Ravenous, A Tame Quantum Novel (Quantum Series Book 5) Read online

  Thankfully, none of the friends or family we’re vacationing with has noticed that I’m playing the nervous antelope to Jasper’s hungry cheetah. I’ll confess to being conflicted about his newfound interest in me, but I suppose I shouldn’t be. If a reasonably attractive woman offers a man unfettered access to her vagina for the purposes of breeding, she ought to expect a certain level of interest.

  But there’s interest, and then there’s cheetah-level interest, thus my dilemma. In all the years I’ve known Jasper and secretly lusted after him and his sexy British accent, I’ve never once suspected he returned the admiration. Sure, he likes me as a buddy, a colleague, as his close friend’s sister, as a woman to vent to about other women. But as a romantic partner? Not so much.

  Since our conversation the other morning, however, all that has changed, and his interest is such that I find myself in a perpetual state of arousal and heightened anticipation, wishing we could act immediately on our plans. At the thought of my longtime dream of being a mother coming true, I’m a mess of emotions—excitement, anxiety, joy and fear. That’s a lot to hide from the perceptive group that surrounds me on lounge chairs by the pool on our last full day in Mexico.

  Everyone is still over the moon about Hayden and Addie’s engagement, and talk of wedding plans continues unabated forty-eight hours after the big announcement. Addie is incandescent with happiness, and Hayden hasn’t stopped smiling for even a minute. I’ve never seen my brother’s best friend look so serene. Normally, he’s like a thundercloud looking for a place to explode. That intensity has served him well in his career, but has made for a messy personal life.

  Falling for Addie has grounded and centered him, and I couldn’t be happier for both of them. Hayden is the second of our group to take the marital plunge, the first being my brother, Flynn, who can’t keep his hands off his lovely wife. They’ve disappeared together so often during this trip that jokes about search parties have been a daily occurrence.

  I enjoy being with Flynn and Natalie for the few hours every day that they come up for air. My brother has spent his adult life in the public eye, his life before Natalie a series of high-profile film roles, adoring fans and a brief disastrous marriage that left him determined to stay single—until Natalie came along and changed his mind about a lot of things.

  I’ll admit to being a tiny bit envious of my brother, who, like our two sisters, has found true love and a life partner. Only recently have I started to take stock of my life and realize I’m going to end up alone if I can’t see past my exacting standards where men are concerned and find someone I can stand to spend my life with.

  How’s that for a pretty low bar? Someone I can stand to spend my life with. You’ve uncovered my big secret—I’m a realist without a romantic bone in my body, and after having dated every form of toad known to mankind, I’m ready to settle for one who doesn’t disgust me. I’m under no illusions that my baby-making enterprise with Jasper will be anything more than a DNA exchange with, perhaps, a few satisfying sexual encounters along the way.

  In the meantime, I need to get busy finding an actual father for my yet-to-be-conceived child. I like to think of myself as a modern, independent woman, but underneath my contemporary veneer is the heart of a traditionalist. I was raised in a two-parent family, my nieces and nephews are being raised in two-parent families, and I want the same for my child. I want a man who is ready to settle down, who is mature, comfortable in his own skin, confident but not cocky. Someone who works for a living and won’t be looking to sponge off me or my famous family members. It would be nice if he’s handsome and polite. As you can see, I’m not being unreasonably picky. I know women who won’t date a man if he has so much as a crooked tooth, even if he’s the nicest, sexiest, most charming man they’ve ever met. The tooth is a deal breaker.

  I’m not that girl. No one is perfect, least of all me, so why would I expect someone else to be? I’m not looking for perfection, but it would be nice to find someone I could talk to about things that interest me, who keeps up-to-date on what’s going on in the world, who cares about the things that matter to me—family, friends, my community, the larger world around us.

  None of this sounds overly ambitious, right? Well, you’d be hard-pressed to find a man in Los Angeles, or most of Southern California, for that matter, who meets even half of my reasonable criteria. I’ve found if he’s handsome and fairly intelligent, he’s already been married three times and comes with several ex-wives, not to mention multiple kids with all different women. In other words: drama. No, thanks. I get enough drama at work, the kind we manufacture on behalf of Quantum Productions.

  I get plenty of drama by association from my famous brother and our famous friends. I don’t need it in a relationship, too.

  Or maybe you find a guy who is mature, never been married, confident but not cocky. Except when the other shoe drops, you discover he can’t hold down a job to save his life, or he doesn’t speak to his mother or some other highly undesirable quality emerges that negates the good things.

  It’s exhausting. If it were going to be just me, I’d say to hell with finding a nice, normal guy to settle down with. But I can’t deny my child a daily father figure in his or her life simply because I’m tired of the dance. That’s not fair to my future child, thus my determination to find someone.

  When I get home to Los Angeles, I’m going to do something I said I’d never, ever, ever do, no matter how desperate things got. I’m going to register with an exclusive dating service that’s come highly recommended by my dear friend Marlowe Sloane. The service has a reputation for pairing people who aren’t able, for whatever reason, to be listed online. I’ll still have to use a different name, so I can keep my famous family out of the equation. If I can find a man who falls in love with me, Ellie, and not the Godfrey name, that’ll be cause to celebrate. If I find one who might also be willing to raise my unborn child as his own, that’ll be a flat-out miracle. I’m hoping for a miracle.

  Addie spreads a towel on the lounge next to mine and plops down to work on her already impressive tan. I stay huddled under my umbrella with Estelle Flynn’s voice in my head, telling me I’ll have wrinkles by forty if I keep up my sun-worshipping ways. My gorgeous mom with her porcelain skin is a real buzz-killer on a Mexican vacation.

  “You aren’t working, are you?” she asks, eyeing my iPad.

  “Nah, just taking a quick look at my email.” As head of the production logistics team at Quantum, we’re always working two or three films ahead of the rest of the group, scouting locations and securing the permits necessary to film in far-flung locations. We also handle travel, lodging and meals for the talent and crew. “My people have things under control, or so it seems.”

  “The best part about going on vacation with my boss is that my people are on vacation, too,” Addie says. “Ahhhh, so relaxing.”

  “And so unfair,” I say. “I’m on vacation with the bosses and still getting slammed.”

  “Totally unfair, especially since you’re the sister of one of the big bosses.”

  “Right? I need to demand a meeting with my brother.”

  “Just do it next week. His assistant is on a badly needed vacation.”

  My laughter morphs into concern when I notice a big bruise on the inside of Addie’s wrist. “What happened there?”

  Addie shades her eyes from the sun. “Where?”

  “Your wrist is all bruised. Is that from when you fell the other night?” She tripped and nearly fell down a sharp embankment during a thunderstorm. Fortunately, Hayden and Flynn were right behind her and managed to help her to safety.

  Turning her arm inward, Addie takes a closer look at it, as if seeing it for the first time. “Oh yeah, must be.” Keeping her other hand propped over her eyes, she says, “Tell me I’m crazy, but there seems to be an Englishman in our party looking at you like he wants to have you for dinner.”

  I don’t know where to look—at Jasper sitting on the other side of the pool w
ith the guys or anywhere but there. “I… I have no idea what you mean.” The one thing I know for certain is that my brother and the other Quantum partners cannot know about my deal with Jasper. It’s our personal business, and the last thing I want is to make this a group project with everyone asking questions. I shudder at the thought of it.

  “You and Jasper… I can really picture that.”

  I snort out a laugh. “Glad you can, because I can’t. Me and the playboy? Right.”

  “You know better than to believe everything that’s said about him. You know him better than that.”

  “I know that he goes through women like you and I go through water.”

  Since she can’t dispute that fact, Addie says, “Hayden and Flynn think the world of him. That ought to count for something.”

  “Of course it does, and I also think the world of him, but I know him too well to ever picture what you’re envisioning.” However, I think enough of him to make a baby with him, not that any of our mutual friends and colleagues will ever know about that. The idea of actually “making a baby” with Jasper makes me feel overheated. “I’m going in the pool. Want to come?”

  “Thanks, but I’ll stay here and grab some Zs while Hayden is in the meeting with Flynn and Nat.”

  I stand and remove my cover-up, revealing the bikini that seemed modest until I have to wear it in front of Jasper. Now I feel overly exposed, and not in a good way. “They’re in a meeting? On vacation?”

  “It’s informal, which is why I’m out here rather than in there. They’re talking about the screenplay for Nat’s story. Flynn’s got a guy lined up to write it, and he wanted Hayden’s input before they move forward.”

  “They’re really going to make that film, huh?”

  “Flynn is extremely determined, and you know how that goes.”

  I laugh, because yes, I know how driven my little brother can be when he sets his mind to something. I’m not unlike him in that way. I’ve decided I want a baby, and less than two weeks after finally making that decision, I’ve found someone to father my child and I have a plan. It’s a Godfrey family trait. We’re all Type-A, get-things-done people, and as I take the steps into the pool, I notice that my baby daddy is watching me. He’s watching me very closely.

  She’s killing me in that teeny, tiny bikini that leaves nothing to my fertile imagination. If I were to create the ideal Southern California girl, Ellie Godfrey would be her—long legs, full breasts, a flat, toned belly and real blonde hair that cascades down her back, nearly reaching her supple arse.

  It’s all I can do not to drool at the sight of her in a peach bikini as she disappears under the water and resurfaces looking like a sea nymph. She’s an actual wet dream, and the thought of making a baby with her grabs the attention of my John Thomas, which is the last bloody thing I need with Emmett and Sebastian sitting on either side of me and Kristian next to Seb. They’re reading, sleeping and listening to music, and thankfully paying no mind to my aroused state.

  Wouldn’t that be something if they were to tell Flynn that I sported wood while watching his sister in the pool? Thank God for sunglasses. If they happened to notice the wood—and why would they be looking anyway?—at least they won’t be able to tell what—or who—caused said wood.

  Since my conversation with her the other day, all I can think about is having sex with Ellie Godfrey. Prior to that life-changing twenty minutes, the possibility of any kind of sex with her was so remote as to have only been considered in passing. Such as, Damn, Ellie looks hot today, or I wonder how she’d be in bed, or Cripes, I’d love to know if her breasts are as fantastic as they look. Check that one off the list. The bikini confirms they’re every bit as spectacular as they appear when fully clothed—a thought that does nothing to ease the ache in my groin.

  Bloody hell. I’m lusting after the sister of my friend and business partner. If I wasn’t half-knackered on sun and tequila, I might tell myself to knock it off. But I haven’t been in my right mind since she confessed to wanting a baby and I offered to provide stud services. As I’ve yet to have a moment alone with her since, I’ve wondered a few times if perhaps I dreamed the whole thing.

  But I wasn’t dreaming when the exquisite Ellie Godfrey told me she yearns for a baby. I wasn’t dreaming when I told her I’d happily father her child, but only if we make the baby the old-fashioned way. In truth, I never expected her to take me up on my offer, and that she did so willingly tells me a lot about how badly she wants this baby we’re going to make together.

  In the days that have passed since our momentous conversation, a few other thoughts have come to mind. First and foremost, no one, especially my family back home in England, can ever know that I’ve fathered a child, for reasons Ellie hasn’t the first clue about. Second, I need to talk to Emmett about the legalities, and Ellie needs to engage a lawyer of her own. We need to do this completely by the book.

  The last bloody thing on God’s green earth that I need is legal problems with any member of the Godfrey family. My association with Flynn has been successful and profitable beyond my wildest dreams, not to mention I value his friendship. I won’t risk that even if it means finally getting a chance to touch gorgeous Ellie. Regardless of my worries, my relationship with Flynn won’t stop me from moving forward with my plans to get into the baby-making business with his sister.

  She’s a grown woman who can make her own decisions, and she’s decided to allow me the supreme honor of fathering her child. I can’t and won’t take back my offer, nor will I leave her to the impersonal process of sperm banks, and God knows what else is involved with that. I shudder to imagine how that works.

  No, I’m more than happy to do this the way God himself intended, and to allow her to raise our offspring as she sees fit. She’ll be a marvelous mother. Of that I have no doubt. She has a marvelous mother. I’m more than halfway in love with Stella Flynn, as are most of Flynn’s friends. I want Ellie to have her fondest desire, and I expect to fully enjoy knocking her up. As much as I like and admire Ellie, though, she and I could never be an actual couple. She’s too sweet—and far too vanilla—for the likes of me.

  I can do sweet and vanilla to make a baby. But long-term? No way. I’m almost thirty-seven years old, and I found out a long time ago that I’m not capable of nice and sweet as a rule. No, I want hot, dirty, kinky sex. I need it the way some people need caffeine to get through a day. A man reaches a point in life where he’s not willing to compromise on certain things. My kink is nonnegotiable, and thus my realization quite some time ago that I’m likely to remain single rather than have to settle for a nice, wholesome girl who’d rather be electrocuted than give me what I want in bed.

  No matter how hard I try, I can’t picture Ellie Godfrey submitting to me or any other man. She’s not a sub, but I am a Dom. I’d like to live to celebrate my next birthday, so I won’t be dominating Flynn’s sister, as much as I’d love to release the beast with her. The beast shall remain chained and under wraps while we make this baby she wants so badly.

  How long could it take anyway? A month, maybe two? Once there’s a bun in the oven, I can get back to business as usual, and that means lots of different women who are as kinky as I am, if not more so. Far fewer complications in the long run, even if thoughts of more than baby-making with Ellie have crossed my mind a few times in the last few days. It’s just not possible, and that makes me unreasonably sad.

  I look over to see that Emmett has put down his book, Seb has his eyes closed and his headphones in place, and Kristian is snoring loud enough to wake the dead, the way he always does after getting pissed on whiskey. “Can I have fifteen minutes Monday morning?” I ask Emmett.

  “Sure, what’s up?”

  “A personal matter.” Though it would probably make more sense to retain outside counsel for this personal matter, that’s a risk I don’t want to take since the mother of this child is Flynn Godfrey’s sister. I can’t risk some outside attorney deciding it would be more profitable to s
ell that tidbit to the rags than to serve as my counsel. Finding another lawyer would also take time I’m not willing to waste. I’m afraid to give Ellie the opportunity to reconsider our agreement. As a Quantum partner, I pay a portion of Emmett’s salary, and he’ll respect the attorney-client nature of our conversation. I have no worries about him telling anyone, even if I fear he won’t approve of our plans.

  “Everything okay?” he asks, as my friend and not as my attorney.

  “Yeah, it’s all good, mate. Just a detail I need seen to.”

  “I’m your guy for details.”

  Ellie emerges from the pool, glistening with drops of water offsetting her tanned skin, her nipples tightening into buds that I can clearly see under her skimpy top. I have to grit my teeth to contain the urge to pounce right here, right now. Since that’s not an option, I’ll see to the legalities, and then we’ll get down to business as fast as bloody possible.

  Chapter 3

  A happy, relaxed, tanned group flies back to Los Angeles on Sunday night. We agreed to stay as long as we possibly could, which is why we touch down at LAX at ten after ten. Flynn and Hayden have nine o’clock meetings in the morning, but I’ll be at the office by seven to catch up on the two million emails that piled up while we were away. I’m meeting with my team at nine thirty to be looped back into what’s going on.

  I’m gathering my stuff when I catch Jasper staring at me. He’s done a lot of that over the last few days, and I’m beginning to expect that when I glance his way, he’ll be looking at me like he can’t wait to see me naked. Antelope, meet cheetah. My body hums with awareness of him, especially the girl parts. If he can make me hum just by looking at me, what’ll happen when we get down to baby-making?

  “El?” Kristian gestures for me to go ahead so he can follow me off the plane.