Page 8 of Playboy Husband

MAISIE

Against every shred of better judgment I had, I found myself pulling into the same cracked parking lot of the same bar where we’d met before. The neon sign buzzed weakly over the door and a single streetlight flickered in the corner like even it didn’t trust the place.

Brody was at home with Jace, safe, sound, and tucked into his math workbook while Jace finished an assignment he had due on Monday. When I’d left, they’d been setting goals for themselves that would earn them extra dessert when they accomplished them. Both boys had seemed pretty motivated by sugar.

As my car slowed to a stop, I reminded myself that despite how crazy it was to be back here, I’d come because of Brody. Because maybe, just maybe, this insane idea would give him all those things I’d never been able to provide him on my own.

Even so, my stomach was in absolute knots as I pushed open the bar’s heavy door. At least I was dressed more appropriately tonight. Jeans and a T-shirt with a light jacket that I hoped gave the outfit a bit of a more professional, businesslike edge.

Callum was already there. It took me no time at all to find him in the dimly lit interior now that I knew who I was looking for.

He sat at a corner table with his broad shoulders hunched slightly forward, a bottle of beer between his hands.

That near-black hair was slightly tousled again, like he’d run his hands through it one too many times.

For a moment, I slowed the brisk pace I’d kept up from the parking lot and just took him in. He looked completely at home here in this dingy, badly lit bar with the cheap carpets, old peanuts on the counter, and sticky surfaces.

I wouldn’t have expected it from a guy like him. A Westwood. To my mind, he belonged at bougie, upmarket cocktail parties or in those restaurants that were so exclusive, you couldn’t walk in or even make a reservation. They either knew about you or they didn’t.

When I reached him, he looked up and our eyes met, but the cocky smirk I’d expected never graced his lips. There was no smug charm radiating from him either. All I saw was quiet acknowledgment and maybe even a touch of relief.

“You came,” he said just loud enough for me to hear. “I wasn’t sure you would.”

“Neither was I.” I sat down in the chair across from him, clutching my purse a little too tightly. “I’m not staying long.”

“We’ll see.” He inclined his head toward the bar. “Do you want something to drink?”

“No.” My voice came out sharper than I’d intended. “If you can convince me to stay for more than five minutes, I’ll have a gin and tonic. If not, I’ll just be wasting your money again, so let’s hear it, then I’ll decide.”

He leaned back, studying me. As if reading my thoughts, he suddenly nodded. “You’re probably wondering why I picked this dump again instead of some fancy place in a better part of town.”

I shrugged but held that devilishly blue gaze I’d spent so many nights thinking about. “I’ll admit that the thought has crossed my mind.”

“I don’t do fancy,” he explained as if it should tell me everything I needed to know about him, and it kind of did.

“I’ve never liked fine dining or restaurants that set tables with seventeen forks.

If it’s cold and on tap, I’ll drink it. Give me a wine list consisting only of bottles that cost more than some people’s rent and I feel nauseated. ”

Despite myself, I felt my head tilting, curiosity bubbling up from deep inside. “Is that true?”

He rocked his head from side to side. “It’s true enough.

I’m a simple guy. If I’d been born into any other family, I’d probably be working a trade somewhere.

Something blue collar. Instead, I was born with a silver spoon up my ass and a brain for marketing, so here I am.

A rich guy with simple tastes who often finds himself in situations where he’s forced to enjoy the finer things in life. ”

I frowned, taking a beat to process his words and trying to decide what I thought about what he’d said. It didn’t sound like he was bragging. If anything, he was just laying it all out like a string of facts he had no feelings about.

“About what you said earlier. At the rink?” He set his bottle down with a slight clink on the battered table. “The ad wasn’t some kind of play for women. I meant what I wrote. I actually need a wife.”

I tried not to let my disbelief show on my face. Last night, he’d explained about his family, but I still wasn’t sure I believed it. “I’ll take that gin and tonic now.”

Even if only because I needed a minute. I needed to think about what he’d revealed so far and how it fit into the image I had in my mind of Callum Westwood, Cal Poly’s own heir to the Westwood fortune.

He nodded and stood up, striding confidently over to the bar and coming back a couple minutes later. After he’d set the drink down in front of me, he took his seat and folded his arms on the table, his eyes intent on mine.

“You don’t believe me,” he said, once again stating it as fact. “You still think that I placed that ad for a different reason, that I had some kind of ulterior motive, but I didn’t.”

“Why?” I wrapped my fingers around my cool glass but didn’t take a sip just yet. My voice was quieter now, but it still carried the edge of suspicion. “Why do you need a wife, Callum?”

He exhaled slowly, like he’d been waiting for the question and was relieved it had finally come.

“My father is on my back about settling down. I don’t have the time or the patience to date, fall in love, or any of that.

I’m a businessman. I see this as a deal, not a romance.

Placing that ad seemed like the best way to find someone whose interests align with my own, but doing so anonymously. ”

I stared at him, wondering how the heck he could say something like that so plainly, like love was some inconvenience to be avoided. Finally lifting my glass to my lips, I took a long sip and swallowed before I looked back at him.

“Why would you even still consider me?” I asked. “I’d be coming into this with a child. That complicates things, doesn’t it?”

He shook his head. “Actually, it helps me. My mother’s obsessed with grandkids. Two of my brothers’ wives are pregnant, but apparently that’s not enough to appease her. If I show up with a wife and a kid already in the picture? That’s a solid move.”

He let out a short, humorless laugh. For a moment, I couldn’t breathe. He was talking about my son, my whole world, like Brody was some kind of chess piece on a board.

I would’ve left right then and there. My muscles even tightened in preparation for jumping up, tossing my drink in his face, and running out again, but then the image of him on the ice earlier flashed in my mind.

Callum had towered over those boys, handling the chaos quickly and efficiently, with soft but firmly spoken words. Brody had looked at him like he’d been seen. Like he’d been understood.

It had terrified me, but the relief had been just as intense, so I settled back in my chair and forced myself to relax. Callum leaned forward slightly, his eyes fixed on mine. “Why’d you even answer the ad, Maisie?”

I swallowed but resisted the urge to deflect. If I was really going to stay here and have this conversation, I had to be honest. Just like he’d opened up to me. We’d be wasting each other’s time otherwise.

“I didn’t do it for me.” I shifted in my seat, my fingers tracing the edge of the table.

“Brody needs a male figure in his life. Somebody he can look up to. But dating is hard when you’re a single mother and don’t know whether someone is going to stay in your life.

Do I introduce him to my kid when I don’t know if he’s going to stick around?

No, but my kid is also the most important thing in the world to me, so I’ll also never know if a relationship is going to work out until the guy has spent time with him. ”

Callum’s dark eyebrows drew together, like he hadn’t expected me to be so vulnerable. “There’s really no one helping you with him?”

Why he’d latched onto that, out of everything I’d said, I didn’t know, but he looked so serious about it that I gave him a serious answer. “Brody and I are alone here. My entire family is back in Michigan. They used to help out, but we don’t have anyone in California to step in and play that role.”

Callum nodded slowly, like he was processing, but when his gaze sharpened, I knew what was coming. “Why’d you walk away from Cal Poly? From diving?”

That old ache of remembered hurt and disappointment pressed against my chest, but I’d never regretted the decisions I’d made, so I looked Callum dead in the eye and told the truth. “I got pregnant and that was that. I had to leave.”

The silence between us stretched for a moment, his stare heavy but not unkind. “Where did you go, though? You said your parents used to help you with Brody and that they’re back in Michigan, so you went home?”

“Yep. Until I got offered a job out here last year,” I explained. “Brody loves his school, but I have no support with him otherwise. No safety net. No backup. So yeah, that’s why I answered your ad.”

Mind racing, I took a breath before I added, “Entering into some kind of arranged marriage with a total stranger is probably the dumbest, riskiest thing I could do as a mother, but I can’t see another way forward. He needs more than I can give and there’s nothing I wouldn’t do for him.”

“That’s fair.” He nodded again, but it was slower this time. Then, like a typical man, he got straight down to business. “What about money?”

I scoffed. “I don’t need your money. I have a steady job and I earn enough to cover the bills, the mortgage, and everything else Brody needs.”

His eyebrows shot up. “Mortgage? That means you bought a house.”

“Yes.” I lifted my chin. “It’s in a nice neighborhood.”

“Good, that means you’ll be able to rent it out quickly after you move in with me,” he said as if it was a done deal. “You should be able to get—”

I shook my head. “There’s no way we’re moving in with you. If I agree to this, and that’s a big if, we’ll be staying at my house.”

His mouth pulled into a hard line. For a long moment, he just looked at me like he was reassessing every assumption he’d made so far.

His dark hair fell across his forehead, that sharp gaze scanning my features like he was looking for any sign of weakness.

When he didn’t find one, he let out a soft sigh.

“We’re at an impasse, then.”

“It seems like it,” I admitted. “Brody and I will not be moving again, though. Our house is close to his school and my job. He’s made friends with the neighbors and he’s only just started settling in properly. There’s no way I’m uprooting him again.”

Callum and I just sat there, staring at each other across the battered table, both of us clearly seeing how this could work, but both having our reservations.

He wanted control. That much was obvious.

There was no other reason he could possibly have for his insistence that we move in with him instead of the other way around.

Meanwhile, I wasn’t about to let anyone bulldoze me. Not when it came to Brody’s well-being and forcing him not only to move again, but to move in with a man he didn’t even really know. That just wasn’t happening.

Even so, underneath all the nerves and tension, I could feel a sense of infinite, endless possibility. This was a huge risk, sure, but there was also the faintest chance that if I was brave enough to take said risk, everything could change. For me but most importantly for Brody.

Callum drummed his fingers against the table. “How is Brody going to handle this? His mom suddenly getting married?”

The question landed in my chest with a painful jolt, but I didn’t flinch. “The pros outweigh the cons. One day, I hope he’ll understand that.”

He nodded, like he accepted the answer without needing me to explain.

I expected a few more questions, but instead, in that no-nonsense way of his, he skipped right ahead to the conclusion as if the negotiations didn’t even matter.

“We could do this on Monday. Go down to the courthouse, sign the papers, and make it official.”

My stomach bottomed out. Just like that?

I must’ve looked as dumbstruck as I felt because the corners of his mouth twitched like he was fighting a smile. At least it humanized him, reminding me that Callum might be direct, but regardless of what he thought, this wasn’t a done deal yet.

“We should think about it,” I said once I’d found my voice again.

He gave me a single nod. “Alright.”

For just a second, something between us softened, becoming almost too comfortable, which was ridiculous. There was nothing comfortable about any of this and I needed to get my head checked if I let him fool me into believing it could be easy.

Shoving back my chair, I nodded at him and grabbed my bag. “I’ll be in touch. Check your emails.”

With that, I spun around and walked out much more calmly than I had last night, but with only one thought looping around in my head. Why would he even still agree to this now that he knows I’m a mother?

Most men would’ve run the second they found out, but Callum hadn’t even blinked. Brody clearly wasn’t a deal-breaker for him. If anything, he’d seemed confident that this would count as a point in his favor with his family—which was a pretty unsettling thought.

By the time I got to my car, it had started raining, droplets spitting against the windshield like the world was echoing my nerves. I drove home with my wipers working furiously, my heart thudding in my chest.

All because the truth was suddenly sitting like a live wire under my skin, sparking and snapping, begging to be told even though I’d kept it buried it for years. Callum Westwood wasn’t just some man I’d hooked up with in college. He wasn’t just some stranger posting ridiculous marriage ads online.

He was Brody’s father.

I had never even expected to see him again, let alone that he would be interested in helping me raise his own son. My fingers tightened around the steering wheel at the thought of him offering to step in.

Fate had a sick sense of humor and I was sweating bullets because of it.

For just about eight years, I’d managed to keep Brody’s paternity a closely guarded secret, and now suddenly, his biological father, who he was practically a clone of, was offering to step into the very role I knew I couldn’t fill.

He was offering to be a father figure. The male influence I’d been looking for. And if I took this risk, then very soon, Brody’s mom and dad would be living under the same roof for the very first time ever—and neither of them could ever know about it.