Mine To Keep (Love By Design 7)

1

Remi

The pain in my back intensified with each table I cleared, making the following steps harder. I brushed my arm over my forehead, clearing off the droplets of sweat. Did it suddenly get warmer in here? I peeled my Easton’s Pub polo shirt out of my cleavage in a lame attempt to cool off.

Andy must have turned the heat up again. I was going to hunt down David for the key to the thermostat and then toss it in the dumpster out back. That was if my bosses weren’t fighting with each other. Both were great to me, even letting me rent a studio apartment upstairs between their floors, but to each other it was complicated. The Easton brothers were co-owners of the best little microbrewery this town had to offer, as different as night and day, and if they stopped bickering for one second, they might even notice I finally popped from a string bean to something that ate a basketball.

The cramps wrapped around my body, making my belly tighten like a vice grip into a hard little boulder. I leaned over a moment and took a breath to steady myself, letting my hand drop down over the mound, feeling the little foot kick low. I rubbed the spot, hoping to settle the movement down. The sound system played a cheesy pop song circa 1998, well before my time. Despite the pain shifting in my body, the movement felt better than getting pummeled by the tiny human inside me. Brittany Spears sang from her album, Baby One More Time, and the lyrics mimicked my body’s reaction over and over, stretching and pushing at my swollen abdomen.

Breathe.

There was no other option.

Braxton Hicks were no joke.

Resuming my wipe down of the table, shaking my hips out, I groaned, reaching the far corner of whatever had been spilled there. How was it possible to get liquor embedded in the cracks like this? I scrubbed with as much elbow grease as I could, removing the sticky stain off the polished wood. My belly pressed against the countertop, reminding me of how short my arms were with each pathetic reach to scrub the stain. The doctor at the campus clinic warned me to take it easy, but that simply wasn’t possible. Time was of the essence, and I had rent to pay and things to buy with three more months or less to go of this pregnancy. I was lucky I was able to get my deposit back for the class I was taking. The Health Services Department on campus hadn’t caught up on my withdrawal yet, and I needed the free student medical care as much as I did the tuition money for a class I couldn’t make, having to work extra shifts as of late. I was so exhausted, even the pain from the cramps dulled because my body simply didn’t have the energy to feel.

Numbness was a blessing in disguise.

“Hey, Remi, you need”—the man behind me cleared his throat—“any help with that bucket of dishes?” I turned, smiling at my boss Andy. He was clean-cut, kind of preppy in a hipster way, and one of the nicest guys I’d ever met. Considering my luck with men, that said a lot these days. It was my glowing recommendation for saint hood, or husbandry to the girl who would eventually snag Andy’s heart. From the rumors I’d heard, his first love really did a number on him, running away after the wedding. She must have been stupid or foolish, and I hated her for ruining a good guy when there were so few of them left for us regular girls out there.

“I’m good, boss, almost finished here.” I turned back to my table, hiding the grimace on my face. I knew if I said yes, Andy would rush over to help me and leave the bar unstaffed. I didn’t see David down there doing what he did best, which was Andy’s description of lurking. He must have been in the back office, doing invoices or trying to not maim Andy. Earlier, they’d argued over computers and technical stuff that was better left to David to handle. Andy was the creative beer brewer, and David was the OCD genius, putting the tedious paperwork together in computer codes, and programs way above my paygrade. You really didn’t want to see the chaos of the back office.

Praying this night wasn’t going to last much longer, I shuffled around with just a few more things to do. Filling salt shakers and sugar packets on the tables was last. Then I could head upstairs to my little apartment and rest my swollen feet for the night. I would still hear the music until closing time, but it was fainter, and I had a feeling that was thanks to one or both of my overprotective bosses. Each step was agony, but I forced myself forward, cleaning up my section.

After wiping a drip of sweat off my forehead with my arm again, I reached for the bucket but found large hands gripped the sides, pulling it off my table. “Hey, Andy….” My eyes darted upward, finding Evan Rooney had robbed the bucket from me like a ninja, smiling. “That’s my job you

know.” Straightening my back relieved another ache temporarily, and I crossed my arms over my ever-blossoming chest.

Thankfully, my interloper wasn’t looking at my breasts. My cheeks flamed and the temperature in there only seemed to escalate the longer I was in his presence. I could huff and puff all I wanted, but Evan wouldn’t give the bucket back. He held the sides easily with his large hands, and the tattoos starting at his wrists flexed, making my mouth water. I didn’t know for certain, but I assumed his arms were full sleeves of tattoos under his tight-fitting shirts. The things he did for arm porn were sinful.

Uh oh…here goes another wave of hormone induced horniness I can’t turn off. Images of ripping his shirt off with my super-human strength ran marathons in my brain. Luckily, my physical exhaustion these days kept me in check from acting out on my foolish impulses. I was a momma bear on crack and probably the deadliest apex predator on the planet until I gave birth.

It was a shame, I could barely get myself off, but mostly because my short arms couldn’t maneuver to my girl parts with this baby in the way. My breasts hurt, engorged like heavy sandbags begging to be petted. My core clenched in something other than a Braxton Hicks contraction and flooded my cotton underwear. It was embarrassing to have these visceral reactions and nothing to abate them with. My whimper probably echoed inside the still-busy crowd of the bar to the beat of another nineties tune. If I were a crazy woman, I might have chased Evan to the parking lot and mauled him behind the dumpster. See…even my fantasies had a bizzaro twist I couldn’t control. I was starting to look like I ate a baby, and there I was hungry for poor Officer Rooney. The temptation to commit a crime, any crime so he could handcuff me was pathetic, but if I was tied up, then maybe I wouldn’t have to hold back every time he got within three feet of me.

But that was part of Evan’s appeal. He was beautiful. Handsome. The perfect gentleman. Had I not been jaded by the man before him, I might have hopped, skipped, and leaped at the opportunity to be with a guy like Evan Rooney—if he reciprocated my feelings in the least, but I doubted he noticed me at all.

This man was tall and thickly muscled from his days playing football and later attending the police academy. Intricate patterns of tattoos curled up and around his neck from what I could see peeking under the collar of his shirt that begged to be traced with my fingers. He wore his hair short, but you could tell it would be thick if he let it grow out. I wondered how soft the bristles would feel against my fingertips. Evan felt a bit like a unicorn for me. He was stable and honest and for a myriad of reasons well above me and my hot mess of a life.

He cleared his throat. “I don’t mind helping, Remington.” Gah! The way he said my name, long and drawled out like he cherished me, had me wanting to sink below the table into a puddle of goo. Bless his heart. There I was foolishly pregnant, barely not a teen mom, and a hot, soupy mess of hormones.

I had to get my head together, or he would know I was fawning over him. “Um, Evan?” I peered up into his deep blue eyes. Yeah, I was screwed. The attempt at a five finger show later tonight wouldn’t do much to calm the wild horses in my pants. I hadn’t had a good jilling since I’d found myself knocked up, and the stress would either make my eyes cross or induce labor in the coming months I had left.

“Remi?” Our eyes met for a second, my face heating up. God, could it have gotten any hotter in this dang bar? Heat. Heat. Heat. That’s all I felt these days brewing my own mini sauna, cooking this child. I shook off the temptation, the “should nots” and the “can’ts” as sweat gathered between my breasts, sliding down under my shirt, tickling me. Thank God for black cotton and dim lights.

“Can I have that now?” I tugged on the bucket, and we both stared at my smaller hands attempting to dislodge his larger ones, feebly. Evan took a step forward and I a step back. He was close enough to box me into the small space. I could smell his cologne. Sharp, almost tangy but mellowed out with hints of vanilla and a wooded musk that made me shivery, given our new proximity.

“No.” He leaned in, saying the word like he meant something else. What that was I couldn’t say because his face got closer, and I shut my eyes, picturing myself anywhere but there and certainly not weeks away from giving birth to my baby. Were these pregnancy hormones? I kept thinking if he got just an inch closer, I could pretend to fall and somehow our lips would meet, maybe touch accidentally and that would be it.

“Remington.” Evan made my name sound growly and impatient this time. What had I done? Clearing the bucket of glasses and small appetizer plates was my job, but he sounded irritated I was even doing it.

I gulped back a response. “Andy needs that bucket in the back. For the dishwasher, since you’ve got it and all.” My eyes squinted with the bar lights blinding me a second as I gave up my stronghold on the bucket after all. Some wars were better fought surrendering and then regrouping. I slung the table rag over my shoulder, side-stepping him so I could get out of the corner. Evan wasn’t going to give up the bucket, and I didn’t want to embarrass myself by dropping it or falling back on my rounder, wider ass, feeling like a fool. I’d likely end up flopping around just like last winter when I tried ice skating with friends and couldn’t get myself up off the ice. I slid around for a good five minutes, helpless. Even standing, that’s how I felt now helplessly sliding around, arms and legs flailing without purchase.

Evan grunted and side-stepped around me, ignoring me.

“I’ll take that back to Andy,” he said, walking away with the bin to the kitchen, leaving me to stare open-mouthed at his jean-clad ass. He easily hauled the dishes away while I shamelessly stared at him from behind. Refilling the salt and pepper shakers seemed like a joke.

Honestly, I was grateful he took it from me; darn thing was getting heavier with each table I cleared from the plates and silverware. Even if Easton’s had a limited pub menu during Happy Hour, it was a popular place to come between the college kids and the regulars who never left town. I was lucky the tips were good for someone who didn’t have very many skills outside of a high school diploma and a few college courses.

I finished cleaning my tables, but my mind kept going back to Evan. Sexy Officer Evan Rooney. One of the local New Paltz town cops. He typically came in after his day shifts for a meal and a beer if he had the following day off. Shamelessly, I knew his rotating schedule better than my own. Every two weeks I knew which days to beg Andy for extra shifts. I couldn’t stop my brain from revisiting his broad shoulders with inked sleeves on each arm that I secretly longed for him to wrap me up in. Of course I knew this was all a pipe dream. Who wanted a girl knocked up with some other guy’s baby?

Besides, our ship sailed months ago when he cornered me in the bar hallway, kissing me soundly. His large hands made the rounds of my skinny body then. He wouldn’t want the swollen version of me now and clearly that kiss in the darkened corner of the bar hadn’t meant much because he seemed to have forgotten about it just as quickly as it occurred. I’d be better off taking the secret of my first kiss, yes, my first real kiss to the grave. If Evan could pretend all was well and normal, then so could I.

For all the rumors about Evan’s playboy ways and having slept with my sort of friend Kristen, I knew nothing could ever happen between us. Well, not because of Kristen. That ship sailed long ago for those two, but more because I was about to pop a mini human, and no single man in his prime without baggage wanted that. I was currently sporting the, “I swallowed an alien” look and it was far from pretty.

Attending a few parenting workshops at the hospital and Planned Parenthood dropped a few warnings that I would never sleep again and to rest while I had the chance. I should have been more afraid of the warnings that I could kiss any dreams I had out the door once my demanding, no longer symbiotic being, exited my body right up there with a functional vagina. Seriously, if they gave these kind of talks to girls much sooner, I might not have ended up starry-eyed and in this predicament.

Screaming, pooping DNA that was so far

removed from his own? Yeah, it wasn’t happening except in my deluded mind that Evan wanted any part of me. My ex said the same when I broke the news to him. Babies required work, attention, and a level of responsibility that terrified a lot of men. The football star who swept me off my feet had promptly dumped me.

I was alone and I would be fine. That was the mantra I told myself after my Sunday morning mommy yoga sessions. I was strong. A goddess bringing forth new life and all that new-age stuff that seemed comforting for about five minutes until the panic set in. I let the defeated sigh fill my chest, weighing heavy on my heart, and moved on to the next table needing to be cleared.

2

Evan

I had an unusual fascination with my not-girlfriend’s breasts. In an effort to not be a pig like my ex-girlfriend enjoyed pointing out, I did anything but look at them. Unfortunately, that left me looking at all sorts of odd things like the tchotchkes all over the walls of Easton’s Pub. Antique growlers, pictures in black and white, and the odd amount of farm equipment bolted into the walls.

It didn’t help that Lia and Whit reminded of the not-kiss we shared months ago when I was on an atypical bender. Apparently, I’d even touched the objects of my fascination before she ran off into the kitchen like a scared cat on a hot tin roof or some other southern euphemism I googled after listening to her whisper the words against my beer-soaked lips. I felt like an idiot—one who took advantage of a sweet girl I hadn’t meant to.

So instead of making eye contact, I tried to be normal. I focused on a space beyond her shoulder and clenched my fists, fantasizing about her delightful blossoming cleavage that left me hungry and unsettled. I forced myself to hang back so I didn’t jump in her way, making her drop the glasses she grabbed off the tables. I tried to be helpful, but my dick was conversing other ideas with my brain as I observed her movements.

Little momma was more stubborn than a mule. There was also a high probability I would get kicked, telling her that. I licked my lips as she walked away and mentally berated myself for not kissing her senseless or just backing away all together, giving her the space her body language said she wanted so badly. I was an idiot. An idiot half in love with a pregnant girl who wasn’t mine.

Remi Kennedy sashayed her pert, round ass past me to another table while I held her bucket of dishes feeling gobsmacked. Yeah, that was the word I was looking for as I noticed her grimace from across the bar. When neither of her bosses, who in their defense were tending their business, did anything to stop her. I felt compelled to take the matter up myself.

She had been shaking her fine ass to a song I hadn’t heard in years. Little school girl outfits and long red-haired pigtails came to mind, the latter not so much the stuff of my adult fantasies but the former in a nice red plaid would have done me fine. Her black apron was tiny, one pocket holding her writing pad for drink orders and appetizers didn’t cover much, and the shorts she wore accentuated the cup of her cheeks, which I very, very badly wanted to touch. I swore there was a little more skin showing out from the frayed denim tonight than on previous nights that made me harder than a steel pole. Thank God for the bucket of dishes parked in my lap, hiding my straining erection. I wasn’t letting those dishes go for anything, no matter how sweetly she begged me.

Tonight, her red hair was up in messy bun, and the pale skin of her neck showed freckles skimming the delicate surface from the bridge of her nose right down past her collarbone and into her shirt. Curiosity made me wonder if the freckles trailed over her newly curvy body all over, or just down her back like faint leopard spots. I bet I could peek if I got close enough, given how short she was compared to me, but then I would have to smell her. Smelling her could be equally as dangerous.

Being tall definitely had it perks and responsibilities, and as an officer of the law, I made an oath to use my powers for good. However, the tempting thoughts of wrapping my hand around her neck in a lose hold while I pounded into her from behind in tune to the beats of my heart and the music playing from the jukebox in the corner clouded my mind. Thinking of connecting the imaginary freckles on her back with my tongue dried my mouth, and I stopped myself from chugging my beer down. Damn, I was kind of a pervert, or maybe I was overthinking things. I didn’t know.

“Um, Evan?” I hadn’t realized she’d been talking to me until she tugged on the bucket I held. She could beg prettily, pout her kissable lips, but no way in hell was I giving up my armor. This dick of mine might scare her off the way it was standing proud and loud tonight.

“Remi?” I stared into her green eyes, which held me captive, waiting for her next words.

“Can I have that now?” She tugged on the bucket, her bottom lip half bitten, and stupidly I looked down, unrelenting in my grasp. She kept a gentle tug going but I held it firm.

“No.” I didn’t have anything else intelligent or otherwise to say. I wanted her to tug other things inappropriately, but I kept that to myself. Despite her rounded state, her clear, beguiling eyes said she wasn’t experienced in the ways of men.

“But Andy needs that bucket in the back.” Pouting all night would get her nowhere. I didn’t care if she begged me, which I knew she wouldn’t. Remi would huff and puff and walk away first than fight with me. Her face had a pinched look to it like she hadn’t been sleeping. I wasn’t giving the damn bucket to her, but I would be taking this up with Andy and David to find her something else to do at the bar for work or at least giving her better hours.