flirty, and people will get a kick out of them.”

  “I don’t want to flirt. I just want to serve them their damn coffee!” Kim winced at the shrill tone of her voice.

  “We have had several customers comment on them already,” Nate said soothingly, “And Freddy likes them.”

  Kim’s eyes blazed, “You had to have bribed him.”

  Nate shook his head innocently and grinned, “He has gotten two hot girls numbers already. We have a contest going. Whoever gets the most by six doesn’t have to clean the bathrooms.”

  “You are staying until six?” Kim wailed.

  He rolled his eyes, “Out of everything I just said, that’s what you heard?”

  “I don’t care if you sleep with every girl in the fucking city, Romeo,” Kim sneered. “I just want you out of my shop.”

  “Can't-do Little Momma,” He moved, and the muscles in his chest temporarily distracted her from what he had said.

  “Did you seriously just call me, Little Momma, ass hat?” her tone was dangerous.

  Nate nodded, “Sure did, and you might want to work on that mouth of yours. Don’t want the little bean to pick up on its Mommy’s bad language.”

  “Were you dropped on your head as a child?” Kim raged. “We aren’t friends. You can’t call me nicknames!”

  Nate arched a brow, “I seem to recall you calling me Romeo.”

  “That was for effect!” she almost stamped her foot.

  Nate tossed the wet shirt under the counter and stretched. Kim’s eyes widened as every nook and cranny flexed before her eyes.

  Hot damn, he was a fine piece of work.

  “I could always call you Queenie,” he teased, those green eyes glinting as he referred to the shirt he had made. “You know—for effect!”

  “How many years does one get for murder?” Kim yelled out to Freddy who scurried into the back and pretended he hadn’t heard her.

  “Fucking coward,” Kim muttered.

  Nate had gotten closer to her when she was turned to speak with Freddy. When she turned her head, he was inches away.

  “What the hell?” was the first thing that came out of her mouth.

  Nate smiled a naughty smile, “You have made me all wet. Are you going to do something about it?”

  Kim could have sworn her teeth cracked as she grabbed the bastard's arm and trudged towards her apartment to let him shower and borrow something that Andrew had left.

  “Freddy, get your ass out here and mind the store,” Kim yelled and opened her apartment door fairly dragging Nate behind her.

  CHAPTER 13

  Elliot was consumed with desire as he watched Mrs. H help Mandy with her stuck zipper. The skirt was too small and hugged the round globes of her ass. He had tried to be patient with her when she said she wouldn’t accept money for clothing. But he couldn’t walk around with a hard-on all day.

  The time had come for a showdown.

  “What do you have on the docket for this morning?”

  The terseness in his voice had Mandy looking up in concern.

  “I was to meet with a few of the local child care facilities to find out what types of things were offered and then meet with Charles this afternoon.”

  Elliot nodded and then dialed a number on his phone. Mandy went over to take the piping hot bowl of brown sugar oatmeal that Mrs. H had made for her.

  “You have to eat more, child,” the older woman admonished kindly. “We want that baby to be big and strong.”

  Mandy could tell by the way her clothes were fitting that it was her that was growing, not necessarily the baby. But she accepted her meals with grace, knowing that both Elliot and Mrs. H would glower if she didn’t partake.

  In the short time, she had gotten to know the funny pair she had noticed that Mrs. H hovered over Elliot like a mother hen. It was strange to see and terribly endearing.

  At the office, Elliot barked out commands on a regular basis to anyone and everyone around him. But not with her, never with her. It was true he was sometimes terse, but Mandy was starting to see that it was only his way.

  Ian had marveled just the other day that he was surprised and thankful that she was still braving it out. Mandy didn’t have the heart to tell him that this was the best she had ever had it in her entire life.

  “Mandy?”

  She glanced up to see that Elliot had ended his call.

  “I am going to need you this morning, so Charles will take over the appointments you
made. Hopefully, if we do return in time, you can meet with him this afternoon as planned. But, if our task takes too long he is prepared to postpone it until the morning.”

  Mandy blinked, “What task are we working on this morning?”

  Elliot smiled, “Finish your breakfast, and we can talk more about it in the car.”

  He handed his own dishes to Mrs. H and then went to his room to finish getting ready. Mandy had almost gotten used to the sight of his tanned, muscular forearms and strong bare feet at breakfast. He usually wore his suit pants, and a crisp shirt with the neck bare and the sleeves rolled up to breakfast.

  Mandy could smell the woodsy scent of his body wash mixed raw male that had her panting and wet before the day even started. She wanted to blame pregnancy for her intense attraction, but sadly she knew it was otherwise.

  Elliot came back out his room ten minutes later with his shoes, tie, cufflinks, and suit jacket on. He always managed to take her breath away.

  “Shall we?” he asked as he grabbed his keys.

  Mandy handed her empty bowl to Mrs. H and grabbed her purse to follow him into the elevator. She secretly loved this part of the day when she could be so close to him. Once he had even asked if she were catching a cold when she had been trying to sniff him. It was beyond humiliating, and she had to fake a cough for the rest of the day.

  They hadn’t gone, but two or three floors when the elevator jerked to a halt and the lights went out.

  Mandy screamed, being deathly afraid of the dark. Her hands struck out wildly to try and find something to hold on to.

  Elliot acted quickly, finding her shaking body and wrapping her in his arms.

  “It is okay,” he crooned against her hair, “You are alright, I am here.”

  Mandy gave a jerky nod, but she continued to hold on to him with a tight grip.

  Another fifteen seconds went by, and Elliot figured that if the elevator were going to restart it would have by now.

  “I am going to let you go for a second to grab my phone,” he said calmly.

  Mandy nodded and allowed his arm to reach into his pocket and retrieve the phone. His call was short, and he spoke rapidly with the person on the other end. If Mandy weren’t already so upset, she might have wondered at his tone. He was clearly unhappy with what he had been told.

  Pocketing the phone once again, he said grimly, “A car ran into a power line, cutting power to the entire block. The police have been notified that we are trapped, but there are pressing concerns with the accident that must be dealt with first.”

  “Were many people injured?” Mandy whispered against his shirt front, and he closed his eyes at the sweetness that emanated from this girl.

  “I am afraid so, there were five cars in the accident. Traffic is backed up in all directions, and they are having trouble getting emergency vehicles on site. We might be here for quite a while.”

  Mandy couldn’t help the shudder that ran through her.

  Elliot tightened his arms, “Do you want to sit down?”

  They sank to the floor and Elliot cradled her in his arms right to his side.

  “Talk to me,” Mandy whispered, “Help me take my mind off of this.”

  “I grew up not too far from here,” he said slowly.

  Mandy hadn’t heard much about his past, “You did?”

  “Yes, my mother worked as a maid at the Regency Hotel and then did billing for a local doctor on her off hours. She also cleaned a few apartments in the building we lived in. I don’t know anyone who worked as hard as she did. Mrs. H was younger then and lived in our building. Mom had me stay with her the nights she worked.”

  “You have known Mrs. H that long?”

  He smiled, but she couldn’t see him in the darkness, “Yes. Nate also lived with his parents on the floor beneath ours. We have been best friends for a long time. I know that he can be a bit much, but the guy has a lot of heart.”

  “Do his parents still live around here?” Mandy asked knowing that his mother had already passed on.

  “No,” Elliot answered, “It is not a pretty story, actually. I was fortunate that my mother was kind. We were poor, and I never knew my father. But my mom always loved me and never hurt me. My only regret is that she worked herself into an early grave trying to provide for me. I found out after she passed that her body was full of cancer, and she had could have been treated, but it would have been costly.”

  Mandy hissed in a breath, “Do you think that she chose not to get treatment?”

  Elliot was quiet for a moment, “A part of me wants to believe that she didn’t know she was sick. But we both knew that she hadn’t felt well for a while.”

  “I am sorry,” Mandy tightened her hand around his.

  Elliot shrugged, “Thank you, it was a long time ago.”

  They were quiet for a moment and then Mandy spoke, “I am ashamed to admit that there were times I wished my parents would disappear.”

  Elliot held her close in the darkness, “Why is that?”

  Mandy spoke as if remembering something from long ago, “They never loved us. Kim was more of a parent than they ever were. I was a mistake, something that they rubbed in my face on a regular basis. I can still remember being four or five and being smacked upside the head for using too much toilet paper. ‘Fucking mistake’ is what my father called me instead of my name. My mother only spoke to me to criticize.”

  Elliot tried hard not to show his anger, “I am sorry that you went through that.”

  Mandy let out a sigh, “A teacher once said to me that how we chose to react to the things that happen to us will shape who we become. Child services removed us a few times from the home when the bruising was too bad, and someone noticed. But we were always returned to them. I remember swearing to Kim that I would never darken their doorway again. But it was a lie when I lost my job when I was first pregnant I had nowhere else to go.”

  His voice felt strangled in his throat, “Did they hit you then?”

  Mandy’s pause was just a moment too long, and he cursed under his breath.

  CHAPTER 14

  Elliot’s voice was raw, “You will never go back to them.”

  Mandy knew he was just being kind. But he was her employer and as much as she wanted to write the fairytale where he swept her off her pregnant feet and carried her away she knew it wasn’t real.

  She pushed back widening her legs to move her ungainly body, but instead of moving she heard a giant ripping noise. This could not be happening. She prayed to whoever would listen to swallow her whole.

  Elliot was immediately on his knees patting her down in the dark.

  “Are you okay? What was that sound?”

  Just as she was about to tell him the horrible truth that she had split her dress when his bare fingers connected with her panties.

  For a moment, he was frozen there. His hand full of her ass and the thin silk that protected her from him.

  He wasn’t sure who groaned, or how he went from a handful to smashing her up against his chest. He felt her belly against his abdomen, and that only spurred him on. His lips crashed down on her face, searching for hers and when he found them, it was like coming home.

  Mandy didn’t have time to go over every reason why this was a horrible idea. She no longer cared that she had split her skirt, nor did she care that they were both kneeling in an elevator. What she did feel was the spiraling heat of his kiss that burned her all the way to her toes.

  This is what it had been like the first night. Drunken kisses and seared their way into her brain, never to be eradicated. He was masterful, swiping his tongue into her heated mouth. She felt ablaze with the passion he radiated.

  His tongue tasted, savored, and devoured her in the same moment. She would have fallen if it weren’t for his arms securing her body. She didn’t want to be a passive bystander. She wanted him to feel every bit as much as she was.

  Elliot knew it was wrong to kiss Mandy. Besides being a human resources nightmare, she was und
er his protection and lived in his home. But kissing her felt like the most extraordinary thing in the world. He couldn’t get enough of her taste, her shy advances, and her scent.

  Fuck, her scent was driving him wild day and night. He held her by the small of her back, but the other hand explored her gorgeous skin. She was smooth and supple. And he couldn’t get enough of her.

  Suddenly she sucked his tongue into her mouth and sucked hard. Elliot felt it all the to his dick. Something was enchanting about her. She was shy and innocent in one moment and a seductress in the next.

  When her hands slid up his shoulders to sink into his dark hair, he felt the kisses slip from passionate to almost desperate. His hand cupped her breast through her clothes, and he wanted more than anything to see her, to taste her, and to take her.

  Elliot’s hand slipped lower to where her skirt was ripped.

  He couldn’t help the words that were escaping his mouth.

  “I want you so fucking bad.”

  Mandy moaned as she felt his fingers trace her mound through her panties. She knew that he wouldn’t do anything that she didn’t want to do, but she wanted him. Mandy had wanted him from the moment he had walked back into her life.

  “Please,” she muttered into their kiss, “Touch me!”

  Elliot growled, and his fingers slipped to the elastic of her panties. He didn’t rush, wanting to remember every moment, terrified that he was dreaming and would wake up before he had her.

  His fingers slipped beneath the elastic, and he glided them across her lower lips.

  “Fuck, fuck, fuck,” It took Mandy a moment to realize that the chant was coming from her.

  “Your pussy is soaked, Sweetheart.”

  Mandy mewled and opened her legs, begging him to touch her, to enter her folds.

  He continued to tease her with open-mouthed kisses on her neck as he glided gently over her pussy. She was dripping with need, and Elliot wanted nothing more than to taste Mandy.