CEO'S Secret Baby: A Standalone Surprise Pregnancy Romance by Iona Rose (books for 5 year olds to read themselves .TXT) 📕

I didn’t want to ask but I knew he would explain nonetheless, so I turned around and folded my hand across my chest with a deep sigh. Ready to listen. Perhaps his excitement would take away some of the current gloom from my life.

“The godfather is the new boss and Leah, I am telling you, I have never ever seen a man that handsome and forgive my Burmese, fuck-able, in my entire life.

My stomach turned. This was the exact same talk that had landed me in the trouble that I was currently in. Too bad Jeremy was forever free of any consequences, should he choose to indulge the way that I had. I watched his excitement with envy.

“And guess what?”

I couldn’t even find the energy to chime along.

He went on regardless, “He is going to be calling one or some of us to an interview in his office.”

I was immediately alarmed. “An interview?”

“Well, not exactly, like a little chit chat you know. To get to know the company a little better through our eyes.”

I looked down at the creased pants and jacket I’d thrown on that morning, along with the flat underwhelming shoes. I wore no makeup on my face, my hair tied back carelessly, and my eyes looked bloodshot and swollen.

He noticed too, his nose instantly wrinkling. “You truly got sick yesterday. I thought you just took the day off like we talked about.”

“Has it already been predetermined? The people that he’s going to interview, or chit chat with whatever?”

“Nope.” He shook his head. “He’s just going to call anyone randomly.”

Fuck, I cursed under my breath. Could life batter me any further? The clear indisputable answer was yes. Yes, it could and would. Its sole purpose seemed to be to completely destroy me and so far, it was forging ahead.

“Do you want to quickly head back home to change? Your house is just a half hour away right? You’ll be a few minutes late but I can cover for you.”

That was the last thing I wanted to do. “No,” I groaned. “I’ll just put on some lipstick and brush my hair.”

“Button your jacket too,” he said. “Those creases are a problem.”

“Fuck,” I cursed again, and headed over to my desk but then on my way over, I thought of an idea. I looked to see that my boss Henry was already in, so I knocked on his door.

“Come in,” he said.

I did while tucking curly fly aways behind my ears.

“Oh, Leah.” He lifted his head for a brief glance, but then did a double take. “Are you all right?”

“Just a bit better from yesterday.”

For a few seconds he didn’t know what to say. “Uh, did you get a chance to come up with some copies for the campaign?”

“Still working on it, sir.”

“Well, you need to speed up, the VP wants a progress report before lunch.”

“Yes, sir,” I replied.

Nodding, he returned to the documents on his desk. “Why did you come in to see me?”

“I uh…” I wrung my hands behind my back. “I heard that the new CEO might want to interview some of us today. I was wondering if I could somehow be omitted from the selection. I'm still quite ill from yesterday and certainly not at my best today.”

He raised his head then to fully take in my appearance. “You do look quite unwell,” he said. “But I have no say over that. HR sent all the files to him yesterday so as long as you’re an employee and you’re in the building, if he calls upon you then you have to go. He seems like a nice guy but I'm sure he didn’t get to where he is now at his age by being flowery. Don’t worry too much about it though. It's just a simple conversation. You’ll be fine and I already mentioned your absence yesterday. You’ll probably not even be the one called. There’s seven other people he can choose from. Don't worry about it.”

None of his words were assuring, but there was nothing either of us could do, so I thanked him and returned to my desk to begin my work for the day.

An hour before our lunch break, the intercom phone on my desk suddenly rang.

I nearly jumped out of my skin at the sudden shrill, my nerves shot to hell at a possible request for the interview. When I saw it was our Content Manager, Aarif’s line, breathing became difficult. I picked up the phone with shaky hands.

“Meeting room four in five minutes. They’ve called a progress meeting for a half-hour before lunch in the VP’s office. We need to collate what we have.”

My head fell into my hands. Could the day seriously get any worse? Why today of all days did they need us making presentations and attending interviews on the executive floor? I barely ever had a reason to be there but on the absolutely worst day of my existence, I was to be paraded on it with my misery.

I felt cheated and attacked.

“Sure,” I said and got my documents in order. The VP was especially on this campaign because it was his first and a personal brief. I understood his diligence but just couldn’t accept it as reason enough for making the team’s life miserable.

Twenty minutes later, the clouds hovering above my head brought down rain. I was on my way up with the Project Manager, Aarif, and Henry.

And I was the center of attention for my half-dead look, and rumpled clothes. I wanted to bury myself into the ground.

“Kudos for not taking the day off,” Aarif said. “I know how you feel right now. I was you all through last week. I couldn’t even attend the RFP meeting. Thankfully, I have you to save my ass.”

Henry gave him a hard look and so did I, but I couldn’t show my contempt for him outrightly since he was above me. I, however, allowed my mind to vent enough to say exactly what it wanted to. Well, fuck you