“Wait, slow down. There’s a what in your living room?”

“A baby,” I repeat, a little slower this time. “She’s asleep in a box.”

“In a box,” Richard repeats. “Why is she in a box?”

“I don’t know,” I say, exasperated. “Everly said that would be fine.”

“Who’s Everly?”

“She’s the marketing person working on my shelter,” I say. “Richard, who cares about any of that? Did you hear me? There’s a baby in my apartment.”

“Okay,” he says slowly. “Tell me what happened.”

I repeat the story, starting with staying up late to work with Everly, and ending with our leaving Alexa in the blanket-lined box.

Richard doesn’t say a word, but I know he’s already calculating what to do next. He’s my oldest friend and my personal lawyer, although right now I just need someone to tell me what the fuck to do.

I know who Jessica is. I slept with her about a year ago, which means Alexa is something like three or four months old, assuming she’s actually mine. I can’t imagine Jessica would just drop another man’s baby on my doorstep, although I didn’t think she’d drop a baby there randomly anyway. What if I hadn’t left the apartment? Maybe she rang the home bell and we didn’t hear it in the conference room.

My head is practically spinning. I’m not the kind of man to get frazzled like this. I’m calm, cool, and collected. I don’t stress under pressure, and in fact, I typically thrive. This isn’t a normal situation, though. I don’t know a damn thing about babies and I’m far from being prepared to take care of an infant.

“How sure are you that this is your baby?” Richard asks me when I finish my story.

“I slept with a woman named Jessica about a year ago,” I say. “But I can’t be sure.”

“Paternity test first, then,” Richard says. “We need to confirm it’s your baby. Next, we hunt down Jessica and we take her ass to court.”

“Fine,” I say to him. “Good. But what about in the meantime?”

“I’ll make some calls,” he says. “Find you a nanny to help take care of her. You’ll have to get all that baby stuff, though.”

“Got it,” I say. “Rich, how the fuck could Jessica do this?”

“I don’t know,” he says softly. “Do you remember her?”

“Vaguely,” I admit. “You know me. I don’t always remember them.”

“You sure it’s the right girl?”

“Pretty sure,” I say. “I don’t think I’ve been with any other Jessica.”

“Do you remember anything else about her?”

“She’s a lawyer,” I say. “I have all her info.”

“Good,” he says. “That’s good. We’ll be able to find her pretty easily.”

“A fucking baby,” I say, shaking my head. I stare at the wall of my office. “If this is really my daughter…”

“We’ll figure it out, Logan,” he says. “Can that Everly person help you for tonight?”

“Yes,” I say. “She already said she would.”

“Good.” He pauses for a second. “Don’t get her pregnant too.”

I groan. “Too soon, asshole,” I say.

I can practically see his shit-eating grin. “Never too soon for a good joke.”

“Just make those calls for me. I’ll get in touch early tomorrow morning.”

“Fine. We’ll figure this out.”

“Thanks, Rich.”

“Talk to you soon.”

I hang up the phone and clench my fists.

What kind of fucked up person would leave a baby alone like that? I can’t imagine what was going through Jessica’s head. Just because I’m rich, doesn’t mean she can just dump a baby on my front step. This isn’t the fucking ‘20s or some shit like that. You don’t just abandon a baby. Whether Alexa is my daughter or not, the poor fucking baby was just abandoned by her mother. She’s going to have to deal with that her whole life.

I can’t imagine what Jessica was going through to do something like this. She didn’t even tell me that she was pregnant. If she had, I might have been able to help her before she got to this point. I suspect we aren’t going tobe able to find her very easily. You don’t dump a baby on someone’s front step and then go back to work the next day like nothing happened. I suspect Jessica is going to be long gone by the time we start looking.

I head back out into the living room to find Everly sitting on the couch, eating a salad she whipped up from whatever I had in my refrigerator. She doesn’t say anything as I walk over to the box that Alexa is sleeping in. I crouch down and look at the sleeping infant, and I feel something stirring in my chest.

I don’t know what it is. I’ve never felt this before. Just looking at this baby makes me feeling something strange, though, like a sense of overwhelming responsibility. I don’t even know if she’s really my daughter or not, but then again, I don’t think I’d have this feeling if she weren’t mine.

I want to reach down and pick her up, but I know that’s stupid. I have to let the sleeping baby sleep.

I stand up and look at Everly. I motion for her to follow me. We head over into the kitchen area together. I pull out a bottle of whisky and pour myself a glass, but she declines.

“Well?” I ask her softly.

She cocks her head. “Well, what?”

“What do you think?”

She bites her lip. Everly is a beautiful woman, and I’m so damn thankful for her right now.

I’ve been hard on her. This community homeless shelter is something of a personal dream of mine. I want to build a shelter for all the homeless of this city, plus I want to combine it with a community center to get everyone to mix. People can help the homeless get back on their feet while taking classes and playing recreational sports. It’ll be so good for this community. The city desperately needs it.

And I need it. I’ve made enough money in my life, more than enough. This is my dream and I’ve gone through a lot to get it started.

She lets out a breath. “I think Chester Winterfield is going to hate this.”

I suck in a sharp breath and knock back my whisky. I hadn’t even thought about Chester. He’s the man that I’m trying to buy an entire city block from, but it hasn’t been easy. The location is perfect and the buildings currently on the land are entirely vacant, making it the ideal place to develop. It’s also in the neighborhood that I want, making it practically perfect.

But Chester isn’t an easy man to do business with. He’s a very conservative person and will only do business with people that have sterling reputations. Chester likes me, and thinks I’m a good upstanding man, but a baby out of wedlock is going to be a fucking problem. I can’t afford to have this deal fall through. I’ve already hired architects, started filing paperwork with the city, and we’re moving forward on all fronts with the assumption that we’re getting this land. I’ll lose a lot if this deal fails, and I don’t know if I’ll ever be able to start back up again.

“What can I do about him?” I ask her. “You know how important his land is.”

“I know,” she says softly, biting her lip. It’s an endearing little habit that I’ve noticed her do when she’s thinking. “He’s eccentric, that’s for sure. He doesn’t care about the buildings or the location or the money, he just wants to make sure he’s selling to someone he deems decent.”

“And in this case, having a random baby isn’t going to be decent,” I say.

“Right.” She nods her head once. I watch as she stretches and yawns, clearly exhausted from working so late, and yet still willing to help me in this totally insane situation.

And suddenly it hits me. I don’t know why I even have this thought, but staring at Everly makes me realize that the solution may be sitting right in front of me.

Everly is good with babies. She knows what she’s doing. She’s smart, gorgeous, and very capable. I’ve been pushing her hard at work lately, but she’s been consistently surprising me with how adaptable and intelligent she really is. Everly is capable and if anyone can pull this off, she can.

“I think you should marry me,” I say suddenly.

She blinks, clearly surprised. “Excuse me?”

“Let’s get married,” I say again.

“I’m not following.”

I grin at her and fill up my drinkagain. “Think about it. Chester wants me to be a fine, upstanding gentleman, right? Well, imagine that this baby weren’t mine, and instead of the mother dumping her in my lap, I decided to marry a single mother to make her an honorable person.”

Comprehension slowly dawns on Everly. “No way,” she says.

“You can be that single mother. We’ll get married, because I can’t bear to see you raise you child without a husband. Of course, it helps that we’re in love. Chester will eat this shit up.”

“You want to lie to him,” she points out. “I’ve never been pregnant. He’ll see through it.”

“No, he won’t,” I say. “We can fake whatever we need to fake.”

“Logan, that’s insane.”

“Is it? If I don’t do something, this deal will fall through. This city needs this shelter, Everly, you know that better than anyone.”

I can see her thinking about it, which surprises me a little bit. I totally expected her to turn me down outright.

“No,” she says finally. “I just can’t.”

“One million,” I say.

She hesitates. “Dollars?”

I grin at her. “Yes, dollars. One million dollars plus a promotion in my company to do this.”

She takes a deep breath. “To marry you and pretend that this is my baby,” she says softly.

“That’s right. To help make sure this homeless shelter is built. You play your role until Chester signs the papers and then you’re off the hook.”

“Are you serious about this?” she asks me.

I look at her for a second and feel excitement pulse down my spine. I’m not sure about anything right now, but I do know that I’m attracted to Everly more with every second we spend together. I’m starting to realize that I want her, want her badly, and maybe that’s a bad reason to get involved with her.

I can’t help it though. I want to make her my fake little wife. She can make sure that my dream of establishing a homeless shelter slash community center comes to fruition, and I can give her a lot of money to make it worth her time.

“It won’t be easy,” I say. “But you’ll walk away from this with a lot of money.”

“What if he still doesn’t sign?” she asks.

“I’ll still promote you,” I say. “And I’ll give you half the money.”

She sighs. “I don’t know, Logan.”

“Do this for me,” I say. “Make a lot of money. Help a good thing happen.” I lean toward her, staring into her gorgeous eyes. “Do this with me, Everly.”

She looks back at me and for a second, I think she’s going to turn me down. But instead, she takes a deep breath, lets it out, and nods her head.

“Fine,” she says.

“Good.” I grin at her. “We’ll make up a contract. No bullshit here. We’ll do this right.”

“And then we’ll get married,” she says softly.

“Exactly. We can do this.”

She looks at me but I don’t think she’s convinced. That’s okay. I don’t need her to be convinced. I just need her to help me with Alexa and to be the smart, capable person that I know she is.

We’ll fool Chester together. And once he signs on the dotted line, I’ll give her what she wants, and then I’ll build the charity project that I’ve always dreamed of.

This baby is inconvenient, but it’s not going to stop me from doing what has to get done.