A Baby For The Billionaire (7 page)

Alicia breathed a sigh of relief at
the news that Chase wasn’t at home—and she couldn’t help but wonder
if she was the reason for his bad mood. She really hoped so,
because he’d certainly made her mood blacker than it had been in a
long time.

She pushed him out of her mind and set
about her daily duties, polishing furniture, mopping floors and
cleaning windows. By the end of the day she was exhausted and her
back was killing her, but at least she’d been too busy to think
about Chase bloody Carter—at least not much.

Unfortunately, Alicia’s
respite was interrupted at the end of the day as she walked up the
stairs to her room, only to meet Chase halfway down them. She felt
her heart sink and her blood pressure rise as she saw him.
So much for him being away for a few
days
, she thought bitterly.

They both paused as they drew closer,
coming to a stop just a couple of steps apart. Alicia hadn’t a clue
what to say, but Chase had no such problem. “Alicia,” he nodded his
head formally as he said her name, “I understand that you went to
visit your mother for a few days. I trust that she is
well?”

Alicia had never told Chase about her
mother’s health. There had never been a reason to, and quite
frankly it was none of his damned business anyway. “She’s fine,
thank you.” If he could be formal then so could she. And if he
could act as though nothing had happened between them, then she
would do that as well. She might want to rant and rave and tell the
world what a sleaze he was, but at the end of the day it was her
word against his, and who was going to believe a college dropout
and glorified house cleaner over a millionaire
businessman?

She felt a little gratified when she
noticed the confused expression that flitted across his face before
he could hide it. He had obviously been expecting her to confront
him in some way over what had happened between them, but there was
no way that Alicia was going to give him that
satisfaction.

“Good. I’m glad to hear that.” He
stepped to one side with his back against the banister of the grand
staircase, obviously moving so that she could go past him. “Have a
good evening, Alicia.”

She walked past him and continued at
the stairway with her head held high. “Oh, I will.” She said
nothing more, but in her mind she railed against him.

Alicia made it to her bedroom and
closed the door behind her, resting against it for a second before
making her way to the bed and collapsing down onto the edge of it.
She was glad she didn’t have to go anywhere else, because she
didn’t think that her legs would be able to hold her up any longer.
Her stomach was in knots and she was shaking like a leaf; she felt
as though she might throw up at any minute.

She rubbed her aching
temples with her fingers, cursing the headache that had hit from
nowhere. She really didn’t know how long she would be able to carry
on working here, but for now she had no option but to at least
try.
You’re just going to have to pretend
that it never happened, Alicia
. Her head
was telling her something she’d already figured out, but maybe if
she had a conversation with herself she would be able to come up
with a plan of attack to help her to keep both her job and her
sanity intact.

It was a plan that seemed to work to a
certain extent over the course of the next few days. Alicia would
go about her duties during the day and head to her bedroom or go
out for the evening afterwards. She avoided Chase as much as
possible, although there were occasions when bumping into him was
inevitable. Those were the times she found the hardest to deal
with; his coldness towards her cut deep, and each time she would
spend the evening in fits of tears while the resentment inside her
slowly built up.

Thankfully, Chase seemed to be doing
the same thing that she was; avoiding her whenever possible and
only talking to her as and when he absolutely had no other option.
Not once did he bring up the events of the night they had spent
together, but not once did he look ashamed or sorry that it had
happened either—and it was the latter that Alicia was having the
hardest time coming to terms with.

She tried to put it out of her mind
completely, but finally had to admit she was failing miserably when
she started to lose weight because of the stress. She constantly
felt sick to her stomach and was sure it was the combination of
worrying about her mother and anger at her boss that was causing
it.

Of course, it would have been a lot
easier if Alicia didn’t feel anything for him. She wished that it
was just anger and resentment she felt, but if she was honest with
herself she knew the attraction she had always felt for Chase was
still very much in place, regardless of how he treated
her.

Occasionally she would catch him
looking at her in such a way that her heart would skip a beat, and
for a split second she would think that maybe, just maybe, he felt
something for her as well. But each time this happened his
expression would change in the blink of an eye to a look that could
only be interpreted as disgust.

Whatever it was that he felt for her,
there was no doubting the instant buzz of sexual attraction that
seemed to fizzle between them. It was almost palpable, and took
Alicia’s breath away on more than one occasion whenever they
happened to bump into one other.

Vanessa had come home from the detox
clinic a few days after Alicia spent the night with Chase, and the
first time Alicia saw her she thought she might die of
embarrassment and shame. She might not like the woman, but that
didn’t give her the right to sleep with her husband. Every time she
thought about what she’d done she felt physically sick and
disgusted with herself. She’d always prided herself on having good
morals, but those morals had flown out of the window for the sake
of a bottle of champagne and a night of unbridled
passion.

Just as she avoided Chase as much as
possible, Alicia found herself avoiding Vanessa too. The situation
was becoming almost too much for her to handle, and had it not been
for the fact that she needed this job so badly in order to make
sure her mom was cared for, she would have quit in a
heartbeat.

There was one positive aspect to
Vanessa’s return home; Chase avoided Alicia more than ever. Despite
being grateful for this, Alicia found herself resenting him more
and more. This was made even worse because she couldn’t stop
thinking about the night they’d spent together and how he had made
her feel when he had taken care of her sexually. Every time she
thought about it Alicia’s nipples would pucker and her clit would
throb, reminding her of how it had felt when he had had his hands
and his mouth on her.

There had been a few times when she
found herself lying in bed at night, touching herself in an attempt
to alleviate the ache he had left her with. But it didn’t matter
what she did or how hard she rubbed herself, nothing could compare
to what he had done to her, and her frustration at herself, at him
and the whole situation was driving her insane.

There was one silver lining to the
whole situation—things between Chase and Vanessa seemed to have
taken a turn for the worse, and Alicia couldn’t help but feel
smugly satisfied that everything wasn’t quite as rosy in the
marriage garden as it should have been. She knew it was petty, but
she hoped Chase was as miserable as he’d made her.

Very often Alicia would hear the two
of them arguing within the confines of their room as she made her
way to her own. Vanessa would shriek like a banshee and Chase would
respond in quieter, but still harsh tones of his own. Alicia
couldn’t hear what was actually being said, but judging by the
frosty way the two of them would greet each other at the breakfast
table in the mornings, she had a good idea that it wasn’t anything
good.

Her visits to her mom were the only
thing that kept her sane over the next few weeks, and she made sure
she spent every available day off with her. It was becoming
increasingly obvious that her mother’s health was deteriorating,
and Alicia felt a growing sense of desperation at the fact that she
still hadn’t managed to come up with any extra cash to enable her
to pay for the treatment her mom needed.

The stress of the situation was taking
a toll on Alicia’s own health, and after being sick for the fifth
day in a row she finally decided it was time she saw a doctor of
her own. She managed to get an appointment for later on that day
and was glad that she was going to get something for her nervous
stomach. She was pretty sure that an antacid would do the trick,
but she never took chances with her health—especially in light of
her mother never going to a doctor until her forties then finding
out that she was seriously ill.

She walked into the doctor’s office
feeling positive that he was going to give her something to make
her feel better. She walked out of there less than an hour later
feeling as though her whole world had just collapsed around her.
She couldn’t believe what the doctor had just told her.

Pregnant! She was going to
have a baby. She, Alicia Owens, was going to have Chase Carter’s
child. Chase Carter, her boss. Her
married
boss, at that. How could she
have been so stupid? And how the hell had she not realized she was
pregnant? All the signs had been there, for God’s sake! The weight
loss, being sick and feeling tired all the time were all classic
symptoms, and she had enough friends who had had children to know
that, so why hadn’t the penny dropped?

For that matter how had she
let it happen in the first place? She’d always be known as the
sensible one in college, the one who would always preach to her
female friends to make sure that they didn’t have unprotected
sex.
You’re not just protecting yourself
against pregnancy; you’re protecting herself against STDs as
well!
She’d said the words so often and to
so many people, and then she’d gone and done exactly what she’d
preached to them not to do; she’d had unprotected sex.

She had no one to blame but herself.
She knew she should be angry with Chase, but her body was her
responsibility. She had let herself down and now it was up to her
to figure out exactly what to do. She had some decisions to make,
but had no idea where to even begin.

CHAPTER SIX

…

Alicia made her way home in a daze,
pulling up outside the house not knowing how she’d got there. She
must have driven the car on autopilot, because she had no
recollection of starting the engine up outside the doctor’s office,
let alone navigating the busy streets.

She went straight to her room, closing
the door behind her and wishing she could shut out the world at the
same time. She sat on the edge of the bed with her head in her
hands, tears falling freely down her face as she tried to come to
terms with what the doctor had said—that a termination was still an
option for her.

Alicia had always imagined having
children, but had thought that it would be after she had married
the father, and definitely after she had seen a little something of
the world first. The best laid plans of mice, men and stupid women,
she thought ruefully, wiping away her tears with an impatient
hand.

She wondered if ending her pregnancy
could be the best thing for all concerned. Right now she didn’t
know what the best thing to do would be, but somehow she would
figure out. She had to, and sitting here feeling sorry for herself
wasn’t going to solve anything. She had to get her act together and
figure out what was going to be the best thing for everyone;
herself, her baby and her mother. She couldn’t afford to lose her
job, so she had to keep her pregnancy quiet for as long as
possible. If she lost her job she wouldn’t be able to look after
her mother or her child, and there was no way that she could let
that happen.

Of course, she could always go back to
her original idea—the one she’d had immediately after that night
with Chase. She could go to the press and tell them what had
happened, except now she would have the added little nugget that
he’d got her pregnant. She had been worried it would just be his
word against hers, but they couldn’t dispute the validity of her
statement when she had a child as proof. No one could argue with
DNA, could they?

Alicia mulled the idea over for a few
minutes before discarding it. She had her child to think of, and
some day, down the line, it was bound to come out that she had sold
to the highest paying tabloid the story of how he or she was
conceived. She didn’t want that for her baby, and she definitely
didn’t want him or her to read all about it on the
internet.

What’s more, Alicia couldn’t come to
terms with the fact that if she actually went through with it she
would also be hurting an innocent woman. While Vanessa was an utter
bitch, she didn’t deserve to find out that her husband was a lying,
cheating bastard by reading it in the newspapers. No, that option
was definitely out of the window.