Page 68 of My Not So Wicked Boss (My Not So Wicked 3)

“His?”

“We don’t know for sure yet if it’s a boy or a girl, but Ryder swears it’s a boy. He’s already planning on coaching peewee football.”

“What’s he going to do if it’s a girl?”

Shelby placed her hand across her chest. “Mylanta, he’s going to be in heaven. That little girl will have her daddy wrapped around her finger. He’s always said he wants a little girl just like me. Isn’t that the sweetest thing?”

It really was. I was happy to know that men like him existed. Sure, it made me jealous. I mean, Shelby left Ryder without saying a word while they were engaged the first time around, and yet he still came chasing after her. As in he started a company and moved it across the country for her.

Me? I have men so desperate to not want to get involved with me they make me sign a contract. In all fairness, I agreed to it and thought it was a good idea. And maybe it was. Maybe all relationships should start that way, with clear-cut boundaries. Each one of mine would start with Aspen, you are not worth the hassle of a meaningful relationship.

I lost it. And I never lost it. Tears started spouting out of my eyes.

Shelby jumped into action and put her arms around me, smashing my head against her voluptuous chest. “Miss Aspen, sugar, what’s wrong? Did I say something?”

It wasn’t her. It was me. All me. I didn’t like feelings. This is why I had buried them. I wanted to go back to naming cockroaches after men and watching them die agonizing deaths. Look what I had been reduced to, bawling into my friend’s breasts.

Poor Chloe came out of the dressing room looking as lovely as could be in a black dress covered in floral embroidered tulle expecting her mom to be oohing and aahing over her, but all she found was her wreck of a mother.

“Mom, did something happen?”

I sat up and wiped away my tears so I could look at my girl. My beautiful, beautiful girl who was looking too grown up. I stood and wrapped her in my arms. “You happened.” I kissed her head. “You are the most wonderful thing on this planet, and you look gorgeous.”

She looked up at me with skeptical eyes. “Why are you crying?”

I tipped her chin up. “Promise me something. Promise me you will always remember your worth.”

Her nose and brows scrunched. “Um, okay.”

“I mean it,” I sniffled. “Don’t settle for anything less than being someone’s priority.”

“Mom, are you feeling all right?”

Shelby’s stare asked the same thing.

Before I could answer, I had some insult added to my injury. At least it was a good life lesson for my daughter. Bobby Jay sounded like he appeared out of thin air. All we heard was, “Marlowe, girl, get out here.”

Shelby, Chloe, and I all looked at each other before we rushed out into the main storefront area to see what was going on. There we found Bobby Jay in the middle of the boutique, dressed in his Sunday finest, a button-up shirt, jeans, and his cowboy boots, standing there like he meant business. All the patrons were staring at him wondering if perhaps they should be dialing 911. Macey darted toward the offices in the back. I assumed that’s where Marlowe was.

Shelby approached Bobby Jay. “My lands, Bobby Jay, what are you doing, disrupting my store?”

Bobby Jay’s eyes stay fixed on the backroom door. “I’m here for my girl, and I’m not leaving until she comes with me.”

Shelby beamed up at the determined man.

“Marlowe, I know you’re here, darlin’. I’ll stand here all day if I have to,” Bobby Jay hollered.

Still no Marlowe.

Bobby Jay upped his game and started singing some out-of-tune country song I’d never heard at the top of his lungs. It had something to do with him crossing his heart and true love. Chloe was giggling so hard next to me it was hard to focus on the words. Several patrons were now recording him with their phones.

Finally, Marlowe came out in a blaze of glory, her ebony hair whipping behind her, wearing a skintight dress that drove her curves like a Maserati and a stone-cold look that said she was dressed to kill.

That didn’t deter Bobby Jay. He wore a grin a mile wide. “It’s about dang time, woman.”

“I don’t want to talk to you,” Marlowe spewed.

“The heck you don’t.” Bobby Jay moved forward.

Marlowe marched closer to him, hands on her hips. “Don’t tell me what I want.”

“Well, I’ll tell you what I want. I want you. Just you.”

Marlowe’s arms dropped, along with her defenses. “No, you want children and a white picket fence.” Her voice shook with emotion.

Bobby Jay stepped near enough to take her reluctant hand. “Baby, I don’t care where we live or if we ever have children, I love you. You’re the one for me.”

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