Mandy was eating cereal three days later when she heard her name being said on TV. Almost dumping the bowl in front of her trying to get out of her seat, Mandy finally wiggled herself and that belly away from the table and raced to the television.

“You heard it here first ladies, the city’s most eligible bachelor is no longer on the market. That’s right Elliot Brand, founder, and CEO of Brand Enterprises is no longer a single man. Sources close to Brand have confirmed that he is engaged to be married.”

The female talk-show host was shaking her head as if some tragedy had occurred, “That’s right, Bryan, not only is Elliot Brand off the market, but he is about to become a father.”

“Well, that was quick, Shelley!” the male host flashed his perfectly straight teeth, “Who is this mysterious woman?”

Shelley, a cute blonde with leaned forward as if she were going to whisper the secret to the camera, “Her name is Amanda Johnson, and from what we have been able to gather she is an employee of Mr. Brands. However, we have heard reports that Johnson has only been working at Brand Enterprises for little more than a month.”

Bryan waggled his eyebrows, “It must have been love at first sight.”

Shelley winked, “There is far more to it than that. Luckily, Ms. Johnson’s best friend Emma Graves was available to come on the set for a one on one interview.”

To Mandy’s horror, the two hosts stood to greet slutty Emma as she sashayed out onto the set.

Black dots began to appear in front of Mandy’s eyes. It was like a train wreck that she just couldn’t take her eyes away from. Emma sat there looking like a million dollars and spewed lies about Mandy.

She twisted things to make it sound like Mandy had set out to trap Elliot at that party all those months ago. Emma had said that she tried to warn Elliot away from Mandy.

The talk-show host’s eye glittered with what they knew would be sensational ratings. They asked if Mandy had done something like this with another wealthy businessman. Emma had the sheer balls the blush and said that she didn’t want to malign her best friend’s character, so it was best that she plead the fifth on that question.

Before Mandy could watch anymore, the television was switched off and then she was being yanked back against a massive wall that could only be Elliot’s chest.

Mandy turned in his arms and buried her face into the soft cotton of his shirt.

“How much did you hear?” he barely made out her muffled question.

Elliot’s reply was sharp, “Enough.”

Mandy pulled back to look at him, afraid that he might have believed the lies that Emma had been telling. “I never tried to trap you, Elliot. I swear it!”

Elliot’s expression softened a degree, “Sweetheart, don’t you think I know you by now?”

“What are we going to do?” she bit her lip, “There have been some strange things at the office as well. Maybe I shouldn’t go in for a few days.”

Anger colored his cheeks, “Who has been giving you problems? I already got rid of Charles and those bitches from accounting.”

Mandy’s color ebbed, “You fired them?”

Elliot scoffed, “I can’t have the head of human resources treating people the way that he did you, Mandy. It was unacceptable and intolerable. The same goes for those women. This is my company that I built up from the ground. I won’t tolerate that type of behavior in my employees.”

Mandy closed her eyes, “That must be what the talk is about then. I couldn’t get Ian to tell me yesterday what was going on. But people acted almost like there were afraid of me.”

Elliot blew out an angry breath, “Do you like working at the office?”

Mandy nodded, “I really think the child care facility will be a great benefit to your employees. The construction crew has already begun to draw up plans.”

Elliot’s eyes narrowed in on hers, “You are going to be my wife, Mandy. Our child won’t need to go there. Do you still feel the same way?”

Mandy felt her back stiffen, “Are you implying that I was only doing this for my baby? How selfish do you think I am? This was about helping to make Brand Enterprises better, not to find me a babysitter!”

Elliot grinned widely and tried to hug her close was Mandy was irritated with him and pushed away.

“Don’t be mad,” he chuckled, “I just wanted to be sure that you really wanted to go forward with this. And for the record, I completely agree with everything that you have said. I wouldn’t have scrapped the project, Mandy. But I wanted to make sure that you were doing this because you wanted to and not because you felt you had to. I don’t care if you work another day in your life. If you want to stay home with the baby, if you want to work from home, or if you want to bring our children to the office...”

Mandy gasped, “Children? There is only one baby in my womb, Elliot.”

She started to back away, somewhat flustered.

Elliot wasn’t about to let her escape, “Children, as in two or three? Maybe four if I am lucky, but I won’t press you to commit to it.”

She was confused. It sounded to her like Elliot was planning on having a large family. Secretly Mandy had always wanted a big family, but she figured that was something that wasn’t in the cards for her. It scared Mandy that she would start to believe in his vision only to have it ripped away.

She had learned a long time ago not to plan on good things happening. It was better to prepare yourself for the worst, that way if things went okay you were pleasantly surprised. But to actually hope and wish for things? That was suicidal.

“Am I going too fast?” he tucked a stray piece of hair behind her ear. “Mandy, we can just take it a day at a time.”

She gulped and nodded appreciatively before asking, “What are you going to do about the story?”

The frown returned to Elliot’s face, “I will get my lawyers on it immediately of course. If Emma was offered any money for the story, she won’t be seeing a penny of it. There isn’t a whole lot they can do beyond that, but we will pursue it. I am sorry, Mandy. There are times when the news is slow, and they poke around in my life. But I will do everything in my power to protect you and our baby.”

Elliot stilled for a moment.

“What is it?” Mandy whispered looking up with concern.

He placed his hand on her belly bump and smiled so wide that Mandy couldn’t help but smile at him and covered his larger hand with her smaller one.

Elliot laughed, “Our baby! It is so strange and wonderful to be saying that. I hadn’t even realized that I wanted to be a father until you came into my life.”

Her eyes were wary, but she met him bravely, “And now that you are going to be a father? How do you feel?”

“Fucking, fantastic,” and he kissed her hard on the mouth.

Mandy had decided that there were a whole host of things that Elliot did well, but he was an expert in the art of melting her panties. She clung to him and lifted onto her toes just as Mrs. H came out of the kitchen with Elliot’s ringing cell phone.