Carrying the Billionaire's Baby (Breeding Erotic Romance) (2 page)

“Again,” Ms. Brook said.
“Thank you all so very much for coming. And I remind you all that
discretion is the better part of valor. But my last selection will
be…” She turned and trailed a finger over the remaining circle of
naked women surrounding her. “You, Ms. O’Connor.”

The old woman’s long,
boney finger pointed at me.

I was stunned. I couldn’t
believe it. She had pointed at
me
. Me! April O’Connor, the plain
jane girl from nowhere. And now I was about to be ushered in to
meet with a billionaire?

I didn’t know what to say.
I had spent some time this morning going over answers to probable
questions. I knew exactly what to say about my family health
history, my education, my skills and interests. But now the game
was different. There was no way to prepare for this.

Ms. Brook handed the three
of us heavy, thick robes, which we wrapped around ourselves
gratefully. The cold in the penthouse had made our nipples hard and
erect, and it felt good to envelop my naked body in warmth
again.

The old woman left for a
moment, heading through ornate double doors to the other wing of
the penthouse. The three of us selected made awkward small talk
when she was gone. I learned that the blonde girl’s name was
Samantha. She was younger than me, a student at the local college
whose parents had fallen on hard times. She would have to drop out
unless she managed to make extra money.

The striking Asian girl,
Karen, had a similar story. She was in her early 30s and had come
to the United States from the Philippines with her mother when she
was just a girl. Now her father back home was sick, and the family
desperately needed money to bring him overseas.

We were all different, I
realized, surveying their faces, half buried in their robes, but we
had one thing in common: we were desperate.

Samantha went in first,
vanishing through the double doors. Karen and I sat in silence for
more than twenty minutes as we waited. Finally, Ms. Brook returned,
without Samantha, and called Karen’s name.

I spoke despite myself.
I’ve always had a problem with asking questions even when I know
I’m not supposed to. “Where’s Samantha?” I asked, as Ms. Brook put
her hand on Karen’s shoulder and started directing her through the
doors.

“Hm,” said Ms. Brook,
eying me suspiciously. “Please wait your turn, Ms.
O’Connor.”

That’s all she said. Then
the proper woman and Karen left through the doors, leaving me all
alone.

I sank into the robe,
glancing around the room. My eyes fell on the elevator and I
thought about leaving. My clothes were gone, though. I don’t know
when that happened, but someone must have come along and scooped
them up when we were talking to Ms. Brook. The robe was all I had.
Still, I considered leaving — figuring it all out later. But some
force held me in my seat in the penthouse. Something compelled me
to stay.

Another twenty minutes
passed and the doors open again. Ms. Brook didn’t say anything, her
face betraying no sign of emotion. I knew what she wanted. I got up
and walked toward hers.

“Smile, girl,” said Ms.
Brook as we walked into the room. “This is a grand
opportunity.”

The doors closed behind us
heavily.

The soft robe clung to my
naked body. Ms. Brook led me down a corridor and through another
set of heavy doors that opened with a soft
clang
. The room in the back of the
penthouse was dimly light — our shadows tumbled across the floor.
Giant picture windows lined two of the walls of the room, offering
incredible views of the city at dusk. On the horizon, tiny cars
streamed across the bridge, their headlights like orderly
fireflies.

“Mr. Atherstone,”
announced Ms. Brook. I couldn’t see who she was talking to. In one
of the corners of the room sat a big oak desk and, behind it, there
was a high-back leather chair. But it was turned away, so that I
couldn’t see who occupied it.

“Yes, Ms. Brook,” came a
response from the chair. “Is this the third candidate?”

“Yes. May I present to you
Ms. April O’Connor.”

My heart was racing and my
palms sweaty. I wanted to sink even further into the robe and hide
myself from the world. I don’t know how I got to be so nervous. All
of this was so strange. So hard to understand. But I knew there was
no turning back.

The chair swivelled around
to face us. And my eyes caught the eyes of Alexander Atherstone for
the very first time.

He was a striking man.
Younger than I anticipated. Maybe mid-40s, but he could have passed
for a man in his 30s. He kept his dark hair short atop his head,
and he had blue eyes that seemed to glow even in his dimly-lit
office. He wore a perfectly-cut navy blue suit, with golden
cufflinks. His skin was perfect, save for one soft, jagged scar
that was just barely evident on the left side of his
face.

He didn’t
smile.

“Ms. O’Connor,” he said.
“Come and sit.”

My heart was still racing
as I approached the desk and sat in the chair in front of him.
There was just the one seat, which made me think about Ms. Brook —
but the old woman had left the room. It was just me and Mr.
Atherstone.

I tried not to forget
myself, despite the anxiety I was feeling. “Mr. Atherstone, it’s so
nice to meet you,” I tried. “It’s —“

He raised a finger to
silence me.

“It’s okay, Ms. O’Connor.
I know this has all been very strange for you. Ms. Brook insisted
on doing this her way. And her ways are… unorthodox, to say the
least. But she’s been my advisor in business since she first
started as my secretary twenty years ago, and she has never steered
me wrong. I hope you understand.”

He paused, waiting for a
response. I just nodded.

“Good,” he said, forcing a
half-smile. “This is my situation, April. I very badly want to be a
father.. I once had plans to make that happen. Those plans changed
very abruptly. I hope you won’t ask questions about
that.”

I had
so
many questions. How do plans to
start a family change abruptly? What was he referring to? I made a
mental note to Google this later. And then I nodded
again.

“Right,” he went on. “I
have spent the last five years of my life looking for something.
And I haven’t found it. And so you’re here today. Let me be blunt,
Ms. O’Connor. I want to be a father. But I don’t want to indulge in
test tubes or plastic cups. I have always been old fashioned that
way.”

Thoughts ran through my
mind. No plastic cups, no test tubes, but then that’d
mean…

“I said I’d be blunt, Ms.
O’Connor. So here it is: this is not a normal surrogacy
arrangement. I want to put my child inside of you. I want to make
love to you and impregnate you.”

My jaw must have dropped
through the floor. I couldn’t believe what I had just heard. This
man — this fabulously wealthy man who could have anything or anyone
he ever wanted — was telling me he wanted to make love to me?
Impregnate me?

“I know this is a
surprise. I suspect it might be overwhelming. So here’s the offer.
There’s a contract in front of you.” He flipped over a file folder
on the desk between us. “Read it. It’s a simple arrangement. You
agree and you walk out of this office with a cheque for $25,000. We
make love for the first time, here, now, and then again every day
until you are with child. I will cover all your expenses during the
pregnancy, including rent and proper food. I will provide you with
all necessary medical care and monitoring. Only the finest
available, of course. I have reviewed your tests and know your
fertility is good.”

I interjected, despite
myself. “You have? Um, how? I’ve never been tested…”

He gave me that half-smile
again. When he smiled, it was easier to see the scar on his face.
“I think you’ll find I’m a very well-connected man, Ms.
O’Connor.”

Right,
I thought.
There’s probably nothing
he can’t get access to.

“Upon successful delivery
of the child, then,” he continued, “you’ll be given another cheque
for $25,000. And then our arrangement will be
discontinued.”

He pushed the file folder
closer to my side of the desk, and lay a silver pen on top of
it.

“Take all the time you
need to review the agreement,” he said, standing up from the chair
and walking toward the door. “Oh, but one more thing, Ms. O’Connor
— you are to agree to complete and total confidentiality. No one,
not even close friends and family, can know about our arrangement.
If you require cover, we can provide documents and photos
indicating that you are acting as surrogate for Harold and Judith
Greenfield. He’s a marketing executive. She’s a schoolteacher.
They’re lovely, I’m told.”

“You’re told?” I asked
quietly, not able to hold my tongue.

He half-smiled at me again
from the doorway to the office. “You ask a lot of questions, Ms.
O’Connor. I like that.”

He stepped into the
hallway and pulled the door closed behind him. “Again,” he said, as
he disappeared. “Take all the time you need.”

Thoughts bounced back and
forth in my head as I tried to take stock of the situation. But it
was all too crazy to process. The richest man in town had just…
propositioned me. But this wasn’t about
sex
, was it? He seemed sincere about
wanting a child more than anything else. But if the child was what
was important to him, why insist on… impregnating me?

And more than that,
why
me?
Why all
this process with Ms. Brook and the other girls? He’s Alexander
Atherstone — he could go out and find a girl who would jump at the
chance to marry him and his billions of dollars in a
heartbeat.

I just couldn’t find a way
to have it make any sense. It was all just too much to
take.

I let my eyes pass over
the contract he had left on the desk, but the dense legalese was
too much for me. I wondered if I should call my lawyer, but then
realized that: a) that would be a super awkward thing to talk to a
lawyer about, and b) I don’t have a lawyer.

I hung my head and let my
long hair fall over my face, smiling despite myself.
How do you always end up in these kinds of
situations, April?
I wondered.

There was a knock at the
door. I jumped and sat up straight instinctively. I hadn’t expected
Mr. Atherstone back so soon.

“Um, come in,” I said
softly, and the door creaked open.

It wasn’t him, though. It
was her.

Ms. Brook had this
incredibly proper way about her. She stepped so softly on her
incredibly long legs that it was almost as if she floated into the
room. She carried her arms crossed across her chest. Her severe
tied-back hair and impeccable make-up gave the impression that she
cared very much about her appearance but thought little of it. For
her — for this woman who must have been sixty but still looked
radiant — carrying yourself like a proper lady was the natural
thing to do. The obvious thing.

“Ms. O’Connor,” she said
as she approached. “Have you signed the document?”

“No,” I admitted, casting
my eyes to the contract on the desk. “Mr. Atherstone said I could
have some time to think about it.”

Ms. Brook coughed
politely. “And so you shall have it. But if I might give you some
advice, dear, I’d say this: sign it. Don’t do it for yourself.
Don’t do it for the money. Do it for him.”

“For him?” I asked. “But
he’s a man who has everything.”

She stepped closer to me,
putting a soft hand on my shoulder.

“Almost everything,” she
corrected. “And as someone who has known Alexander — Mr. Atherstone
— since he was a young man, I can tell you with confidence that he
is a man that
deserves
everything. And you, my girl, are tonight in a position to
give him that.”

I thought back to the
conversation I had with Mr. Atherstone. I thought about the way he
had expressed his desire. I thought about his sad eyes when he said
the words “I very badly want to be a father.” To
be a father
.

And I’d be, what, a
mother? No. That’s not what this is about. I’d just leave. With
enough rent money for the rest of the year. Enough to move
on.

I should have said no, by
all rights. There was a million reasons to say no. But then I
looked up at Ms. Brook, hand still on my shoulder, and the urgency
in her eyes. And I thought of Mr. Atherstone and the words he had
used.
I very badly want to be a
father.
And I thought about my life, and
how purposeless I had felt. And I thought about how maybe this —
weird as it seemed — might be a chance to finally do something that
matters. This was my chance to do something important.

And so I picked up the
silver pen and slowly wrote my name on the bottom of the
contract.

When I finished, I turned
back to Ms. Brook.