Most Eligible Single Dad - A Billionaire's Secret Baby Romance (Love Is Priceless Book 2)

by Holly Rayner

  “I’m sure Tanya doesn’t want to have dinner with us, sweetheart. She was just being polite if she said otherwise.”

  “She wasn’t just being polite, papi. She’s down in the garage right now. I just have to call Marco to have her join us. Is it all right?”

  I almost said yes, but then I remembered how close I had come to forgiving Tanya last night. I wasn’t ready to be completely forgiving. I was still wary of her motives, though that was fading. It was hard to dispute her earnest desire for forgiveness when she behaved as she had since her arrival.

  “Not tonight, honey. You have homework and so do I. You can come have lunch with us tomorrow. We’ll pick you up from school early. How about that?”

  Rey’s face fell, and a fist tightened around my heart. I hated to see that look on my daughter’s face, but I had to be sure to keep my distance. There was still too much undone between Tanya and me for her to spend casual time with us like dinner on a weeknight.

  “Why can’t you just forgive her, papi? Wouldn’t that be better than being sad all the time?”

  “Who says I’m sad all the time?”

  “I see you. I see you hiding tears from me. I know you’ve been sad since she left. Tanya says she’s sorry for leaving without saying goodbye. That she wants your forgiveness. I believe her. Why can’t you?”

  “It’s more complicated than that, Rey. We’ve talked about this before. How adult relationships are different from the relationships adults have with children.”

  “But papi, forgiveness is forgiveness. It doesn’t matter how old you are.”

  I stared at my daughter for a moment. She was right, of course, but I didn’t want to have the talk Tanya and I needed to have while Rey was with us. She didn’t need to know what Tanya had done, especially if Tanya was going to be a part of our lives.

  “How did you get to be so smart?”

  “Mamá told me that once, a long time ago.”

  “She did?”

  “Yes. She also told me that sometimes you needed someone to tell you what was right and wrong so you could accept what you already knew to be the truth.”

  “Your mother was a smart woman, and so are you.”

  “I know. Now will you reconsider?”

  I sighed and shook my head.

  “I wish I could, but now is not the time for Tanya and me to talk about these things. We need a little more time.”

  “Okay, I guess.”

  I hugged Rey.

  “I’m sorry, sweetheart. I’m not punishing you. I just need a little more time and space to make things right.”

  “I need to let her know Marco can take her back to her hotel.”

  Rey lifted her phone and waggled it at me. I nodded and let her step away from me to get a little privacy. She dialed the phone and then spoke softly to Marco or Tanya for a few moments.

  I heard her say, “lunch tomorrow,” so I assumed she was on the line with Tanya. I held out my hand for her phone and Rey shook her head at first. I made a more imperative movement, and she sighed.

  “Papi wants to speak to you,” she said and then handed me the phone. “Be nice, papi.”

  I took the phone and held it to my ear.

  “You’ve got quite the defender in my daughter, Tanya.”

  “I didn’t recruit her, you know, or ask to have dinner. That was all her choice.”

  “I know. She’s a stubborn little bug when she wants to be.”

  “Papi! I am not a bug.”

  “I know, honey, I know.”

  “Don’t blame her, okay. You said I could see her, so I asked Marco to take me to see her. He brought me along when he went to pick her up. I didn’t think you’d mind.”

  “I don’t mind, actually. I wanted you to know that not having you join us for dinner isn’t a punishment. I just don’t want to have the discussion we need to have while Rey is here.”

  “I never thought it was a punishment, and I absolutely understand. I’ll go back to my hotel and have dinner there.”

  “Goodnight, Tanya.”

  “Goodnight, Raul.”

  I hung up the call, wondering how we were possibly going to get through tomorrow’s events.

  Chapter 41

  Tanya

  “The results of the DNA paternity test are that you are most certainly the father, señor Jimenez,” the doctor said when we sat in front of him the next morning.

  I felt the tension in the room slip away as realization settled in. I hadn’t lied about the baby, so I hadn’t been concerned with the results, but obviously Raul had harbored lingering doubts that he was the father.

  “I’ll give the two of you a few minutes in private.”

  The doctor left the room at darn near a run, and I honestly couldn’t blame him. I wasn’t sure I wanted to be in this room with Raul now.

  “I’m happy to be the father of the child,” he started, his tone cautious. “I’ll see to it that you are both well cared for, for the rest of your lives. You won’t want for anything.”

  Raul looked at me. I could see he was searching for something in my eyes, but I had no idea what it was. He took my hand and held it firmly to his chest.

  “I won’t try to take the child from you, but I will want visitation, especially as he or she gets older.”

  He released my hand and got up abruptly.

  “I must thank the doctor for accommodating us. Will you meet me in the car? If we’re going to pick up Rey, we should go.”

  I got up and walked behind Raul down the hall to the waiting room. Marco stood as soon as he saw us.

  “Please take señorita Owens down to the car. I’ll be down in a few minutes.”

  “Sí, señor.”

  Marco held out his arm for me, and I took it. I went with him to the car and waited for Raul in the back seat.

  “Would you like something to drink, señorita?”

  “That would be wonderful, Marco. Do you have any lemon soda?”

  “I have some in the trunk, just for you.”

  “You’re a saint. Thank you.”

  I sipped the soda Marco handed me with gratitude. My stomach had picked back up on its campaign to make sure I didn’t gain weight with my pregnancy, so I’d been unable to keep much down except this soda, and I was so thirsty.

  Raul pulled the door open, scaring the heck out of me, and slid into the back seat.

  “Marco, please take us to the hotel.”

  That wasn’t the plan—

  “But I thought—”

  Raul held up his hand to silence me, and I was so shocked by his action that it worked.

  “Rey needs school more than lunch with you. I know you’re not feeling well and you have an early morning flight. You should go back to the hotel to rest.”

  I didn’t know what to say or how to react, so Raul took my silence as an invitation to continue digging his hole.

  “In the future, any communication between us will take place via my attorney. I think that’s the best way to keep our distance and ensure we don’t end up resenting one another. I’ll leave his card with you before you leave.

  “As for how we’ll handle visitation, I thought it would be within the realm of reasonable for me to have the child for the summer months so I’m not interrupting his or her schooling.”

  “Wait, you only want to see your child two months out of the year? Raul, you could have so much more that that…”

  Raul turned stunned eyes to me.

  “What are you offering me, Tanya? I need you to be specific.”

  “You know exactly what I’m offering. I would be an amazing mother to your little girl. I already love her, and she’ll love her little brother or sister. I love you, you crazy, stubborn, man. Doesn’t that count for anything?”

  He sat back as though I’d struck him. He was silent for several blocks as Marco drove us toward my hotel.

  “I… Tanya, you have to understand… I really just—”

  “Will you please stop censoring yo
urself and tell me what’s on your mind. That would be so much easier, wouldn’t it?”

  “Yes, it would. You’re right, of course.”

  He shot his cuffs and tightened his tie, gestures I recognized as power moves he likely used on his business rivals. They didn’t faze me because I knew he had all the power here. I’d done what I could to convince him I was worth forgiveness. All I could do now was accept his decision.

  “I believe you did what you did for reasons you believed were right. I don’t think you set out to purposely hurt my daughter or me.”

  My chest started to loosen, but somehow, I knew this was going to be followed by a very large “but.”

  “But…”

  He turned those green eyes on me and my insides melted. This was the father of my child. I wanted him with me when I went to the doctor, when I gave birth, and when the baby spoke his or her first words. I wanted him in my life for more than a few weeks in the summer each year.

  “But I cannot spend my life with a woman I do not trust. I’m sorry, Tanya. I have to protect my heart.”

  My mouth moved, but sound refused to come out. I wanted to say all the things I’d just been thinking about—wanting Raul to share in the pregnancy and the birth and our child’s life—but I couldn’t get the words from my brain to my mouth.

  Raul stared at me while I struggled to get my brain and my mouth to speak to each other. Marco pulled into the hotel driveway and stopped the car, and Raul got out and held out his hand for me. I took it out of reflex and was standing beside the car before I realized what he’d done.

  “For what it’s worth, I’m sorry, Tanya.”

  And then he got back into the car and closed the door. I could see him watching me from the seat as Marco pulled the car away from the curb.

  Chapter 42

  Raul

  “Are you certain, señor?”

  “Damn it, man, are you going to start questioning every order I give you?”

  “No, señor, of course not.”

  “Then put the car in gear and get me out of here.”

  “Sí, señor.”

  I watched Tanya’s face crumble as the car pulled away from the curb. I nearly had Marco stop and turn back. The raw pain on her face and in her eyes clawed at my heart. No matter what she’d done, she didn’t deserve that kind of pain. I’d brought her here, treated her as though she were the worst betrayer who’d ever lived, and refused to truly listen to her.

  She’d been right when she’d pointed out that what she’d done, while underhanded, hadn’t really harmed my family or me in any way. In a way, she’d actually done a good thing. If I’d gotten the contract for the Angel Tower, I’d have had to spend months in New York and unless I’d been willing to take Rey out of school here and enroll her in a New York school, I’d have had to be away from my daughter for that entire time. Without the contract, I was staying in Madrid to work on local projects. I was staying with Rey.

  And she’d truly had a good reason for taking the job. I couldn’t fault Tanya for wanting to care for her mother. I would have done all she had and more to ensure Rey’s future. How could I fault Tanya for what she was willing to do for her mother?

  We pulled up in front of Rey’s school, and I shot Marco a look.

  “What are we doing here?”

  “We were to pick señorita Rey up from school early today.”

  “That was when we were going to go to lunch with Tanya. Take me to my office, please.”

  But as I looked out the window, I saw Rey dashing across the lawn to the car.

  “Damn it. You old meddler, stay out of my personal life.”

  “I will when you start thinking with your heart and not overanalyzing everything. That woman loves you. She’s carrying your child. She loves the daughter you already have like she was her own. What more do you need?”

  “I need employees who know their place. Now shush and keep the baby talk to yourself or you’ll be looking for a new job in the morning.”

  “You won’t fire me. Who else would put up with you?”

  “We’re about to find out, aren’t we?”

  Marco chuckled at his own joke and I scowled at him good-naturedly in the rearview mirror.

  Rey reached the car and pulled the door open, popping her head inside and scanning the car for Tanya. When she didn’t see her friend, my daughter’s face fell.

  “What did you do, papi?” she asked as she climbed into the car. “Tanya was going to have lunch with us, remember? You promised.”

  “Tanya wasn’t feeling well and had to cancel,” I said. I frowned at Marco when I heard his disbelieving snort.

  Rey looked at Marco and back at me. She shook her head.

  “Nope, I don’t believe you.”

  “What?”

  “I don’t believe you. You have that look on your face you get when you’re trying to keep something from me.”

  “I don’t have a look.”

  “Yes, you do. Remember when you planned that party for me for my birthday last year and tried to surprise me? You had that look on your face all the time while you were keeping the secret. It disappeared as soon as you gave in and told me what you were doing. You have that look right now.”

  I sighed wearily.

  “When did you grow up so much?”

  “You’re avoiding the question, papi. Where’s Tanya and why isn’t she here? She wouldn’t leave me without saying goodbye, not after the talk we had yesterday.”

  I had no idea what to say to my daughter. How could I explain that I’d just left the mother of my second child crying in front of a hotel—because I was afraid to love her or trust her in case she might betray me a second time?

  Just thinking these thoughts made guilt swirl uncomfortably in my gut. Was I doing the right thing? Should I turn back and get her? Would she forgive me if I did?

  Funny I was now thinking in terms of Tanya forgiving me, not the other way around. Was that the answer right there? That I had already forgiven her, but now feared her rejection of me?

  Chapter 43

  Tanya

  I watched the limo until I couldn’t see it anymore and then turned and went into the hotel. I passed the reception desk without making eye contact with anyone and slapped the close-door button on the elevator until the doors slid shut, blocking out the sounds of humanity in the lobby.

  I wiped at the tears spilling down my cheeks, screwing myself up to be finished with my tears for Raul. He’d made his choice clear. He wasn’t going to forgive me, and I needed to come to terms with that. I was going to raise this child with only minimal connection to his or her father. I would do it because I had to. This baby would never doubt it was loved.

  The elevator reached my floor and I stepped off. I made my way to my room, where I immediately started packing. My flight was scheduled to leave in the morning, and I wanted to be ready to leave as soon as possible. Being here in Madrid brought back memories that kept the tears flowing. I had happy, untainted memories in New York. I’d go back to them.

  I picked up the hotel phone and dialed the front desk. An overly cheerful man answered.

  “Hola, how may I help you today?”

  “Hola, this is Tanya Owens. I need a wake-up call for five a.m., and a car ready to take me to the airport in the morning. Can you please arrange those for me?”

  “Of course, señorita. Can I offer you further assistance?”

  “No, gracias. That’s all I need right now.”

  “Buenas noches, señorita.”

  “Buenas noches.”

  All I needed right now was a man willing to forgive and forget for the sake of his second child, rather than one willing to hold a grudge for no reason other than his stubborn pride.

  I zipped up my suitcase and then slumped onto the edge of the bed to assess my options. I could leave in the morning, deserting Rey yet again by leaving without saying goodbye. That would mean turning my back on everything I had once toyed with having in my life. A
man who loved me and a daughter who already shared many of my interests.

  Or, I could stay and fight for what I wanted for myself and my child. I could try to force Raul’s hand, but what kind of future would that set up for us? He would always feel trapped by the child and me and would come to resent us. I sure didn’t want to condemn my child to that simply because I forced Raul to accept us when he wasn’t ready.

  I flopped back on the bed and stared at the ceiling. How did I get myself into this mess? Money was the answer, but it had to be deeper than that. I wasn’t greedy by nature, but when money is the only thing standing between me and making my mother’s life safer and happier, what choice was I supposed to make?

  “Damn it all to hell,” I said and sat up. I decided to take a shower now, so I wouldn’t have to deal with it in the morning.

  I stepped into the bathroom and turned on the hot water. I loved hotel showers. It was rare for me to get a shower as long as I wanted in my New York apartment because of the minuscule water heater, but in a hotel I could stand under the hot water for hours if I wanted to. Right now, I wanted to. I wanted to lose myself in the sensation and sound, block out the world until I was forced to deal with it again.

  Chapter 44

  Tanya

  “This is your five a.m. wake-up call, Miss Owens. Can I send up some breakfast for you?”

  “Just some lemon soda, please.”

  “Of course. We’ll send that right up.”

  “Gracias.”

  I hung up the phone and rolled over, burying my head under the covers. My sleep had been spotty at best, the short stretches of solid sleep plagued with nightmares where I chased Rey and Raul, but they ignored my screams and then disappeared whenever I came close to them.

  When the bellman knocked on the door, I groaned and swung my legs out of the bed. I pulled on the hotel robe and accepted the sodas from the man in the hallway.