Secret Baby: A Second Chance Navy SEAL Romance (Forbidden First Times Book 4) Read online

  Secret Baby

  A Second Chance Navy SEAL Romance (Forbidden First times Book 4)

  Sofia T Summers

  Copyright © 2020 by Sofia T Summers

  All rights reserved.

  The following story contains mature themes, strong language and sexual situations. It is intended for mature readers.

  No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

  Contents

  Description

  Prologue

  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

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Epilogue

  Boss’s Baby (Sample)

  The Rest of Forbidden First Times Series

  Connect with Sofie

  Description

  It was my duty to my country that tore us apart.

  But I’m back to make things right again.

  Jessie took my breath away the moment I saw her in college.

  She was so mine.

  But I knew I had to leave for a SEAL mission.

  And I didn’t have the heart to say goodbye to her.

  It was just a year-long mission.

  Until it wasn’t.

  We were torn apart for way longer than I’d expected.

  Long enough for her to keep a secret from me.

  I missed her sweet lips.

  Her intoxicating smile.

  And I had to have her again.

  So I returned, wishing that fate was on my side.

  On our side.

  And hoping that her little secret doesn’t destroy our second chance.

  Prologue

  Jessie – Seven Years Ago

  “So, what do you think?” I twirled around in front of the mirror and batted my eyelashes at myself. Without waiting for a reply, I grinned.

  My best friend, Henny, sat on the edge of the bed and stared at me.

  “Jess,” she said, blushing a little. “You’re not wearing a bra.”

  I glanced down. “So?”

  Henny blushed harder. “You should always wear a bra, Jess,” she continued.

  “Did you hear that from your mother or from Cosmo?” I asked, cocking my head to the side and raising an eyebrow.

  Henny bit her lip. “You look great,” she admitted. “But like, everyone is going to be staring at you. Is that what you want?”

  I turned back to my reflection in the mirror. In my favorite pair of high-waisted black leggings and a black lacy top, I was about as dressed up as I was ever going to get. In my twenty-one years on earth, I had never really been one for dresses.

  Or parties. Or makeup.

  “Hen,” I said. “This is our senior year. We deserve attention, don’t we?”

  “I don’t know,” Henny said slowly. “I don’t even know that I want to go. You want to stay in and watch 13 Going On 30 again?”

  I resisted the urge to roll my eyes. I loved Henny – she had been my roommate since freshman year and even though our personalities were like oil and water, she was kind, loving, and generous to a fault.

  She was also likely the reason that I hadn’t been expelled from Seaside University. It was Henny who had convinced me to send a thoughtful letter of apology after getting into a heated argument with my ethics professor after he’d said that plus-sized people should automatically buy two plane seats. Henny who had gently persuaded me into tutoring younger students, in an attempt to get in good with the chair of the English department after I’d said that Joseph Conrad was a racist hack. Henny who had gone to bat for me, so many times, when I’d threatened a group of punks who had made my twin brother, Jared’s, life a living hell just for being gay.

  In short, she was my guardian angel.

  But tonight, I was getting my way.

  “No,” I told her shortly. “I want to go to this party. And I want to eat and drink and dance and have fun.”

  Henny looked doubtful. She shifted her skinny ass on the bed and twirled a lock of her pin-straight red hair around one finger.

  It wasn’t just our personalities that clashed. Henny was pale and skinny as they come, with practically no curves and bright red hair. Her default facial expression was a shy smile with twin circles of pink on her cheeks, and her blue eyes had a constant bashful look about them.

  I, on the other hand, was as large as my personality. A big head of curly brown hair. Brown eyes that, according to Jared and Henny, were constantly on the lookout for a challenge. And a big, round body that Henny politely called “curvy” ... and that had prompted my parents to ask if I’d like a Weight Watchers subscription for a birthday gift. I knew they were kidding – mostly – and to be honest, I wasn’t sensitive about it. I had never been some delicate flower, and that wasn’t about to change just because I was a woman now instead of a little kid. I was who I was, and if people didn’t like me, well, it didn’t bother me all that much. Mom always said that attitude was off-putting, that I needed to be more sensitive and forgiving.

  But I always said that I didn’t have time for assholes, and I didn’t sense that changing any time soon.

  Henny must have sensed that I wasn’t backing down. She slid off the edge of the bed and stood straight up, tossing her head.

  “Well, okay,” she said finally. “But like, just because we’re seniors, okay? And next weekend, we do what I want to do.”

  I grinned at her. “I think I’m rubbing off on you,” I teased. “You sure?”

  Henny flushed, but she nodded.

  “Yeah,” she said. “I’m sure.”

  It was twilight dusk as the two of us left our dorm and trooped across the campus of Seaside University. It was late in the second semester of our senior year and the air smelled like salt from the nearby Atlantic Ocean and perfume from the wisteria and magnolia that had blossomed like wildfire over the last few weeks. It was so hard to believe that I was graduating. College had been wonderful but truthfully, I was more than ready for it to be over. I wanted to get out into the world. Seaside University had been an insulating bubble. It had been great when Jared and I had first moved out of Mom and Dad’s house – but I wanted more.

  My dream had always been to become a sports journalist and with an internship lined up with a local news station, I felt that I was well on my way. I’d just gotten the news earlier that day and I felt that I was oozing confidence as Henny and I walked across the darkening quad.

  “You’re going to stay with me the whole time, right?” Henny asked.

  “Hen, the point of a party is to mingle and meet new people,” I said. “I bet there are going to be tons of cute guys there.”<
br />
  Henny put her face in her hands and groaned. “Don’t remind me,” she mumbled. “You know I can’t date right now.”

  I stopped walking and put my hands on her shoulders.

  “Henny, look at me.”

  She took a deep breath, but lifted her face from her hands and turned to me.

  “You are a beautiful, strong woman,” I said. “And any guy would be lucky to have you.”

  Her chin wobbled. “Derrick didn’t think so.”

  “Derrick sucks,” I said. “He dumped you after three years of dating so he could do, what? Screw his way through Europe for one semester? He’s not worth it,” I told her loudly. “You deserve better.”

  Henny gave me a thin smile.

  “Repeat that,” I said. “You deserve better.”

  “I deserve better,” Henny said softly.

  “Of course, you do,” I said with a grin. “Now, let’s get going.”

  The party, located at a shared house off-campus, was already buzzing and thumping with loud music by the time that we arrived. I waved at a few people I’d seen here and there in classes – Seaside University wasn’t exactly huge – and then made a beeline for the keg, where I poured two plastic red cups to the brim and gave one to Henny. Beer sloshed over the edges and I grinned at her.

  “Sorry,” I said.

  “It’s so loud in here!” Henny yelled. “I can barely hear myself think!”

  “You’ll get used to it,” I called back. “I promise.”

  Henny and I did a lap through the party – I called it our Clueless move – and she found a group of people with whom she’d suffered through organic chemistry with. One guy in particular, with blonde hair and bright blue eyes, couldn’t take his eyes off her.

  “I’m going to stay with these guys for a while,” Henny said, almost shyly.

  I grinned at her. “Go get ‘em, tiger,” I said as I playfully patted her on the shoulder.

  “Jessie!” Henny said. “Shh!”

  “They didn’t hear me, don’t worry,” I told her. “It’s way too loud in here.”

  As I left Henny with her chemistry friends, I realized that I was sweating. It was hot inside the house – it felt like the heat was on, even though it was in the eighties outside, and I was breathing hard. I gulped down the rest of my beer, then refilled my cup and stepped outside to the back garden. Whoever had rented the house before the students had taken great care with the garden itself but now, the flowers and vegetables plants were eclipsed by the weeds. There was a rose trellis against the side of the house and I smiled as I ran my hand along the whitewashed wood.

  I loved living in Wilmington, North Carolina. It was the only home I had ever known, and even though it was kind of provincial, I honestly hoped that I’d stay there for the rest of my life.

  Plus, covering the Wilmington minor league baseball team had always been my dream.

  The spring air was soft and sweet and the beer was perfectly cold and frosty – the perfect thing to refresh me after being inside that hot, sweaty, loud house. I smiled to myself as I walked through the garden and tilted my face back to look up at the moon. It was funny – I had been the one who had wanted to come to the party and here I was, shunning everyone for some moonlit roses and weeds.

  The sky was so beautiful that I couldn’t tear my eyes away from it. As I wandered further away from the house through the ruins of the garden, I didn’t see the tall, hulking figure that stood in my way and before I knew it, I stumbled over my feet and bumped into it.

  Him.

  “Watch where you’re going,” a stern voice said and I gasped, practically leaping backward and spilling my beer everywhere.

  “I didn’t see you,” I said, narrowing my eyes and crossing my arms over my ripe bustline.

  The figure shifted and moved and turned to me. In the moonlight, I saw the hottest guy I’d ever laid eyes on. His face looked like it could have been carved from ivory with dark hair that tumbled away from his brow. In the bright beams of the moon, I could see that his eyes were dark and intense.

  And he was glaring at me.

  I couldn’t help it – I burst into giggles.

  “What?”

  “Nothing,” I said. “It’s just ...” I trailed off, then took a deep breath. “It’s just funny, that’s all. What the hell are you doing out here? Don’t you know the party is in the house?”

  His nostrils flared slightly. “Maybe parties aren’t my thing,” he said.

  I blinked. “Then what are you doing here?”

  He stepped closer and I smelled a slight hint of cologne – something musky and woody and fresh. The scent made my mouth water and I swallowed hard, suddenly feeling more awkward than I ever had in my entire life.

  “My friend dragged me,” he admitted. For a brief moment, there was a crack in his stern armor, the look of someone who was unhappy and almost lost. It vanished after a second, so quickly that I wondered if I’d imagined it.

  “You sound like my roommate,” I said. “She didn’t want to come, either. And now, she’s inside, laughing it up with a bunch of friends.”

  “Really?” The guy smirked. He raised an eyebrow at me and our gazes met and locked. My heart fluttered with excitement and I felt a tingle spreading through my entire body.

  “Yeah.” I cursed myself – I sounded like a total idiot! – and swallowed again. Despite the two cups of beer that I’d practically inhaled, my mouth was dry.

  “Benjamin,” the guy said. He offered his hand a second later and I had to wipe mine on my thigh before accepting his grip. As soon as our hands touched, I nearly gasped. The air between us grew heated and I could feel that tingle again, stronger than before, pulsing and racing and lighting up my whole body.

  “Jessamine,” I said. “But no one calls me that – it’s Jessie.”

  “Shame.”

  I blinked at him. “What makes you say that?”

  I saw a faint smile etch its way over Benjamin’s face.

  “Because that’s a beautiful name. It’s unique.”

  I held my breath.

  “It’s like you,” Benjamin continued. “You seem like the kind of person who wants to stand out.” When I didn’t reply, he continued: “Isn’t that what you want?”

  A shiver ran down my spine. Why did it seem like he was talking about so much more than names?

  I couldn’t answer him – it was too intimate, too close to the heart. Instead, I cocked my head and gave him a saucy smile.

  “How come I’ve never seen you before?” I challenged him. “I’m a senior. I thought I knew everyone on campus.”

  Benjamin snickered. “I don’t live on campus,” he said.

  “I haven’t seen you in any classes,” I said. As soon as the words were out of my mouth, I blushed. What was I doing? I sounded like a loser, or like a total nerd!

  “I’m in NROTC,” Benjamin said. He smirked at me and I blushed hotly.

  “Well, I’m a communications major,” I said breezily.

  “What do you hope to do with that, Jessamine?”

  Just the way he said my name sent shivers down my spine. A strange mix of feelings was building inside of me, unlike anything I’d ever felt before. Despite my brashness and frequent bold behavior, I hadn’t ever thought of myself as the type of woman who could attract a man – especially not a man like Benjamin, all lean muscle and sculpted jaw. In my own weird way, I had sort of resigned myself to being the “best friend” character in everyone else’s lives – the kind of person who encourages and dotes, who smiles from the wings of the stage as my skinnier, prettier friends got the leading guy.

  Now, though, I wondered if I hadn’t sold myself short. It couldn’t be a joke, could it? The way Benjamin was looking at me. The way my heart was pounding like a drum. The way my palms were damp and sweaty, no matter how many times I wiped them off on my thighs.

  Despite the warm evening, I shivered.

  I still hadn’t answered his question – but I wa
sn’t thinking about college, or my major, or my future career anymore.

  I was only thinking about him.

  Stepping closer, I took a deep breath and stretched up on the tips of my toes. Then, without thinking about what I was doing, I kissed him.

  For a moment, neither of us moved. Then, the kiss seemed to become alive. Benjamin’s lips moved against my own and I moaned softly when I felt his sharp teeth nipping at my mouth. His tongue slid into my mouth, caressing mine, and I shivered when Benjamin put his arms around me and pulled me closer. His body was muscled and solid and in his arms, I felt almost dainty, like I weighed nothing at all.

  The kiss grew more passionate and I was aware of every single movement in my body. My heart thudding against my ribs, my nipples hardening under the lacy shirt I wore, my clit throbbing and my pussy getting wet. I tilted my head back and whimpered with pleasure as Benjamin broke the kiss and moved his mouth down my neck, to my collarbone. He bit and sucked and licked and I cried out, tangling my hands in his dark hair and pulling him closer. The sensations flying through my body were heavenly and I was barely aware of Benjamin holding me in his arms and walking me backward, until I was pressed up against the rose trellis.

  “I want you,” I whimpered as Benjamin’s head moved lower and lower. I shouldn’t have been doing this – it was slutty and wanton and careless, anyone could have seen us!

  But I didn’t care. All that I cared about was Benjamin, and how much I needed him in that moment. He dropped to his knees, moving his hands over my body and drawing me close. I could feel the heat of his breath through the lace of my shirt and I shivered when his mouth found my nipples and began to suck through the scratchy material. The wet, liquid heat of his tongue on my sensitive skin made me blush hotly and I yanked my shirt up around my shoulders to give him better access. In the moonlight, my skin was so pale that it was practically glowing and I shuddered with anticipation as Benjamin put his hands to my breasts and cupped them, rubbing his thumbs over my nipples.