Page 97 of Playboy

It takes all my willpower not to fling myself back in my chair and growl. Those are the words I’ve repeated time and again. He hears them from a man one fucking time, and suddenly, they’re brilliant. “What else did mybrilliant boyfriendsay?”

Jasper smirks. “He told us that if we didn’t respect the mother of his child, we’d be dealing with him from now on.”

My panties practically incinerate on the spot. Oh, that is so inappropriate when I’m sitting across from the fucking bane of my existence. “He saidwhat?”

Jasper leans forward. “Kid’s in love with you. You know that, right? Don’t fuck this up.”

I ignore that little dig because it’s way too on the nose. “I’m going to need you to repeat what he said, verbatim.”

I have a feeling I’ll be using it to get myself off during the next away stretch. Holy shit. I’ve never wanted to be anyone’s mother, but god, being the mother of Daniel’s child…yeah, that’s hot.

“He asked us what we thought of you. We all agree you’re awesome. The best. That’s when he made his first good point.” He scratches at the back of his neck. “He said we’re doing a shit job of showing you that, and if we respected you at all, we’d clean up our act. And then, like I said, he glared at all of us—practically made Leggs shit a brick—and said, if we didn’t respect the mother of his child—then he smacked his fist to his hand like this”—Jasper mimics the move—“we’d be dealing with him.”

Yeah, just as hot the second time. Would it be weird to ask Daniel to recreate the moment? Maybe stand over me and smack his fist into his hand as he demands respect for the mother of his child?

Oh god, the heroine of my work in progress should be pregnant, shouldn’t she? Is this hot? Do I think this is hot? Yeah, I really think it is.

“You’ve got to go.” I open up my laptop, and my hands fly over the keys. I don’t hear him leave. I don’t hear anything except the click-clacking of the keyboard as the story flows from my fingers.

“If we ever go threemonths without a girls’ brunch again, I’m going to revolt,” Lennox says as she holds up her drink.

“I’ll drink to that.” Sara taps her glass against Lennox’s and eyes me.

“I’m not the only one who’s pregnant.” I point at Ava. “She probably gave it to me.”

She giggles, green eyes sparkling. “It’s not contagious.”

“Maybe pregnancy isn’t, but you were walking around talking about your sex god of a husband, and I got so horny I fucked her”—I throw a thumb in Millie’s direction—“brother.”

Daniel’s twin gags, and I wink at her. I love us so much.

“Speaking of sex gods.” Sara grins. “I heard a certain daddy threatened the baseball players last night.”

I hiss out a breath. “Yeah, as head of PR, letting him handle it was definitely not the best move I’ve made.”

Sara cackles. “I’ve been using Brooks to do my dirty work for years. Why shouldn’t you?”

Millie nods. “My brother needs to be good for something.” She rolls her eyes. “Something that doesn’t involve his dick, atleast.” With a groan, she drops her head back. “Did I just say that out loud? Hannah, look what you’re doing to me!”

I giggle. “But seriously, I should have handled it myself. It sucks being interrupted in the middle of the night, but that’s the job. I deal with emergencies. Even if I’m fucking over telling the imbeciles not to use their fists to have conversations—or their dicks.”

“Ugh, so true,” Sara agrees. “But I’m serious. You did yourself a favor by allowing Daniel to chat with them. Guys are annoying in that they only listen to other dudes.”

“Right?” I throw my hands up. “Jasper literally showed up in my office today and yammered on about how, when Daniel said they represent the city of Boston and that they’re doing a piss-poor job of it, it really stuck with him. Um, I say that all the time.”

Lennox licks her lips. “It’s a good thing Jasper is so freaking hot.”

Millie shrugs. “I prefer my men older.”

Sara cackles, and Ava nudges my foot. “But things are good with Daniel?”

There’s no tempering the smile that spreads across my face. I love coming home and finding him in my bed. I also love coming home and finding him playing games with Oliver. Or hanging out in the kitchen with Noah. In summation, I guess I just love coming home tohim.Rather than freak out when he declared me his girlfriend, I all but melted. I want to be his girlfriend. I want to be his anything, really. I just want to behis.

And I don’t know when that happened.

Fine. Maybe that’s not exactly true. It began the night he wandered through Walgreens at my side, searching for pregnancy tests. The sensation only grew when he didn’t freak out about how my pregnancy would affect his life. He justhandled the situation with grace and care—and in turn stopped me from freaking the fuck out.

Normally, I’m the one cleaning up messes, but despite his age and his playboy reputation, Daniel has never once made me responsible for his decisions. No, he’s constantly looking for—and finding—ways to make my life easier. It’s refreshing, and damn if it’s really hard to remain unaffected by all of it. So I’m choosing to uncomplicate things. I can accept that I’m going to fall for him, and I’m certain it will all be okay.

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