Micah

The only thing worse than keeping a pregnancy secret from the entire municipality?

Keeping it from my father.

It wasn’t as if I owed him any particular explanation. I’d made it perfectly clear years ago that I didn’t owe him any damn thing, especially news regarding my life, career, or, in the current situation, my all-too-crowded womb.

For the past twenty-six years, I’d worked and planned and scrimped and saved to become a better person than my sleaze ball of a father. And, for twenty-six years, I’d been successful. My life plan had offered me a respectable path of professionalism and stability.

Until now. Until this. Until, suddenly, my life paralleled with the turning point in his.

I’d been knocked up by a stranger. And, twenty-six years ago, he’d knocked up his own.

Nothing like an illegitimate child to bond an estranged father and daughter.

I’d binged purchased a dozen baby books, but none of them included chapters on how to handle this sort of stilted conversation with a man I neither respected nor loved.

Nothing in Your Uterus and You—A Modern Woman’s Guide to Hormones, Hemorrhoids, and Awkward Holiday Discussions. And Single Motherhood—The Land Of Milk and Wine was also a bust.

Even my most recent purchase So You’re Having A Bastard – Out-Of-Wedlock Wit and Wonder had very little actionable advice.

The pregnancy was probably better kept secret and revealed only once the child could speak and demand details regarding all the asshole men in my life. But my father’s sudden arrival in Butterpond complicated matters.

What the hell was he doing in the township building?

Shaking the hand of the mayor? Handing business cards to members of the council?

And greeting me outside of the meeting room with as much of a smile as he could stuff into a three thousand-dollar suit?

“Micah, honey.” He offered me a hug. It was better to power through the awkwardness than deny his obligatory affections and embarrass us both. “I was hoping I could see you today. Do you have a minute?”

The committee members had arrived, though it would take time for the senior access van to lower the ramp onto the sidewalk for their wheelchairs.

“What are you doing here?” I adjusted my vest and skirt, feeling for all the world like I was preparing myself for one of his inspections again. No knee-high socks or braids today. Just pregnant. Would have gotten me kicked out of my fancy Catholic private school long ago. “I thought your company only handled properties in the city?”

Dad grinned. “We’ve got our eye on a couple locations outside of Ironfield. Hearing good things about Butterpond.”

From who? “What sort of things?”

“You know your old man.”

I didn’t, but what I had learned about my father meant the residents of Butterpond deserved a fair warning to hide their wallets and lock away the deeds to their properties.

“I’m always looking for a hip, new area that’s begging for some revitalization,” he said.

No. He was looking for a quiet community with lax building codes that would enable him to build hundreds of cheaply constructed, HOA-blighted homes with illegal labor. I knew his game. Hell, he was the one who originally sent me to school to learn building code. What better way for a daughter to help her father find “cost-saving measures” for the betterment of his company?

“There’s nothing hip in Butterpond,” I said. “In fact, most of the populace does all they can to ensure their hips remain healthy and unbroken.”

Dad stroked his goatee. The diamond on his cufflink glittered in the light, entirely too flashy for the humble community. “But there might be one location ripe for the taking. And that’s where I need your help. What do you know about Triumph Farm?”

Oh, God. Could I get fifteen freaking minutes of peace without thinking of Julian?

“The Payne farm?”

His grin widened, a regal, handsome warmth that had bewitched me and Mom while he destroyed our credit and emptied our bank accounts. “Ah, so you do know them.”

“Hardly.” Only that I was carrying the eldest’s child. “They’re a local family. The farm has been here for generations.”

“They have three hundred acres of unused farmland.”

“And?”

“That’s a lot of land in a little town near a highway outside of a major metropolitan center. Are they interested in selling?”

Julian had practically whored himself for a damn barn. Doubted he wanted to share the land with hundreds of mini-mansions and a community pool.

“Why don’t you ask him?” I said.

“I thought with you being the zoning officer and all…” Dad straightened his tie if only to prove its worth to himself. “You might have some insight.”

“You mean, I might know him personally?”

“And you might whisper a little into his ear.”

“No way. I’m not doing anything to Julian Payne’s ear…or any other part of his body. You want the land? You make him an offer. Don’t involve me.”

“Why not?”

I tensed. “Because that’s not my job.”

Dad leaned close. “But we’re family.”

“And the legal definition of my job is only to approve building and development plans as per the community and state’s statues. I don’t create the plans. I simply review them.”

“Well, take my word for it. I’ve reviewed the prospects too. It’d be a lucrative deal for the company.”

“And a conflict of interest for me. I’m not doing anything that will threaten my job.”

Dad gave me his usual placating smile. It’d only ever worked before my parent’s divorce. “Honey, you know you always have a job with me. Say the word, and I’ll get you your own office, your own secretary, your own title.”

And, knowing my father, he’d also offer me all the company’s liability. “I have a job, Dad.”

He leaned in, fingers tapping against the glass meeting room door. “Not from what I’m hearing, honey. Small towns are vicious. You gotta learn to play the game.”

My heart sunk. He hesitated as a parade of walkers and canes burst through the lobby. The metal scraped against the tile floor as the majority of my fair committee shuffled into the meeting room.

Alice Mahoney, one of the oldest members of the Butterpond community, shouldn’t have driven herself to the meeting. She fumbled with the keys to her Buick and squinted through a pair of glasses half inch thick.

A piece of sucking candy rattled around her mouth. “Is this where we play bridge?”

“No, Alice,” I said. “Today is the county fair meeting.”

“Right, right.” She patted my arm. “Well, maybe that zoning girl will forget today too.” She chuckled to herself and wagged a gnarled finger. “Stoic thing. Needs to smile more.”

Dad nodded. “I agree.”

I didn’t. I guided Alice towards the meeting room as Dad watched with either amusement or pity.

“I know my job is on the line,” I said. “And I know Butterpond doesn’t like that I’m enforcing the rules on the books. But once this fair is successful, they’ll love me.” He didn’t deserve the explanation, but it soothed me to reiterate my own damn plan.

“And even if they don’t…” Dad was always the optimist. “There’s a job waiting for you at home.”

Home: the land of shady deals, debts, and betrayal.

No thanks. Not even if I was unemployed.

Not even if I was unemployed and pregnant.

Not even if I was alone.

And I was. Very, very alone.

“I’ll be fine, Dad.”

He tucked a business card in my hand anyway, like I didn’t remember the R&J Developers radio jingle, phone number, and slogan—R&J puts the WEE in Luxurwee Homes!

“You let me know if you talk to that farmer.” He pulled me in for another hug. That filled our quota of physical intimacy for a year. “Tell him…selling his land could buy him another farm and a half.”

A nice sentiment, but I knew the truth. His land was worth three new farms, but Dad would only ever offer enough to tease, not ensure the deal was fair.

I dumped the business card in the trash on my way to the meeting. I hardly made it inside before a woman gave a yelp and unsuccessfully wrangled a black and white border collie that charged my feet.

The dog yipped, rushed around my legs in tight concentric circles, and effectively drove me—and the other seniors—into a tight group on the right side of the room.

“Ambrose!” Gretchen Murphy, clad in a flamboyantly green safety vest, dove over the chairs. Her pig-tailed afro puffs bounced, almost mimicking her dog’s cocked ears. “Don’t herd the zoning officer! It’s not polite!”

Pretty sure Gretchen chided her dog in English only for my benefit, especially as she’d trained her border collie to respond to a variety of clicks, whistles, glances, and seemingly telepathic demands. The dog whined, plunked in a pout at her feet, and studied each of the confused seniors, now migrating out of the meeting to wander aimlessly across the hall.

“Actually…” I kept my voice low, not exactly proud that I’d sic a dog on a group of the town’s respected elders. “Can he bring them back? They’re my only volunteers.”

Gretchen took her job—and her herding—seriously. She whistled two sharp yips and pointed. Ambrose needed no other instruction, seemingly practiced at stalking unsuspecting Korean War veterans.

“You’re better off without them.” Gretchen watched her dog in action as she slurped a noodle from her thermos, forgoing the usual early morning coffee for a hearty cup of chicken soup. According to her, life was too short to waste on breakfast, so she and Ambrose celebrated the crack of dawn with lunch. “You shouldn’t have promised pie and coffee for committee signups.”

“Better than your idea,” I said. “I wasn’t going door-to-door without a bra on.”

“Gotta learn what makes the town tick.”

“Unrepentant humiliation?”

“Sex appeal.”

Gretchen shimmied her hips. Slim, trim, and just as eager as her dog to live her life from run-to-run, she was one of Butterpond’s more beautiful residents. While the booty-shorts helped, especially as her toned, black legs stretched from the floor to her chin, the rest of her ensemble only benefited her on a dog walk, not the catwalk.

“Where does the florescent vest fit into this grand plan of seduction?” I asked.

Gretchen glanced down. Her self-appointed electric green uniform looked no worse on her than it did buckled on Ambrose. The patch on her uniform proudly proclaimed Geese Police…though the municipality preferred she use the official title of Animal Control Officer.

Of course, Gretchen had only earned the position after an unfortunate incident involving our last officer, a log mistaken for a rabid opossum in the bed of his truck, and a wayward M80. Gretchen, though only barely past twenty, came highly recommended from Butterpond’s only vet—her father. As a bonus, she provided a secondary, bewildering, expertise—herding nuisance geese away from public places. The geese patrol paid her more than the part-time work she did for the county.

The seniors shambled back into the meeting room, though Ambrose had rewarded himself for a job well done with an inexplicable tennis ball. Gretchen gasped, removed the ball from his mouth, and hurriedly replaced it on the bottom of Mr. Mitchell’s walker.

“So, no Julian Payne today?” Gretchen hid her smirk as she pretended to refasten Ambrose’s collar.

She knew damn well he wasn’t showing his face.

“We’re better off without him,” I said.

“Heard he’s giving you a hard time.”

“Something like that.”

“Is he giving you anything else?”

Nothing that I’d admit, even to her.

Gretchen grinned. “You know he’s the town’s most eligible…”

“Jackass?”

“So, you have gotten to know him.”

I busied myself with my phone. “We really need to start this meeting.”

Gretchen gave Ambrose a pat and laughed. “Oh, you’ve got it bad, don’t you?”

“Got what?”

“Julian got under your skin.”

Under my clothes. Under my skin.

Inside my uterus.

Did it matter?

“I will not let Julian Payne interfere with my work,” I said.

“Skip the work. Head straight to the bedroom.”

That I could answer truthfully. “He hasn’t been there.”

“Yet.”

“You’re here to talk feral cats,” I scolded her. “Don’t start trouble.”

“Oh, sweetie.” Gretchen cackled. “You’re already in trouble.”

She had no idea how much.

I greeted the committee members with a peppy hello. Ten senior citizens stared at me. Two already thumbed through a deck of cards. One wore an oxygen mask. The rest snuck away to steal more hard candy. Gretchen gave me a smile from the back of the room.

“Let’s get started,” I said.

Alice eagerly tapped her cane. “When do we play bridge?”

“We’re talking about the fair today,” I said.

“The what?”

Roy Jenkins shouted so he, Alice, and the entire municipal center could hear. “She said she’s having an affair!”

Gretchen giggled, nearly toppling from her chair, but Ambrose covered his eyes and whined. At least I had some camaraderie.

“The county fair.” I spoke a little louder, cringing as my voice carried. “We’re discussing the county fair.”

“When do we play cards?” Alice asked.

Roy patted her hand. “After the affair! Looks like it’s a hell of a story.”

I never thought I’d miss Julian. “Oh God.”

“Miss Robinson?” A man no more than fifty years old—a variable toddler in the room—raised his hand. He stood, patting the dust from his flannel shirt and kicking the low hanging hem of his sweat pants from under his tennis shoes. “My name is Dan Granwala. I…heard you have an issue with some feral cats.”

I nodded. “More than an issue, really. We’re overrun.”

“Well…” He rubbed a hand through sandy hair that should have been blonde. “I think I might be able to help. See, I run a company that specializes in pest removal.”

“In what?” Alice asked.

Roy leaned over. “Breast approval!”

Alice nudged Agatha Barlow. “Don’t all men?”

Agatha pointed at me with her cane. “Don’t you change a thing, missy. You’re beautiful!”

Gretchen cackled, but I gestured for Dan to continue. “You can help remove the cats?”

“Oh yeah. Cats. Rats. Termites. Even cleared a stubborn mule out of a shed in Ironfield.”

“That’s…perfect.”

“Yeah, it’s a real shame what happens with these cats,” he said. “Get some folks who want to help ‘em, but they’re feral. Can’t get close. Can’t tame em. They breed out of control. Suddenly, you got yourself a dangerous area—cats doing their business, defending their territories.”

“Yes!” Finally, progress. “We need to move them from the fairgrounds before they get the kittens hooked on catnip.”

“Not a problem. I can set up the traps overnight. Can get probably five or ten cats a night, if we’re lucky.”

Prayers answered. I would have hugged him if he wasn’t coated in dirt. “Thank you! I’ll call the council this afternoon!”

“You tell your board members that I’m a professional. It’s all humane. I’ll trap them, I’ll load them in the truck, and then the gas I use is real gentle.”

I tilted my head. “…What?”

“I throw a tarp over the back of the truck, and then I get a hose?” Dan mimed the action, solemn and serious. “Tuck it up under the tarp, run the truck, and it only takes a couple minutes.”

Gretchen stood. She had no real authority, but someone had given her a whistle. The harsh trill echoed over the meeting room.

Gretchen pointed at him. “What the hell did he just say?”

Dan winced. “I know it’s not pretty. But you have a problem. I have the solution.”

“Yeah, the final solution!” Gretchen raced to confront Dan, hopping a line of chairs. At least she hadn’t grabbed one as a weapon. “What are you? Some sort of…of…Cat Hitler?”

Alice tugged on Roy’s sleeve. “What’d she say?”

Roy leaned over. “Asked if he liked Bette Midler.”

“Oh, who doesn’t? I loved her in that…” She wagged a finger. “That Moon movie.”

Roy clapped a hand on his thigh. “Apollo Thirteen.”

Gretchen tore at her pig tails. “You can’t just kill the cats.”

Dan shrugged. “What else are you going to do with them? Cooking them seems even crueler.”

“Bette Midler wasn’t in Apollo Thirteen.” Agatha Barlow swore at Roy. “You’re thinking Moonstruck.”

Gretchen raged. “Why would you eat a cat?”

Dan huffed. “Maybe if someone ate yours, you wouldn’t need a goddamned whistle.”

Oh God. I attempted to separate Dan and Gretchen as the movie trivia now agitated the seniors too.

Roy swore. “Nah, Bette wasn’t in that. It was that ugly fellow—Rick Cage or something. Him and that singer were in Moonstruck.”

Agatha racked her brain. “Streisand.”

“No, no. The other one with the honking nose.”

“Cher?”

“Share?” Alice offered her bag of candy. “Help yourself.”

Oh, no. The meeting would end with the carpets stained by blood and butterscotch. I eased Gretchen back to a seat and faced Dan.

“I’m sorry,” I said. “We can’t kill the cats. It’s out of the question.”

“It’s humane.”

“You’re gassing them!” Gretchen yelled.

“Only for a couple minutes,” he said. “It’s over real quick. Not like they’re horses—that takes all afternoon.”

We couldn’t have PETA picketing the offices again. I had to get this guy out of the building and quick. “No. No people or animals will be harmed in the planning of the fair. Does anyone have any idea how to remove the cats from the fairground that doesn’t involve a pipe hooked into a truck’s exhaust system?”

And, of course, he answered.

That rumbling voice, the sensual boom of confidence, might have coiled inside my tummy had his last conquest not taken root there.

Julian Payne volunteered with a casual smirk. “I can take care of a pussy…cat.”

Hell no. I wasn’t in the mood. Not to laugh. Not to joke.

And not to kick his ass out of my damn meeting.

“Take five, everyone,” I said.

Alice didn’t need to ask. Roy leaned in. “She said, survive everyone.”

Alice agreed. “Everyday’s a blessing, thank you Lord.”

Gretchen poked Dan’s chest. Ambrose gave a growl. “You better watch yourself.”

“No bloodshed.” I sent her toward the cookies I’d set out for the meeting. “And don’t let the rest of the committee leave…or fall asleep…or worse.”

Julian waited for me, though I was not having this conversation in the middle of the meeting room. He followed me to the hall, but I couldn’t castrate him there either.

“What are you doing here?” I hissed. “I thought I made myself perfectly clear.”

“You did. But then I realized you’re pregnant.”

“Took you long enough.” I shushed him with a fierce growl. “I don’t need special treatment.”

“No, you probably need to be institutionalized.”

“Go home, Julian.”

“You need help, princess.”

I grimaced. “I don’t.”

“You expect the Geese Police and half of Sunny Acres to get this fair up and running?”

He’d seen me nearly naked and had knocked me up. No sense in lying. “A girl can dream.”

“I’ll help.”

“Why the hell would you want to help me?”

He pointed at my stomach. “Because you had to make it complicated.”

“Me?” I gritted my teeth. “This isn’t complicated, cowboy. This is very easy. I don’t want anything to do with you.”

“I know you’re attracted to me—”

“You are such an arrogant—”

“—But that doesn’t mean I can’t help. And I will, if only to make sure you’re not stressed.”

I huffed. “Stressed? You raise my blood pressure.”

“But I also drop your panties. It balances out.”

His stupid sexy grin jumbled me even more than before—the sudden influx of hormones terrible for a girl’s concentration. I breathed deep, regretting the sun-kissed scent of him.

“I’m in enough trouble already because of you,” I said. “Don’t ruin this for me. You’ve already compromised my job. I won’t have you ruin this fair or blab about the baby or break anyone’s heart…”

Shoot.

Wrong words.

Wrong wrong wrong.

Julian laughed. “So, I’m a heart-breaker now?”

“More like a uterus-stuffer.”

“I’m still amazed a tease like you let me get that far.”

“Don’t get smart.”

“Then stop being a brat and let me help,” he said. “I’ll be at the fairgrounds tomorrow morning. You can either bring me a cup of coffee or an approved building permit application.”

“You got lucky once—don’t push it.”

But he would.

He’d push, prod, and fuck me over just to watch me squirm.

“See you tomorrow, princess.”

Damn it.

Why was he so irritating? So crass?

So unbelievably sexy?

Julian might have been the cockiest son of a bitch in the world, but he was also the smoothest. That made him entirely too dangerous for a girl like me and exceptionally destructive to the life plan I’d meticulously maintained for the past ten years.

I was already pregnant. Fumbling through the remnants of my organized plan. Attempting to revise and re-order the next twenty years of my life. The last thing I needed was some schoolgirl crush on the bully who pulled my pigtails and rutted me against the wall.

I would not get charmed by Julian Payne. I’d cross my arms tighter than I’d squeeze my legs just to protect my heart.

He’d already gotten inside me once.

No sense letting him stay.