Zara
P.S. It’s Baby Beckett—my child will have the same surname as me. It’s non-negotiable.
P.P.S. I contacted a boutique Italian design company. Requested swatches of their custom made Italian leather for the casino booths. I’m looking into lighting and marbles now.
I’m going to be late if I stay to reply, but fuck it. It’s easier on the Mac than fucking around on my phone.
Don’t be unnerved. My intention is to care for you and our baby. We just need to figure out the logistics.
Looking forward to figuring them out together.
Cole.
P.S. You know every inch of me. But perhaps you need to be reacquainted with all of those inches?
P.P.S. And you know I know how to break you in gently, but I have no problem reminding you. ;)
P.P.S. If we get married before you give birth, you’d be a Hartmann and so would our baby. I’m not averse to the idea if you’re not?
I snigger as I shut down my computer.
I’m joking about getting married.
Obviously.
Well, sort of.
I spent the last five months fantasising about Zara Beckett, not knowing she was pregnant with my baby. Now that I know the truth last night’s fantasies were markedly different from simply finishing unfinished business—they were about carving out the kind of future I never realised I wanted until I saw her swollen stomach. It was like someinvisible force of nature reached into my chest and stole my heart.
Zara owns me—body, mind, and every fucked-up part in between. She just doesn’t know it yet. She thinks she knows nothing about me—she’s wrong.
The memory of my mother’s latest wedding flashes before my eyes.
I opened up to Zara. I confided in her. I let her in—whether she knows it or not.
I don’t let people in.
But even back then, some part of me related to her on a deeper level. It was supposed to be sex. It was so much more from the offset. For me, anyway. I can only hope to hell she feels the same because Iwillbe in her life in some capacity—I’d like us to at least try to give a real relationship a go.
I could lie and say it’s for the sake of the baby. It is, partly. But it’s also a selfish want. Because the second I saw her again, the caveman in me screamed I need to make her mine. Really mine, not because I got her pregnant, but because the thought of her being anyone else’s—the thought of another man raising my child—feels like a fate worse than death.
I ride the lift and step out into the May hazy sun. The heat hasn’t got a patch on Vegas, but I like it. No humidity, just sunshine and a south easterly breeze. There’s something honest about it. And it makes a change from the usual damp and dreary climate. Two of my security team, Sanson and Holmes, ride in the limo with me. Unlike in the Dominican, here, I have to travel with bodyguards. The Becketts have made no secret of their disdain for me. I can’t imagine that’s going to improve when they find out I impregnated their sister. A fact that I’m slightly smug about now that I’ve had time to process.
My iPhone buzzes in my pocket. I whip it out, stupidly willing it to be the one woman I can’t get out of my mind.
If that was your idea of a proposal, it was shockingly disappointing.
And I’m perfectly capable of taking care of myself and my baby.
See you at 6.30pm.
Zara.
I love the banter. Irish was always sharp and sassy—ferociously independent. It was one of the things I loved—liked—about her. I type out a quick response as we pull up outside the Government building.
