Summer of Love: The Billionaire's Baby (BWWM Pregnancy and Marriage Multicultural Love Story)

by Imani King

  I desperately hoped she was right as we walked out of the airport with her arm wrapped protectively around my shoulder. We were just approaching the huge glass doors that led out to the parking lot when a bright light temporarily blinded me.

  "Natasha! Natasha Ray! Where's Blake? How long have you been fucking him?"

  There were three men with expensive cameras, all focused on me, all snapping off shot after shot and screaming at me.

  "Everyone thinks you're a slut! What do you think of that? Are you a homewrecker? Is it true his wife had a miscarriage because of you?"

  It was the first time in my life I've felt the way a deer must feel as it's surrounded by wolves. My breath was fast and shallow and I could feel my heartbeat pounding in my chest. I remember wanting to scream for Blake as Rosa did her best to shield me, putting her body between me and the paparazzi and holding her bag up in front of my face so they wouldn't get a shot of me sobbing.

  "Don't say anything, Nat. Don't say anything. We're almost there." She urged me on as we made our way through the sea of parked cars to ours and she hustled me into the passenger seat, yanking a blanket off the back seat and handing it to me to cover myself with.

  I'm not sure anything before that day had ever felt worse than that - cowering in the front seat, blanket and hands over my head as the paparazzi continued to shout terrible, crude accusations at me. It took every ounce of strength to hold it together until Rosa drove us far enough away that I could safely remove the blanket and just start bawling openly. When I turned to look at her she was crying, too, her hands tightly gripping the steering wheel as she took deep breaths to try and calm down. Eventually we felt safe enough to pull over. Rosa unbuckled her seatbelt and leaned over to hug me and I could feel we were both shaking.

  "Oh my God, Nat. Oh my God."

  We sat there in the car for half an hour, catching our breath and trying to calm down, before Rosa felt up to driving again and we followed Blake's directions to his house. When we arrived, she waved me away when I tried to take some of my bags.

  "Just go inside, Nat. Here's the key - some woman dropped it off yesterday - oh and there's a phone for you, too. I'll get your things, just go inside and sit down."

  I did as Rosa instructed, robotically unlocking the front door and sinking down into the first chair I saw, completely exhausted both physically and mentally. When she had everything moved inside she came and sat down beside me, placing a brand new iPhone down on the table in front of us:

  "Here. The woman from yesterday - Lisa - she said you're only supposed to use this phone now. She also said she was picking up groceries so why don't you go and have a shower, put on some fresh clothes, and I'll make us something to eat?"

  Rosa's kindness brought fresh tears to my eyes.

  "Hey," she soothed, rubbing my shoulder, "Nat, we're going to deal with, OK? You know this doesn't have anything to do with you, don't you? This is about Vanessa Charlton's need for revenge - you're just caught in the crossfire. I'm here for you and you're going to get through it. In a few weeks you'll be back to normal and the media is going to forget all about you."

  I wiped tears off my face with the back of my wrist.

  "Rosa, I can't thank you enough for this. I just - I can't. I feel so out of my depth right now, it's almost like I'm losing my mind. Thank you for picking me up. Thank you for being my friend."

  She gave me another hug and shooed me off to find the shower, which happened to be upstairs, enclosed in glass on two sides and facing out towards the ocean. I stood under the hot water with my face angled upwards, letting it stream down over my body until the realization that I was at least temporarily safe sank in and I began to feel just slightly better. Something Blake had said to me came back, as well - his comment about money not buying happiness. Now, I've never really thought money could literally transform a sad person into a happy one but the ever-unreachable prospect of being able to pay rent and bills and other expenses every month always seemed like it would lessen the stress in my life. I hadn't changed my mind about that, either, but I definitely noticed the fact that the luxurious surroundings of Blake's beach house, straight out of the lifestyle pages of a magazine, didn't change a single thing about the reality of the situation I was in.

  When I went back downstairs, wrapped in a fluffy, brand new robe that I found in a linen closet filled with other, identical robes, Rosa looked up and chuckled:

  "Ha! You look like a munchkin in that thing!"

  It was such a relief just to laugh over something as stupid as a too-large robe.

  "Sit down - there's a balcony out through the living room, I thought we could sit out there and eat."

  Once again I followed Rosa's advice, walking through the elegant living room with high, vaulted ceilings and out onto a stone terrace that overlooked the ocean. It was beautiful - as beautiful as everything - materially speaking, anyways - seemed to be in Blake's life. I sank down into a sleek deckchair with a sheepskin thrown over it and looked out at the blue-gray sea, only stirring when Rosa joined me, putting two bowls of bright orange mac and cheese - one childhood comfort food I've never been able to give up - and two forks on the table in front of us.

  "I always wanted to eat mac and cheese in a waterfront mansion," she said, smiling at me and handing me one of the forks.

  We ate and made small talk for a while but I knew a more serious discussion was coming - one I knew needed to be had.

  "So," Rosa started, a little tentatively, "What are you going to do?"

  I turned to her, eyebrows raised and shaking my head: "You know what? I have absolutely no idea what I'm going to do! Hide here? Forever? Maybe I will - if you stay with me."

  Rosa laughed. "Yeah, sounds good, I'm up for that."

  "Seriously, though, Rosa. I really don't know what I'm going to do. Blake said he's talking to Lisa about everything, but I don't even know what that means - I don't know anything about any of this. I'm completely lost."

  "Are you in love with him?"

  I met Rosa's gaze and sat back in my chair, unable to answer at first. Did I love him? Truthfully, yes, I think I did - in fact I may have already been in love with him for a good while at that point - but could I admit it to myself, let alone Rosa? No. So I tried to play it off, looking back out at the sea and replying.

  "Uh, no. I don't even know him very well, Rosa! How could I be in love with him?"

  Rosa knew exactly how to handle me - with compassion, but without letting excuses or bullshit slide.

  "I don't know, Nat - stranger things have happened than a young woman falling in love with a sexy, charismatic older man, you know. You do seem different with him - different than you've seemed with any other guys."

  "Do I?" I asked.

  "Yeah, Nat. I've already had to talk you out of this guy once before - do you need me to do it again? Because to be honest, this time it kind of seems even more necessary."

  "What do you mean?"

  I didn't really want an answer to that question. I didn't want to hear any of Rosa's well thought out reasons why being with Blake Charlton might not be the best idea in the world, because I was starting to come up with some of them myself and it was scaring me.

  Rosa looked at me with disapproval on her face - mild, affectionate disapproval but still disapproval.

  "Nat - do you even need me to answer that? Look around you, look where we are. I mean, this is a beautiful house and everything but you know we're hiding here. When I picked you up earlier - honestly, I've never seen you looking so damn bad. You just looked broken. You still do. Look what happened at the airport. Do you want my blessing for a relationship that makes you feel this way? Because I'm not sure if I can give it."

  "But it isn't the relationship that makes me feel this way! Blake didn't do this - his ex did," I started, aware that my voice was rising defensively but unable to stop it.

  "Oh I know, Nat. I know he didn't call the paparazzi this time but I'm just thinking about the bigger picture h
ere - about what you're signing up for if you decide to stay with him."

  "What am I signing up for?"

  "I mean, Natasha, come on! Do you think this would end if his ex called the gossip rags tomorrow and said she was sorry and that it was all lies? It wouldn't - that's my point. If you're with Blake Charlton, it won't ever end. You're going to have paparazzi stalking you all the time, people calling college friends for dirt, people going through your garbage - they did that, you know, a couple of men came and went through our garbage looking for anything they could frame as scandalous."

  I pinched the bridge of my nose between my fingers and sighed.

  "They went through our garbage?"

  "Yes. And Nat, don't get angry OK? But Blake had to have known the kind of attention this would bring. He's been living this live since he was a teenager. How could he have put you in a position for those photos on the beach to be taken - I mean-"

  I couldn't stop myself from jumping in at that point.

  "Rosa, Vanessa paid someone to follow us. She paid someone to take those photos. He didn't know that they-"

  "But that's exactly my point! How couldn't he have known? He marries this crazy famewhore out of nowhere and he doesn't have any idea who she is or what she's capable of? And who paid for that? You. I'm just asking you to think about this, Nat, even though I can see the look in your eyes when you talk about him and I'm ninety-nine percent sure I'm wasting my time."

  I rubbed my forehead with my fingertips and grimaced at Rosa's words.

  "Rosa, you're not wasting your time. Please don't ever think that. I'm so thankful you're my friend, I mean that. But you - you haven't seen the way he is with me. He's not an arrogant jerk at all, he's not spoiled or entitled or any of those things I thought he would be. And he's - he's excellent in bed."

  Rosa looked up at me quickly, grinning.

  "Is he?"

  I giggled - half with the subject matter and half with relief at the momentary break from the heavy nature of the conversation:

  "Yeah, he is. And he's really...big."

  "Nat, shut up! You know I'm in the middle of a dry spell, dammit!"

  We stayed out on the balcony until the sun went down, drinking white wine and talking, although I was aware that Rosa was holding back on a number of other things she wanted to say, reluctant as she was to make me feel worse than I already did. When I finally went to bed there was a message from Blake on the new phone.

  "I miss you so much, Natasha. Hope we can see each other soon. - Blake"

  I sent one back, telling him I missed him too and then waited ten minutes to see if he would call or reply but he didn't. I lay awake in bed for a long time before falling asleep, thinking about everything. What Rosa had said, Blake, the situation with the media attention on our relationship, the horrible paparazzi at the airport earlier that day. Was Rosa right? If I stayed with Blake, would the horror of the last few days just become my new normal? And if I didn't stay with him, how could I go on knowing I was never going to feel his blue eyes on me or see the way his eyelashes flutter slightly just before he comes again?

  Chapter 14: Blake

  The first thing I intended to do when I got back to L.A. was see Barrington. The gloves were well and truly off with Vanessa but I didn't want Barrington bullying her or trying to force anything that was just going to antagonize her further. Don't get me wrong, I longed to punish my soon-to-be ex-wife for what she'd unleashed on the entirely blameless Natasha. I also knew that doing so while we were still technically married was just going to give her more incentive to keep going - as well as providing the gossip industry with more page views.

  The truth was that Vanessa was going to need to be pandered to, on some level anyway. Punishing her was just going to make her hungrier for revenge and that revenge was going to involve Nat, which I couldn't have. If it meant paying Vanessa off, so be it - it would be a small price to pay. If it meant that retaliation was off the table, that was also fine. As long as Natasha was left alone.

  As I was jogging out to the driveway, though, I found Lisa there, on her way to my front door.

  "Blake. We need to talk. Now."

  "Can't, Lisa - besides, don't we have a meeting this afternoon? I've got to go meet with Barrington right now, I'll see you in a few hours."

  Lisa blocked the way to my car with her body, as stubborn as ever, and got right in my face.

  "Blake, no. We need to talk now. Your first priority right now is your image, not your divorce or your girlfriend."

  Something about her tone when she said 'girlfriend' pissed me off and she saw the look on my face and immediately launched into an apology.

  "Alright, I'm sorry - I'm not sure what's going on there but if it's something you take seriously then we can talk about it."

  "Yes, Lisa, it is something I take seriously," I said coldly.

  "Well then we should talk now, because it's not just you in the firing line here, Blake. The press is having a goddamned field day with this, in case you haven't noticed, and it needs to be dealt with."

  "Fine."

  I gave in and turned back to the house with Lisa. There was no point in resisting her when she was in one of her steamroller moods - and she was also probably right about Natasha still being in the firing line. When we got settled in my office I held my hand up just as she was about to start talking.

  "Lisa, before you start, I just want to say something."

  "Alright..." she replied, sitting back and waiting for me to speak.

  "I know your priority is my career. I get that. I appreciate that that's your main job. But right now, the only thing I'm concerned about is getting these stories about Natasha off those shitty websites and out of the tabloids. I want her to be left alone - that's actually one of the reasons I need to see Barrington. So just tell me you understand what the priority is here."

  Lisa made a face and crossed her legs. It looked like she was thinking about how to handle me. I know Lisa. She doesn't actually know how well I know her because I've always been content to have her think of me as the pampered superstar who needs to be talked through the more complicated aspects of his career and his public relations strategy. But I know when I'm being 'handled.' I knew Lisa was one of the best people-handlers I've ever met in my life.

  "Hmm. OK, Blake. I understand. I'm not sure what's behind this sudden outburst of chivalry - nor am I sure it's going to end up benefiting you or that poor girl, but OK, let's talk about that. You realize you need to dump her, right?"

  I rolled my eyes and ran a hand through my hair.

  "No, Lisa. No one is getting dumped. That's what I need you to understand."

  "Oh, really?" She feigned innocent surprise and kept going: "Because you know you're just going to end up destroying her life and your own, don't you? Come on Blake, I know you haven't exactly grown up in the real world but let's be honest here."

  "Goddammit, Lisa! You are my publicist, not my mother! Let me repeat myself. No one is getting dumped. Now let's talk strategy if that's what you want to do."

  I'm not a person who tends to get angry easily and Lisa had known me long enough to know that. When I shouted at her that day in my office I could see, for a split second before she replaced it with a blank smile, the consternation on her face.

  "OK, Blake. That's fine, I understand. What I need to get through to you, though, is that this is a major scandal. Do you get that? The internet is going crazy. You say you want to help protect Natasha from the press intrusion, but in order to help you do that I need to know you're on board. Are you?"

  "Yes," I sighed, frustrated. Hadn't I just told her that Natasha was the main priority?

  "Right, good, OK then, we've got that settled. You can't divorce Vanessa, not right now."

  I took a very deep breath, willing myself not to order my boundary-stomping PR lady out of my house and to keep my voice calm:

  "Why?"

  "Because it will ruin your career, that's why. It will also ruin that Nata
sha girl's life. You don't need me to tell you this, Blake, you know very well how this works. They have a narrative and it's selling magazines - whether or not it's true doesn't matter at all."

  "Then let's change the narrative. That's why I employ you, isn't it?"

  Lisa gave me a small, patient smile and shook her head.

  "Nope, can't do it. Too late. If you leave your wife for this girl your career is over and she goes down in history as the girl who broke up Hollywood's golden couple and caused Vanessa Charlton to miscarry the crown prince. Or princess."

  "Lisa - Vanessa was never pregnant. I told you this. She wasn't pregnant when I married her and she wasn't pregnant at any point after that - the whole reason I met Natasha is because Vanessa refused to 'ruin her body' with a pregnancy!"

  I was getting heated again and I could sense Lisa's cool disapproval.

  "I know that, Blake. Do I need to repeat myself? It doesn't matter what the truth is. Why is this concept suddenly so alien to you? If you fight it, Vanessa is going to go straight to the press with the gory details of her abandonment for a younger woman at your hands - and subsequent miscarriage - and they're going to eat Natasha alive."

  "Natasha is older than Vanessa!" I yelled, jumping to my feet and finally losing my cool in one of the most unproductive ways possible.

  "Is she? Oh." Lisa seemed shocked by that revelation. She sank back into the leather sofa she was perched on, giving me the time to compose myself before we continued.

  Why did I let her convince me? Is it because I was as naive as she thought I was? A spoiled rich kid all grown-up with no idea how things really were outside my bubble of my own privilege? Maybe. It was at least partially that I trusted Lisa, too. Not on a personal level but on a professional one. The trust wasn't even misplaced - in fact if anything I underestimated just how dedicated she was to my career - and to her own continued fat paychecks, of course.

  I was going to have to move back into Three Palms with Vanessa. Not as a husband but as part of a public relations push that Lisa was organizing on a scale not seen since World War II. The paparazzi and the media weren't going to back off - on that point Lisa and I were in complete agreement. The plan was to get Vanessa on my side.