His Amazing Baby_A Miracle Baby Romance Read online

  His Amazing Baby

  B. B. Hamel

  Contents

  Special Offer!

  Prologue

  1. Riley

  2. Aaron

  3. Riley

  4. Aaron

  5. Riley

  6. Aaron

  7. Riley

  8. Aaron

  9. Riley

  10. Aaron

  11. Riley

  12. Aaron

  13. Riley

  14. Aaron

  15. Riley

  16. Aaron

  17. Riley

  18. Aaron

  19. Riley

  20. Aaron

  21. Riley

  22. Aaron

  23. Riley

  24. Aaron

  25. Riley

  26. Riley

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  Copyright © 2018 by B. B. Hamel

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

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  I will hold your voice in a little box

  And when you come upon me I won’t look back at you

  You will feel a hand upon your heart while I place your voice back

  Into the heart from where it came from

  And I will not cry also

  Although you will expect me to

  I was wiser too than you had expected

  For I knew all along you were mine

  - Dorothea Lasky, “Poem to an Unnameable Man”

  And so both projected, we are now

  part of a garden, that is part of a

  landscape, that is part of a world

  that no one believes in.

  - Joshua Beckman, “[Lying in bed I think about you]”

  Prologue

  Twelve Years Ago

  Aaron Ward stands in front of my brother’s boombox, his shirt off and a lit joint between his lips as I slowly come down the basement steps. I stop for a second, staring at his chest and feeling like a moron, terrified he’ll catch me watching, my fingers on the smooth wooden railing, my toes curling on the basement steps.

  Pink Floyd’s Dark Side of the Moon wafts through the air as I take a sniff of the weed stink. I’ve never smoked pot before, my brother won’t let me, but he’s always doing it. I think Davis smokes just to look cool in front of Aaron, and I can’t really blame him.

  “Hey, kid,” he says without looking up.

  “Hey.” I pretend like I wasn’t just caught staring. I sit down on the steps, looking between the railings at him. “Where’s Davis?”

  He shrugs. “Out.”

  I nod a little. It’s not unusual to come downstairs and find Aaron alone in our basement. This is practically his second home. We have Bilco doors, the big side-by-side style set right into the base of the house that he sneaks in through, not bothering to ring the doorbell. They’re big, red, and heavy, and my dad once told me he saw a friend nearly lose his finger trying to open a pair of them. I stay away from those doors, but Aaron’s not afraid of them, not at all. He comes and goes as he pleases. It’s weird but I don’t really question it.

  I like having Aaron around. I mean, he’s cool in all the ways I’m not.

  And plus, he’s looks like something I’m not supposed to touch. Tall, with shaggy dark hair and gorgeous light eyes that stare without any semblance of shame. His body’s lean but muscular from playing sports his whole life. I’m twelve years old and just finally starting to notice boys, but none of them are anything like Aaron. He’s sixteen, four years older than me, and normally he pretends like I don’t exist. But not today for some reason.

  “What are you doing?” I ask him.

  He glances over at me. “Looking at your brother’s shitty music.” He pauses for a second and hits a button on the old black plastic boombox. The music stops and he opens the top, taking out a CD. He tosses it casually onto the table, the plastic clattering onto a pile of other discarded discs, before taking a long drag of his joint.

  I crawl down the steps a little more and watch, fascinated, as he blows out a huge wreath of smoke. Normally, I’d be upstairs studying for my bio exam on Monday but the sound of music drew me down here. Mom and Dad are out somewhere, which is the only reason Aaron’s getting away with smoking openly right now. Although I think he might do it even if they were home, just to see if he could.

  “Anything good?” I ask.

  “Nah.” He pauses for a second. “Actually…” He pulls out a CD and pops the case open. The front’s black with a guy wearing a big chain and a tank top silhouetted in gray. I can’t read the title as he tosses the CD into the boombox and hits play.

  Nothing for a second, and then a strange, lilting song, like an Arabic prayer, high-pitched and warbling. Then discordant piano sounds, or maybe strings plucked wrong, and a smashing beat.

  Aaron nods his head along to it, singing softly to himself, Get you some, fortune power fame, get you some…

  I come down to the bottom of the steps. “What is this?”

  “Busta Bust,” he says, grinning at me, one eye shut still as he takes another hit of the joint. “Want some?” He offers it to me and I stare at him, surprised. Davis would freak out of he knew Aaron just asked me that. They’ve never asked if I wanted any before.

  “No, thanks,” I say. I’ve never done drugs and I doubt I ever will. I’m a straight-A student and I can’t risk screwing up my GPA. My teachers say I have potential, whatever that means, and I always listen to my teachers. Little goody gumdrop, my brother sometimes teases when I’m nose-deep in a textbook for hours on end.

  Aaron nods, smiling a little. “Good. Stay away from this shit.” He stubs it out on top of the CD case and slips the joint into his pocket before walking over to the couch and flopping down on it.

  I drift into the basement, past the boombox shrieking rap, floating toward Aaron. He watches me, a little grin on his face. “Davis told me something the other day,” I say suddenly.

  “What’s that?” he asks slowly, almost bored looking, but smiling.

  “He said that Billy Porter had sex with Jenny.”

  “Jenny?” Aaron laughs. “Yeah, right. Porter never fucked anyone, let alone Jenny. She’s fucking hot.”

  I lean up against the arm of the couch. “Have you… had sex?” I feel a thrill of transgression run through me. Good girls like me aren’t supposed to ask older boys questions like that, but this is Aaron. He’s practically my big brother, although he’s definitely not my brother, which makes it that much more confusing. And that much more exciting.

  His grin gets bigger. If he’s surprised, he doesn’t let on. “Why are you asking me that, kid?”

  “I don’t know. Davis says you did, but he called me a perv for asking with who.”

  He’s quiet for a second. “Yeah, I’ve had sex. It’s not a big deal.”

  “Really?” I blink, staring at him. It feels like a huge deal, like the biggest deal imaginable. But here’s a guy that smokes weed, knows rap lyrics, sneaks into other people’s houses, and has sex. He�
��s like an alien to me, a beautiful, alien god.

  “Look, when you’re ready, it’ll be like…” He hesitates, looking for the words. “Like poetry, you know? You’ll just feel it, it’ll happen and it’ll be right.” He laughs at himself. “Know what I mean?”

  “Yeah,” I say, nodding, although I have no clue what he’s talking about. That’s some bad high school stuff right there, and part of me knows that already, but it’s hard to tell Aaron he’s being cliché. “Sure. Katie told me it really hurts, she said her older sister told her, and—”

  “Who’s Katie?”

  “Katie Flanagan?”

  “Never heard of her.” He shuts his eyes, stretching his legs out. “Listen, Riley, you gotta understand something.” He sits up suddenly, moving closer to me. I can see the muscles on his chest and his abs and I’m staring at him like a moron, but I don’t care. I can’t help myself. “Sex is fun, okay, but you’re just a kid. You’re cool, but you’re a kid. So let it go. Keep studying.” He stares at me for a second. “You get it?”

  “Yeah,” I say, shrugging. “Okay.” I realize suddenly that this is the most I’ve ever said to Aaron, and definitely the most he’s ever said to me, but I’m not sure how to feel about it. I’m not some dumb little kid like Jenny or Katie, I’m one of the smartest, most mature girls in my grade. And Aaron just keeps treating me like a little baby. He’s an arrogant asshole, and I don’t understand why I’m even bothering with him right now.

  He watches me for another second and I can feel something weird inside of me roiling and shifting like the ocean during a storm. I want to sit down closer to him, but I don’t know why. Maybe I can put my hand on his leg, or he’ll let me touch his chest. I bet he smells good, too.

  “The fuck’s going on down here?”

  The moment’s ruined as my brother, Davis, comes stomping down the steps. I quickly stand up, moving away from Aaron, praying I’m not blushing too much.

  “’Sup, man,” Aaron says, lounging back onto the couch.

  Davis sniffs. “Stinks like fucking weed. Are you smoking?”

  “I was,” he says, shrugging. “Want a hit?”

  Davis hesitates. “Fuck it. Yeah.” He walks over and looks at me like he’s noticing me for the first time. “Don’t you have homework or some shit?”

  “Yeah,” I say, standing up.

  “Then go do it.” Davis turns back to Aaron. “Move over, asshole.”

  He sits down on the couch and I hesitate. Aaron doesn’t even look at me again as he takes the tiny joint from his pocket. I linger there and watch as my brother takes the joint and the lighter before looking at me again.

  “Riley, go upstairs,” he says. “You can hang out with us later, okay?”

  “Okay,” I say, drifting toward the steps. As I start up, I watch Davis put the joint in his mouth and light it, breathing the smoke deep. He doesn’t look nearly as practiced or comfortable as Aaron does, but then again, everyone pales when compared to him.

  I head upstairs as Davis lets out a plume of smoke, the white enveloping the two laughing guys as Davis falls into a coughing fit. The song on the boombox changes and I shut the door behind me.

  1

  Riley

  Present day

  When I see Aaron Ward for the first time in years, I’m not sure if I want to run away or punch him in the teeth.

  It’s the way he holds himself, like the room was built just for him to occupy it. He has this supreme, insane confidence that I was always jealous of, especially back when we first met. He leans into my cubicle, a little gleam in his eye, his expensive tie clipped onto his pristine white button-down oxford with a tiny gold American flag tie pin. His suit is immaculate, not a stitch out of place, and his thick, dark hair looks like it was professionally styled. He makes everyone around him look absolutely shabby, and I suddenly feel like that little dorky girl again.

  I haven’t seen Aaron since he went away to college. He slowly drifted apart from my brother and lost touch, which is pretty much what happens when you go to school in different states. But I never forgot about him. Sometimes, late at night, even as recently as a year ago, I’d think about what it would have been like to lose my virginity to the gorgeous Aaron Ward while touching myself under the covers. I’m not really proud of that fact, but it’s a hard truth, and I’m all about facing hard truths. It’s totally embarrassing to be an adult human and still daydream about your older brother’s best friend from high school, but here we are. I also still think Grover from Sesame Street is legitimately funny, and I only have two coffee mugs, one for me and one for a guest.

  Now my masturbation fantasy is standing in front of me, and I don’t know what to do.

  “Hi, Riley,” he says, extending his hand with a little cock of his head. His teeth are almost unnaturally straight and white.

  “Uh, hey.” I stand up and shake it, meeting his gaze, which falters for a second.

  “Wait, Riley?” His grin turns into a puzzled frown, and I can see recognition in his eyes. Yeah, it’s me, asshole.

  I smile, a little embarrassed. I knew who he was the second I saw him, but it took him a minute to place me. Well, maybe I can’t blame him there. I was a nerdy little dork back when he knew me before, but I’ve obviously grown up since then. Not that I’m particularly beautiful or something like that, but I don’t wear sweatpants in public anymore and I got rid of the acne.

  “Davis’s sister,” I say.

  He laughs, squeezing my hand harder and pulling me into a hug. I stumble against him, completely taken off guard. I mean, we were close back when we were younger, or at least we knew each other, but I haven’t seen this guy in forever and we’re in a professional work environment. I’m almost embarrassed, but it feels good and somehow Aaron can get away with it. “Holy shit, it’s you!”

  He hugs me tight, crushing me against him. He smells like grass and fresh dirt, which is really surprising. I can feel the muscles under his clothes as he flexes slightly, squeezing me against him. I expected some sort of cologne or after shave or fancy scent thing, but instead he smells like a forest after a fresh rain. It’s almost intoxicating.

  He lets me go and our boss, the CEO of our company, Mitchell Trainor, looks between us with a confused expression.

  “I’ve been good,” I say to Aaron before turning to Mitchell. “We know each other from high school,” I explain.

  “I was close with her brother,” Aaron says. “Wow, what a freaking small world.” He shakes his head, that grin back, even bigger than before. It lights up the drab office like a lighthouse beacon. “It’s so good to see you again. And we’re going to be working together!”

  I get a good look at him now, smile plastered on my face. He’s grown up too, slightly taller, slightly more muscular, but still the lean, athletic guy I remembered. His face has stubble, just the hint of a beard, and his eyes look slightly more tired. But it’s still Aaron, still the same old Aaron, and he’s grinning at me like he’s really excited to see me.

  It’s so obvious he has no clue that I hate him, and that’s the worst part of all this.

  I’ve always hated him, even back when I had a huge crush on him. He’s loud, outgoing, thinks the whole world is his playground. He’s the kind of guy that used to be a dick to me in school, and I bet he would have if he weren’t friends with my brother. I remember him going from girlfriend to girlfriend, breaking hearts left and right. He allegedly took the virginity of at least five girls, although based on the veritable train of them he had coming through our basement back then, I suspect it’s more than that.

  I was always repulsed and attracted to him. There’s a reason girls go for Aaron. He’s handsome as hell, charming, and funny. Except he’s also a total douchebag, and now I have to relive what it was like to have a stupid crush on him while he went from chick to chick. Sure, he’s a great masturbation-fantasy-lay, don’t get me wrong. He’s the kind of guy you can tuck in at night, close your eyes, and pretend to have a stupid swe
aty fuck-fest with. But actually date? I’d rather hammer a nail into my hand nice and slow than spend too much time with a guy like him.

  It’s stupid, I know. We were kids back then, and I should just forget about high school. Except based on the way Aaron’s looking at me, I don’t think anything’s changed at all.

  “Well, what a coincidence,” Mitchell says. “Riley here is our secret weapon.”

  “You were telling me earlier.” Aaron gives me this appraising look, like I’m some prized pig or something. I get a chill down my spine and I can’t decide if it’s anger, excitement, or both. “Some novel designs or something like that?” He cocks his head at me quizzically. I want to smack him and kiss him. It’s pretty damn confusing.

  “Just some new ideas for energy storage and efficiency,” I say to him.

  He leans against the wall of my cube, one eyebrow raised. “I’m not just some suit, you know. You can give me some more detail.”

  I glance at Mitchell, who shrugs. “He’s our lead PR guy for the panels,” Mitchell says. “He’ll need to know all about the technology sooner or later.”

  I nod and look back at Aaron, sighing a little bit. Just my freaking luck. “Okay then. I guess I can catch you up.”

  “I hope you can do it quickly.” Mitchell says. “Because you two are going on a little trip.”