Claimed by Her Web Master (Web Master #3) (6 page)

“
I
t’s going
to be a long flight,” I told Kate.

“Not a problem, boss. I’ve never been to Hawaii. I’m really looking forward to it.”

I bought first class tickets for Kate and myself. My long legs could not do coach anymore. I’d considered having Kate sit back there, but I couldn’t bring myself to be that big of a dick. I was going to need her on my side. Better to keep her happy.

Somehow I’d been left on the guest list for Shelby’s wedding. Imagine my excitement when I received my invitation in the mail, and not long after that an invitation to join a Facebook group for all the attendees with a schedule of all of the events surrounding the nuptials. I guess when your guest list numbers in the hundreds you forget to remove some people. I wasn’t foolish enough to think that Sophie actually wanted me there now, but it probably hadn’t occurred to her to ask Shelby to cross me off the list. Either that or it was a detail that slipped through the cracks.

Thanks to the access I had to the schedule, we knew where the bridesmaids would be most of the time. We had a bead on the bachelorette party, and details about the wedding. We even knew all about Shelby’s honeymoon plans for her and Bryan to hop on over to Maui for a few days.

Shelby’s security people should really be fired for letting her and her friends tell the world about their plans, but that wasn’t my concern. My only concern was Sophie and the little bundle of cells growing in her lovely tummy. I booked a room at the same hotel as the wedding party, and in order to ensure the success of the trip, I paid for Kate to accompany me. She’d been an invaluable ally to me so far, plus I’d stand out less if it looked like I was traveling with a companion. Plus, she could go places I couldn’t. Kate could hide in a bathroom stall, ask to borrow a tampon, or any number of “immediate girl bonding” things that my having a penis would disallow.

Kate also made me accountable. If she knew what I was up to I was less likely to go completely off the reservation. Yes, I’d hired myself something of a babysitter, but it was probably the one move I’d be making on this trip that my therapist might actually approve of.

The flight was uneventful, and when we arrived Kate was overjoyed when a trio of Hawaiian beauties met us at the end of the runway with floral leis they placed over our heads along with kisses for each cheek.

“Aloha!” the raven-haired beauties said in unison, and Kate would have taken a dozen selfies with them if I hadn’t shut her down.

We boarded a hotel shuttle, then checked into the hotel where Shelby’s wedding was to take place. It was a luxurious resort, and I had to give Shelby props for picking such a lovely location. The first night we attended a luau, complete with fire dancers and hula girls, along with Hawaiian music and a Don Ho impersonator singing
Tiny Bubbles
.

As we sat in our chairs I grew more and more impatient. Shelby and Sophie and the rest of her friends were supposed to be at this show. It had said so on their itinerary. Where were they?

I was dying to see if Sophie was showing yet. It had been too long since I’d seen her. I was dying for a fix.

The longer we waited, the more impatient I became.

But then there she was. My beautiful darling girl. She and her friends sat down at a table on the other side of the venue. I switch seats with Kate so that there would be no way Sophie could see me. Of course she wasn’t looking for me so that made things a lot easier. And she’d never met Kate before so there was no possibility that she would recognize her.

For the rest of the performance Kate reported back to me what Sophie and her friends were doing. It mostly consisted of drinking fruity drinks from glasses the size of fishbowls.

“She’s drinking?”

“Actually, it looks like she’s just having fruit juice. Her drinks are a different color than the other girls. Hers is yellow. Maybe pineapple juice? Theirs are either red or blue.”

“Thank God! Tell me no one is smoking over there.”

“They’re not.”

“Good.” I drank more than my fair share of fishbowl-sized drinks that night myself. Pitiful I know, but I wasn’t above drowning my sorrows, and I sure as hell wasn’t pregnant.

I should have been there by Sophie’s side. If I hadn’t fucked it all up, I would be here as her date. Not her stalker.

Over the next few days, with Kate’s help, I watched over Sophie from afar. I got pretty good at tracking her every move and not being seen. Kate thought I was insane, but she was polite about it. I don’t think she wanted to jeopardize her stay in Hawaii, so she mostly did as I asked and kept her mouth shut.

I watched Shelby’s wedding through a pair of binoculars from one of the hotel rooms. I’d had to switch rooms to get that view. It was a pain in the ass, and I had to make up a fake report of mouse droppings under my sink to make it happen, but turned out to be worth it to watch Sophie walk down the aisle. She wore a sky-blue dress, and even though I was far away, I thought I saw a small baby bump when the wind whipped her dress tight against her stomach.

Kate commented that Sophie looked lovely. She told me the dress was chiffon, but I just knew it was blue and she looked radiant. Pregnancy agreed with her.

Shelby and Bryan looked good too. And I took some notes on features I liked about their wedding, since I was going to be planning my own wedding day pretty soon.

Seeing how happy the bride and groom looked, I couldn’t help but want that to be me and Sophie someday soon. Hopefully the wedding was putting her in a similar mindset.

Wait, weren’t weddings supposed to make women horny? Maybe that was funerals, but surely weddings made single pregnant women think about their futures. The idea almost made me want to go downstairs and crash the reception.

Sophie
was
going to be surprised when she saw me, and hopefully her friend’s nuptials will have put her in a romantic, even a domesticated frame of mind. Because what I had in store for her was going to blow her mind.

V
isiting
Pearl Harbor had been amazing, a touching and surreal experience. The wind whipped my hair around, and I pushed it out of my face. I looked over the side of the boat that had taken our tour group to the site of the memorial. On the way out we’d seen some porpoises playing in the ocean, so I kept my eyes peeled for more. They were so graceful as they jumped out of the water and dove back in pairs. Their antics seemed a reflection of pure joy. Perhaps it was that way because there was usually more than one.

Today that struck me as unusually poignant because I’d been feeling lonely. Odd when I was carrying another human being around inside of me, but there it was.

I’ll bet Quentin would have enjoyed seeing Pearl Harbor. There was a seriousness and a depth to him that made me think he would have found it inspiring somehow. Who knows, he might have composed something magnificent after having stood in the place where such tragedy occurred, and from where our soldiers and our country drew courage. It might be just the thing, since he was working on the score for a war movie.

There were so many times during the day when I thought of something I wanted to tell Quentin, something I wanted to share with him. But then I remembered—he’s no longer a part of my life. It was depressing, but whenever I grew tearful I blamed the pregnancy and tried to eat something. Unless I was nauseated, and then I tried not to throw up.

The other girls in the wedding party hadn’t wanted to come. One girl had shown mild interest last night, but begged off this morning blaming a hangover. I hadn’t been to Hawaii since I was four years old and I didn’t even remember that, but since I didn’t get to the islands very often I wanted to take advantage of the opportunity to visit one of our most famous historical national monuments. I’d always liked history. Probably the teacher in me.

And it had been incredible. The still quiet of the place spoke with the silent voices of the thousands who perished there.

Now, on the way back to the hotel, back to Shelby and her partying friends, loneliness crept into my heart and I promised myself I wouldn’t cry.

It was the hormones. Had to be.

Never in my life had the possibility occurred to me that I’d become a single mother.

I’d been raised that people got married
before
they had children, and when I’d been married, the children never came. That was actually a blessing since my marriage had been unhappy for the most part.

But now that I
was
pregnant, the father of my child and I were estranged. He said he wanted me back, but I wasn’t ready to entertain that possibility. As controlling as the man was, I wasn’t ready to tell him until I figured out some things.

I waited until about a month after we broke up before I considered getting back out there—dating. I probably wasn’t ready, but it made me so sad to sit around my house moping all the time, that I decided to try to have some fun.

But my relationship with Quentin had been so much more than girlfriend-boyfriend. It had been Dominant/submissive. And after I’d experienced that I worried I wouldn’t be happy with a more vanilla partner, so I tried to meet some men through the Internet site where I’d met Quentin.

What a disaster that had been!

The first guy who reached out to me insisted that we meet at his house, which he kept calling his “lair.” When I refused and told him I wanted to meet in public the first time he unleashed a diatribe on me that basically amounted to him calling me worthless, and me blocking him on every possible channel.

The next guy was young, handsome, and willing to meet at a coffee shop. The fact that he was almost ten years younger than me made me nervous, and while I couldn’t see it turning into anything long term, I was interested in a possible play session with him.

As we sat at a table in the coffee shop, sipping our drinks, the conversation floundered. I could tell he didn’t want to get too personal, but I had to admit I found myself attracted to his wavy blond hair, dreamy blue eyes, and his hard, young body. Just as I was starting to warm up to the idea of taking things further, he asked if I wanted to go to his car and give him a blowjob.

I looked at him like he was nuts. “Your car? Right now, in broad daylight?”

“Yeah.” He shrugged.

“That wasn’t exactly what I had in mind.”

So that encounter ended before it really began.

The third person I had contact with on the site sent me a gnarly dick pic after we’d exchanged two messages. At that point I gave up.

The entire experience made me realize how special what Quentin and I had was. And how lucky I’d been to find him, a thoughtful and caring Dom, in a sea of people with either poor social skills or who were only out for themselves.

A nagging voice in the back of my head told me I shouldn’t throw away something as rare and precious as what I’d found with Quentin. But as good as things had been most of the time, he’d shown me that I couldn’t trust him.

How could I possibly raise a child with a man who deceived me for months?

No, my baby and I would be just fine—the two of us. He or she would be better company once he was on the outside of my uterus. Only five more months to go …

Settling my hand on my belly, I peered over the railing again hoping for a glimpse of another porpoise.

T
he day
after Shelby and Bryan’s wedding, I got into the hotel limousine and had the driver take me to a day spa in downtown Honolulu. I could have visited the spa in the hotel, but I’d wanted a change of scenery. Plus this particular spa boasted a special massage and mani-pedi package for mothers-to-be that I wanted to try, and since I was still keeping my news under wraps I wouldn’t have dared ask for any maternity services at the hotel. I’d be too afraid some of the other bridesmaids would be standing next to me the moment the masseuse entered the waiting lounge saying, “Sophie Davenport for the pregnancy package.” Then my secret would be revealed, and I would rush back for my appointment with my nerves all balled up and relaxing wouldn’t be an option.

It was a good decision. My massage was wonderful, and they even had a cut-out in the table for my belly, which was starting to look like either a tiny baby bump or too many cookies. After that I had my fingernails and toenails painted a lovely shell pink.

When I got back in the car I asked the driver to take me back to the hotel. Sleepy after releasing all that tension, I leaned back on the buttery leather seats and closed my eyes. These days three in the afternoon felt more like ten o’clock at night. I stretched my palm over my stomach. This baby took every bit of energy I had. My pregnant friend once told me that during the first trimester the amount of exertion your body underwent preparing your womb to sustain your baby was the physical equivalent of climbing a mountain. That explained why I felt like I’d run a marathon every day.

I was so glad school was finally out. During the last few weeks I’d practically been falling asleep in class, even while standing at the blackboard. Once Bunny found out about the baby she insisted that I take the following year off from school, and I’d agreed. I know everyone says it gets easier later during pregnancy, but I didn’t want to risk it. Plus—I’d given up on the idea of ever becoming a mother. So now that it was happening I wanted to take advantage of every minute I had to be with my child once he or she was born.

I’d never say it out loud, but secretly I hoped the baby was a girl. Not for me, necessarily, but for Quentin. I didn’t know how much he’d participate in the child’s life, but I knew I couldn’t keep him away entirely and with that being the case, I feared it would be more painful and difficult for Quentin to have a son after he’d lost his first one.

I knew he was convinced this baby was a boy, but a boy might be a constant reminder of Sam. And as angry as I was with Quentin for deceiving me, I didn’t want him to suffer any more than he already had.

The vehicle rolled to a stop, jarring me from my drowsy state. I sat up and yawned. But when I opened my eyes I could see we were not at the hotel. Instead, we were somewhere deep on the island surrounded by lush vegetation and a driveway leading to a large, modern house.

I pressed the button to roll down the glass partition, but the driver wasn’t up front. The car door opened and instead he stood there holding out a hand to me.

“Sir, I’m sorry but there must be some mistake. I requested to be taken back to the hotel.”

“No mistake, miss. Your husband wanted to surprise you. Had me bring you here for a special surprise.”

No. Alarm bells went off in my head and I could feel beads of sweat forming on my brow. Something was desperately wrong here.

I didn’t have a husband. What was this man talking about?

Then, handsome and slick as the devil himself, Quentin walked out of the house and strode toward the limo. “Honey, you’re home.” Before I could recover from the shock to protest, he palmed the driver a few bills and helped me out of the car.

Something in the back of my mind told me to scream, to tell the driver this man wasn’t my husband, to kick and fight to get back in the car. Refuse to go with him. But deep down inside I knew Quentin would never hurt me, and even deeper than that I knew I still had feelings for him. As much as I wanted to protect myself from him, a part of me wanted to forget everything he’d done to me and go back to the way things used to be between us.

“Come inside,” he said, slamming the car door and whisking me up the driveway.

As I heard the car’s tires roll over pebbles and exit the driveway, my stomach dropped out from under me, and my hand reached for my belly.

“Are you okay?” Quentin took me by the shoulders, concern creating lines on his face that hadn’t been there before. “Is it the baby?”

I shook my head. How could I explain to him that I was nervous about being alone with him? That I didn’t trust myself to be around him and not revert to that innocent schoolteacher who fell head over heels for him when she opened her eyes and saw him for the first time. No. I had to protect myself, and I had to protect my baby from him. He might be well-meaning, but he’d proven that I couldn’t trust him. And my baby and I deserved better than that, even if it meant growing up with a single mother at home and a father he saw only occasionally.

At least that’s what I’d convinced myself.

“Let’s get you inside and get you something to drink. I got milk, juice, water. What would you like?”

Tears started to well up in my eyes as he helped me to a seat on a couch in the living room. He’d gone to the trouble of stocking the kitchen in this place, wherever it was, with drinks he thought a pregnant woman should drink. For a split second I allowed myself to revel in the fact that he’d gone to the trouble to do something like that to take care of me and our child.

I’d been on my own from the beginning of this pregnancy. The only people I had told so far had been my parents and their reaction had been mixed—they were pleased to be getting a grandchild, but displeased that I was unmarried in my current condition. There were a number of times I’d been tempted to tell Shelby, but I decided to wait until after her wedding. I wanted her to have her big day first, before my belly started lobbying for everyone’s attention.

So now, having Quentin show me this small kindness made me want to curl up in his arms and bawl like a toddler. Instead, I sniffed, “Juice. What kind of juice?”

“I got orange and pineapple. The lady at the market said pregnant women sometimes craved pineapple juice.”

Being as this was Hawaii, where they grow pineapples by the acre that made sense. “I’ll try that,” I answered, trying to picture Quentin discussing the cravings of pregnant women with a woman in a market. The Quentin I knew ordered most of his groceries from Amazon. We’d been to the store together a few times, but he was usually aloof, not the type to strike up a conversation with a stranger.

He poured me some juice and took me to what looked like a guest bedroom. “Here, you can lie down in here. I’m sure this is a lot for you to take in so why don’t you just rest and we can talk later.”

“Why don’t you just take me back to the hotel? You can come to my room and we can talk there. I promise I’ll listen to what you have to say. We can talk on the way over there too.” I was nervous being in a place I didn’t know. A place I’d been taken to without my knowledge. It was creepy.

“Let’s not play games with each other, Sophie.”

“I’m not playing games. I just don’t appreciate being kidnapped.”

“Stop being such a fucking drama queen. You’re lying to me. If we go back to your hotel you will tell security and I will be thrown out, possibly arrested and you’ll go on your merry way. I’m not a fool, girl.”

My heart sank. I was stuck out here with him, and he would do whatever crazy thing he felt like.

Unless I could get to my phone to call for help. Shelby and Bryan were still in Hawaii. They’d gone to Maui, but I might still be able to reach them. I glanced over at my bag discretely.

Quentin caught on immediately and snatched the bag off the bed. Damn!

“Looking for your phone?” He riffled around in my bag. Finding the phone, he slipped it inside his pants pocket.

“Quentin, why are you doing this to me?”

“Forty-eight hours, that’s all I’m asking for.”