The Contingency Plan (The Lonely Heart Series) (6 page)

Charlie was lost for words.  Gawking, she coughed out, “How is that even possible?” Suddenly, she couldn’t breathe as she tried to push out the image of Dane screwing like a wild animal in some high-end hotel room. 

“Should I even give you the details?” Sully asked with a naughty smile. 

Charlie exhaled loudly. “
Unfortunately
, since we are taking a gift as a result of the details, then yes.  I guess that I’ll just have to hear about it.  Besides, I would hate to hear it on E! later.”

“You have a point.  Okay.  Dane has a bit of
freak
in him.  I call it the celebrity syndrome.  You see, he can’t
just
have sex with one woman.  In fact, som
e
times, he can’t
just
have sex with just two women.  It started when he played ball in college and was intr
o
duced to the whole group thing, and basically, it just never went away.  Unfortunately, with situations such as these, the byproduct of a threesome can be…kids.  Plural.”

“But how did he impregnate two women at one time?” Charlie grilled. 

“Oh, it wasn’t at the same time.  It was the same night, different session, same girls, just different rotation.”

“Well, that’s simple enough,” she said sarcastica
l
ly. 

“I thought you’d understand,” Sully said with a chuckle.  She was taking it better than he had e
x
pected. 

“Doesn’t he know about protection?  A condom would definitely have prevented the situation all together.”  In her mind, she knew that she would never see him again without thinking of large amounts of sperm. 

Sully put up his index finger and narrowed his eyes.  “Here’s the super personal part.  He handpicks the girls in advance, has them screened for STDs, then sets up the times because he hates using condoms.  He said something about being allergic.”

“They make special condoms…”  She stopped he
r
self. 
Why bother?

Sully seemed unmoved, obviously because he was all too familiar with his friend’s fetish.  “Some men just like to go raw.”

“Ugh.”  She shook her head. That was too much. 

“What?” He shrugged with a laugh.  “We used to…go raw.” 

Charlie blushed involuntarily.  “We were mono
g
amous.”  She tilted her head.  “Weren’t we?”

“How can you even ask that?  See, that’s why I hate to discuss Dane’s situation.  After hearing it, a woman completely thinks all men are dogs.”

“I thought that well before you told me about Dane,” she said with a wink.

That cut Sully’s hopes down a bit. He redirected. “I never was a dog with you.”

“But you admit to being a dog at some point, with some woman, right?”

“Why would I admit to something like that?” he felt himself digging a deeper hole for himself but was determined to dig himself out.  “I was in love with you.  I would have never done anything like that to you, with or without your consent.”  That was a completely true statement whether she knew it or not.  He only hoped that she believed him. 

For some reason, that small confession made Cha
r
lie feel so much better, and even though she tried, she could not hide the light in her eyes.  So, she settled for rolling them.  “Loved me…yeah right.”

There was no need to beat a dead horse.  Sully knew that he had turned the corner with her.  The tug of her lips at the corners let him know that she thought a great deal higher of him than she put on. 
Success was imminent.

He took another sip of his martini and wiggled down in his seat.  “So for two million dollars, can you get the board of directors on the line for an emergency call on a Saturday?” Sully waved over the pudgy purple-haired waitress who was lingering a few booths in front of them.  “Ma’am, we’re ready to order.”

“Be with you in a sec,” she said, sending a text message on her phone.

Sully cracked a smile.  “You gotta love New Yor
k
ers, right?”

***

Two hours, a dozen oysters, one rib eye steak and two million dollars transferred later, Sully and Charlie sat exhausted in the back of the restaurant with their I-phones nearly dead, napkins written all over with strategies and numbers and plates and glasses su
r
rounding them.  The consensus between the two was that it had been a productive meeting, well worth the time. 

Sully had defended his friend’s position and e
n
couraged the board to support Dane based mostly on his highly regarded recommendation, and Charlie had proven that she was the person for the job of Pres
i
dent. 

With everything etched in concrete mostly, there was nothing left to do but focus on each other.   

Trying to let loose a sly burp from too much soda, Charlie rested her head back on the booth and looked up at the dim light.  “Well, that was exhausting,” she said, pushing her feet up out of her shoes. The imm
e
diate relief of pressure off of her big toe was delicious.  Dazed off in a sense of calm, she almost forgot that her ex was sitting across from her. 

Sully concurred with a half-nod before he buried his head in his hands.  “Tell me about it.” He had just brokered a deal and busted his ass in the name of friendship just to arrive at this point.  And while he did have an ulterior motive, he would definitely let Dane know that he owed him big time later. 

Raising his head just an inch above his fisted hands, he looked across at her, eyeing her long, swan like neck and the mole just above her collar bone.  Suddenly and without control, his mouth began to water.  Thoughts of what it would feel like to be able to slink up against her, wrap his hands softly around her ebony skin and gently lap at her neck until she collapsed into his hands began to fill his head.

He remembered a time when that would have been possible, when she would not have fought him at all.  But seven years later, his mildly innocent little butte
r
fly had immerged from her cocoon as a grown, very intimidating woman with jaded undertones and an ice cold façade.  Sully could only blame himself.  The way that he had left her was deplorable by all measures of the word, yet here he was trying to redeem himself for his own selfish reasons…again. 

“What are you thinking so hard about?” Charlie asked, raising her head back up to stare directly at him.

A growl preceded the truth.  “The next part of our meeting,” Sully answered.

“That’s right. You had some sort of a personal issue to discuss, right?”

The way that she said it sent a chill down his no
r
mally steel spine.  Sitting up, he stretched his long legs until they hit her booth and yawned.  “You could say that.”

Charlie waited.

Sully scratched the back of his neck.  A tale sign that Charlie recognized.  Catching himself, he pulled his hand down and planted both elbows on the table.  Knitting his brows, he laced his hands together and gave her his most serious glare.  “You know that I’ve never stopped thinking about you.”

Great fucking intro, idiot,
he admonished himself quietly.  “What I mean is that what happened between us has forever stuck with me.  It shaped me in a lot of ways.”

Charlie’s face was still blank, but she did at least blink at his last statement.

“I’m at a special place in my life where I’ve made the money, made the contacts, made the difference that I wanted to make.  But I’m still hollow,” he said, touching his chest.

You mean shallow
, she thought to herself.  “Did you come here to ask forgiveness?” Charlie interrup
t
ed.

“That and…” Sully took a deep breath.  Shaking his head, he gave a nervous laugh, revealing the dimple in his cheek.  “What I’m about to say…you just don’t hear every day.”

“Spit it out, Sully,” Charlie huffed.  She couldn’t let on, but the anticipation was killing her.

“I’ve recently realized that the one thing that I’m missing in my life is a family, but you know my background.  My mom ran off; my dad basically crumbled behind closed doors and has spent the rest of his life working like a robot.  I have serious trust issues…”

“Blah, blah.  What is it, Sully?” Charlie pushed harder.

“Wow, you don’t make it easy on a man, do you?” he asked, bucking his eyes.

“What man has ever made it easy on me?”  Her eyes narrowed. 

Sully had to admit that she had a point, but her statement could not stop him.  After all, he had not come this far just to be verbally castrated.  “The point is that I’ve recently visited a fertility clinic in D.C. about having a child.  I want to skip the bat-shit crazy wife, the chaotic divorce and focus on the kid.”

Charlie suddenly slouched in her chair.  “What?” she said aloud before she knew it.  “What does that have to do with me?”  The confusion on her face spoke volumes. 

Again
with
a nervous laugh, Sully lifted his finger. “Funny you should ask.”  He cleared his throat.  “My very good friend runs this clinic.  And I’ve told him about my very, very unorthodox plan and he’s agreed to help me.”

“What?  You can’t have kids?” she asked, looking down at his crotch.

Sully looked down in between his legs and frowned. “What?  No, my reproductive organs work just fine,” he said, bringing her back to his point. “I need
eggs
.”

Charlie blinked hard.  “You need…eggs?”

“I have several viable hosts, and obliviously, I have the sperm, but I need eggs.”

“And how do I fit into this equation at all?” Charlie asked with a serious scowl.  This is not the discussion that she had been planning for all day.  This was something completely different, almost
Twilight Zone
in nature. 

“Not just any eggs.  I wanted it to be with the most special woman that I could find.  Luckily, I already know her…well.”  Sully moved his hand closer to hers. 

“Well, who is she?  Do you need me to call her?”  Charlie asked, barely able to follow his wild story. She moved her hand back. 

“It’s you, Charlie.  I want you to be the mother of my child.”

There was a long silence married with an intense pause before Charlie grabbed her purse and pulled herself out of the booth. “This conversation is over,” she said, shaking her head. 
Oh my gosh, he’s crazy,
she thought to herself.
  Stalk-raving mad!

“Charlie!” Sully called out as he watched her walk away. “Charlie! Shit!” he said, throwing down three hundred dollars cash on the table and bolting after her. 

She had already made it out of the dark, seedy re
s
taurant into the blaring sunlight by the time that he caught up with her.  Throwing on her shades, she stepped to the edge of the curve and tried to hail a taxi, but Sully was behind her.  Unable to control himself, he wrapped an arm around her waist and pulled her to him from behind.

“Give me a minute to explain,” he begged into her ear.  His deep baritone was dripping with pure, unadulterated need. 

Her voice was pitched high.  “What is there to e
x
plain?  You’ve totally lost your damned mind,” she said, trying to push away from the smell of expensive cologne and luscious feel of his rock hard body.  Her iron-like exterior was starting to crumble, and she had to get away from him before she turned to complete mush. 

But Sully’s hand clenched her waist tighter. “I won’t let you go until you’ve at least given me an opportunity to explain myself.”

She looked down at his arm around her, his Rolex gleaming in the sunlight, his fingers just above her navel and felt light-headed.  Why did he have to feel so good? Why did he have to smell like heaven?  Why did she have to be here right now dealing with this? 

Sully could no longer resist.  He nuzzled his face down into the side of her hair and took a deep breath.  “Charlie, I’m begging you.  Please.”

Warm familiar feelings started to rise up inside of her instantly.  Suddenly, she felt like seven years had simply disappeared and they were picking up where they had left off. 
No!  This couldn’t happen.
 

“Take your arm from around me,” she said on baited breath.

“No,” Sully said with a growl. “Not until you’ve heard me out.”

Charlie gave in. “Fine. I’ll hear you out. Just…
stop
,” she said, stepping forward as she felt him release her, though she wasn’t entirely sure that she wanted that either. 

Sully ran a hand through his hair and realized that he had become all hot and bothered on the corner of Lennox Avenue.  The world began to move again as people walked around the pair.  He raised his hands.  “Do you want to go back inside or do you want to go to my hotel to talk.”

“Oh, no,” Charlie said with a huff. “I’m not going to your hotel.”

“Because you think that we won’t be able to…” His eyes sparkled.