Page 1 of Baby Proposal
1
ADI
There are three things I’m pretty sure about right now. One, this website is dodgy as a designer dress sold cheap on social media. Two, I’m ovulating. Three, I should not be doing this at work.
But timing is everything for this task, so claims the internet.
I type my name and credit card number into the little box, then swallow hard as I look at the delivery details for this “magic juice”.
Eeewwww.
Must be handed over in person, it says.
Double ewww.
But this um, “high quality” seed? It’s dirt cheap. Which is a major advantage for me if I’m going to make my grandma’s last wish true.
There’s a picture of the “seed producer”, who will be my baby’s father. He looks like a perfectly normal bloke. Sandy blond hair, mid-brown eyes. Not that tall, perhaps five-eleven?
Even though my hair is dirty-blonde with pale highlights and my eyes are a green-grey colour, I guess I always imagined my kids with dark blue eyes. And black hair.
I groan internally. What I’m saying is, I envisioned my baby looking likemy boss.
Grandma probably thinks I’m going to find a boyfriend, but that’s spectacularly unlikely, and IVF is expensive, even on an assistant’s salary that is generous by any standard. Besides, the only man I want to lose my virginity to is… Well. Let’s say he’s not interested. He’s a towering, gorgeous, grumpy, impeccably-dressed billionaire who I suspect is also a mafia kingpin. That edge of danger only makes me crave him more.
I stare at the little white box.
It’s time. Grandma has been declining fast, being sharp and forgetful in the previous few months, like her mind isn’t going to last forever. I want her to have a great-grandchild while she’ll still be able to recognise them. Especially since we lost my mother to illness, so we just have each other now: Grandma in a nursing home up north, and me on my own in a tiny London flat.
Maybe that’s why the thought of a baby of my own won’t quit popping into my mind. A child to love and love me back, someone who won’t leave me—unlike my father who walked out on my mother and me when I was a toddler.
Ultimately though, I am not going to let down Grandma; one great-grandchild is not an unreasonable request. Or it wouldn’t be if I weren’t a twenty-three-year-old virgin with a desperate crush on her boss and as much dating knack as a houseplant.
I guess I should go on an app or something and try to meet a man, but I’m kind of shy with most people. My mum passing while I was studying put a dampener on socialising. I’d rather save my pennies to visit Grandma and buy more books. And those stories set high standards; I want to give and receive unconditional love.
Not going to happen, so the sperm seller it is.
I live in London.Can we meet just off the motorway? I type in, then pause. I think I’d prefer to meet somewhere else. Not at my house, obviously, but what about one of the bars near work? Being close to here seems—
“What time is my meeting with the engineering department?”
A shocked yelp escapes me as I scrabble to hide the website. “Mr Cavendish!”
“What a surprise, no need for you to jump out of your skin,” he drawls in that deep voice, like melted toffee. “This is my office, Miss Blake. The meeting?”
I make the mistake of looking up at him and I’m drawn in like he’s a force field in a sci-fi movie. He’s tall and broad shouldered, and the suit he’s wearing today matches his eyes, just a shade lighter than navy. His hair is black, almost blue-black, and his eyelashes are ludicrously long. He’s positively spoiled with eyelashes, plus has dark stubble peppering his lightly tanned jawline today, which makes him look all of his forty-one years.
Still. It’s a good thing he doesn’t walk anywhere in London, because he’d be nabbed as a model for smutty book covers and then he wouldn’t be my secret. The girls in finance and legal on the lower floors swoon over Rhys Cavendish, but only I get to see him regularly throughout the day.
But then, they don’t have to deal with him constantly, which probably helps with the swooning. He is astonishingly grumpy.
“Adrianne,” he says with exaggerated patience, and my tummy swoops like a roller coaster. “The calendar.”
“Right. Yes.” I blush furiously as, with shaking hands, I try to bring up his diary. “It’s…” I scan the program without seeing. Where is the engineering department meeting? Is it that one?
“Or do I just have to wait and find out who arrives. The roulette approach to meetings today, is it?”
“It must not be labelled, hang on.” I’m clicking manically, hardly able to read for the drumming in my ears.
