Perfect Ten (23 page)

“Oh
, my God. Say it again.”

I raised my hands to her face and gently kissed her precious lips. “I love you, Faith.”

Her arms went around my neck and she pulled her legs in to grip my waist. “I love you too, Joe.”

The rest of the family had made their way back up to the house, getting food ready for the grill or chasing children, which is why no one had noticed
the extra person walking the grounds.

“Isn’t that fucking sweet.” I whipped my head around to see Sophia standing behind us at the edge of the woods. “Joe, I really need to talk to you.” She walked out of the woods and didn’t stop until she was standing right next to us.

“Sophia! What the hell are you doing here?” She had to have followed us. There was no other way for her to know where we were.

“I told you. I need to talk to you. You don’t return my calls or my texts so when I saw you leaving your place today to pick
her
up, I followed you. Come to think of it, I’m kind of surprised you didn’t notice me following you to her house, and then all the way up here.” She was now sitting on the rim of the hot tub. I wasn’t sure if I was simply amazed or a little concerned that she’d actually followed us all the way up into the mountains.

Faith kept looking between
Sophia and me. I had no idea what was going on inside her mind. Hell, I had no idea what was rattling around in mine. “I had other things to keep my eyes on. What do you need to tell me, Sophia? Tell me and leave.”

“It’s not going to be that easy, Joe. You see, I’m pregnant.”

My mind began to work furiously. It wasn’t possible! I always,
always
used a condom. I’d only fucked her twice and once was in the ass. Can’t get pregnant that way. And then it hit me. I remembered that I’d already started coming the last time we fucked. When I whipped the condom off, some of my cum landed on her spread opened pussy. Could it possibly be? Fuck no! It wasn’t fair.

“Joe? You told me you’d never had sex without a condom before me. Were you lying?” Faith stood up, and I simply watched as the water slid down her glorious body.
Christ! I could lose this.

“Condoms break.” Sophia smirked at Faith and ran a hand over her abdomen. “Right now, our child is growing inside me.” She looked back at me expecting God knew what. This day was going to hell in a hand basket when only a few short minutes ago, I told Faith I loved her for the first time.

“I’m going up to the house, Joe.” I didn’t do anything to stop her. Truthfully, I wanted her away from Sophia.

“I’ll go with you. Really, we should talk. Woman to woman.” Sophia followed Faith, who did her best to get away from her, short of running.

When they got to the top deck, as luck would have it, Marge was standing there. “Well, who is this, sister?”

Faith didn’t have a chance to answer. “I’m Sophia
DeMarino. A client—well, more of a special friend I think—of Joe’s from Perfect Ten.”

Oh God…
no.

“What’s Perfect Ten?”

Sophia, looking completely innocent answered her. “The escort service he works for. He’s the best.” She winked at Marge and rubbed her belly again. “If you know what I mean. Full service.”

Faith spared me one backward glance and ran into the house, Cindy fast on her heels.

“Get out.” I guess my voice was hard enough, because she turned, leaving and waving over her shoulder.

“Escort service, Joe?” Marge stood there, a satisfied smile on her face. “I knew there was more to you dating Faith. How rich. She
paid
for you!”

I didn’t even bother responding to her. Dale was standing on my right and I turned to him, having no idea what to say.

“Just go after her, son. I’ve preached to her all her life about people deserving a second chance. I’m not going to change my mind now.”

“Thank you.”

***

After gently pushing Cindy out of the room, Faith and I talked for hours.

“What are you going to do about the baby?”

She’d finally allowed me to hold her and we were sitting together on the bed, she on my lap. “I really don’t know, Faith. If it’s true, and that’s a huge if, then I’ll take care of the baby. I wouldn’t turn my back on a child, but I don’t see how it’s possible. I only had sex with her once that could get her pregnant. The condom breaking? I guess it’s possible, but I just don’t believe her.”

“I think we need to take a break, Joe. I think you need to find out what your responsibilities are before you can concentrate on us.”

“No, Faith. Please don’t let her do this to us.” It was so unfair. She was my life now. The only thing I truly wanted. I ran my hands up her arms, trying to evoke some sort of physical reaction to me. It was what I was best at
—what I was fucking trained to do, I guess.

“No. None of that, Joe.”

“But I love you. That’s the only thing I truly know right now, Faith. I love you.”

“I know.”

“Then let me love you. I
need
to love you.”

We didn’t make love, but she let me hold her through a restless night, and I drove us home the following morning. I have to assume that Dale
threatened the rest of the family to ensure their silence, as not one word was spoken of the night before.

We had both skipped dinner the night before, but Faith didn’t want anything at breakfast. “Come on, sweetheart, eat something.”

“I’m not hungry, Joe. Okay? Just leave it alone.” She got up and hugged her father. “I’ll wait for you on the porch. Bye, Daddy.”

“I’m sorry. This is all part of my baggage. I’m so sorry, Faith.
” She nodded and made her way out of the kitchen. What else could I do? I didn’t know what my next step was.

I said my goodbyes to a handful of people and then I took Faith home, feeling hopeless. Everything was my fault. We could have had a great week together.

When we reached her house, I took her bags in for her and left. Shortly before nine that night, she called me and asked me to come back. I knew she wasn’t sure what she should do with me, but hell, I didn’t know either. But when I got there, she met me at the door. I could tell immediately she’d been crying, and if possible, I felt even worse. With a barely mumbled ‘hi,’ and a short pat on the head for Heidi, she led me back to the bedroom. Silently, she stripped and climbed into bed, where she promptly fell asleep. I climbed in after her directly.

Without even thinking about it, my hands roamed over Faith’s body, and her answering moans alerted me to the fact that she
wasn’t entirely asleep yet. We didn’t fuck fast and furious. Instead, I lifted her leg, slid into her delicious, warm heat from behind, and pumped my hips steady and slow until she climaxed around me, drawing my own orgasm into her.

Through a heavy sigh, she said, “I love you, Joe.” The sweetest words I’ve ever heard, and I was so glad she still felt that way.

“I love you too, and I’m so sorry about yesterday. I promise you that I’ll figure it out.”

Faith

The situation with
Sophia still weighed heavily on my mind a couple of days later. Joe assured me that no matter what the outcome was, everything would work out, but I couldn’t imagine having Sophia in my life—and if Joe really was the father of her child, she’d be in my life as long as I had Joe.

We were sitting in the living room watching a movie and his phone
was buzzing every five minutes or so. “Why don’t you just answer it?”

“Because it’s Sophia.” He put his head in his hands and sighed. “Fuck. I don’t know what to do. We can’t even find out if the baby’s really mine until after it’s born. And if it is mine, I’ll feel like shit if I didn’t make sure Sophia was okay during her pregnancy. But dammit, I don’t want anything to do with her. What do I do, Faith?”

“Oh, no. I can’t tell you what to do with this, Joe. It’s hard enough for me to think about her being pregnant with your child. God.”

I felt for him. I really did, but I wanted to be left out of the whole thing. That’s probably not a realistic idea since he was such a part of my life now. The whole thing just plain sucked.

His phone buzzed yet again, and he answered it, sounding weary. “Hello?”

“Hi, Joe. I wanted to know if we could get together. You know, to discuss what we might do.”

“I don’t think that’s necessary right now, do you? What do we need to discuss?”

It was quiet on Joe’s end of the discussion and he finally agreed to meet her. “Okay. Meet me at the coffee shop in a half an hour.” More silence. “No, Sophia. I’m not coming to your place.”

He hung up the phone and looked at me with fear in his eyes. “I guess you heard. I’m going to go meet her to talk. She said she’s feeling scared and—aw, hell, I don’t know. I feel sorry for her. I’m a fool, aren’t I?”

I grabbed his hand, throwing him a lifeline. “No, Joe. As hard as this is for both of us, you’re not a fool.”

His thumb rubbed my palm in slow back and forth motions. “I don’t suppose you’d go with me, would you?”

A sarcastic laugh flew out of my mouth. “I’m doing my best to deal with all of this, but hell no
. I’m not going to go see her with you. I will ride with you though and do some grocery shopping while you’re talking.”

“Okay. Let’s go.”

Little did I know, we were about to get another big surprise. What a roller coaster of a week!

***

Joe parked in the grocery store parking lot and gave me the keys while he walked a block farther to the coffee shop. Sophia was already there, smiling and waving to him as I ducked into the food market.

I took my time doing my shopping
, and with four bags in my hands, I made my way back to the car. Joe was already there with a big grin on his face.

“I guess your talk went well.”

“Extremely. She lied. She’s not pregnant.”

I almost dropped all four bags in the ground as my mouth flew open. “What? Are you serious?”

“Yup. I kept pressing her to tell me who else could possibly be the father. She’s not a one man kind of woman. Well, she cracked and admitted that she wasn’t pregnant.”

“Why would she do such a thing?”

“I guess she has a thing for me. It’s weird, too. I only saw her a few times on the job. I don’t know why she seems so attached now. Honestly, I was barely civil to her the last time.”

Well, I couldn’t figure it out either, but who cared? She wasn’t pregnant! “That’s it then? It’s all over?”

“God, I hope so. I told her not to contact me again. She cried and left.” He took the bags from me and placed them in the back of the truck. “Let’s go celebrate.”

***

Since I’d already taken the week off, Joe and I spent just about every minute together. Instead of it being too much, I loved it. As a matter of fact, I was ready to tell him that he could move in with me when he had to leave his condo. Heidi already loved it here. The backyard was like her own personal domain. She thoroughly enjoyed having some grass to run around.

It was nearing the end of the week, and things were running smoothly with no Sophia drama to ruin it. “What are you thinking about?” Joe’s legs surrounded mine as we sat in one lounge chair together, my back to his chest. “I can actually
hear
you thinking, Faith.”

He knew me well. “A couple of things, actually. First, I was thinking of having Thanksgiving dinner here. I need a break from my family. What about inviting your family, and Essie
, too?”

“Are you sure, sweetheart? What about your father?”

“He’ll understand. He always does. I’m happier than I’ve ever been right now, and I don’t want my relatives ruining our first holiday together. It’ll be fun. You can help me cook.” I’d never hosted a Thanksgiving dinner, but I was a good cook and I wanted to do it.

“My mom would love that. I’ll go call her.” He shimmied out from behind me to grab the phone as I reflected back to the first time I’d met her.

A few days ago, we were supposed to meet Joe’s mother and her husband at a small mom and pop Italian place she loved in the Hills. Joe and I got there a little early and were messing around in his truck. Honestly, we had a hard time keeping our hands off each other.

Well, the windows were plenty fogged up, and I had just wrapped my hand around Joe’s cock when we heard a tap on the window.

“Ignore it,” Joe said around a mouthful of my breast.

“Okay,” I panted, stroking him again. His fingers were inside my pussy, making my hips undulate in a most decidedly perfect rhythm. I kept rocking my hips and moaning his name, stroking him harder and faster until I felt his release coat my hand. Just the feel of his
cum on me, caused me to burst with a loud exclamation.

The banging on the window grew louder and we heard, “Uh, we’ll just meet you at home, Joseph.”

Neither of us said a word as we cleaned ourselves up the best we could with Dunkin Donuts napkins I had pulled out of the glove box. After a minute or so, Joe busted out laughing. “That was my mom. Oh, my God.”

“Oh, she’s going to love me. God, Joe. She’s going to think I’m a slut! What were we thinking?”

“We have to go over there.”

“No way! We can’t go like this. Joe—we smell like sex. Hot, sweaty sex.” The look in his eyes told me he wanted more. “Let’s go home and get cleaned up first.”

“Okay.”

It took us a bit longer than expected, since we
got cleaned up together. In the shower. Another orgasm later, and we were on our way over to his mom’s house. She never even gave me a nasty glance. The minute I walked through the door, she’d enveloped me in her sweet arms and welcomed me into her family. It was a moment I knew I’d never have with my own mother.