Perfect Spiral (A Playing Dirty Sports Romance Book 2) Read online

  “Now what?” I ask Lathan after I hear him shut and lock the front door.

  “Oh shit,” he mutters. When I look over, he’s holding the black bag that came with the baby in one hand and a white sheet of paper in the other.

  “What?” I ask, going over to stand beside him so I can read over his shoulder. It’s a handwritten note that says, “I can’t do this anymore. He’s yours, I’m certain of it. You would have known about him sooner if you read your mail.”

  Two words stand out more than the others.

  He’s yours.

  “Fuckkk,” I groan while squeezing my temples as I try to think. “That’s impossible, right? I mean, I haven’t knocked anyone up! I’m not stupid. I always use condoms. Always!”

  In response to my rambling, Lathan bends over at the waist and just starts laughing. When he eventually recovers enough to straighten, he says, “I believe the words I’m looking for are, told you so!”

  “There’s no way. He doesn’t look anything like me,” I reply, gesturing toward the tiny, sleeping baby.

  “He’s a baby. Babies don’t look like anyone but babies,” is Lathan’s unhelpful response.

  “What the hell are we gonna do?” I ask him frantically, my chest tightening with a lack of oxygen in what I know from experience is the makings of a full-blown panic attack.

  “You mean, what are you gonna do?”

  “Yes, what the fuck am I gonna do?” I ask while pacing in front of the sleeping kid, breathing in through my nose and out through my mouth to try and calm the mounting anxiety.

  “Oh shit, man,” Lathan whispers. “Now it’s looking at us.”

  My pacing stops at his words, and then the two of us start inching closer to the seat. Pale blue eyes blink open and stare up at us, right before the face scrunches up and turns red, its mouth opening in a loud wail.

  “Shit. Now, look what you’ve done. You’ve got to pick it up!” Lathan declares with an elbow to my side.

  “I’m not picking it up. You pick it up,” I tell him.

  “Oh, for fuck’s sake,” he says while pulling out his cell phone.

  “I thought you said we shouldn’t say fuck,” I remind him.

  “I’m calling Roxy,” he tells me over the increasing cries. “She’ll know what to do, right?”

  “Maybe. Hopefully”

  “Shit, she’s not answering,” Lathan informs me. “Let me try Kohen. Maybe they kissed and made up or whatever.”

  “Maybe,” I agree with a wince as the crying grows louder

  “Yo, Kohen! Do you know where Roxy is?” Lathan shouts into the phone, his index finger pushed into his free ear so he can try to hear. “Yeah, does Roxy know anything about making them, like, stop crying? Can you and her come over to Quinton’s? There’s a…situation.”

  While he talks, I collapse into my leather recliner as the reality of the situation starts to hit me. Someone actually thinks I’m the father of this kid, which is insane and impossible, but now it looks like I’m stuck with it.

  “Yeah, you won’t believe this, but someone dumped a freaking baby on Quinton’s doorstep with a note saying it’s his,” Lathan continues to explain to Kohen. “Tiny little guy. We were just watching it sleep in its plastic seat thing, and then all of a sudden it woke up and started wailing. Now it won’t stop!”

  What the hell am I gonna do with a baby? I’ve never even held one before, and someone thinks I’m the appropriate caretaker for this unknown kid?

  “Thanks, Kohen!” Lathan shouts into the phone before hanging up, and then says to me, “They’re on the way.”

  “Thank God,” I grumble.

  The crying continues, increasing in volume and intensity while a continuous loop of mostly hazy female faces flash through my mind. All the one-night stands that were fun but fleeting. I don’t even remember all their names, only recognizing them by the idiotic things that came out of my mouth before we ended up naked.

  Now it’s not so funny.

  Did I fuck up and not use protection? Did a condom fail me? I can’t count all the times a woman has tried to slip it in without wrapping it up, because it happens so often. Getting knocked up with my baby would mean more than just a big-ass child support paycheck. It would mean owning me.

  Never gonna happen.

  I always refused sex when I realized what those women were up to, usually pushing their pretty little heads down and coming in their mouths just to be safe.

  This kid’s mama has to be mistaken.

  When the doorbell finally rings a few minutes later, I jump up to answer it, but Lathan reaches it first with me right behind him. Fuck, I just hope it’s Kohen and Roxy and not another kid.

  The blonde woman standing before us in a blue dress should be deemed a goddess as relieved as I am at the sight of her.

  “Help?” I beg.

  “Why me?” Roxy asks. “Do you just assume that I know what to do with a baby because I’m a woman?” she asks, crossing her arms over her chest. Our team’s new kicker, the first female in the league, tries to be tough, but I know she’s a softie on the inside and isn’t really upset.

  “No. Maybe. Yes!” I shout, covering both of my ears with my palms to momentarily drown out the noise, so I can think. “You’re the only one I trust not to break my son,” I say, and then my jaw falls open when I realize my slip. Just because someone dropped him off on my porch doesn’t mean he’s really mine. I’ve always been careful. “I mean if he really is my son. Even if he’s not, it wouldn’t be cool to break someone else’s baby, right?” I ask Roxy.

  “Explanation accepted,” Roxy replies before pushing past us and moving further into the house. Kohen is right behind her and nods at Lathan and me in greeting.

  Kohen and I haven’t exactly been friends since I joined the team and accidentally slept with his fiancée, but I think we’re working on it. He’s learning to trust me more since I’ve had the opportunities but haven’t made any moves on Roxy. Never will, because while we may be good friends, it’s clear that Roxy started falling for Kohen from the first day they met, as shitty as that was when she ran Kohen over. In fact, it’s good to see Roxy holding Kohen’s hand, which I take to be a sign that they’ve officially made up. The two had their own trust issues to work through, and I’m glad Kohen pulled his head out of his ass to fix things with Roxy.

  “Whoa. So this is, what, like official now?” Lathan asks Kohen in reference to their relationship while we all make our way to the screaming in the living room.

  “Official,” Kohen yells to be heard.

  “And Quinton said you both get to stay on the team?” Lathan asks him.

  “Yep. And Roxy’s starting tomorrow,” Kohen tells us with a smile.

  “Congrats!” Lathan yells to Roxy as we reach the living room.

  “Thanks,” she raises her voice to reply. “Has he been in that seat the whole time?” she asks, gesturing toward the gray baby car seat with blue trim still sitting in the middle of the floor.

  I nod in the affirmative.

  “That’s at least one reason he’s crying. He wants out; wants to be held,” she informs us.

  When Roxy steps around to the front of the seat, she gasps and falls to her knees despite the fact that she’s wearing a dress.

  “Oh my goodness!” she squeals. Letting go of Kohen’s hand, she starts unbuckling the straps over the crying baby’s chest. Once she’s done, she scoops him up in her arms with zero hesitancy, telling me that, thankfully, she has taken care of babies before. The kid even dials back the volume of his screams when he’s resting in her arms. The woman’s a miracle worker, as evidenced by the three men she has crowding around her on the floor in awe.

  “Did he come with a bottle by chance?” Roxy looks up and asks us.

  “I think so,” Lathan says. He gets to his feet, goes over to grab the black diaper bag from the sofa and brings it over before retaking his seat on the floor.

  “Wow, he’s little,” Kohen says. “No big
ger than a football.”

  “Yeah, he’s probably just a few days old,” Roxy tell us.

  “That can’t be my kid, right? I mean, my baby would be, like…ten times his size,” I point out since my mother likes to remind me that I was over ten pounds when I was born, requiring her to have an emergency C-section.

  “Actually, genius, even big men start out as little babies, otherwise how would women push them out?” Roxy explains.

  “Got a bottle, but it’s empty,” Lathan says, holding a little one in the air before I can respond. “Can’t you, like, you know, whip it out and let him eat?” he asks Roxy.

  “Oh my God,” she mutters, rolling her green eyes in exasperation. “My jugs are empty. Only having a baby fills them up. Jeez.”

  “Ohhh,” we all mumble in understanding. You would think that with as many tits as I’ve sucked on I would already know that.

  “Okay, Lathan, look through the bag and see if there are any containers that say infant formula,” Roxy tells him slowly.

  “How do you know all this baby stuff?” Kohen asks her.

  “I babysat in the offseason around our neighborhood when I was a teenager,” she explains, looking down at the baby who is already a little mack daddy, rooting around the top of her dress in search of her titty. Okay, so maybe he is my flesh and blood. “Babies were my favorite,” Roxy says to Kohen. “I mean, I don’t want one. Well, not right now or anytime soon because my kicking career would be over, but someday…”

  “Yeah, me too,” Kohen replies, his eyes on hers.

  They’re so sweet I could puke. Nope, that’s probably the anxiety.

  “Found it!” Lathan shouts, holding up a small canister. Unfortunately, his loud voice makes the baby start fussing again. “Shit, sorry.”

  “Okay, all we need now is water. Quinton, you got any filtered or purified water?” Roxy asks me.

  “Ah, yeah, the kitchen faucet has a purifier on it,” I tell her.

  “Good. Why don’t you do the honors since you’ll be here alone with him tonight?” she suggests with a smile.

  “What the fuck?” I exclaim. “No, you guys can’t leave him here with me! I don’t even know how to, like, pick him up or whatever. He’ll just scream, and we’ve got our first game tomorrow! I need to be rested and ready!”

  We can’t lose the first game, or it will haunt us the entire season. My rookie year we lost not only the first game but the first six. It was awful to try and stop that cycle. By the time the team got our shit together, we were out of playoff contention.

  “Calm down,” Roxy tells me. “I’ll show you how to do everything you need to know before we leave. Then we’ll come back over in the morning to check on things before we go to the stadium, okay?”

  “Who’s gonna watch him during the game?” I ask since I sure as fuck can’t play with a baby strapped to my chest.

  “Guess we’ve got a few calls to make tonight,” she answers with a shrug. “First, take the bottle to the kitchen, put four ounces of water in it and then however many scoops the container says to add for four ounces. Easy, right?”

  “Um, yeah,” I mutter as I get to my feet. Grabbing the bottle and canister from Lathan, I take them into the kitchen, reading the label on the formula as I go.

  First, it tells me to wash my hands. I figure the bottle needs to be washed too, so I take the lid off and clean it. Now for the tricky part. Since the bottle has a four on the side, I fill it up with water, assuming it holds four ounces. The instructions say that I need two unpacked scoops of powder shit for that amount of water, so I pop the top on the canister and measure the powder out with the little plastic scooper before screwing the lid back on the bottle.

  Done.

  That wasn’t so bad.

  Back in the living room, Roxy says to me, “Great, now shake it until you can’t see the powder chunks floating around and have a seat on the sofa.”

  I do as she says, shaking it like a Polaroid picture before sitting next to the armrest. Roxy stands up and carries the baby over in her arms. God, this all seems so surreal. Just this morning I woke up in a random woman’s bed after a night of hot, sweaty sex, not a care in the world other than the season opener tomorrow, and now here I am, stuck with a kid.

  When Roxy starts to lower the baby toward my lap, I snap back to reality.

  “What are you doing?” I ask her frantically.

  “Showing you how to hold a baby,” she answers. Placing the kid in the crook of my right arm, she removes hers from him completely.

  Oh shit, I’m holding a baby!

  “There, you’re doing it,” Roxy declares proudly.

  She’s right. I am doing it, and he’s not screaming his head off quite as loudly anymore. I say it’s a he based on the blue one-piece outfit and blue and white striped hat he’s wearing. He looks so delicate and small. Fragile. I hope I don’t accidentally hurt him. My outstretched palm is probably about the size of his whole entire body.

  “Wow. He’s so…light and warm,” I mutter while looking down at the little guy. Holding him isn’t as scary as I thought it would be. While I’m still worried I might break him, I can’t help but think he’s kind of…cute.

  “Let me see your phone,” Roxy says to Kohen, who hands her the device. She snaps a few quick photos before she lifts my left hand that I forgot was still gripping the bottle and brings it up to the baby’s lips. The little guy opens his mouth and instantly starts sucking.

  “He was hungry. He’s a growing boy,” Roxy says while snapping a few more photos with Kohen’s phone. “Especially if he’s gonna be six feet six like his daddy.”

  I don’t know who the hell dropped him off with me, but I’m pretty sure they’ve made a mistake. A huge one, in fact, by leaving their kid with someone who doesn’t know shit about babies.

  “He may not be mine,” I remind Roxy.

  “If it turns out he is yours, do you have any idea who the mother may be?” Roxy asks before taking a seat on the sofa next to me. Kohen eases down on the other side of Roxy like he can’t stand to be more than a foot away from her.

  “No. No name on the note,” I answer her question. “All it said was, I can’t do this anymore. He’s yours, I’m certain of it. You would have known about him sooner if you read your mail.”

  “Wow. Okay. So first thing’s first, let me call the local hospitals and police department just to make sure we don’t have someone’s stolen baby,” Roxy suggests, which is pretty smart thinking. “Then, you’ll need to go get a DNA test on Monday, probably take him to a pediatrician and get him checked out too.”

  “Yeah,” I reply, wondering how long it will take to get back the results. A few days probably. What the fuck do I do with the kid until then? My parents are coming in for the game tomorrow, so maybe they can stay and help out.

  “In the meantime, try to think of who you may have slept with around nine months ago, so the end of December? If he was born a few weeks early, maybe the first of January?” Roxy offers, trying to be helpful. There’s no way I’ll admit to her that I can’t even recall exactly how many women I slept with during those two months.

  “Ugh, don’t remind me,” Lathan says when he slumps down into my brown leather recliner. “January second we lost big time in the first round of the playoffs.”

  “Aw, fuck,” I groan and lean my head back against the sofa at the god-awful reminder of the night we lost the playoff game. “That was a bad night. I got shitfaced doing a bar crawl with Cameron and Nixon. I made them both drink a shot for every dropped pass of mine, and I had to do a shot for every interception I threw. For the entire season. We all lost count around the tenth or eleventh one. I woke up the next morning naked except for my shoes in the back of a cop car with three different club wristbands on.”

  “Shit, dude. I didn’t know that. Did you get arrested?” Lathan asks.

  “No, but only because the cops were apparently big fans. They said they picked me up on an indecent exposure call when I wa
s wandering around Nixon’s neighborhood. Since they recognized me, they drove me around until I woke up and gave them my address. When I got home, I signed some jerseys and shit to thank them for not throwing my sorry ass in jail or selling me out to the paparazzi.”

  “So you think the mother is someone you hooked up with that night?” Roxy asks.

  Goddamn it.

  The one night of my life that I get blackout drunk and I knocked someone up?

  “Maybe,” I answer honestly on a sigh. “That’s the only night of my life that I don’t remember all the shit I did.”

  “And since you didn’t keep it in your pants, now you’ve got a baby on your doorstep,” Lathan says.

  “We still don’t know for sure that he’s mine,” I remind him.

  “In the meantime, though, he’s your responsibility,” Roxy tells me. “Once he finishes eating, I’ll show you how to change him. Kohen, can you and Lathan go to Target and buy some newborn diapers and a pack and play?”

  “A pack and what?” Kohen asks, and I’m glad I’m not the only one who doesn’t know jack about kids.

  “I’ll send you a text with pictures,” Roxy tells him with a kiss on his cheek.

  “Okay, but when I get back, you and I are going home,” Kohen says when he stands up. “Sorry, Quinton.”

  “Yeah, yeah. I’ll make Lathan stay to help out,” I reply.

  “No way, bro,” Lathan argues. “At least one of us needs to be fresh and ready tomorrow; and since my dick is free and clear in this situation, it’s gonna be me.”

  A snort escapes before I can help myself at the sad reminder that he’s never actually been inside a woman. “I’ll take a crying baby any day over your long, miserable years of suffering with your virginity.”

  Roxy gasps in surprise over hearing about the twenty-four-year-old virgin at the same time Kohen pipes up and says, “Amen.”

  “While I would rather you keep your big mouths shut about my personal shit, I’m not ashamed,” Lathan says, although his cheeks are a nice new shade of red. “If this baby is yours, you’ll have to spend the rest of your life taking care of him,” he says, causing me to wince at that dick slap of truth to my face. “And, Kohen, you nearly lost your million-dollar career because of your dick. So, tell me again what I’m missing out on by not sleeping around?”