Page 55 of Daddy's Reckoning
“What about your friends?”
Theo grinned. “Well, we’re about to find out. Nyla texted right before we went into the courthouse. She said they were all leaving work and going to the club for an impromptu business meeting. I told her to give me an hour.” He looked at his watch and grinned. “That was… forty-five minutes ago.”
My eyes widened and my stomach knotted. We didn’t even have time to change out of our wedding clothes. I took a deep, nervous breath, and was filled with peace. I loved Theo’s friends. I already considered them my friends, even though I didn’t know them well. But they’d always been good to me, and I knew they were rooting for us. They’d thrown an impromptu engagement party in our living room the night we got engaged, showing up with Chinese food, champagne, and sparkling cider for me.
They’d be bummed that they missed the wedding, but mostly, they were just going to be happy we had, as Lennon said “pulled our heads out of our asses and realized we were perfect together.
“Starting our wedding night with a business meeting, then, huh?” I teased as Theo came around the car and slid into the driver’s seat. “Aww, how romantic.”
Theo’s eyes twinkled as he rested his hand on my thigh, then slid it underneath my dress. “How ‘bout I make it up to you later?”
“You better.” I giggled as we made the short drive to the club, and allowed him to carry me from the parking garage to the elevators.
We paused outside the club door, our gazes locked as we both drew a deep breath.
“Here goes nothing,” Theo muttered.
We pushed through the doors, where all his friends were waiting, still dressed in their work clothes, chattering amongst themselves.
When they saw us everything stopped. Archer raised his eyebrows. Lennon cocked his head to the side. Nyla’s mouth fell open.
“We’re married!” Theo cried, setting me on my feet just in time for me to be swept up in a rush of enthusiastic well-wishes and warm hugs.
“Congrats, man!” Lennon slapped Theo on the back.
“That’s amazing, you two. We’re so happy for you!”
“How was Theo the first one married?” Bas joked. “I did not see that coming.”
“Oh my gosh! You have to let us throw you a reception, soon!” Nyla cried.
Theo’s eyes met mine over the top of her head, and he winked. “Told you so,” he mouthed.
I nodded, and turned to accept all the love that was being offered. All the love I’d never had. I’d found my family.
THEO
“So that’s it? Rent-A-Daddy is just… over?” I looked down at the press release Nyla had drafted up, canceling any and all existing contracts with full refunds. “But?—”
“But what? Theo, you just got married. You have a baby on the way. The rest of us are married now, or getting married, thinking about having babies of our own. Lennon moved out of the building, and so did Bain. Nyla and I are looking at houses.” Bas shrugged as if that settled everything.
“It was such a good idea. There was so much potential. It had a purpose!”
Erin patted my arm. “It was a great idea with lots of potential, and it did serve a purpose. Just not the one you thought it would.”
I looked at the love of my life, my wife, her belly ripe and rounded with my child. My heart swelled, and I realized her words were true, in ways I never could have fathomed back when Bas had pitched me the idea for Rent-A-Daddy over a year ago.
“It served a great purpose,” Lennon said from across the room, his words echoing my thoughts. I looked at my long-time friend, and slowly nodded. Out of all of us, Lennon had probably changed the most. Rent-A-Daddy had certainly served a purpose in his life. In all our lives. I looked around the room at my friends, who all had the loves of their lives by their side, and thought about what each of them had gained.
Bas and Nyla, constantly stuck in friends-with-benefits mode, had finally cut the crap and admitted how much they meant to each other after Nyla left her asshole husband and came home to Philly where she belonged. With us. With Bastian, once and for all. I’d be the best man at their wedding, and I couldn’t have been any happier or more proud to see them finally tie the knot.
Bain, the silver-spoon elitist, who’d gotten even richer when the five of us had won the lottery together in our last week of college, had been brought barreling down to earth when he’d fallen for Jasmine, one of Nyla’s friends, after the struggling, grieving, single mom of three had drained her savings to hire Rent-A-Daddy to help her get her life in order. Now Bain spent most of his day playing Mr. Mom. Honestly, I’d never seen him happier, and I was pretty sure they would announce soon that they were expecting a little one of their own. Our kids would grow up together.
Archer, our resident workaholic shark of a lawyer, had finally realized he couldn’t do it all and that was okay. For the first time ever since I’d known him, Archer’s life had balance. He’d learned to prioritize what was important, and he had his sexy assistant/fiancée Audrey to help him organize the rest.
Lennon, the forever frat boy who’d taken the party-animal lifestyle to an artform, had settled down, and spent most of his evenings painting or watching movies, attending gallery openings and theater shows all over the city with Zoe, the professor he’d been in love with since our college days. Now, he only drank once a week at our Friday meetings, and he’d shown all of us a side of him we’d never expected to see.
And then there was me, a recovered asthmatic nerd turned hopeless playboy who’d only felt fulfilled by having an endless stream of submissive ladies in and out of my bed. I'd finally settled down. Erin had made me see that there was nothing left to prove. I could be comfortable in my own skin, and I didn’t need to have all eyes on me all the time to have value. And she was making me a father soon. My life was good.