Carrying the Billionaire's Baby is the first in my new Manhattan Babies Series.
Jake and Avery are as different as night and day. The only place they're compatible is in bed. What started out as a one-night stand became a fling...and a baby. Avery's happy, as long as Jake stays and arm-length away. Jake is shocked, and the last thing he wants is to stay away. He wants Avery and the Baby on his terms. But Avery's not like any other woman he's met.
Here's a sample...
Chapter
1
Jacob McCallan strode down
the quiet hall of Waters, Waters and Montgomery – the law firm employed by his
family – with tall, lanky Pete Waters, senior partner.
“So, how’s your mother
holding up?”
Jake glanced at Pete, not
surprised he’d asked. His father had died five months before and everyone was
worried about his mom. “She’s working to pull herself together. Some days are
better than others.”
“Rumor has it she headed the
last board of directors meeting.”
Jake grimaced. Nobody was
supposed to know about that, but Pete had sources everywhere. Jake chose his
words carefully. “She tried.”
“Tried?”
“It was no big deal. She walked
into the meeting saying she wasn’t ready to be put out to pasture and would
assume Dad’s role as Chairman of the Board. I took her out of the conference
room and privately told her that the corporate bylaws name the CEO as acting
chairman.”
“You.”
He nodded. “Me. I told her
that if we went against the bylaws, we risked being sued by shareholders.”
“How’d she take it?”
“She was a bit confused. A
bit hurt. I think she believed taking over as chairman would give her something
to do now that Dad’s gone.”
Pete took a long, slow breath
and blew it out in a gust. “That’s rough.”
Painter’s scaffolding crowded
the end of the private corridor to Pete’s office. He pointed to the right.
“We’ll go the long way.”
The “long way” took them
past cubicles filled with workers on the phone or frantically typing on computer
keyboards, then a file room. A wall of windows exposed rows of files – thinner
than they had been before most things were stored on computers – and five copy
machines.
Jake frowned and slowed his
steps. Was that Avery Novak standing in
front of one of those copy machines?
He couldn’t really tell
because the tall redhead’s back was to him. But a man didn’t forget silky hair
long enough to tickle his chest when she straddled him.
He told himself to keep
walking. He and Avery had had a short fling, which she’d mercifully broken off
after three weeks. They’d been dynamite in bed. But out of bed? They would have
done nothing but argue about politics and principles if Jake had ever risen to
any of her bait. The woman was ridiculously headstrong, and she didn’t like
rich people.
No matter how hot they were
together, he had looked down the board and seen a future filled with her being critical
of his privileged lifestyle, and in general acting as if he were Marie
Antoinette and she was a beleaguered peasant. His only regret was that he hadn’t been the one to break it off.
Jake and Pete were just
about at the end of the long wall of windows, when she turned. Her huge green
eyes widened. Her mouth fell open and she quickly lowered the file she held to
her stomach. But it was too late. He’d seen the baby bump.
Baby bump!
She had to be at least five
months pregnant. Maybe six.
Oh, God…Six?
That took them back to
February – when they were dating.
That could be his baby. His child.
He glanced at Avery again.
Her figure hadn’t changed much except for the baby bump, yet she’d looked more
womanly, more attractive. He remembered her soapy and sexy in the shower, added
the baby bump to the naked body he knew so well, and something raw and
emotional ripped through him. Stronger than lust, more profound than awe that
they’d created a child, the feeling rendered him speechless. The reality that
that “bump” could be his child slammed
into him like an eighteen-wheeler, mostly because his father had been a
terrible parent. He had no idea how a good dad behaved. What a good dad did—
But no. It
couldn’t be his child. Avery would have told him. Wouldn’t she?
He and Pete finally walked
past the file room. Pete still chatted on about Jake’s mother. “I understand
that she’s on shaky emotional ground. But you really have to hold the line with
her coming into the business and trying to do things.”
“Actually, I’m thinking of
giving her a job.”
“What?” Pete stopped
walking.
Jake stopped too. “She lost
her husband.” A movement from the file room caught his eye and he glanced up in
time to see Avery racing away. His throat constricted. His gut clenched. Why
run away from him if that wasn’t his child?
Embarrassment?
Maybe.
Had to be.
She was
probably embarrassed she’d found another man and gotten pregnant so soon after
him. Because it couldn’t be his baby…
Otherwise she
would have told him.
He faced Pete. “Mom’s
grieving. She’s searching for meaning in her life. Trying to be chairman of the
board proves she wants something to do. Why not give her something?”
“Because she’s been a
socialite for forty years and doesn’t have any skills?” Pete sighed. “Jake,
giving her a job is only going to make your life difficult. There are better
ways to handle her grief than having her underfoot.”
“I’m not sure I agree. Maybe
she has skills we don’t know about? Or maybe she won’t even want a job? At
least if I ask, she’ll feel wanted.”
“I think you’ll be sorry.”
“Perhaps. But I think I
should ask. She’s leaving today for a week in Paris. I thought if I offered her
something, it would perk her up enough that her friends could snap her out of
her depression.”
“You’re sure she’s going?”
“She and her girlfriends
have been spending the first week of September in Paris for decades.” He took a
brief glance up the hall, but Avery was gone. “She’ll recognize she needs to be
with her friends and go. Besides, there’s a charity ball over the weekend that
I’m attending this year. She won’t miss my first time there and a chance to
introduce me to her friends.”
“What if she jumps on your job
offer and doesn’t care about going to the event?”
“A condition of her coming
to work for us will be that she takes the week in Paris first.”
Pete shrugged as if
grudgingly agreeing with Jake’s decision.
They reached Pete’s office
and Jake took one final glance up the hall. He didn’t see Avery, but his chest
tightened anyway.
As Pete droned on about
fulfilling the bequests in his dad’s will, Jake realized three things. First, Avery
was independent enough that she could consider it her right not to tell him
about his own child. Second, if that baby really was his, he was in trouble. He
had no idea how to be a parent and he would need all the time he could get to
figure it out before the baby was born. Which meant, number three, he was going
to have to confront her.
Today.
Avery didn’t get home until
after nine that night. Law firm associates did all the paperwork and the bulk
of the legwork on most cases. Before she’d gotten pregnant, she’d fought for
the extra work. She sat in on every meeting they’d permit her to attend, and campaigned
to be a part of every important case. She had a plan, big goals, and had only
allowed herself five years to get the experience she would need to start her
own law firm back home in Pennsylvania. She’d had to cram in everything she
could.
Then she’d started hooking
up with Jake. It was wrong. From day one, she’d known it was wrong. Her dad had
gone to jail for something he hadn’t done because a rich employer had used his
money and power to ride roughshod over the system, and her dad couldn’t afford
high-priced counsel to fight him. That was why she’d become a lawyer – to be a
voice for people who couldn’t pay five hundred dollars an hour to defend
themselves from something they hadn’t done. She couldn’t date someone just like
the guy who’d sent her dad to prison.
No matter how sexy Jake was,
an undercurrent of privilege ran through his life. Riding in his limos, taking
his helicopter to Maine for lobster, sleeping in a penthouse monitored by
security guards only reminded her that people like Jake didn’t know a damned
thing about real life, about suffering and struggle…about being normal.
She didn’t want her baby
getting lost in the shuffle of drivers, maids and nannies, any more than she
wanted her little girl or boy growing up thinking money somehow made her
better, even as he or she stayed behind a wall of bodyguards, rode in
bulletproof limos and lived with the threat of being kidnapped.
She also didn’t want to risk
the consequences if Jake found out her dad was an ex-con. He could demand that
she stay in New York – away from her dad – or even try to take the baby. Then
she’d have no way of shielding her child from the craziness of the McCallan
life.
So, she’d made the decision
not to tell Jake she was pregnant to protect her child. Immediately, relief had
coursed through her. Joy at becoming a mom had blossomed. With Jake out of the
picture, she was ready to become a parent. Sure, it changed her plans a bit. She’d
be returning to Pennsylvania two years sooner than she’d thought, and without
sufficient experience, but she’d adapt. She wanted this baby enough that she’d
change her life any way necessary.
She kicked off her subway
shoes, tossed her briefcase on a chair and headed to her bedroom, but her
doorbell rang.
Closing her eyes in misery,
she muttered, “Damn it.”
She could ignore the bell,
but she had a sneaking suspicion Jake McCallan had been sitting in a limo somewhere
down the street from her building, waiting for her to come home. He’d seen her
that morning. Seen the baby bump. Stickler for detail that he was, he’d
undoubtedly done the math.
The bell rang again.
She headed for the door,
shaking off her fears. Lawyers planned for all contingencies. Her first choice
might have been not to tell him, but that didn’t mean she didn’t have a backup
plan, a Plan B. He was a super-stuffy aristocrat, who wouldn’t want a crying
child in his world. All she had to do was remind him that a baby didn’t fit into
his well-ordered life and he’d back off.
Wondering how such a
serious, stuffy guy could be so good in bed, she walked to the door and opened
it.
“Jake. How nice to see you.”
It was nice to see him. He
had black hair cut short to be neat, but strands poked out, making him look
sexy and interesting. His solemn blue eyes always made her want to tell him a
joke. But his body was a work of art. He could be an ad for the gym. Three days
a week had virtually turned him into a god. And the sex? Amazing. Just thinking
about it made her weak-kneed and breathless.
He pointed at her stomach.
“That’s my baby, isn’t it?”
She opened the door a little
wider, urging him inside. “Nothing like a little small talk to warm up a room.”
He stayed right where he
stood. “There’s no point to small talk. We have nothing to say to each other,
except to discuss whether you’re keeping my child from me.”
“I’m not. Technically, I’m
keeping a pregnancy from you.”
He cursed.
“See? This is exactly why I
didn’t tell you!” She caught his arm and dragged him inside, leading him to one
of the two teal-and-white trellis-print club chairs in front of her marble tile
fireplace. Though the legs that carried her across the dark hardwood floors
were extremely tired, she walked into the kitchen and took a glass from the
first white cabinet then filled it at the sink in the center island. Bringing it
into her living room, she said, “I knew you’d freak.”
He took the water. “I’m not
freaking. I’m in shock. You’ve known about this for months. I just found out
today – and only because I ran into you. Not because you told me.”
“Okay,” she soothed, sitting
on the white sofa across from him, keeping control of the conversation. She had
to be calm, rational and appeal to his love of order in his life.
“What do you want to know?”
He looked up at her, his
gorgeous blue eyes serious, direct. “How?”
She laughed. “I think you
pretty much know the basics of how babies are made.”
“No. How did you get
pregnant? You told me you were on the pill.”
The insinuation that the
pregnancy was her fault rattled through her like an angry wind, but she gave
him a little leeway because he was still processing all this.
“My doctor is blaming the
antibiotic she gave me for bronchitis. You and I met –” At a coffee shop on
Valentine’s Day, both dateless and treating themselves to a latte. They
recognized each other from the law firm and had an impromptu dinner where he
was just so charming and sexy they’d ended up in bed. “—when the bronchitis was
all but gone from my lungs.” She shrugged. “But while I was celebrating feeling
better, I was also finishing up the meds and forgot the antibiotic’s effect on
birth control.”
He set his untouched water
on one of the coasters she had on the glass coffee table by the club chair. “I
never thought to ask about antibiotics.”
Her heart did a crazy little
flip. Every time she was ready to write him off as sanctimonious, he’d do
something like that. Something that would make her wonder if deep down he was
fair. But she knew better. A man with enough money to buy his way into or out
of anything had no reason to look at the other side of a situation.
Still, he hadn’t blamed her
for the pregnancy, so she could go back to Plan B, remind him of how much
trouble a baby could be and let him bow out gracefully.
“My goal had always been to
get a job at a big law firm and buy a nice condo that would go up in value as I
paid down the mortgage.”
His earnest blue eyes stayed
on her face, as he waited for her to explain why she was rehashing things he
already knew.
She cleared her throat. “What
I didn’t tell you was, I’d made that plan so that I could get tons of
experience and learn from some of the best lawyers in the world before I sold
the condo for a profit and returned to Pennsylvania to start my own law firm.”
“Oh.”
She wasn’t surprised that
she’d stunned him. Every damned time they’d gone out she’d said or done
something that raised his eyebrows or caused him to frown. Their problem wasn’t
merely a case of a middle-class woman with an upper-class man. They were
opposites in just about every way.
“I didn’t really keep that
from you.”
“Like you didn’t really keep
the pregnancy from me?”
She sighed. “We dated three
weeks. There’s no law that says I had to tell you my plans for the future.”
“So, you weren’t seriously
dating me. What was I? Beefcake?”
The way he said it, with his
calm, poised tone, as if he didn’t realize how funny he sounded, made her
laugh.
He glared at her. “No. Come
on. I’m curious. Did you just go out with me because we were good in bed?”
“You were pretty good.”
He cursed and rose from the
teal chair to pace. “Seriously!”
“You do realize another man
would be so damned complimented by that he’d probably glow in the dark.”
“I’m not like most men.”
No kidding. “Okay. Why did you continue
to ask me out when we both realized on our third date that we weren’t
compatible?”
He took a patient breath,
but ran the fingers of both hands through his hair. A gesture she’d never seen.
She pulled back a bit. The last thing she wanted to do was anger one of the
richest men in New York City when she didn’t have a leg to stand on to keep
their baby from him. Her moving to Pennsylvania without telling him would have
been the easy thing for both of them. But now that he knew, convincing him he
didn’t want to be part of this baby’s life was her best option. She’d never do
that if they continued to argue over pointless things.
“Anyway,” Avery said,
bringing them back to the real discussion. “My life plan has been altered a
bit. With my down payment on this place and the extra I’ve put on the mortgage
every month, not to mention the increase in real estate values, I can sell the
condo early and still make a profit. Then once I pass the Pennsylvania bar, I
can start my own firm there.”
“If you wanted your own law
firm or even to jump the ranks of Waters, Waters and Montgomery, all you had to
do was say the word.”
She gaped at him. “Really?
You think it would be okay for me to jump over the heads of lawyers who know
ten times what I know? To be made partner before them because my ex is their
biggest client?”
He drew a breath and
expelled it quickly. “So, you’re really leaving?”
Another thing he had a habit
of doing was not answering her questions, but changing the subject so they
wouldn’t argue. This time she appreciated his stopping them from going down
another useless road, so she let that slide too.
“Well, I’m not packing up
and heading out tomorrow. My doctor is here in New York. I plan to have the
baby here. Plus, I have to sell the condo. And I do need the experience I’m
getting at Waters, Waters and Montgomery. But eventually I have to go.”
“And you expect me to be
okay with that?” When he faced her, his sapphire eyes had gone from serious to
furious. “You think I don’t have rights, options?”
Fear raced through her, but
she calmed it. This was the most rational man on the planet. If she stayed
neutral, he’d stay neutral. If she set out her plan logically, especially
highlighting how he benefited from it, he would follow it.
“Okay, let’s start this over
again. I am pregnant. The baby is yours. I’ve had the goal since high school to
earn a law degree, get some experience in New York City and then return to
Pennsylvania to start my own law firm. The baby doesn’t stop that plan. Yes, I have
to take the Pennsylvania bar exam and, yes, I will have to get a job at another
law firm in Pennsylvania while I study for it. But the goal hasn’t changed.
Isn’t going to change. That’s non-negotiable.”
He paced in front of the
fireplace. “And, realistically, Pennsylvania isn’t that far away. I can drive
there to visit or send a limo to bring the baby to me.”
She winced. There were a billion
things wrong with his idea. Especially considering she didn’t want her child
sucked into “McCallanville,” a world of pampered rich people who didn’t
understand reality.
She argued the easiest
point. “I’m not putting my baby into a limo alone.”
“There will be times he
should be with me.”
“With you? Don’t you mean
with a nanny? Even when you’re home you’re on the phone or computer.” Just
thinking about it filled her with anger. “Why should my baby spend his time
with a with a driver and a nanny when he or she could be with me? I won’t let
my child be raised by a nanny, Jake. Not ever.”
He closed his eyes and shook
his head, obviously controlling his temper. Finally, he said, “How much?”
“How much what?”
“How much do you want to
make you more agreeable?”
She gaped at him. “Are you
trying to bribe me?”
“I’m trying to make you more
agreeable.”
“And you think if you give
me a few hundred or even a few thousand dollars, I’ll give you what you want in
a visitation agreement?”
“I was thinking more like a few
million.”
Her eyes widened. “You’re insane!
I have a plan. I don’t need your money! I don’t want your money. I want to do what’s best for the baby. So should
you.”
He studied her. She could
all but see the wheels turning in his head as he came to terms with the fact
that this situation wasn’t about money. In his world, everything came down to
money. She couldn’t even fault him for trying to find her price – though she
did want to deck him. The truth was, she didn’t even want child support. But
she figured it was a little too early in the game to tell him that. His brain
would have to work so hard to process it that he’d probably have a stroke.
“We’re going to need a written
agreement.”
For ten seconds, she wished
he hadn’t seen her that morning at the law office. But while her dad had been
in prison for something he hadn’t done, she learned wishing for things to be
different didn’t change them. Plus, she hadn’t given up on Plan B, convincing
him he didn’t want a crying, pooping, spitting up baby destroying the peace of
his life. And that would take more tact and diplomacy than she could muster
tonight.
“Okay. But we should have a
few more conversations to see what we both want before we even try to get anything
on paper.”
He considered that.
“Agreed.”
He headed for the door. Though
Avery gave him a pleasant smile as she saw him out and said goodbye, another
alternative jumped into her brain.
If she couldn’t make him see
a baby didn’t fit into his life, there was a risky Plan C. She could tell him that
her dad had been in prison and remind him of the can of worms that would be
opened once the press started digging into the life of the woman pregnant with
his child. They both knew he wouldn’t want that kind of media attention any
more than she did. If anything would send him scurrying away from her, it would
be the horror of that much negative attention from the press.
There was just one little
problem with Plan C --
When she told him about her
dad, she’d also be handing him the ammo to take her child, or to at least keep
her and her little one in New York City. All he would have to do would be tell
the court he wanted to keep his child away from Avery’s ex-con dad.
Then even if she kept
custody, she’d be stuck in New York, away from the people she wanted to help.
Away from the dream she had
nurtured and worked for since she was fifteen.
If Plan C went south, it could
ruin her life.
