“Think we’re safe?” she asked.
I spun her around, then urged her down with my palm on her upper back. She planted her hands on the raised ledge in the corner of the shower as the water washed the soap from her in glorious, shimmering rivulets of water. I took a moment to enjoy their path across her curves and between her legs.
Then I gripped my cock and guided it to the tight warmth of her entrance.
I’d slept with Nola before, but those times had felt different. They felt like scooping a spoonful of ice cream into my mouth directly from the carton in the light of the fridge at midnight. They felt like little time bombs I was planting beneath the foundations of my life and Ben’s. But this…
I watched my length sink into her and admired the way her waist narrowed to provide the perfect grip for my hands as I pulled her into me. I watched the water splash across her back and run down our bodies. And when she turned her face to look back at me with her lower lip pinned between her teeth, I waited for that same feeling of impending regret to come.
But it didn’t.
All I felt was rightness. Ever since I got Ally pregnant all those years ago, it had felt like my life was a crusade to make things right for Ben. All the money and the success in my career hadn’t felt like it made a dent in that regard. Nothing I’d tried had.
Now I saw what I’d been missing.
Ben needed his dad to be whole. He needed a father who was happy. A father who was able to love.
What we’d both needed was Nola.
44
Epilogue - Nola
Two weeks later
Jack, Ben, Griff, and I were all living out of a tiny motel room for the time being. Jack had offered several times to put us up in a nicer place, but I’d already paid for the motel through the month, and there was something nostalgic about all of us living in the cramped little space. It reminded me of family vacations with my parents when I was a kid, of eating breakfast on a bed that was probably far dirtier than anyone wanted to really know, and the moldy smell of possibility that greeted me every morning.
I don’t think either me or Jack really knew what it would mean to fight for our relationship. All I knew was that I would’ve sacrificed my growing love for trying to run my own restaurant, but he hadn’t made me.
Jack had insisted on making Damon find a way to get him traded to a team in Florida. I was blown away. He was one of the biggest baseball stars in the country and he was leaving his team for me. Of course, I’d tried talking him out of it and saying I’d find a way to make things work, but he wouldn’t hear it.
Jack and Damon hadn’t been sure if it would work at first, but once the teams found out Jack was willing to take a pay cut, they’d jumped at the possibility of landing him in Florida.
It seemed like two weeks ago, all the obstacles in the world were between us. Now, I kept finding myself expecting to run into some new resistance or problem. Instead, the days just kept rolling by and the only minor worry was Ally Callaway and her recently renewed interest in legally pestering Jack with lawyers and threatening emails.
Jack and I were sitting outside the motel on a pleasantly warm day watching Griff prance around and count like a drill sergeant as Ben busted out a set of pushups. Jack had on his athletic gear because he had to head to the team facility in an hour, and I was in my Castillo’s t-shirt and a pair of jeans.
“Oh,” Jack said. “I talked to the legal team last night. They were able to trace back the program on your laptop. It was some sort of remote access thing, they said. But it led them directly to a guy, which led them to a payment from Ally a few days prior. They think it might be enough to get a judge to throw out the whole case.”
“That’s amazing. But what if it’s not?”
He shrugged. “Then we’ll keep fighting it.” Jack’s legal team had been building a case to show that Ally wasn’t trying to win Ben out of motherly love, but out of a jealous, spiteful urge to punish him for being with me. It wasn’t exactly an easy thing to prove, but it turned out she’d told her lawyers to drop the case once news broke that Jack and I appeared to separate. Then she’d hastily called them back when another story announced we were back together. Combined with hiring a hacker to sabotage our relationship, who knew? Maybe it’d be enough to convince a judge she was batshit crazy.
I leaned my head on Jack’s shoulder. “You know,” I said. “When you told me you were going to set me up with some kind of branding whizz two weeks ago, I thought you meant an actual professional.”
Jack chuckled. “You don’t think Chris Rose has the chops to help you?”
I lifted my head, then gave him a dirty look. “Do you?”
“Chris insisted. But if you don’t like the advice he gives, you don’t have to put it into practice. Just hear him out. He was really excited about getting a chance to help the restaurant.”
I nodded. “Okay. But I’m not crossing my fingers.”
Chris walked into the restaurant with a sharp suit and black sunglasses on. His usually wild hair was slicked back in a somewhat neat way, but a few strands had already broken free of his hair product to fall in front of his forehead. He carried a briefcase, which he set down on the table in front of me.
I grinned. “Impressive.”
“Isn’t it?” He asked. He opened the briefcase and pulled out a sandwich, which he took a quick bite of, dusted his hands, and set back inside.
This was going to be interesting.
“Congratulations, by the way.”
Chris smiled wide. “Nobody told me how gross newborns were. But I learned to appreciate the little alien pretty fast.”
I grinned. “Please tell me you didn’t call it an alien in front of Belle.”
“Oh, no. I passed out. When I woke up, they’d cleaned all the blood and goop up. They also put a little hat on her, which really helped.”
Chris cleared his throat, then clapped his hands brisky. “Anyway. Back to business. I’d say we’ve got a branding issue here. A major one.”
“Okay.”
“Castillo’s. The last name thing is… uninspired. Especially when it makes it sound like the place is some run-of-the-mill Italian spot. What you’ve got here is a bakery. You need people driving by to know at a glance what they’re getting into. And, you’re dating a professional athlete. You could make this a bakery slash sports bar.”
I raised a skeptical eyebrow. “Aren’t bakeries usually more of a mom and pop, calm vibe? A sports bar isn’t really what I think of.”
“Exactly. Do you want to be a ‘usually’ kind of place? Or do you want to be something special?”
I had to respect a little bit of the wild energy Chris had. To tell the truth, my parents had been huge sports fans, too, which made the idea probably have more appeal than it should’ve. “Okay. So you’re saying there should be TVs in here and more of a sports theme? What about the name.”
Chris cleared his throat. He opened his briefcase again and pulled out a napkin with two coffee rings stained into it. But there was a crudely drawn image as well below the name “Home Run Buns.”
I lifted my eyes to his, then worked my lips to the side in thought. The picture was what appeared to be two bread loaves shaped like butt-cheeks getting hit by a baseball player with a bat. “Home Run Buns,” I said dryly.
“Home Run Buns,” Chris said with a proud smile.
“I can’t believe I’m actually considering this.”
“I can. It’s brilliant.”
45
Epilogue - Jack
I watched Nola move around the restaurant while it was packed with people. Music was playing, people were laughing, and the TVs were broadcasting several of the afternoon’s college football games.
She stopped to talk to a pair of women and had them all smiling wide and laughing within seconds. Then I saw her go to one of the servers who looked frazzled as she pointed to something on the computer where they put in the orders and tried to explain it to her. Nola put a ha
nd on the girl’s arm and talked calmly for just a few moments before the girl visibly relaxed.
This was her element. It was her pitching mound. Her stage.
I’d put up with Damon and my former teammates calling me fucking insane for risking my career for “some woman I barely know and her failing restaurant.” I’d already known the Nola half of the equation was worth it. But it felt good to see that she was blossoming here.
Maybe she’d convinced herself it was okay to give up on her parents’ dream, but I knew I’d done the right thing by making sure she got to stay here and pursue this. Her life had been on hold to take care of everyone else first, and now she finally had something that was hers. Something she could pour her talent and energy into.
I was sitting with Chelsea, Belle, Damon, and Chris at one of the corner booths. Ben and Griff were currently doing something to the salt and pepper shakers that had Griff highly amused and Ben looking deeply curious. Luna was also following the boys along and appeared to be both taking notes and criticizing their technique at the same time.
Chris blew on his fingernails and then brushed them off on his shoulder smugly.
“Proud of yourself?” I asked.
“Please don’t even ask him,” Belle said. “He’s been insufferable. He thinks he’s going to have some post-football career as a brand consultant now. Our fridge is covered in expo marker pictures of ridiculous name after ridiculous name and all kinds of logos. It’s out of control.”
“Out of Control Branding…” Chris spread his fingers out as if he was imagining some giant flash-bulb lit sign. “That could work.”
Belle rolled her eyes, then gave her attention back to the too-small-to-be-real bundle of humanity in her arms.
It had been a long ass time since Ben had been so small, but seeing the baby was igniting a sort of biological man-clock inside me. Nola would look good with a swollen belly. With my baby inside her.
She caught me watching her from the bar and twinkled her fingers at me, wiggling her eyebrows suggestively.
I’d been waiting for the right time and the right way to pop the question, but now I was starting to wonder if I could wait any longer. I wanted to have a baby with her, and if I needed to propose first, then I had a feeling the proposal might come sooner rather than later.
“Somehow,” Damon said, setting his phone down after he’d spent a few minutes reading something. “Your move to Florida has been good for us. There’s a whole swathe of sponsors who had their eye on the Southeastern markets. Your existing sponsors aren’t wanting to give you up, and now we’re getting offers left and right from new ones.”
“That’s great,” I said, completely distracted and barely hearing him. Nola was reaching for something on the other side of the bar, which meant her perfectly shaped ass was pointed in my direction.
Chelsea followed my eyes, then scoffed. “I swear. Men and asses. Like, what is so mystical about two hemispheres of fat sandwiched together?”
“Stop,” Chris said. “You’re making me think about sandwiches. And my stomach is already growling. Shouldn’t we get our orders faster because we know the owner, anyway?”
Chelsea jumped a little and her eyes went wide. I saw Damon discreetly taking a handful of her ass for himself. She was barely concealing a smile now.
“It’s easy,” Belle said. “Men are like big, hormone-filled arrows looking for a place to penetrate. A woman’s ass is the easiest target.”
“Has it been six weeks yet?” Chris asked, giving Belle a longing, lustful look.
“Almost,” Belle said. “But if you try to bring that thing anywhere near me before I’m fully healed, I swear I will kick it right off.”
Chris looked sadly at the table but didn’t argue.
“Just a minute,” I said, getting up abruptly.
“Thank God. Someone is going to ask where the hell our food is,” Chris said.
I pulled Nola aside toward the little hallway toward the bathrooms, then dug in my pocket.
She was watching me with a curious expression. She had her hair braided the way I liked, and she smelled like flowers with a hint of fresh bread. “You’ve got a funny look on your face. Is everything okay?”
“Listen,” I said, heart pounding. “I still want to do this the right way. Later. But I fucking love you. Okay?”
“I fucking love you too,” she said with a sideways grin.
“And I know we’re supposed to act like we aren’t sure this is forever. But I’m tired of pretending I don’t already know. There’s not going to be anyone else. There never will be. It’s just you. And I want to put a baby in you.”
Nola looked up, silently counting on her fingers. “Did you just sort of propose and tell me you want to get me pregnant at the same time?”
“Possibly.”
She smiled wide, then let out an adorable little squee of happiness. “Yes. To the first one. And to the second one.” She lowered her eyebrows, giving me an awkward, sexy smolder of her eyes. “Can you meet me in the walk-in freezer, like… two minutes from now?”
-The End
My (Mostly) Secret Baby: My Mostly Funny Romantic Series, Book 1
You know that instinct to run when something bad is coming?
Yeah. I apparently missed out on that one.
Because Damon Rose came, and instead of running, I got pregnant.
Read the story that started it all with My (Mostly) Secret Baby: A Grumpy Boss Romantic Comedy. Tap Here>>
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My (Mostly) Temporary Nanny: A Grumpy Boss Romantic Comedy Page 17