All Chapters of In Bed With Daddy’s Best Friend : Chapter 211 - Chapter 220

LAYLAI woke up in the night, the nausea working its way up from my toes to my throat. Not wanting to wake Aiden, I transferred my weight from the mattress to the floor in painfully slow increments, then tiptoed to the bathroom. The cool marble tiles felt delicious as I sank down onto them, like they were pulling whatever this was out of my body through my pores. And then the nausea regrouped and surged its way up from my abdomen to my throat.Half an hour later, when it had finally subsided, I splashed water on my face and made my way back to bed. I could tell by Aiden’s deep, even breathing that he hadn’t been disturbed by my exit from our bed. I was glad, but I was also disappointed. My heart was beating triple time, and I wanted to slide up against him and feel his strong arm curl around me.Are you sure he’s as serious as you are?I squeezed my eyes shut tightly and willed Liv to get out of my head. In just a few hours, it would be morning, and I had the perfect day planned for u

LAYLAIf I hadn’t felt Blake’s eyes on me like leeches, I would have been impressed by the event. The ballroom was beautifully appointed with gilt and crystal chandeliers, plush velvet settees, and a dance floor that gleamed under the biggest chandelier of all, the one suspended just in front of the stage by swooping, glittering ligatures. A string quartet was playing a mix of classical and pop.I wanted to just dance with Aiden and forget why we were here, but that wasn’t an option. It seemed that just standing beside him, taking on the brunt of the shop talk together, wasn’t even an option. Somehow, he always ended up embedded in conversation with someone else. And increasingly, I ended up in conversation with Blake.And only Blake.“Let’s dance,” he urged.I laughed awkwardly, stalling for time. The first time he asked, I’d made the excuse that no one else was dancing. That had changed though. Seven or eight couples were moving across the floor in time to Sia’s “Chandelier.” “I don

AIDENThis asshole Stanton had managed to convince me to take my eyes off Layla. I knew I should have stayed right where I was until she was off that dance floor and away from Blake Morten, but like an idiot, I thought,we’re in a crowded room. What can he do?I stepped into the private back room reserved for the VIPs to meet Holly Bernstein–and when I came out two minutes later, Layla was gone.“Relax,” Stanton said as I began searching the room for her. “I’m sure she’s in the bathroom.”If I could have found Blake, I might have relaxed. If I’d spotted him ingratiating himself with some up-and-coming producers or talking to the Netflix executive, I could have believed Layla had just gone to the bathroom. But I circled the ballroom twice, bisecting it multiple times, and neither of them were anywhere to be seen.Stanton had disappeared during my search, but I didn’t bother trying to find him. If he knew where Blake and Layla had gone, he wasn’t going to tell me.Instinct propelled me o

AIDENThe next week passed in a hellish blur. It was a series of worst-case scenarios, all linked together on one endless chain of torment.First, Jack bailing me out of jail, his jaw set and his eyes burning. I knew without having to ask that he knew. He didn’t say a damn thing about it though. He just nodded tersely at me as I walked toward him, holding the envelope they’d sealed my phone and wallet into. Then he turned on his heel, pushed through the precinct’s front door, and was gone by the time I got out to the sidewalk.I took a cab back to the hotel and wasn’t surprised to find that Layla had completely erased herself from the hotel room. There wasn’t a spare earring back to prove she’d ever been there. I looked around and felt the pit in my stomach deepen.The next link on the chain was the story that broke by that afternoon. It was centered around Blake, which made sense because he was the one with the most name recognition. What blew my fucking mind though was how sympathet

LAYLAI spent the week in my childhood bed, staring at the ceiling. Cross Media’s HR had put me on a week-long leave of absence, and I was grateful. I kept my hands folded over my abdomen as though if I kept them there long enough, eventually I would believe there was a real baby in there. My baby. Aiden’s baby. Apparently, the three pink plus signs on the pregnancy tests I still had lined up on my bathroom sink weren’t enough proof.Even if my brain wouldn’t accept it though, my body wouldn’t let me forget. The sudden nausea and exhaustion made so much sense now, I didn’t know how I hadn’t seen it before. I suppose because I hadn’t wanted to. I’d fallen in love with Aiden before I had the chance to rationalize it. With Christian, I’d done my legwork. I’d gotten to know him. I’d ascertained that we both wanted roughly the same thing–to establish our careers, then have children. With Aiden, just like with this baby, my body had succumbed before my brain had a chance to catch up.As far