Secret Baby for My Brother's Best Friends

1. Chelsea

CHELSEA

Ijerk when the door opens, half-hoping that someone is coming in to put me out of my misery

Not by killing me, of course.

By taking me home.

I don’t know what I was thinking coming to this party. My brother has mellowed out as he’s gotten older, but there are still aspects of the college frat boy in his thirty-nine-year-old body, and it comes out in times like this.

When I walked in, he was hanging upside down, drinking from a keg as people chanted around him. Then, when he realized I was there, he straightened, gave me a slobbery, drunken kiss on the cheek, and told me how happy he was to see me.

And then he basically ignored my existence for the next thirty minutes or so, until he had to go out and get more drinks because we were apparently running low.

Thankfully, someone sober agreed to drive him, and they've been gone since then. Meanwhile, I was stuck at the party with people I didn't know, all of whom seemed to be getting spontaneously drunker by the second.

Drunker and hornier, too.

Someone is having sex in the downstairs bathroom, people are making out on the couch, and I think they might be having a threesome in the pool as well.

And here’s the thing. I’m not a prude or anything. I can stand around and watch people have sex all day.

But it’s just highlights to me how much I’ve never been a part of this world–the world of the high-powered extroverts who don't have to overthink every word and aren't currently hiding out in their brother's bedroom waiting for him to come back.

I really wish I could be like them, I do. I wish I could relax at parties and not surreptitiously monitor everyone's alcohol intake, making sure no one is getting alcohol poisoning.

I wish I could just drink and let loose and make a fool of myself without dying of embarrassment the next day. I wish I could be the fun girl for a change.

But instead, I get to be the sensible girl who refuses to drink past her limits and wears sensible flip-flops to a pool party like an idiot. No stilettos that make my ass sit high and tight.

Boring.

That's what my ex, Eric, called me the day we broke up. The day I caught him having sex in our almost-marital bed with someone who was categorically not me.

At first, he went through the stages: shock, sincere-seeming apologies, then, when he realized I wasn't budging and he couldn't gaslight me into believing that I didn't see what I saw, he suddenly turned cold and snarky.

"Well, can you blame me?" he snarled. "You think I could get by on just boring sex once every month or so? I’m so fucking sick of missionary sex every now and then. A man needs some excitement."

Even now, the words are like daggers stabbing into my heart. Equal parts rage and devastation assail me as I think of his face, the man I thought I was going to marry, staring at me in barely concealed contempt.

The irony is that I was sick of the missionary sex, too!

But I was the only one who actually attempted to fix it.

I was always the one suggesting we spice up our sexcapades, with toys, roleplay, heck, I would have even put on my sexiest big girl panties and paraded to the sex club in Harlem on a Saturday night if that's what he wanted.

He was always the one who turned me down.

Unless it was about having a threesome or some kind of swinging thing, he wasn’t interested.

I initiated sex more times than he did in our relationship, and though it made me feel a little insecure, I excused it because I just assumed that maybe he wasn't a very sexual person, and maybe he was just tired from work. There were so many maybes I gave myself that it makes me sick in hindsight.

And sure, maybe he was tired from working so much.

But not too tired to screw his PA, as life would have it. I don’t know how I missed the signs, considering I work in the same building as both of them. I was the head of marketing at his company, the one I helped him build while we were still in college.

All three of us were friends then, and recently, the three of us were working on pitch decks for new investors, meaning we spent a lot of late nights together, putting our thoughts in a basket.

Plenty of times, we have been out together at bars, shooting the shit, having a good time.

I thought Eric and Claire had a close, brother-sisterly relationship.

But no.

They were just screwing each other behind my back and probably laughing at me while they did it.

I’m such an idiot.

No, not an idiot, my brother James said when I said it out loud. Just trusting.

And boring.

And kind of a doormat.

I refuse to let those thoughts drag me down and reject the urge to hide, even as the door opens fully. I may not be the most extroverted person, but I’m not the mouse he thinks I am either. And I refuse to let myself become that mouse.

Maybe I can use some practice being the fun Chelsea.

Maybe I can pretend to be her, just for today, just to see if I can.

But I almost reconsider when the intruder pushes the door fully open.

Oh my God.

Well, it's not my brother, that's for sure.

A literal Adonis walks into the bedroom.

I spotted him earlier when he first arrived, and he was instantly surrounded by a group of women in the corner.

I couldn't even blame them. He was the type of handsome that it was impossible to play it cool around, the kind of handsome you make a fool of yourself over, the type of handsome that you just know is plastered over someone’s walls or Pinterest board, and they just look at it every time and sigh, because being with a guy like that is just really fucking unrealistic.

He has blonde hair, windswept and sparkling blue eyes that look like he just heard a joke.

Of course, I can’t see them right now because he’s not looking at me yet, but I studied them extensively when he looked down at one of the women hanging onto his arm.

She was saying something, and he smiled indulgently, his eyes twinkling as he did.

I swear I saw her swoon.

Hell, I swooned too, and that smile wasn’t even directed at me. Not to mention that body. He’s just wearing a simple T-shirt and jeans, but it clings to every curve of his muscles, his powerful thighs, and complements the oozing power and raw masculinity in his aura.

Yeah, I'm way out of my depth here. No way I can play fun, Chelsea, in front of this guy. I'll make a fool of myself, and he'll instantly see me for the fraud that I am.

If I had any brain cells left, I would duck to the side or hide under the bed so he doesn’t see me. Or I would simply walk out of this bedroom entirely to keep from making a fool of myself. But I don’t do that. For some reason, I can’t get my legs to work. Hell, I can barely get myself to breathe.

And then he looks around, humming lightly under his breath, probably looking for something.

Either way, his eyes fall on me. And they flare open.

I don’t know what that means.

My brain's not working at max capacity right now, so I don’t know if flaring of the eyes is a good thing or a bad thing, not until a sultry smile spreads across his lips.

It's the smile that gets me.

It awakens something feminine within, and now I have butterflies bouncing in my belly.

“Well, hello,” he says, his voice deep and honeyed. “I don’t think I’ve seen you at all this afternoon.”

I laugh nervously, and it’s a little higher and tighter than my typical laugh. “That’s because I’ve been hiding out here.”

“What’s happening in here?”

“Nothing, just…” Having an existential crisis after being abandoned by my brother and then realizing that a crowd of drunk strangers has never been, and will never be, my scene.

Except I don’t want to leave either because then I'll go home and cry all night into my Pinot Grigio, which will then make things more awful than they are now.

I don't want to tell him any of that boring, painful real-life stuff. I'm still trying for fun-Chelsea, so I attune my brain to what she would say if she were caught in her brother's bedroom at a party.

“Just thinking about how I’m going to lure you away from your harem out there."

Oh God. Oh God, oh God, oh God. Why did I just say that?

“Harem?” His voice dips in amusement, and I gird myself against just what it does to me. I have to keep playing it cool. I already started this, so I can't just stop now.

In for a penny, in for a pound. "Yeah, you heard me."

He chuckles. "If you’re talking about the women I was chatting with, most of them are good friends.”

“Oh, I bet," I cross my hands over my chest, cock my hip to the side, and ask, "And how do I become a good friend too?”

My voice doesn't shake, though inside, I’m screaming. Am I actually flirting with him right now? Is that actually what I’m doing? I cannot believe myself. What the hell has come over me?

But for some reason, I'm pulling it off. He's buying it. He's not laughing in my face at least, and there's definitely some interest simmering in his eyes, sparking a thrill through my entire body.

This is actually kind of fun. Why have I never flirted with a hot stranger before?

"Well, it won't be too hard for a woman like you,” he says, and he's definitely flirting back. His voice dips several octaves, and his eyes drip down my body, slowly, languorously lingering around my hips.

Yeah, I'm being objectified right now, maybe that's exactly what I want.

Hell, I'm objectifying him pretty hard too.

"Are you sure?" I start walking toward him, because apparently a demon has taken control of my body, and I don't stop until I'm standing right in front of him. “What if I want it hard, though?"

I swear I feel him hardening.

I manage to keep my eyes on his face, but I feel a movement down there regardless, one that lets me know how much he's packing.

And I almost think I'm delusional because it feels like a lot.

His smile grows, and his eyes now rest on my lips. He's into it. Oh God, somehow I'm doing it, seducing him, and I'm not fumbling. Am I going to kiss him?

I want to kiss him so badly I can almost taste it.

He has really kissable lips, a tad on the wide side, but inviting regardless. And his eyes sear through me, making my breath scatter in my chest.

I've never kissed a stranger before.

Never flirted with one, either.

But it looks like I'm doing it now.

He's leaning forward slowly, giving me enough time to back away if this isn't what I want.

I appreciate the consideration, but I don't need it. And I let him know I don't need it by wrapping my hand around his neck and drawing him forward, shivering with lust as a heavy, muscular arm wraps around my waist and draws me forward for his lips.

Suddenly, a creak echoes throughout the room as the door opens once more.