Blindsided Read online

  Table of Contents

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Epilogue

  BLINDSIDED

  A SECRET BABY ROMANCE

  AVA ASHLEY

  Blindsided

  Copyright © 2017 Ava Ashley

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form without written permission of the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review. This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents either are the products of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locations is entirely coincidental.

  Contents

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Epilogue

  Dear Reader

  Chapter 1

  Sloane

  The article was damned sexy. There was no way Kirk could argue the fact. Even if I’d turned his ass down flat Friday night.

  The piece was Pulitzer material. Straight. To the point. A complicated topic simplified into talking points that were easily digestible.

  If only the leftover Bacon Cheese Fries from Mel’s last night were.

  Whoa!

  I groan as my stomach does an internal loop-de-loop and clutch the walls of the bathroom stall. I’d sarcastically started referring to the ladies’ room on the second floor of the Sacramento Bee as my “office”. God knows I had been spending far more time in here than at my column desk for the past week.

  Hey. At least this office is waterfront property, I think wryly as I stare down into the porcelain bowl. Another stomach flip. Ugh! There was so a reason I’d gone vegan. I had caught the world’s worst stomach virus ever and it was kicking my ass.

  It’s entirely my own fault. I hadn’t been taking care of myself. Instead, I had been burning the midnight oil, crushing to get my editorial piece fine-tuned and polished so Kirk couldn’t say no this time. And I wouldn’t let him con me into “discussing it over drinks” again. Instead, I would march right into his office and slap my piece on his desk and demand he take me seriously.

  But, first I’d wait until gravity righted itself in my stomach.

  I had spent so much time researching facts, crossing my T’s and dotting my I’s, that I had neglected myself.

  I had been too exhausted to even think about my daily five-mile run. Not to mention none of my sports bras could rein the girls in enough lately so I didn’t wince with every stride of my cross-trainers.

  And my diet? Well, that had gone to hell in a handbasket. I might as well be Andrew-Friggin’-Zimmern with the bizarre and crazy detour my normally considered palate had taken. My traditional, conscientious and compartmentalized lunch, neatly separated in its vegan-restyled bento - deconstructed no-rice salad of cucumber, avocado, sesame and a papery wrap of nori; an organic Asian salad of carrot, daikon and cabbage slaw; buckwheat soba noodles; and five-spice stir-fry tofu with edamame? Yeah. That hadn’t happened either. Instead, I had caved to sudden, intense, repetitive cravings for double-orders of greasy, fried potatoes topped with artery-clogging bacon bits, calorie-laden ranch dressing, and thick, gooey, pasteurized, processed nacho cheese stuff.

  My gut reverses gravity again.

  I almost don’t hear the sharp rap of knuckles on the stall door over the flushing whoosh.

  “Sloane?” Emma Dowd, the paper’s librarian and research fact-checker asks, her voice piquing with concern. “You okay?”

  “Yeah. Emma. Give me a sec, huh?” I mutter. “This stomach bug is wreaking havoc with my insides.”

  “That must be one helluva bug, kiddo,” she replies. “Seems like every time I’ve gone by your desk this week, you’ve been in here. What did you do? Eat some bad sushi or something?”

  I grab my flipping stomach again. “Come on, Em. You know I don’t eat sushi.”

  I unlatch the stall door and step out, feeling a little steadier after my confessional to the porcelain god.

  Emma is leaning against the cool, ceramic tile of the wall. She snorts.

  “Yeah. You also don’t eat fried foods. Or bacon. Or dairy products.” She ticks off the list of vegan forbidden foods on her manicured fingers. “And yet, I do believe I saw a crumpled Mel’s bag in your trash.”

  Her brown eyes narrow an accusatory gaze at my own sea-tossed blue. I shake my head.

  “You missed your calling, Em. Your investigative skills are totally wasted as a librarian. You should have been an investigative reporter.”

  “Just call me Sarah Stillman,” she folds her arms, smugly referencing her fellow Yale alum, staff writer for The New Yorker, and recipient of the prestigious George Polk Award for her thought-provoking investigative work. Then Emma’s brow furrows.

  “Yeah, but, then again, there’s no way that would work, cause then I’d have to move to New York and I positively hate snow. Nope. I like my Sacramento sunshine. Librarian it is.”

  I step toward the sink and slather my hands full of the bubblegum pink hand soap. I wrinkle my nose.

  “What’s wrong?” Emma asks.

  I rub the soap into a foamy lather, a distasteful grimace on my face. Partially from the biting smell of the soap and partially from the sallow, tired reflection staring back at me from the vanity mirror. Jesus! The bags under my eyes have carry-on luggage.

  What did I expect, though? When my head had hit the pillow this week, which wasn’t much, I could never seem to find a comfortable position. I return my attention to Emma’s reflection in the mirror.

  “I dunno. I guess I just never noticed how astringent this soap smelled before. It smells like a hospital.”

  Emma suddenly stands straight. She throws a curious look toward the stall I’d just vacated and then back at me. Suddenly, she bobs her head like a tortoise-shelled sifu.

  “Ohhhh,” she drawls, a wicked smile quirking the edges of her wide mouth.

  I shake the excess water from my hands and draw them through the high-powered dryer mounted on the wall.

  “What?” I nearly holler over the noise of the industrial blower.

  “I see what’s going on here,” she hollers back.

  “Yeah. I’m wiped out!” My voice is suddenly five decibels louder than it needs to be as the noise of the blower cuts off. The bathroom door swings open and one of the artists from graphics wanders in, eyes wide at my megaphone mouth.

  “Hey, Tawyna.” I sheepishly temper my volume as Tawnya disappears into a stall. I turn back to Emma.

  “You know I’ve been working my ass off to get Kirk to put me on a real story. I’ve been trying to sell him on an Op-Ed piece for months now, and I think I finally have one that will convince him that I’m a better journalist than he thinks.”

  Op-Eds were journalism’s new fashion. Powerful, meaningful articles that allowed
an author to declare a critical viewpoint. An opportunity to persuade the public. A way to suggest viable resolutions to the issue at hand. It’s the type of writing I craved. I want to be able to discuss the things that are important to me — the huge, broad jumble of life, from politics to global warming — and do it in my own words. Ones that felt familiar and real on my tongue.

  Besides, Mom hadn’t spent the better part of her life serving her country so I could go through Columbia’s journalism program on her GI Bill for me to write fluff pieces for the society column my whole career.

  I owed this to her.

  I look at my watch. Her watch. An old wind-up she’d given to me years ago. I could have afforded a newer one a hundred-times over, but I just couldn’t bring myself to part with it. Well, that and the rhythmic winding of it every day somehow soothes me.

  I just wish it could soothe my jacked up insides.

  “Nuh, uh, kiddo,” Emma shakes her head. “It’s way more than that.”

  She twirls an index finger toward my belly. “You, my intrepid journalist, are definitely cooking up a story alright, but your deadline? It’s about nine months away.”

  Right at that moment, a loud flush sounds from one of the stalls. I almost don’t notice Tawnya toddling out of the stall with the biggest, dopiest grin on her face.

  “Congratulations, Sloane! I’m so happy for you!” Her high-pitched voice squeals like nails on a chalkboard. She scoops me in a big hug and I’m nearly suffocated in a cloud of patchouli and sandalwood.

  I peel myself from her viselike grip and manage a weak “thank you,” though I’m not altogether certain just what I’m thanking her for. She nearly trips over her own feet as she backs out of the bathroom, giggling the whole way. I wait until she’s all the way out of the bathroom then whip back to Emma, although knowing Tawnya, she’s likely got her ear pressed to the door.

  “What in the hell are you talking about?” I ask in confusion and alarm.

  Emma is doing her deplorable best to suppress a grin. “Newsflash. You’re pregnant, my friend.”

  “Yeah. Right,” I scoff. I shake my head. “No.”

  I head back toward my desk. Emma follows dutifully. I keep right on mumbling, right through the newsroom.

  What’s that first stage of grief? Oh, yeah.

  Denial

  “There’s no way, Emma. Not a chance in hell. See that suggests the existence of a relationship. With either a man or a petri dish. Take your pick. And, in case you haven’t noticed, my friend, I have spent almost every ounce of my free time with you lately, going over facts and figures for this article. So, unless you have some secret to tell me, or you’ve been performing lab experiments in staff lounge, I think I’m in the clear there.”

  “I dunno,” Emma defended. “Have you seen some of the science projects growing in the staff fridge?”

  “Oh, shut up. Besides, my monthly visitor isn’t due until the eighteenth. And it’s only the...”

  Smiling, Emma taps a gel-tipped index finger on today’s date...the thirty-first.

  Second stage of grief.

  Anger.

  “This CANNOT be happening right now!” I practically bellow. Curious heads start to swivel.

  “Honey bear, unless you want to become the next headline, you might want to keep your voice down,” Emma suggests.

  I bury my head into folded arms, and repeat. “This cannot be happening.”

  “Oh, it’s happening,” Emma states matter-of-factly. “But, you’re only fifty percent responsible for this, you know. Fess up. Who’s the proud papa to be?”

  I hadn’t been kidding. I hadn’t a spare minute for anything resembling a social life lately. I’ve been so laser-focused on my career lately, I hadn’t had time for a relationship.

  I hadn’t even had time to go buy batteries.

  But, Emma’s right. This isn’t the Immaculate Conception. I consider the last month. What had I done? I grimace.

  Be specific, Sloane. It’s more like who have you done. I racked my reeling brain. The only thing that came to mind was the campaign. And that’s when it hit me.

  The campaign.

  Representative Colbert Daley is the Independent incumbent. He had been campaigning for re-election for the whole past year. Though I’d ridden the campaign trail with him the whole way during the first election, I had only managed to carve out enough time to attend one of his fundraisers this year.

  Representative Daley and I share a common interest in a lot of things. We have similar political opinions. We both went to Columbia, though he was law and myself, journalism. And we are both die hard sports fans.

  Granted, the Congressman worships all things football, but me? I’m a fire and ice kinda gal. Give me a heated brawl over a little case of high-sticking, with a little blood bouncing of the ice, and my nose was plastered up against the Plexiglas. Even if my team, the Santa Ana Devils, is least likely to host the Stanley Cup. It doesn’t stop me from cheering them on. Year after miserable year. It’s hard-wired into my DNA from years of Sunday afternoons, sitting in front of the television with Mom, when she was in town, and Frank, my de facto father figure.

  It’s the same addictive lure of the Powerball. Your chances of your ball being pulled are sandwiched between slim and none. But, if you win? If you somehow overcame the odds?

  What...a...rush.

  So, in the end, it doesn’t matter if they sucked harder than a sour lemon. Our allegiance remains unswayed, even if everything points to certain, inevitable failure. But, no matter how you try to dissuade it, your heart wants what your heart wants. And the night of the Daley fundraiser, it had wanted Lennox Hardy.

  Well, certain parts of me had wanted him, at any rate. And those parts had flushed with unaccustomed warmth when his large hand had pressed against the bare small of my back and leaned past me to give the bartender his drink order. He’d offered me a smile, which I reciprocated, as he waited for his drink. Then, he offered his name.

  I knew who he was, of course. The Sacramento Cougars are America’s darlings.

  I hadn’t come to the fundraiser looking for date, but I’d been busting my hump on the Op-Ed piece so much, I was more than tempted to blow off a little steam. I deserved it. Something off the wall, out of my safety zone. A good night with a bad boy. The small scar over the cleft of Lennox’s chin gave him a roguish air, a hint of something dangerous.

  Equally as dangerous? The three martinis he bought me as we talked our way into something with a less-formal dress code.

  It hadn’t surprised me the Cougars quarterback had been at the Representative Daley’s fundraiser. Like I said, I knew the Senator was a huge fan. What had surprised me was how devastatingly hot he was in a tuxedo and out of his helmet and shoulder pads...and even hotter out of the tux.

  “Ahem,” Emma cleared her throat and brings me barreling back into the present. “Should I give you the room?”

  I suddenly realize that I’m biting the full flesh of my lower lip. And that warm flush between my legs that I’d been daydreaming about is all too present.

  “Oh, crap. What’d I say?”

  “It’s more like what you groaned,” Emma stifles a giggle...unsuccessfully. “Damn, girl. I can’t believe you’re having Lennox Hardy’s baby!”

  Chapter 2

  Lennox

  I fucking hate press. The defensive coverage type, that is. Don’t get me wrong. I’m not keen on the other kind of press either. Both kind of give me the red ass. But, the only kind I’m worried about right now is the kind that involves defensive backs knocking my guys off their routes, screwing with the timing of the plays. That’s what I’m watching for right now. This particular man-to-man defensive formation can go from zero to shit in a matter of seconds. And in this game, it all comes down to seconds.

  My job? Directing ten helmeted gladiators down to the fucking end zone and score as many goddamned points as possible. As quarterback for the Sacramento Cougars, I ready my hands underneath the cente
r, prepping for the snap.

  A trickle of sweat runs down the ropy veins of my forearm, absorbing into the already soaked terry band at my wrist. This game had been brutal. Two touchdowns. Two field goals. And we still trailed the Bushmasters by four. It didn’t matter if it was four or thirty-four. The only point that mattered was one. One more than the other team to claim a win.

  This season had to happen. We were American fucking royalty. Except, lately the crown had been getting a little tarnished. Locker room scuttlebutt says if we don’t pull another ring out of our asses, management’s selling. Moving the team to Vegas. I mean, okay. Vegas. The City of Sin. That’s got its perks. But, more than half the guys on the team have admitted they won’t stay with the Cougars if that happens. And these idiots? They’re family. Dysfunctional and immature, but family means something.

  But, bad as we’ve been, we’ve seen recent surge. A change in performance that’s kicked our asses in gear. More power. More speed. Fractions of a second faster on the snap. Don’t know where it’s coming from, but I’ll take it. So, now here we are, a whole new season, but with our futures on the line. And I’m not going to fuck it up.

  Fourth down. A field goal wasn’t going to cut it. A passing play was the only option. I ticked a quick look up at the clock. Eight seconds. Shit!

  The average play in American football took seven seconds. If anything, and I mean anything slowed my guy down...we were fucked.

  I had scoped out the lineup. At first, I read zone coverage. The defensive back is lined up at the outside, back turned toward the sidelines. Five guys across the line of scrimmage. They’re eyeballing my receivers like they’re on the goddamned menu. One of them is probably going to press Aaron Pratt, my wide receiver, looking to jam him at the line. Great. Not like Pratt’s not already getting jammed at home. His wife’s biological clock is ticking like a friggin’ time bomb.

  They’ve already got one rug rat. I can remember his horror stories of vicious morning-sickness. He showed up to more than one practice with puke on his clothes during that pregnancy. Then there were the insane late-night cravings. Sometimes he’d had to drive halfway across town because she wanted shawarma. And don’t even get me started on the wild-mood swings he described. Tears at the drop of a hat – because the fucking sky was blue, or something. And yet, he seems ready, willing, and able to hit that and subject himself to it all over again.