To Professor, With Love (Forbidden Men 2)

“Should we answer it for him?” Quinn was the first to ask.

I spread my arms. “And say what? Sorry, but your man can’t come to the phone right now; he just found out he’s going to be a daddy...to another woman.”

Ham winced and shut his mouth. I glanced at Aspen. She lifted her brows as if telling me she’d support any decision I made. But I didn’t answer the phone, and it finally fell silent. The room exhaled a collective breath of relief.

Until the phone started ringing again.

“I have a feeling she’s going to keep calling,” Pick said. “She must know something’s up.”

Damn it. I glanced toward Aspen again. Her steady green gaze gave me the boost I needed to pick up the phone. I pushed Accept, still wondering what to say to Lowe’s woman, when Ten shouted, “Shit! Are you really going to tell her some old chick just came in, claiming Lowe knocked her up?”

“Say what?” a girl’s voice screeched from the other end of the line.

Double shit. Panicking, I punched the End Call button and glared at my roommate.

“You moron,” Pick exploded, slapping Ten on the back of the head. “He’d already answered the phone; she probably heard everything you said.”

“Oh...fuck.” Ten hunkered his shoulders and sent me an apologetic cringe. “My bad.”

“You mean, Lowe’s bad,” I muttered. “Damn it.” I shouldn’t have tried to answer the phone.

When it rang again, I jumped, set it back where I’d found it, then lifted my hands and backed away slowly. Lowe was going to kill me for this.

Mason didn’t return to the bar until after the phone had stopped again. No one had seemingly moved, so when he exited the back hall, rubbing his face, we all turned to stare. He was busy wiping the back of his hand across his mouth and didn’t immediately notice all the attention until he glanced up. When he caught us gawking, however, he jerked to a stop and dropped his arm.

His face was still pale and his skin looked damp as if he’d sweated out a bucket of anxiety. “What?” he croaked, his eyes darting fearfully to each of us. “Jesus, she’s not gone, is she?”

“Um,” I started and tossed him an apologetic grimace. “No, she’s gone, but...uh, we might’ve just...accidentally told your girlfriend what happened.” When he merely blinked, I cleared my throat. “Your phone rang...and then it rang again. I was only going to let her know you were away for a minute, but...yeah...sorry, man.”

Lowe dashed around the counter to swipe up his phone. After fumbling in his haste to dial, he pressed it to his ear. “Reese?”

“Let me guess,” a muffled female voice spoke from the entrance of the club. “Mrs. Garrison just showed up to announce you’d put a baby in her.”

I lifted my face to see the picture of the girl off Lowe’s phone step inside Forbidden, followed by a blonde, who was also very pregnant.

Damn, how many women had Lowe put a baby in?

Dropping his phone to his side, Lowe let out a lengthy sigh. “Yeah. Pretty much.”

After a quick glance between the two, I decided Lowe wasn’t going to get beaten to a bloody pulp for his transgressions. He looked like shit with his apologetic puppy dog eyes and his expression a mask of shame and regret. But other than the tensing of her jaw, his girl didn’t look like she wanted to kill him.

I glanced at Aspen, wondering what she’d do if we found ourselves in the same predicament. Though we kind of already had, hadn’t we, when she’d assumed Caroline had been one of my party girls. And no...no, she hadn’t been very forgiving. Lowe’s Reese looked pissed, but she remained rational.

“I had a feeling we hadn’t gotten rid of her so easily.” Reese stormed forward, her pregnant friend trailing behind her. Stopping next to Quinn, she set her hands on the countertop and let out a world-weary sigh. “I say, if a stake through the heart doesn’t work, we try cutting her head off.”

While everyone else gaped at her as if she’d lost it, Lowe actually laughed. He approached and took her hands in his so he could lift them to his mouth and kiss them reverently. Falling serious, he said, “I am so...so sorry.”

Tears glistened in her eyes, but she tried to shrug it off. “Hey, if there isn’t some insurmountable obstacle in our path, we wouldn’t be us, would we?”

Lowe shook his head and kept her hands by his mouth. “You shouldn’t have to deal with this.” He drew in a deep, shaky breath. “You shouldn’t—”

“I think she was lying,” the pregnant blonde spoke up, breaking him off. After tossing her hair over her shoulder, she slid onto the stool next to Reese and reached for bowl of beer nuts, but Pick snagged them away before she could

reach them.

When she sliced him a dirty look, he merely winked. “Let me get you a fresh batch, Tinker Bell. Who knows what kind of filthy fingers have been in these all night.”

Her mouth fell open as she watched him jump over the bar and toss the old bowl, only to pull up the box and sprinkle out a new pile, just for her. Then he slid it toward her with an indulgent smile.