Alpha Billionaire Series
Baby Surprise Chapter 26

ALICIA

I had another trip with Christopher, which was just days away. The reservations were set. I was going to travel in business class right next to him, and we had a room with a big bed all booked.

Christopher assigned me to prepare for his today's business trip. When I first started working for him, that would have panicked me, but I had everything under control. He was giving the same presentation. All I needed to do was go into the file and change out a few logos. He will be returning to Atlanta tomorrow, and the next day we will be flying to Dallas for the OffSet conference. More print industry technology and improvements. A lot of the same people, and a lot of different ones.

My phone vibrated and made the twinkling sound that was the ringtone for Christopher's texts.

"Too bad you couldn't come on this trip. The hotel bed is large and empty without you."

I smiled at the text he sent.

"Good thing this isn't a work phone." I texted back. "Aren't you supposed to be in a meeting?"

I looked at the time. He was late. "You are late!"

"Different time zones. I still have an hour before I have to be anywhere."

"And you texted me first thing in the morning?" My chest clenched with feelings. That was thoughtful. That was romantic. That was going to get me in trouble with him. I constantly thought about all the sweet, wonderful things he did for me and the way he treated me. I was knee-deep into falling for him. If I didn't guard my heart, I could drown in my feelings for him.

I could sense he was concerned that I wasn't willing or able to spend the night with him when we were home. But I was going to explain a few things on this trip. He didn't know it, but I scheduled for us to have an extra night at the end of the conference. Jumping from the conference back into work without any recovery time had been a hard-learned lesson.

I didn't have anything else planned, and even though there were plenty of touristic opportunities in Dallas, I didn't think we would take advantage of any of them. My plans were for a day in bed and room service.

"Have you gotten the files for the booth flier?"

I had hoped his next text was going to be a continuation of his flirting. Sigh, it was back to work.

"No, Kathy is supposed to have those for me tomorrow."

"Email me those files the second you have them. We will be doing a demo print run with them in the booth."

"Will do. You need to stop texting and get ready for your meeting." I texted him one last time. I wanted to say something gushy and sweet and teasing, but I didn't know how he would take that. The first time I told him something like that, I wanted to see his face. I could say 'I love you,' and he could sneer, and say the words back. But it was his expression I needed to see. Because I don't think I could accept those words if his face didn't look like he meant it. He could also not say the words and look at me like I was the best thing since sliced bread. And if he did that, I would know he felt something even if he couldn't say the words.

I had plans for telling Christopher some important things. Things that may or may not involve those words. Depending on how he responded, I would know if he was serious about me. I was feeling very serious about him. I needed to tell him I had a kid. I needed to tell him he was a father, but I wasn't going to do that until I knew where things were between us.

Hopefully, when that day comes, Christopher will realize that I had not told him about Ceejay in order to protect my child. I wasn't trying to hide Ceejay from him. But I also didn't want to tell Christopher too soon, or he might think I wanted a paternity claim against him. I had Ceejay thinking I would never actually know any more about his father than what I did.

I had no inclination of going after him for paternity. But I might go after him for something more. I didn't want to be in love with Christopher just because we had a child together; I loved this man more than anything, and I definitely could see us having a future together.

My day sped by, on my way home I stopped at the mall. Not only did I want to see if my favorite plus-sized shop sold sexy lingerie, but I had also totally forgotten that Ceejay was going to need a Halloween costume next week, and I was about to be gone for four days. I needed to get started immediately.

A little over an hour later, I had sexy things to show off to Christopher, and yards of green felt for a dinosaur costume. The range from sex kitten to domestic goddess that a mother had to embrace was not lost on me.

Hannah and Ceejay were sprawled on the couch watching cartoons when I got home.

"Hey, how is everybody?" Ceejay barely lifted his head to look at me when I walked in. Normally he would stop everything to run over and hug me.

"We've been really low energy today, haven't we, buddy?" Hannah said. "He barely touched his noodles for dinner. I made ramen." "He loves ramen, and he didn't eat it?"

After setting my shopping on the table, I sat down and pulled my tired boy into my lap. I rested my hand on his forehead. He felt warm. We skipped the bath and went straight to reading stories when it was bedtime. Ceejay was asleep before I finished the second story.

Ceejay started throwing up at some point in the middle of the night. I had a long miserable night taking care of a sick and scared little boy and doing laundry. By the time it was time for me to go to work, I was exhausted and felt beat up. Ceejay had finally fallen back to sleep, but he was still running a fever.

"Not feeling well. I'm going to work from home." I texted Christopher. I couldn't tell him I was home with my sick little boy, when he didn't even know I had a kid. "Do you need anything? Can I bring you some ginger ale or anything?"

Panic surged. Christopher could not come over. "I don't want you to get sick."

I didn't want him to see Ceejay, or that I was taking the opportunity to work on the costume in my downtime, while still trying to manage my work-from-home tasks.

Ceejay was sick all morning, and after lunch, everything got worse. Everything. I never got a fever, but I started throwing up too.

The files from Kathy finally came in. They needed a few minor tweaks so that the printed fliers would coordinate with the presentation Christopher was giving. I couldn't just tell her to send them on. I made a few adjustments, but my computer froze up in the middle of trying to email them to Christopher. When I got it restarted, I could not connect to the internet. Which meant I could not send the files to Christopher.

"I don't know what's wrong," I whined into the phone.

Christopher did not sound pleased. "Put the files on a USB drive, I'll come by to get it."

"I'll call a courier; you don't have to come over."

"Don't be foolish Alicia. Get the files ready, I'll be there in a bit." He ended the call. I could tell he was disappointed in me.

"I'm here to pick up the file." I stared at the text in disbelief; it had taken him less than my normal commute time. I had told him not to come, I was going to call a courier if I couldn't get it to connect.

When I opened the door, I could tell by his posture he expected me to ask him in. I couldn't. I didn't want him to see the state of my apartment after a day of being home with a sick kid. I wasn't ready to tell him about Ceejay.

"Well, I picked up some soup for you. I thought you might need something to eat." He held up a brown bag from that bakery chain.

"Thank you," I said as I took the bag. "Give me a moment, and I'll grab that drive for you." I kept the door only opened a little bit. "Is everything okay?"

"I'm sick." I didn't want him to try to come in. "I don't want you to catch this. And my place is a mess. Hold on, I'll be right back."

At that moment Ceejay, who I had counted on being mesmerized by the TV, came running into my leg. He hugged me tightly. Christopher's gaze went straight to my son.

I ran my hand over Ceejay's sweaty head. Good, the fever had broken, hopefully, it would stay that way. I didn't say anything. I didn't know what to say. I picked Ceejay up and turned, stepping back into the messy apartment. I put Ceejay on the couch and stepped over to the table where my laptop was set up opposite the sewing machine, with a half-finished costume draped over it.

Christopher stepped inside. At least he stayed by the door. My stomach clenched. I couldn't tell if it was because I was about to throw up again, or if I was nervous that Christopher was going to ask questions I was not prepared to answer.

I held out the small drive as I crossed my living room back to where Christopher stood.

"Here you go. Everything should be fine with the file. I'll have IT take a look at my laptop when I get it back to the office."

"And when will that be?"

I shrugged and pulled a clipping of green thread from my shirt. "I really wanted to go, but I'm not getting on an aeroplane right now. I haven't been able to keep anything down since this afternoon. You should go. I don't want you getting sick too."