Rising Stars. Maisey Yates

bouquet of wildflowers she’d picked from the nearby community garden. Instead of a veil, pearl-laced barrettes strained to hold back her long, light brown hair.

      In a few minutes, she’d marry her best friend. A man she’d never kissed—or even wanted to kiss. A man who wasn’t the father of her baby.

      As soon as Brandon came back with the rental car, they’d be wed at City Hall, and start the long drive from New York to his parents’ farm in North Dakota.

      Callie closed her eyes. It’s best for the baby, she told herself desperately. Her baby needed a father, and her ex-boss was a selfish, coldhearted playboy, whose deepest relationship was with his bank account. After three years of devoted service as his secretary, Callie had known that. But she’d still been stupid enough to find out the hard way.

      A car turned off Seventh Avenue onto her residential street in the West Village. She saw an expensive dark luxury sedan and watched it go by, then exhaled. It wasn’t Eduardo’s style of car, and yet, as clouds covered the noonday sun, Callie looked up at the sky and shivered. If her ex-boss ever found out their single night of passion had created a child …

      “He won’t,” she whispered aloud. Last she’d heard, he was in Colombia, developing offshore oil fields for Cruz Oil. After Eduardo possessed a woman in bed, she was pretty much dead to him, never to be remembered again. And though Callie had witnessed this scores of times during her time as his secretary, she’d still thought that she might be different. That she would be the exception.

      Get out of my bed, Callie. She’d still been naked and blissful and sleepy in the pink light of Christmas morning when he’d shaken her awake, his voice hard. Get out of my house. I’m through with you.

      Eight and a half months later, his words were still an ice pick in her heart. Exhaling, Callie wrapped her arms around her baby bump. He would never know about the life he’d created inside her. He’d made his choice. So she’d made hers. There would be no custody battle, no chance for Eduardo to be as domineering and tyrannical a father as he’d been a boss. Her child would be born into a stable home, with a loving family. Brandon, her best friend since the first grade, would be her baby’s father in all the ways that counted, and Callie would be a devoted wife to him in return. In every way but one.

      She’d been doubtful at first that a marriage based on friendship could work. But Brandon had assured her that they didn’t need romance or passion to have a solid partnership. “We’ll be happy, Callie,” he’d promised. “Really happy.” Over the months of her pregnancy, he’d worn her down with kindness.

      Now, as Callie leaned back against their suitcases on the stoop, her eyes fell on her Louis Vuitton handbag. Brandon kept telling her to sell it. It would look ridiculous on the farm, she knew. It had been a gift from Eduardo last Christmas. Totally unnecessary, she’d wept, amazed that he’d noticed her gaze lingering upon the shop window months before. I reward those who are loyal to me, Callie, Eduardo had replied. A woman like you comes along only once in a lifetime.

      Squeezing her eyes shut, Callie turned her face upward, feeling the first cool raindrops against her skin. Such a ridiculous trophy, a three-thousand-dollar handbag, but it had been a hard-won symbol of her hours of devotion, of their partnership. But Brandon was right. She should just sell it. She was done with Eduardo. With New York. Done with everything she’d once loved.

      Except this baby.

      A low roll of thunder mingled with the honk of taxis and distant police sirens on Seventh Avenue and the hiss from the subway vent at the end of the street. She heard another car pull down the street. It stopped, and she heard a door slam. Brandon had returned with the rental car. It was time to marry him and start the two-day journey to North Dakota. Forcing her lips into a smile, she opened her eyes.

      Eduardo Cruz stood beside his dark Mercedes sedan, powerful and broad-shouldered in an impeccable black suit.

      The blood drained from Callie’s cheeks.

      “Eduardo,” she breathed, starting to rise. She stopped herself. Maybe he couldn’t see her pregnant belly. She prayed he couldn’t. Wrapping her arms loosely over her knees, she stammered, “What are you doing here?”

      Silently Eduardo stepped onto the sidewalk. His long-limbed, powerful body moved toward her with a warrior’s effortless grace, but she felt every step like a seismic rumble beneath her.

      “The question is—” his dark eyes glittered “—what are you doing, Callie?”

      His voice was deep, with only a hint of an accent from his childhood in Spain. It was a shock to hear that voice again. She’d never thought she would see him again, outside of her haunted, sensual dreams.

      She lifted her chin. “What does it look like I’m doing?” She jabbed her thumb toward the suitcases. “Leaving.” Her voice trembled in spite of her best efforts, and she hated Eduardo for that, as she hated him for so much else. “You’ve won.”

      “Won?” he ground out. He slowly circled her at the end of the stoop. “A strange accusation.”

      Beneath his gaze, her body shuddered with ice, then fire. She stiffened, glaring at him. “What else would you call it? You fired me then made sure no one else in New York would hire me.”

      “So?” he said coldly. “Let McLinn provide for you. You are his bride. His problem.”

      A chill went down her spine.

      “You know about Brandon?” she whispered. If he knew about her coming marriage, did he also know about her pregnancy? “Who told you?”

      “He did.” He gave a harsh laugh. “I met him.”

      “You met? When? Where?”

      Eduardo gave her a hard smile. “Does it matter?”

      She bit her lip. “Was it a chance meeting … or …”

      “You might call it chance.” His casual drawl belied the cold accusation in his eyes. He looked up at the expensive town house behind her. “I stopped by your apartment and was surprised to find you had a live-in lover.”

      “He’s not my—”

      “Not your what?”

      “Never mind,” she mumbled.

      Eduardo moved closer. “Tell me,” he said acidly, “did McLinn enjoy living here? Did he relish living in the apartment I leased as a gift of gratitude for the secretary I respected?”

      She swallowed. A year ago, she’d been living in a cheap studio in Staten Island, so she could send most of her salary to her family back home. Then Eduardo had surprised her with a paid yearlong lease for a gorgeous one-bedroom apartment close to his own expensive brownstone on Bank Street. Callie had nearly wept with joy, believing it was proof that he actually cared. She’d later realized he’d only wanted to eliminate her commute so he could get more hours out of her.

      “What could you possibly have to say to me now?” She frowned. She’d been home all week—packing boxes, directing the movers, being informed by the airlines that she was too pregnant to fly, calling car rental agencies. “When were you even here?”

      “While you were in bed,” Eduardo ground out.

      Her heart lifted to her throat.

      “Oh,” she whispered. It suddenly made sense. She slept in the bedroom, while Brandon had the couch. “He never mentioned meeting you. But why? What do you want?”

      His black eyes glittered at her. He was staring at her as if she were a stranger. No—as if she were a bug beneath his Italian leather shoe. “Why didn’t you ever tell me about your lover? Why did you lie?”

      “I didn’t!”

      “You hid his existence from me. The very day after you moved into this apartment, you had him move in with you. But you never mentioned him, because you knew it would make me question