Doctor's Secret: A Secret Baby Romance Read online

  Doctor's Secret

  A Secret Baby Romance

  K.C. Crowne

  Copyright © 2020 by K.C. Crowne

  All rights reserved.

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  Contents

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  Also by K.C. Crowne

  1. Annie

  2. Duncan

  3. Annie

  4. Duncan

  5. Annie

  6. Duncan

  7. Annie

  8. Duncan

  9. Annie

  10. Annie

  11. Duncan

  12. Annie

  13. Duncan

  14. Annie

  15. Duncan

  16. Annie

  17. Duncan

  18. Annie

  19. Duncan

  20. Annie

  21. Duncan

  22. Annie

  23. Duncan

  24. Annie

  25. Duncan

  26. Annie

  27. Duncan

  28. Annie

  29. Duncan

  30. Annie

  31. Duncan

  32. Annie

  33. Duncan

  Epilogue

  Burning Up (Preview)

  About the Author

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  Description

  What would you do if the man of your wildest dreams…

  Turns out to be your evil ex’s long lost brother?

  A doctor.

  Millionaire.

  Sexy. Charismatic. Passionate.

  Andrew is everything I ever wanted – but never had.

  The sexual tension is unlike anything I’ve ever experienced.

  And boy does the talented doctor know how to treat all my body parts.

  But I discover the most shocking news.

  A secret he’s kept hidden all this time.

  And I vow never to see him again.

  But, months later, guess who shows up ready to deliver my baby...

  And he’s in for a big surprise!

  He's not the only one that can keep a big secret.

  Annie

  I loved Dad to death, but at that moment I kind of wanted to kick his butt.

  “Come on, kiddo,” he said, almost pleading. “I just want to help.”

  “And I get that,” I replied, my iPhone cradled against my ear as I paced back and forth through the one room of my studio apartment. “But I don’t need help. That’s the thing.”

  “Yes, you do. How long have you been living in White Pines?”

  “Two months.”

  “Right. You’ve been there for two months and you still haven’t found a job. Not trying to make you feel bad about it, but you have to be running low on money by this point.”

  OK – he was right about that. Depressingly right.

  “How much money do you have left?” he asked.

  “That’s not important.”

  “Are you saying it’s not important because you don’t want to tell me the amount or because you haven’t checked and don’t know?”

  “That’s not important either.” I cut my eyes to the side even though I knew he couldn’t see me.

  “Kiddo,” he murmured, and I could picture him shaking his head.

  “Don’t kiddo me, please.” It was the nickname he used when he didn’t see me as an adult, like I was nothing but a silly little girl adorably failing to make her way in the world.

  “Sorry, sorry,” he backtracked. “But Annie, I know you’re in a tough spot right now. All I want is to give you a helping hand while you get yourself settled in your new home.”

  “I appreciate that, Dad, I really do. But I’ve got this,” I promised. “The job situation’s a little dicey right now, but I’ll figure it out. I always do.”

  A pause followed, meaning Dad was thinking. “How about this – you get on your computer and pull up your account. If you’re going to turn down my help, I at least want you to have a realistic idea of where you’re at.”

  I sighed. “And after that you promise to stop offering to help?”

  “Promise.”

  My gut tightened. But I knew this was just Dad’s way of getting me to do what I needed to do. “Fine, fine.”

  I sat down at my tiny desk and with a deep, steadying breath opened my laptop. A few keystrokes later and I was at the webpage for the credit union I’d started an account with when I’d moved to White Pines.

  “Well?” he asked when I didn’t speak for several moments.

  “It’s…fine.”

  It wasn’t fine. The bank had done the oh-so-convenient thing of delaying charges and letting them hit me all at once. I had a few hundred less than I’d thought. Not good.

  “It doesn’t sound fine.”

  “It’s not the best situation in the world,” I admitted, though I refused to concede. “But I can handle it.”

  Dad sighed, clearly frustrated that his stubborn daughter wouldn’t simply suck up her pride and let him help out. “You know,” he said. “If you were still with Andrew you wouldn’t have to deal with stuff like this.”

  I shut my laptop with a sharp click. “Do not start up with that ‘if you were still with Andrew’ stuff. That’s the last thing I want to hear right now.”

  “I’m just saying,” he said. “You could’ve, I don’t know, stuck around and tried to make it work.”

  “You don’t think I tried?” I asked, letting my impatience with the subject color my tone. “Dad, I supported him through law school, was there for him every chance I had when we were living together.”

  “Correction,” Dad piped in. “I supported him through law school.”

  He had me there. During my relationship with Andrew, there’d been more than a few occa
sions when money was tight. And Dad, being the stand-up guy he was, always helped us out.

  “I know, I know. And I appreciate it like crazy. But I guess me being the best girlfriend I could be and you always being there to help wasn’t enough.”

  “I still don’t understand what happened between you two. Years together and he decides, what, that it wasn’t enough? That work was more important?”

  “Spending ninety hours a week at a law firm doesn’t leave you much time for anything else.” Sadness crept into my tone, and some anger.

  “It’s a damn shame. Couples are supposed to be there for each other – no matter what.”

  “That’s what I thought, too. Guess he didn’t feel the same way.”

  “That’s all in the past, I suppose.” His tone suggested he really wished it wasn’t. “And if picking up your life in Denver and quitting your good job is what you needed to move past it, that was your decision to make.”

  “It wasn’t a good job, Dad – I was substitute teaching.”

  “Small jobs are steps on the path to a big one. But like I said, it’s in the past.”

  “And that’s where it’s going to stay,” I said definitively.

  A rapid-fire series of knocks sounded from my apartment front door, the noise sudden enough to make my heart jump up into my throat and interrupting our conversation.

  “What was that?” Dad asked.

  Once my jangled nerves calmed, I realized who it was – no doubt with a knock like that. I stepped over to the door and put my eye up to the peep hole. A bright, pearl-white smile on a trim face surrounded by loose black curls was on the other side.

  I grinned and told him, “It’s Gia.”

  “Tell her hi for me,” he said.

  “Of course. Anyway, Dad, thanks for everything, and sorry if I’m being stubborn. I really appreciate your help.”

  “Of course, kid. And you know I’m there for you no matter what.”

  We said our I love yous and hung up just in time for another blast of knocks to fill the apartment.

  “Coming, coming,” I called as I slipped my phone back into my pocket and headed to the door. I opened it and there she was bottle of sauvignon blanc in her hand.

  “Hey!” she trilled. “I’d ask if you were busy, but the whole unemployment thing…”

  “Har-har,” I responded, stepping aside and letting her in. “What’s going on?”

  “Wine – that’s what’s going on,” she said, setting the bottle of wine on the tiny kitchen table and not wasting a moment rifling through my drawers to find the corkscrew and a pair of glasses. Once she found the opener, she quickly plucked out the cork and filled the glasses, handing one to me.

  I glanced at the cheap, Target clock hanging on the wall. “Might be a little early for me.”

  Gia waved her hand through the air, dismissing the idea. “It’s past five. And I don’t know what you’ve been up to, but I bet you deserve a break.” She plopped down on the couch and crossed her legs, her big curls bouncing voluminously.

  “I think you need to actually be doing stuff to earn a break,” I commented, gently sitting down next to her. “And how did you even get in the building?”

  She reached into her pocket and took out a key. “Helped you move in, remember? Got the spare.” I gave her a look. “You want it back or something?”

  “Nah, hang onto it. But at least shoot me a text before dropping in.”

  “Please,” she said, giving me a come on now look. “Like you’ve ever had a problem with my little drop-ins before.”

  I smiled at her. Since we were kids, Gia had always been the spontaneous one, loving to make plans on the fly, structuring her day around whatever mood she was in. I, on the other hand, preferred to have some kind of organization to my life. Another reason the whole unemployment thing wasn’t working out for me.

  “And speaking of check-ins,” she asked after sipping her wine. “How’s life in fabulous White Pines working out for you?” To make her point, she got up and walked over to the window, pulling open the curtains. The sight outside my window was nothing short of breathtaking.

  White Pines was about the quietest, most picturesque little mountain town I could imagine. The view from my window looked down onto the main drag of downtown, both sides of the street clustered with mom-and-pop shops, the road leading to a diamond-shaped park just before city hall. The Rocky Mountains rose in the distance, their tops capped with white peaks, their slopes covered in deep-green pines. It was winter, so they were dusted with snow, accounting for the name of the town. The sun was beginning to set, the sky above the mountains a brilliant orange.

  “Well,” I said. “I wanted a change of pace from Denver, and that’s exactly what I got.”

  “That’s right,” Gia agreed, cheerfully raising her finger. “You’re going to love it here. It’s chill and laid-back and friendly and, most importantly, I’m here and there are no asshole lawyers who will randomly leave you for no damn good reason.”

  I laughed. “That you know of.”

  “True, true,” she admitted, sitting down. “Place could be lousy with jackass men. I mean, not like I haven’t found a few of them myself.”

  “Dating’s the last thing on my mind right now. I just want to get a job, find some stability, and start my new life.”

  “Girl, you know I’m right there with you. Andrew was such a…I don’t know. I never liked him.”

  “Oh yeah?” I asked, surprised.

  She shuddered dramatically as she spoke. “He was always so weird and serious. The whole time you two dated, I’m pretty sure I saw him smile, like, once. So intense, and not in a good way.”

  “And you’re just now telling me this?”

  She laughed. “Babe, are you serious? I told you all the time how much I didn’t like him. But I know how it is – when you’re smitten with a guy, you don’t notice the red flags.”

  “What other red flags did I miss?” I asked curiously.

  She took a sip of her wine, glancing away as if trying to pick from any number of things she didn’t like about my ex. “You remember how he always made you check in whenever you went out? Like, if you were going to be gone somewhere more than an hour, you had to send him a text letting him know where you were and what you were doing.”

  “That was just his way of making sure I was safe.”

  She scoffed. “Total controlling behavior. Being in a relationship is about trust, and him pulling that crap was way, way more about him wanting to keep tabs on you than making sure you were safe.”

  Gia continued, her eyes flashing as she remembered something else. “Oh! And how he always got weird when you talked about your job, like it was some silly little hobby you were into. I’m pretty sure he’s one of those men who thinks women are supposed to be, like, barefoot at home in the kitchen.”

  “He had his good parts, though. Right?”

  “I mean, he was a hard worker, I’ll give him that. But we saw how far that got you. You and your dad helped him through law school only for him to drop you the second he got a little bit of success.” She snorted, annoyed. “So much for sticking together.”

  Her eyes lit up, as if something else had occurred to her. “Oh! And remember how he started that big project or whatever with him trying to find his long-lost brother who got put up for adoption?”

  I frowned. “What about it?

  “You were so sweet and supportive through the whole thing, and he was…I don’t know, so secretive about it. Never telling you anything about it.”

  “Well, that was a private matter,” I defended, hearing the pathetic note. “I didn’t want to intrude.”

  “But don’t you think that’s weird? That he had this whole other family member he found after all this time and didn’t include you?”

  “Maybe it was,” I said with a shrug. “But it doesn’t matter now, does it?” I sipped my wine, knowing that every word she said was right. “I have no idea how I got into something so
serious with a guy like him. No idea.”

  “It’s just habit. You meet someone and all of a sudden it’s a year later and your lives are totally linked together and you can’t imagine being without them – whether they’re right for you or not.” She leaned forward and put her hand on my knee. “But look on the bright side.”

  “There’s a bright side?”

  “Sure! You get a chance to start over and learn from your mistakes,” she said, her positivity infectious. “Annie, you’re young and hot and brilliant and in a new town with your best friend. You’ll have your pick of guys – the hardest part’s going to be choosing which one you want.”

  I forced a smile, but it hardly felt that easy. I’d dated before Andrew, sure, but it’d never been something that’d come easy to me.

  “But if I want to date, it means I have to, you know, actually go out on dates.”

  She beamed at me and laughed. “That’s the most fun part! You get to meet new guys, let them buy you drinks, maybe even hook up with a few of them.”

  I wasn’t convinced. “Yeah, and then there’s the part where you wonder if they’re ever going to call you back, or if they’re going to cheat on you, or if they ever even plan on committing…”

  Another dismissive swipe through the air. “Oh, don’t worry about any of that. You need casual and fun. No point in thinking about relationships right now.” She said the word relationships as if it were the most unappealing thing in the world. And at that moment, I had to agree with her. “Has Andrew even asked about you?”