Karen Booth - The Best Man's Baby

“I asked you to marry me. I’m willing to play my part.”

“You did not ask me to marry you. You were issuing a mandate. And that’s not happening, anyway. I’m not marrying someone out of obligation, and certainly not a man who broke up with me. I’m done making mistakes when it comes to you.” She opened the door and stormed out. It closed with a thud behind her.

Logan turned, his eyes wide open. No way he was getting any sleep tonight. Julia had given him more than enough to chew on.

His phone beeped with a text. What now? He wandered across the room and picked it up from the coffee table. It was from Julia.

We have to leave for the florist by ten.

Great. A whole day of wedding errands with the pregnant woman who drove him crazy, refused to marry him and might be carrying his baby.

Three

Logan had been a royal jerk last night—selfishly worrying how he’d survive the next six months of uncertainty, informing Julia that he expected her to marry him. That was not happening. She could do this all on her own. She didn’t need help from Logan.

Although she didn’t mind the view.

“Oh. Hey. Good morning.” He flashed a sheepish smile, standing in the doorway of his room, nothing more than a towel wrapped around his waist, beads of water dotting his shoulder. “I was just getting the paper.” Bending over to pick it up, he showed off his perfectly defined back.

Julia stood stuck. His velvety voice delivered a too-sexy memory of their last morning in this hotel—Logan’s long, warm naked body pressed against her back in the wee hours, his giving lips on her neck as he slid his hand between her knees, lifted her leg and rocked her world with the most memorable wake-up call, well, ever.

“Jules? You okay?”

“Morning,” she sputtered, pushing a room service cart out of her room and into the hall. “I ordered bacon with breakfast, but the smell was making me queasy. If you want the leftovers.” Sexy, Jules. Real sexy.

He looked both ways, flipped the latch on his door and crossed the hall. He raised the stainless cloche from the plate, grabbing some bacon. “Just two. The camera adds ten pounds.”

“You’re fine.” She stole a glimpse of his stomach, just as hard and muscled as ever. He might not be paid to be an elite athlete anymore, but he maintained his body like one. And to think she’d reaped the benefits—those strapping arms wrapped around her, keeping her close, making her feel for two whole days that she belonged nowhere else. The price of admission had been far more than she’d been willing to pay—every shred of her heart. A big chunk of her pride, too.

“Ready in fifteen?” She braced herself against her door. Being around nearly-naked Logan was making it impossible to stand up straight.

“Definitely. I called down to the valet. We can go out the side entrance. They’ll have the car waiting for us.”

“You don’t think the press will be tipped off by the eighty-thousand-dollar gleaming black sports car you just had to rent?”

He shrugged. “I’m not about to drive anything less. You’ll have to suffer through it, babe.”

Babe. As if.

Julia retreated to her room and tried not to obsess over her makeup or hair, but it was hard not to, knowing she’d be spending her day with Logan. He deserved to be tortured by what he’d so solidly rejected. It would likely be her only measure of revenge. She dressed in a swishy navy blue skirt that showed off her legs, black ballet flats and a white sleeveless top with a cut that left her expanding bustline on full display. Boobs. At least she was getting something out of this whole single-and-pregnant thing, other than a baby, of course.

She met Logan in the hall, and he just had to be stunning. So effortlessly hot in jeans and a white button-down, sleeves rolled up just far enough to again mesmerize her with his inexplicably alluring forearms. He led her out through the side exit and to his rental car. His plan to remain incognito was working perfectly until he peeled out of the parking lot.

“Why did you do that?” Her vision darted back to the hotel entrance. Sure enough, reporters were racing to their cars. “They’re following us now.” She shook her head. He always had to have his manly moment.

“Don’t worry. I’ll lose them.”

He tried to shake the media as he had the day before, but they got stuck at a red light and he was left to lead a dysfunctional caravan to the florist, with his fancy car front and center. They found their destination a few minutes later, and Julia dashed for the door while Logan took his chance to reprimand the reporters yet again and tell them to stay outside.

Julia swept her hair from her face as a red-haired woman came out of the back with an enormous bucket of flowers blocking her view. “Can I help you?” she asked in a lovely singsong British accent. She plopped her armful onto the checkout counter. “Blimey. You’re...her.”

Her. Yep. Julia smiled warmly. It was the only way to put people at ease and get them off the subject of who she was. “Hi. You’re doing the flowers for my sister Tracy’s wedding on Saturday. She asked me to come by and look over everything. She’s more than a little picky and I want everything to be perfect for her.”

The woman nodded. “Yes. I’m Bryony. And I remember your sister. Very well. Come with me.”

The bell on the door jingled as Logan walked inside. With a nod, Julia motioned for him to follow her, and he trailed behind her into a back room. While Bryony pulled buckets of blooms from a cooler, Logan assumed what Julia called his jock-in-command stance—feet nearly shoulder-width apart, hands clasped behind his back, shoulders straight, chest out proud. This was his way of taking in the world. She’d first noticed him doing it their junior year of high school, eyeing him when they played softball in gym class. What a joke that had been—like sending in an Olympic broad jumper to play hopscotch. No one had ever beaned a softball as hard as Logan.

He’d been so far out of her league in school that it took her nearly a year to get up the guts to talk to him, and only after he accidentally showed up at a party at her parents’ beach house. Imagine the horror when it dawned on her during that first conversation, as she drank in the mesmerizing beauty of his eyes up close, that he didn’t actually know her name. She must have done something right, though...he was her boyfriend a week later.

And when it came to part a year after that, as they both went off to college at far-flung schools, she’d taken the initiative and broken up with him. It had been a bit of a preemptive strike and her attempt to be mature about something. She was terrified to leave home, but she was even more scared of how badly it would hurt when Logan called her from UCLA and said he’d met another girl. Or more likely, another fifty girls. It wouldn’t have taken long. In the end, Logan became the guy in her past she couldn’t have. That was all there was to it. Circumstances, fate or other women—there was always something standing between them.

Logan waited dutifully next to her while Julia checked the array of flowers set aside for her sister. Her mother’s penchant for gardening had left Julia more knowledgeable than the average person. She checked each selection off the list her sister had given her. Hydrangea, snapdragons and roses in white. Pink was for tulips, more roses and... Oh no.

“These aren’t peonies,” Julia said.

“Our supplier was out,” Bryony answered. “We had to substitute ranunculus.”

Julia shook her head. “No. No. No. Peonies are Tracy’s favorite flower. She’ll pitch a royal fit if she doesn’t have them.”

Bryony shrugged. “I’m sorry. That’s the best we could do. They aren’t that dissimilar.”

“Logan, don’t you think Tracy’s going to be mad about ranunculus?” Julia asked.

“I wouldn’t know a ranunculus if it walked up to me and introduced itself.” He flashed a wide and clever smile.

The florist tittered like a schoolgirl at Logan’s comment. “I’m sorry, but I can’t make pink peonies magically appear this time of year. I told your sister there might be a problem getting them.”

“I have to fix this.” Filled with dread, Julia pulled her phone out of her purse and dialed her assistant, Liz. If Tracy didn’t have the right flowers, not only would she freak out, by the transitive property of sisterly blame, it’d be Julia’s fault.

“Julia. Is everything okay?” Liz answered.

“Hey. I need you to do something for me. Can you call your flower guy and have four dozen stems of pale pink peonies overnighted to the florist in Wilmington? We need a very pale pink. Not rosy. Not vibrant. Does that make sense?”

“Yes. Of course. I’m on it.”

“I’ll text you the address. And make sure he knows it’s for my sister. I need this to go off without a hitch.”

“Got it. Anything else?”

Julia felt as if it was now okay to exhale. “That’s it for now.”

“Is everything else going okay? The press is really hammering you on this Derek thing, aren’t they? And I saw you’re hanging out with Logan. How’s that going?”

Liz had worked for Julia for years. She might’ve heard her complain and wax poetic about Logan a few dozen times. Or a few hundred. “Oh, um, it’s been fine.” She couldn’t say more, not with Logan in such close proximity.

“You know, if you wanted the press to go away, you could tell them that you’re with Logan,” Liz said. “They’ll run off and speculate about it for at least a day or two. Or they’ll turn it into more of a spectacle. Hard to know, but my gut is they’ll take pictures, write their stories and hound Derek with questions about being heartbroken.”

Julia watched Logan as he chatted up Bryony, who was blushing like crazy. If any man knew how to make a woman feel good about herself, it was Logan. His presence alone—just breathing the same air he did—made a girl feel special. Precisely why it hurt so much when he took it away. “Well, that’s one idea. I’ll think about it. Thanks. You’re the best.”

Julia hung up and took the florist’s business card, texting the address to Liz. “The peonies will be here tomorrow morning. Everything else looks great. Thanks for your help.”

She turned to Logan. He had the funniest look on his face—both bewildered and amused. She loved that expression, although if she were honest, she loved everything about his face—full lips shaping his effortless smile, square chin with a tiny scar obscured by scruff, and eyes so warm and sincere it was hard to imagine him ever doing something hurtful.

“Your sister is really lucky she didn’t put me in charge of this,” he said. “I mean really lucky. Imagine how horrified she’d be if she ended up with ranun...you know. Those flowers.”

Julia granted him a quiet laugh. “Ranunculus. And you know how much I love my sister. I’m just trying to make the mess I made a little better. Now let’s go deal with the cake.”

The throng of reporters outside had grown. Either Julia was losing her patience or they were getting pushier. Logan made sure she got into the car safely, making her truly thankful to have him there. On the way to the bakery, she stole a glimpse of his handsome profile, allowing herself to think about what would’ve happened last night if he’d proposed for real, because he loved her. If he’d never called it off. If the baby was his. They could hold hands, they could stay up late talking for hours, they could make plans. Perhaps that was why she was so dead-set on making everything perfect for her sister. If she couldn’t have the fairy tale, at least her sister could.