What am I going to do?
Still no fucking idea as she stood in the small spare bedroom, mentally redecorating it. Can’t put a crib too close to the window. It’s drafty in the winter. Have to tell the builder to install double-pane windows. Dresser near the window. Crib on the opposite side of the room. Maybe the crib should go in my bedroom, at least for the first few months.
“Stop!” She marched out of the room, slamming the door behind her.
Saturday, she spent crying in bed. She couldn’t do it. She couldn’t bring a child into the world when she hadn’t a clue what to do and no one to help her. Yes, Laverne would be there, but she didn’t want to burden her cousin with another person to take care of. And that’s precisely what she would be, a burden. Yeah, Julius said he wanted the baby, but he hadn’t even called her in days. On and on it went until she threw up. Surprise, surprise. Hours later, after forcing herself to calm down, she found herself switching between apps for brainless online shopping. At some point she stumbled onto Overstock browsing through their shoe section, and somehow ended up in maternity ware.
Sunday, she dragged her tired self out of bed late into the morning. She dressed, had some dry toast and water because that’s all her stomach wanted, and headed to the nursing home. She found her mother on the day room terrace, in a wheelchair, by herself. Her heart broke a bit, yet her mother seemed content sitting at the railing, watching the birds do their thing.
Contentment was a blank stare off into space. Eyes tracking nothing. Body registering nothing. “Hey, Mom.” No registering the presence of her only child. Calista sat in the chair opposite her mother, a lunch tray with a covered dish between them. Her mother’s lunch waited. Calista had called ahead and asked them to hold it. She wanted to feed her mother.
There wasn’t much to talk about as she spooned lukewarm mashed potatoes into her mother’s mouth and cut up congealed chicken into bite-sized bits. The weather was always a good topic. She skipped over Harvey even though there was little chance her mother would understand.
“I’m not a bodyguard anymore.” No response. “Yeah, I’ve moved on.”
Voices echoed from the lounge. A family approached. Grandma in a wheelchair pushed by a teenage boy. Beside him was a fortyish woman holding the hand of a preschool-aged little girl. “It’s a beautiful day, Mom,” said a man bringing up the rear. In his arms was a toddler dressed in a pink tutu with tiny heart-shaped bows all over the front.
The parents nodded respectfully at Calista and her mother, then took seats in the middle of the terrace. The grandmother waved and Calista watched to see if her mother waved back. Nope. No response. The family brought lunch. Takeout from some Italian restaurant Calista’s stomach didn’t appreciate. The aroma wafting on a breeze had her stomach lurching.
“Mom, I’ll be right back.” There was a vending machine with bottled water at the entrance to the lounge. Threading her way through the room, it was impossible to overlook the room teeming with families visiting loved ones. Mostly grandma and grandpa; however, there were two severely disabled residents needing care their families couldn’t provide at home. Everyone seemed happy, engaged in board games, or connecting with other loved ones through video on social media apps. Some were just having quiet conversations.
God, how she missed that with her mother. A conversation over a cup of coffee. A phone call in the middle of the day. A home-cooked meal prepared by her mother’s loving hands. She missed her mom, desperately, and she wasn’t even gone yet.
Depressed, she bought her bottle of water and made her way back to the terrace. On the threshold between outside and inside, she halted at the most startling sight. The toddler who’d been in her father’s arms was now on her wobbly feet and wandering away from her family. All on her own, she crossed the entire six feet separating her from Calista’s mother.
But that wasn’t the startling part. Her mother, who hadn’t said a word or acknowledged her daughter in weeks, smiled at the adorable little girl.
And when the toddler reached out a chubby hand…her mother reached back.
“Rachel! Don’t bother the lady.” The mom rushed over and scooped her child up.
Calista intercepted her. “Please, wait,” she whispered. “My mother has dementia and hasn’t responded to anything in forever.” Not since Harvey had become too sick to visit, then died. “Please, don’t take your beautiful daughter away. Let her visit a moment longer. Please,” she begged.
“Um… Well.” Uncertain, the woman glanced at her husband, who shrugged.
Calista seized the moment. “You can sit with her in my chair. Not too close if you don’t want. Just close enough for my mother to see Rachel. Just for a little bit longer. Please, this may be the last time I ever see her smile again.” Calista didn’t mean to sob and for tears to leak out of her eyes. It worked. The woman sat in the chair with Rachel on her lap and let the two visit each other. Rachel seemed fascinated with the older woman in front of her, while Calista’s mother smiled, then waved, then played peekaboo. It lasted ten glorious minutes before Rachel climbed out of her mother’s lap and wobbled into her father’s open arms.
“Thank you so much.” Calista hugged the woman. “You don’t know how much your kindness means.”
“I think I do, and you’re welcome. We’ll be back next week and make sure to visit with your mom.” The family waved goodbye and wheeled their matriarch away.
The smile lingered on her mother’s face long after Rachel left. Calista came for the visit out of obligation and avoidance. A few hours with her mother meant a few hours not thinking about the decision she had to make. The decision she hadn’t really been leaning toward yet had to consider.
“Mom.” Calista gathered her mother’s hands and held them in hers.
Aged eyes that had seen so much and still not enough locked onto her daughter’s hazel gaze. Her mother smiled, the same smile she bestowed on Rachel, and it was more than enough for Calista. More than enough, whether her mother understood every word or none at all.
“You’re going to be a grandmother.”
Chapter Thirteen
C alista left the nursing home two hours later. She met with the nurse and doctors taking care of her mother. She wanted to know how much time her mother had left. The staff physician couldn’t give Calista a date but did suggest she had less than a year. And that was optimistic given her mother’s diabetes and hypertension. He was being generous, and Calista didn’t fault him for it. She needed all the generosity she could get.
Two o’clock in the afternoon. Perfect timing to beat rush-hour traffic, though rush hour on the Long Island Expressway occurred twenty-four seven. Her car was only a few feet away in the parking lot, a short-term lease on a silver Audi. She strode past it to the blue Kia Sorento at the end of the row. The idiot saw her coming and had the dignity to roll down his window and not duck.
“Hey, Scotts.” She leaned into the open window and gave him a tight hug.
“Hey, Calista. How’s your mother?”
“Good. Well, the same, but no worse, which is good.” She gave a half-hearted shrug. “How’s the leg?”
“Not paining me as much. Jogging helps. When did you spot me?”
“Thursday. Then Friday when I set the trash on the curb. I know all the cars in the neighborhood. Caught your profile from the glow of your cell. Rookie mistake.”
“Shit,” he mumbled, his gaze sheepish. “Don’t blast me. Julius is being protective.”
She patted his shoulder. “Don’t sweat it, but do better next time.” He nodded once. “Do me a favor. Call your boss and tell him I need to see him. My place.”
“Why can’t you call him yourself?” He frowned, silently saying your “fingers ain’t broken. Call your damn self.”
“I could do that and inform him how I caught his bodyguard spying on me three days ago and he should be fired.”
“You wouldn’t ’cause you like me.” He grinned.
“And you like me. Tha
t’s why you’re gonna make the call.” She sashayed away, back to her car and headed home.
Six o’clock the doorbell rang.
Calista forced down chicken noodle soup and a buttered roll. Her stomach seemed happy enough. She took that as a win. The time between leaving the nursing home and this moment had been productive. She showered, washed her hair, and changed into her baggiest sweatpants and a long-sleeved top. Comfort was her goal. A call to her GYN had gotten her nowhere since the office was closed on Sundays, though she did leave a message for them to return her call on Monday.
The doorbell rang again.
She had no reason to be nervous, yet her heart raced and her palms sweated. He wanted this child and so did she. That was half the battle. Yeah, right, she cursed under her breath. The war hadn’t even begun. It would start once she opened her front door and let him inside.
Two flips of the locks, one turn of the knob, and he filled her doorway. She expected the usual suit and tie, not a pair of jeans and Henley hugging his pecs and hinting at a six-pack. His five o’clock shadow had returned and damn if it didn’t send erotic memories traipsing through her mind. All of him sent her mind happily skipping into the gutter.
She stepped aside for him to enter and caught a hint of cologne mixed with his natural musk, both scents she loved. Now, she hated. Snort. Lie! She wanted to sniff him like a drug dog catching a whiff of cocaine. She closed the door, leaving Moe, Curly, and Larry—AKA Scotts, Sunny, and Edwards—on the curb.
She led Julius to the kitchen and put the butcher block island between them. He studied her as she did him. His usually burnish eyes were flat, as if he were dead inside. Is that how he’d been this entire week waiting for her decision? Guilt twisted its way through her chest. Ignoring it, she folded her arms under her breasts and steeled her spine. “Let’s get this over with.”
He opened his arms and said gruffly, “You called. I came.”
She ignored the not so subtle innuendo and cleared her throat. “I’m having the baby.”
His breath left in a rush and he leaned against the butcher block as the tension bled out of his body. She couldn’t miss the blatant relief transforming his stoic features. His dead eyes warmed, seeming to burn brightly. “Thank you.”
“I’m not doing this for you.” She lashed out.
“Okay.” He held up his hands in surrender. “Why are you doing it? Don’t get me wrong, I’m elated, though I was prepared for the conversation to go a different way.”
Yeah, about that. “What would you have done if I did make that decision?”
His eyes went dead again, and he growled low. “You don’t want to know.”
Calista nodded once. “Feeling territorial? Good. Because that’s exactly how I feel.” Once she made a decision, there was no turning back. She didn’t do anything halfway, and she damned well wasn’t going to break that streak now. “This is my child,” she said. “Mine. And what I say goes.”
“Our child.” He corrected fiercely. “You and I created it. It’s my child as much as it is yours. So, our child.”
Fine. That’s how he wanted to play it. “Let me make something perfectly clear,” she snarled, not backing down a single inch. “You want to be daddy, I won’t get in your way. Until the first time you don’t show up. Until the first time you break my child’s heart. Until the first tear my child sheds because you didn’t call. That’s as long as you have to be daddy because after that we are gone and you will never find us. I may not be a billionaire, but I have enough money to make it happen, and I won’t hesitate.”
He leaned closer, filled her vision with his handsome, arrogant, angry face. “You take my child and I will hunt you to the end of the earth.”
She eased close, within kissing distance. “Good. Now we both know what’s at stake. My freedom and your life because I will shoot you dead and dance on your body if you cause my baby one second of misery. You want to be daddy, you better be dad of the fucking year because my kid deserves nothing less. And I won’t settle for less.” She couldn’t because that was what she had gotten. Less than. Always less than. She refused to have that for her child. Refused!
Her eyes burned and watered. Tears gathered, threatening to run down her cheeks. Damned hormones. He came from around the butcher block, too handsome for his own good. He had cheated on her. Kissed her damned sister! Her heart shouldn’t be racing. Her core shouldn’t be pulsing with a heartbeat of its own.
Blinking away tears, she gave him her back until she reined in her emotions, which wasn’t easy. He didn’t touch her, yet the heat of him seeped through her clothing, skin and muscle, warming all the way to her bones. He was there, present and accounted for, not shying away.
“I know what it’s like to have a father who’s there in body but not in spirit. It’s just as bad as not having one at all. I will not do that to our child. This baby isn’t an accident. It was meant to be and I will be there for every moment of their life. I swear it.”
It was an empty promise. He couldn’t be there for every moment, but as promises went, it was the best she would get. The hard shell shielding her heart was once again in place. She spun and stuck out her hand. “Deal?”
His strong, warm hand enclosed hers—and yanked. Taken off guard, she stumbled forward and collided with his chest. His mouth crashed into hers with a rough, demanding kiss, which was exactly what she needed. Calista gave as good as she got. She returned his kiss with equal aggression and demanded more. She parted her lips and invaded his mouth, tasting, sucking, teasing, dueling with his tongue. She curled her fingers into his shirt while he curled one hand through her hair, the other wrapped around her waist. All of her was flush against him, feeling every wonderful inch.
A sharp twist of her head broke the kiss, but not his hands on her body, holding her to him. Not to mention her fingers still anchored in his clothing. She unclenched her fingers and released him. He did the same, though his pace languid, dragging his hand over her hip and ass, through her hair and across her nape. She didn’t move until his hands dropped to his sides, hands she still craved on her.
“That’s not going to happen again.”
His smirk said, “Yeah right. Keep telling yourself that bullshit.” Wisely, those thoughts stayed on the other side of his closed lips. “What now?”
She retrieved a bottle of water from the refrigerator. “I called my doctor for an appointment. I’ll let you know what the results are.”
“I’m going with you.”
No almost slipped off her tongue. He surprised her, again. If he wanted to be there… “You don’t have to come. I don’t…need you there.” Lie.
“I need to be there.” He pointed to himself. “Our child. Remember?”
Her heart expanded. “Yeah. I remember.” She looked away because damn if she didn’t tear up again. Stupid hormones. “The point is moot. I have to wait for an appointment. Once I know the date, I’ll—”
“I’ve made an appointment with a doctor.”
One eyebrow arched as her brow furrowed and she cocked her head to the side. “You have an OB/GYN on speed dial?” He’d better explain this shit and quickly.
“No.” He barked out a laugh. “The doctor came highly recommended.”
“From who?” She sounded territorial and couldn’t help it.
His lips twitched. “From my doctor. My male doctor’s sister is an OB/GYN.”
Oh. Embarrassed, she rubbed the back of her neck. “Well, when is the appointment?” Probably late next week, she thought.
“Tomorrow. I’ll pick you up at nine, or would a later time be preferable?” He reached behind his back and came back with her gun in his palm. “Did you miss this?”
“Yes. I meant to ask if one of the guys had it.”
“I noticed the bulge when you were lying on the stretcher in the ambulance. I kept it safe for you.”
“Thanks.” That was sweet of him.
“Are you still suffering from hyperemesis gravidarum?”<
br />
Wow. She couldn’t remember the name, but he did. “I’ve, ah, figured out how to manage it. Nine will be fine.” With nothing else to say, she led the way to the front door. She opened the door to find Larry, Curly, and Moe loitering on her property. “You three are fired for letting your client enter a dwelling not knowing if he’d come out alive. You all know I’m armed. And, Scotts, you know I hold a grudge.”
Scotts ducked his head in shame. Edwards shrugged. Sunny winked and said, “At some point you gotta carry your own water. And I saw you in action. I ain’t messing with that.” The trio sauntered away, giving Julius and Calista some privacy.
“I’ll see you in the morning. Get some rest.”
“I will.” Both paused, stuck in a moment. Both unsure how to end the meeting. “Goodnight, Julius.”
He took her hand and squeezed, stroked his thumb across her knuckles. “Thank you.”
Her breath caught, trapped by the unexpected. “I… Um…”
“I’ll see you in the morning.” A quick jog down her three steps, a short stroll to her fence. The hinges squeaked when he opened and closed the gate behind him. Sunny held open the passenger door of the Maybach. Then he was gone. She watched until the $200,000 car turned the corner.
Chapter Fourteen
9:00 a.m.
T ogether, Julius and Calista entered the offices of Kane and Meyers located off Columbus Circle. A nice upscale neighborhood. The office was opulent with crown molding, wainscot, art on the walls, and what had to be a good replica of an antique area rug.
They drew the attention of every woman in the half-filled waiting room. Correction: Julius took center stage, not that he was trying. His looks combined with the innate power he radiated drew women in like shit drew flies. The man embodied money and good dick. A long, thick, fuck you into the mattress then buy you a Birkin, good dick. They didn’t have to know his name or the condition of his bank account. The confident and slight cocky strut, I-beam shoulders, sharp jaw, dimpled chin, the entire picture told a carnal story of nights bent over, spread wide, up against the wall, bound, tortured, throat raw from screaming his name and begging for mercy, each way, every way, until several orgasms later you were comatose.
Plain and the Billionaire's Seduction (Plain Jane Series Book 3) Page 10