The CEO's Baby Surprise. Helen Lacey
said it over and over, against her skin, against her breath. “I’m not sure what’s going on with you, but you’re not making much sense.”
The truth screamed to be told. There was no other way. She couldn’t stop being who she was. She was an honest, forthright person who wore her heart on her sleeve. Mary-Jayne stepped out from behind the chair and spread her hands across her stomach, tightening the baggy shirt over her middle. Highlighting the small bump that hadn’t been there four months ago.
“I’m talking about this.”
Daniel quickly refocused his gaze onto her middle and frowned. “You’re pregnant?”
She nodded and swallowed hard. “Yes.”
“And?”
She shrugged and her hair flipped around her shoulders. Now or never.
“And isn’t it obvious? You’re the father.”
He hadn’t moved. Mary-Jayne looked at him and took a long breath. “This isn’t how I wanted you to find out. I was going to call and tell you and—”
“You’re not serious?” he asked, cutting through her words with icy precision.
She nodded. “I’m perfectly serious. I’m pregnant.”
He raised a dark brow. “We used protection,” he said quietly and held up a few fingers. “Three times, three lots of birth control. So your math doesn’t quite work out.”
“My math?” She stared at him. “What exactly are you accusing me of?”
“Nothing,” he replied evenly. “Simply stating an irrefutable fact.”
A fact?
Right. There was no possible way of misunderstanding his meaning. “I’m not lying to you. This baby is—”
“Yours,” he corrected coldly. “And probably the ex-boyfriend who my grandmother said is giving you grief at the moment.”
She fought the urge to rush across the room and slug him. “I don’t have a boyfriend. Ex or otherwise.”
“You do according to my grandmother,” he stated. “Who I trust more than anyone else.”
No punches pulled. He didn’t believe her. Okay. She could handle it. She didn’t care what he thought. “I only told Solana that to stop her from asking questions about why I’ve been unwell.”
He crossed his arms, accentuating his broad shoulders, and stood as still as a statue. He really was absurdly good-looking, she thought, disliking him with every fiber in her body. His gray eyes had darkened to a deep slate color and his almost black hair was short and shiny, and she remembered how soft it had been between her fingertips. His face was perfectly proportioned and he had a small cleft in his chin that was ridiculously sexy. Yes, Daniel Anderson was as handsome as sin. He was also an arrogant, overbearing, condescending so-and-so, and if it weren’t for the fact he was the biological father of her child, she’d happily never see him again.
“Do I really appear so gullible, Miss Preston?”
Miss Preston?
“Gullible? I don’t know what you—”
“If you think naming me in a paternity claim will fatten your bank balance, think again. My lawyers will be all over you in a microsecond.”
His pompous arrogance was unbelievable. “I’m not after your money.”
“Then, what?” he asked. “A wedding ring?”
Fury surged through her. “I wouldn’t marry you if you were the last man left on the planet.”
Her words seemed to amuse him and he looked at her in such a haughty, condescending way that her palms actually itched with the urge to slap his face. In every way she’d played the scene out in her head, and not once had she imagined he wouldn’t believe that her baby was his. Naive perhaps, but Mary-Jayne had been raised to take someone at their word.
“That’s quite a relief, since I won’t be proposing anytime soon.”
“Go to hell,” she said quietly as emotion tightened her chest, and she drew in a shuddering breath. He pushed her buttons effortlessly. He really was a hateful jerk.
“Not until we’ve sorted out this little mix-up.”
“Mix-up?” She glared at him. “I’m pregnant and you’re the father. This is not a mix-up. This is just how it is.”
“Then, I demand a paternity test.”
* * *
Daniel hadn’t meant to sound like such a cold, unfeeling bastard. But he wasn’t about to be taken for a ride. He knew the score. A few months back his brother Caleb had been put through the ringer in a paternity suit that had eventually proved the kid he’d believed was his wasn’t. And Daniel wasn’t about to get pulled into that same kind of circus.
Mary-Jayne Preston’s baby couldn’t possibly be his...could it? He’d never played roulette with birth control. Besides, now that he could well and truly see her baby bump she looked further along than four months. Simone hadn’t started showing so obviously until she was five months’ pregnant.
“I’d like you to leave.”
Daniel didn’t move. “Won’t that defeat the purpose of your revelation?”
She scowled, and he couldn’t help thinking how she still looked beautiful even with an infuriated expression. “You know about the baby, so whatever you decide to do with the information is up to you.”
“Until I get served with child-support demands, you mean?”
She placed her hands on her hips and Daniel’s gaze was immediately drawn to her belly. She was rounder than he remembered, kind of voluptuous, and a swift niggle of attraction wound its way through his blood and across his skin. Her curves had appealed to him from the moment they’d first met, and watching her now only amplified that desire.
Which was damned inconvenient, since she was obviously trying to scam him.
“I don’t want your money,” she said stiffly. “And I certainly don’t want a wedding ring. When I get married it will be to someone I actually like. I intend to raise this baby alone. Believe me, or don’t believe me. Frankly, I don’t care either way.”
There was such blatant contempt in her voice that he was tempted to smile. One thing about the woman in front of him—she wasn’t afraid to speak her mind. And even though he knew it was crazy thinking, it was an interesting change from the usual lengths some women went to in order to get his attention. How sincere she was, he couldn’t tell.
“We spent the night together a little over four months ago,” he reminded her. “You look more than four months pregnant.”
Her glare intensified. “So it’s clearly a big baby. All I know is that the only possible way I got pregnant was from that night I spent with you. I hadn’t been with anyone for a long time before that night. Despite what you think of me, I’m not easy. And I don’t lie. I have no reason to want this child to be yours. I don’t like you. I’m not interested in you or your money or anything else. But I am telling you the truth.”
He still wasn’t convinced. “So the ex-boyfriend?”
“A figment of my imagination,” she replied. “Like I said, Solana was asking questions and I needed a little camouflage for a while.”
He kept his head. “Even if there is no boyfriend and you are indeed carrying a supersize baby...we used contraception. So it doesn’t add up.”
“And since