The Billionaire's Unexpected Baby(30)

"She's the one you've been seeing?" Brooks asked. "Why didn't you say anything?"

"Because I didn't feel like playing twenty questions with my personal life," he said. Cass elbowed him in the gut.

"I asked him not to say anything just yet. It's pretty new. I wanted to  keep it between us for a while. But since we're all here at the shower … "

"Speaking of which," Harrison said, "I have a few questions. Do we  shower at this shower? Or shower a baby? And if not, why the hell is it  called a shower?" He glanced over at the other guys. "I know a few  escape routes if anyone is interested."

"It's not going to be that bad," Kiersten said, coming up behind them.  "And no, there is no actual showering involved, of a baby or otherwise.  It's a party to celebrate the coming arrival where you shower the new  parents with gifts for the baby. Basically, we'll be hanging out and  talking."

Brooks, Harrison, and Cole all groaned.

"And drinking, for the non-pregnant people."

That made them cheer.

Kiersten shook her head and rolled her eyes. "Juveniles."

Brooks gave her a little bow. "I have been called much worse, madam."

She laughed. "I know. By me. Last week."

He winked at her. "You know you love me."

Leah came in, her face lighting up at the sight of Brooks. "You came."

He leaned in to whisper in her ear. "I did. And so did you. Twice."

Her cheeks flushed deep red and he laughed, loving that he had that effect on her.

"Don't start with that," she said. "Or it won't happen again."

"Hmmm," he said, wrapping his arms around her growing waist and pulling her close. "You know you can't resist me."

She cuddled into him more, proving his point. Damn … too bad they couldn't  sneak off somewhere and have a private party of their own.

"Okay everyone," Kiersten said, waving the guests over. "It's game time!"

"Run," Harrison said. "Run, now."

But there was no escape. Kiersten wrangled everyone together for a  series of baby shower games, which, if Brooks was to be honest, he  enjoyed. Not that he would ever admit that to another living soul.

He kicked total butt at the belly race. He and the rest of the boys  strapped a ten-pound bag of flour to their bellies and raced around a  small obstacle course Kiersten had set up on one side of the apartment.  Brooks won, by a navel. Some of the other games he wasn't quite as good  at, and one in particular terrified the shit out of him.

When Kiersten lined him and the other boys up in front of naked baby  dolls beside a stack of diapers, powder, and blankets he was ready to  bolt. Until Cole started in on how easy it would be for him to win since  he was supposedly such an expert now.

"You going to let him get away with that kind of talk?" Leah asked.

"Hell no, baby." He rolled up his sleeves. "It's on."       

   





He grabbed the baby powder and liberally doused his baby. And himself,  by accident. And then Cole, on purpose. One good shot to the face, and  Cole started sputtering and swearing and powdering Brooks back. He was  not, however, diapering his baby, a fact he remembered when Brooks held  his own baby up in triumph.

Sort of. He had managed to get the diaper on the baby, but it ended up  being backward. And it may have taken him three or four tries, but hey,  he did it finally. And the blanket …  Well, who was to say that the way he  did it was wrong?

Kiersten, apparently. And since she was the judge …

"The baby is covered," Brooks argued. "It should totally count. Take  blanket, cover baby. As long as those two points are covered, I don't  see why it needs to be done any other way."

"He'll suffocate," she said. "You've got his face wrapped up and his feet sticking out the top."

Brooks looked down at his baby doll. "Wellll, maybe he wanted to take a  nap and it was too bright and it was just a little too hot so he stuck  his feet out. Don't judge."

"Sorry, it's my job to judge. I declare Chris the winner!"

They all stared at him and his perfectly wrapped baby in surprise.

"It's like the damn barnyard all over again," Cole said. "How the hell is he so good at this stuff?"

"You guys act like it's hard," Chris said, glancing around at the other  men who were almost entirely covered in powder with babies no reasonable  person would deem properly covered.

Brooks looked at Cole and Harrison. "He's much too clean. I don't think he got any powder on his baby at all."

Harrison nodded. "We'd better check."

Chris didn't stand a chance. Three minutes later and he was seated on the sofa beside the others, powdered head to toe.

"At least they smell good," Kiersten muttered to Leah, who had to choke off a laugh when Brooks mock-glared at her.

Present time was much more fun. The women sat around in a group ooing  and ahhing over each gift. The men on the other hand got to hang out in  the kitchen drinking.

"Now this is my kind of game," Brooks said.

From the women's circle someone squealed, "Oh, how precious," and all the men said, "Shot!"

With the amount of times that phrase was being thrown about the room,  they were all going to be too drunk to walk out the door by the time the  party was over.

"Don't get too hammered," Kiersten called into the kitchen. "I've got a job for you boys."

They all turned and blinked at her like a bunch of meerkats watching for predators.

She pointed to a large box in the corner of the room sitting next to a tool box.

"Marcus couldn't make it, but he sent a gift. He said he'd put it together later, but since you are all here … "

"We've got it handled," Brooks said. No way was he letting Marcus show  him up by getting the best gift in the room and being the hero that put  it together, too.

"What is it?" he finally thought to ask.

"That's the crib," she said. "Get to it."

The men slowly approached the box like it was a snake poised to strike.

"Have you ever put one of these together before?" Brooks asked Cole.

He snorted. "Hell, no. I attempted once. For about five minutes. Then I  figured my wife and child would rather have me alive and sane, so I  hired someone to come in and put it together for me. Plus, Kiersten  threatened to divorce me if I didn't. Then she added a clause to the  prenup forbidding me to attempt to assemble furniture ever again."

"Wonderful," Harrison said.

Chris frowned at it. "It can't be that hard."

The women chose that moment to start giggling at something. Brooks was  pretty sure it wasn't related to their conversation. Well, maybe about  eighty percent sure. Okay, fifty. They giggled again. Okay, they were  laughing at them.

"Piece of cake," Brooks said.

Cole looked over at him, one eyebrow raised. "I hope you were referring  to the fact that you want a piece of actual cake. Because if you were  talking about this thing being easy to put together, then you really are  out of your damn mind."       

   





"Come on, guys, seriously. It's one stupid little crib. There are four of us. How hard can this be?"

There was blood before they even got the thing out of the box. Chris  sliced his finger cutting the box open and was now sitting with it  wrapped over in the penalty box. Well, really he was over on the couch  with the ladies. But for their purposes, they were calling it the  penalty box. And since Chris tended to be the Golden Boy who did  everything perfectly, Brooks had more than a sneaking suspicion that the  ass had purposely cut his finger to get out of setting up the crib.  Brooks wished he'd thought of that first.

But the rest of them hung in there. Although there were two more cut  fingers, a smashed thumb, and at least forty-three inappropriate curses  before they had the entire thing unpacked and laid out in neat rows so  they could see all the pieces.

"These instructions are in Chinese," Harrison said, throwing the paper at Brooks.

"Don't you speak Chinese?" Cole asked.

"Not well enough to understand those," Harrison said, flipping off the  paper. "Besides, that's not really Chinese, it's English. Just really  tiny print. And I don't speak English well enough to understand those,  either."

"Look," Brooks said, pointing to the sheets of paper. "There are pictures. How hard can this be?"

"You need to stop saying that," Cole said. "Every time you do someone nearly slices something off."

Harrison yelped with a muffled curse and stuck his finger in his mouth.

"See," Cole said.

Brooks frowned at the incomprehensible instructions in his hand. "Come  on, guys, we have to figure this out, or the poor kid is going to be  sleeping on the floor." And Marcus would drop by to save the day and  there was no way in hell Brooks would let that fly if he could help it.

There were a few more moans and groans, but the guys finally rallied and  got the thing marginally put together. Sure, there were a few pieces  left over when they were done, but it looked pretty decent.