Blurb
Normally when you say, “I have a stalker,” you think bad thoughts. That wasn’t the kind of stalker Folsom was when it came to Kobe Sano. Folsom liked to call herself a “guardian angel in disguise.”
The first time he catches her attention, he’s been assigned to hunt her down and throw away the key. All she did was steal someone else’s child. Well, embryo, that is. What Kobe doesn’t know, though, is the man that hired him is up to no good, and she has no other choice but to run without looking back.
From that moment on, she spends the rest of her spare time running away from him while also digging into every nook and cranny of his personal life, finding every weakness he has and utilizing it any way she needs to keep herself one step ahead of him.
Only one day, when she goes to do her usual snooping, she finds out that not only is her favorite person in trouble, but he’s also in need of her help.
Too bad it takes her years to find that help.
Her next step is to break him out of the pokey prison-break style.
If she knew he’d go without question, she very well might have.
• • •
It didn’t take a genius to know when someone was stalking you. The signs were all there, and they eventually pointed right at Folsom.
When he figures it out, he plans to confront her and maybe address the silent sexual tension that’s been brewing between them for the last few years.
However, right when he’s ready to admit to himself that she might be the one—daughter who intimidates the hell out of him or not—she up and disappears for a year.
In that year, he spends every waking moment searching for her.
And eventually he finds her, confronts her, and is hit in the face with the secrets she’s kept from him for years.
One of which is a big one.
The daughter that she protects with everything she has—the one that he’s come to love with all his heart, just like her mom—is the very abducted child from his one and only unsolved case.
Author’s Note
Okay, so here’s the deal. I’m human. In the beginning, I intended to let Folsom’s story go a different way. Sadly, Folsom’s character didn’t want to go that way, and I write where I’m led. That’s why, when you get to this book, Folsom might be a little different from where she started out during the first book of this series.
I apologize for making her a little bit confusing from the beginning. I hope you like her how she is, though.
Also, in the book, there’s references to -sama added to words. I know for young children, you’re supposed to add -chan, but that’s not the way my husband and kids do it at my house. And I know we’re wrong, but this is loosely based off of a conversation in our own house. So…just know that -chan is for children (Juliechan) and -sama is for adults (Kobesama.)
Love, Lani
PART I
PROLOGUE
Yet, despite the look on my face, you’re still talking.
-Coffee Cup
FOLSOM
“I’m sorry. Can you repeat that?”
The life inside of me kicked, and I flinched.
Not because I hated the way it felt but because I’d come to love it.
And loving something that wasn’t yours…well, that was true torture.
“The baby in your uterus is genetically fifty percent yours,” the doctor repeated.
That was what I’d thought she said.
I looked over at my best friend and felt my stomach sink down to my knees.
“What is she talking about?” I asked, voice fragile sounding and so soft.
My “best friend” swallowed.
She looked nervous now.
“We found out that my eggs were incompatible with life,” she said. “I told you that.”
She had.
So, when the fourth contract came, I signed it, hoping for a miracle.
What I’d gotten was a whole shitstorm heading my way like a freight train on the warpath.
Four separate times, I’d been a willing womb for my best friend and her husband’s prospective baby. I’d had her egg fertilized with her husband’s sperm implanted in my body. I’d then taken care of myself for the last few years as I waited for one of those implants to take.
And I’d thought one had.
Only that “one” was actually not her one, but my one.
I was having my best friend’s husband’s baby.
“And you signed the contract,” Lisbeth explained.
I felt sick to my stomach. But not the same kind that I’d felt for the last six months.
The kind where I wasn’t sure what to do.
I’d spent my life trying to make up for shortcomings, and now, it looked like I was going to start paying for other people’s as well.
I licked my lips. “I didn’t give my permission.”
The doctor looked frantic all of a sudden. “What do you mean you didn’t give your permission? We have your signed contract!”
“I wasn’t aware that I was signing anything like that,” I said, shaking my head as I felt the bile start to creep its way up my throat. “When I signed, I was under the understanding that it was just like all the others.”
“But the egg retrieval…” He shook his head. “What did you think that was?”
I was already shaking my head. “All the shots and the pills…” I shook my head. “Sure, I should’ve paid more attention to all of that as you were doing it. But I thought that it was just one other thing that would help them get pregnant. Lisbeth explained that it was a procedure that would help ensure implantation. I never had any thought to question her on it. She was my best friend…why would I?”
That’s when her husband, Farrell, chimed in. “You’re not dumb, honey. You had to have realized that you were getting more than what you usually did.”
I glared at him.
I hated when he called me “honey.” It made me feel like a dumb girl.
I may be blonde, but I certainly wasn’t dumb.
“I don’t care what you say,” Lisbeth said. “We have the contract signed and sealed. You have no legal rights to this child any longer.”
I felt my stomach drop.
For some reason, I had a feeling she was right.
I’d signed away the rights to my child and hadn’t even realized it.
The urge to run hit me in the chest like a battering ram.
They had money, power and prestige.
I had nothing. I barely made rent, could hardly hold down a full-time job, and had never even met a lawyer, let alone had one on retainer.
Meanwhile, Farrell had so much family money that it was hard to see past the dollar signs on his expensive suits.
There was no way this would end well for me.
I’d have to watch the one person I thought was my friend raise my child and cut me out of their life.
I couldn’t do it.
I couldn’t and wouldn’t.
Resolve straightened my spine, and I got up. “If you’ll excuse me, I’m feeling rather sick to my stomach.”
“Don’t fight it, honey.” Farrell smirked as he watched me walk away. “It won’t end well for you.”