The next two weeks went merrily along for both Brielle and Alex. They had even fallen into a routine; wake in the morning and have breakfast together then shower and dress and Alex would drive her to work. On some days he’d show up and they’d go out to lunch during her break, but he was always there to pick her up right at five. He finally met her boss, who was more than thrilled and did indeed try to convince him to buy some studio time. Alex told him he’d have to put a call in to their manager.

Then the evenings, sometimes he took her out to dinner and sometimes they stayed in and cooked it themselves or ordered out. He supervised her work in the kitchen, not wanting a replay of his birthday Sunday, but he also taught her how to correctly measure and make the meals so they’d actually be edible.

It all felt natural to him; her there in his arms when he slept and by his side during the day. Her laughter filled him and he found himself loosening up, smiling and becoming more like the Alex he used to be before Renee got her talons into him. And the best part about it all was that Renee didn’t try to contact him. At first, he did admit to being on guard and holding his breath for the phone calls, but every day that passed and she didn’t reach out to him, he relaxed a little.

It was now Monday, January 24th and Alex had just returned from meeting with the rest of the group and their management and record label. The album was over halfway complete and the record executives wanted to kick things into high gear and have it ready to go by the end of February; which gave them just a little over five weeks to finish things. Of course that translated into long, long hours and very little sleep. He had a feeling they were really going to push the guys and he wasn’t too happy with it. Brielle wouldn’t be either and he hated having to tell her and upset her.

“Hey, baby,” she greeted him as he stepped through the front door and into his home.

“Hey.” He tossed his keys to the side and slipped his shoes off. “You get home okay?”

“Mhm, Laurel showed up on time.” Over the last couple weeks the two girls were quickly becoming fast friends. Which meant the couple would be attending Nick’s big birthday bash that Friday night at a club where he’d rented the entire VIP section.

Alex grinned then moved to where she was leaning against the doorframe and kissed her lips. “Good. How is Laurel?”

“She’s doing great. Busy trying to get Nick’s party ready, but good. She said you guys had some big meeting today with some record execs.”

“Right, the one I told you about this morning.” He smoothed his hands to her growing tummy and leaned down, pressing a kiss to it. “How are you feeling? How’s our baby doing?”

Brielle smiled. “We’re both doing well today.”

“Good.” He kissed her belly again then rose up and kissed her lips. “Come sit down and I’ll tell you about the meeting.”

“Okay.” She allowed him to lead her into the room and to the sofa where they both sank into it and got comfy. “So, what’s going on?”

“Well, they’re wanting us to finish the album up that we started in the fall. We were going to finish it anyway, you know, just took the holidays off, but now they’re really pushing for an end date,” he explained, taking her hands in his and watching her intently.

“Okay.” She was watching him back like she didn’t understand where he was going with this.

Alex chuckled low at her perplexed look and took hold of her face with both his hands then he kissed her forehead. “I love how innocent to all of this you are. And I don’t want that to ever change about you.”

“Innocent to what? What is going on?”

He sighed. “They’re really gonna push us to have the album finished up by the end of February. So that gives us five weeks to get the rest of the songs recorded and fix anything about them or the others we want. Then it’ll be finalized and they want to release it in mid to late March.”

“Well, that’s good? Isn’t it?”

“Yeah, it’s good to have it done, but it means I’ll be working long hours and once the album is finished then it’ll be time for promoting it and then planning a tour.” His dark eyes searched her face. “We have a bit more sway in the length of the tour and when we start it, but it’s really up to the dates the venues have available.”

“So, what are you saying?” She didn’t seem to understand what he was trying to get across to her.

“That the next year or so of my life is going to be insanely busy with the album and the tour and all the interviews and promoting I’ll be doing.”

“Oh,” she watched him, her clear eyes studying his face and showing the realization that was starting to set in, “what about me and the baby?”

He sighed and pulled her into his embrace then sank into the back of the sofa with her. “That’s why I want to talk to you. We’re going to need a plan and the sooner we figure it out, the better it’ll be.”

Brielle tilted her head until she could see his face. “What kind of plan?”

“Um…I’m not really sure.” He sighed then massaged the bridge of his nose. “They said they would want to start the tour sometime in the summer and we usually start rehearsals six weeks ahead of the tour.”

“But I’m due in the summer.”

“I know you are.”

She pushed herself up and out of his arms, her hand pressed to his chest. “You’re saying, you’d go off on tour and leave me here, about to give birth? What if I have the baby and you’re in like…Australia or something? I can’t do this alone, Alex. I just can’t.”

He could hear the panic starting to set into her voice and nodded his head, taking her hand in his and gently shh’ing her so she would calm down. “I know you can’t and you’re not going to have to. I’m not going to miss the birth of our child. I told them I wasn’t going to leave you alone so they would have to start the tour sometime after the baby’s birth. And if I’m not there right away, or have to miss a few shows, then so be it.”

“Okay,” she relaxed some at that and allowed him to guide her back to his chest, “wait, what about after the baby is here?” And then she was sitting up again. “You’re still going to leave me alone to take care of a newborn? I can’t do it alone; I don’t know how to take care of a baby. I don’t know the first thing about being a mom; I’ll end up scarring them or hurting them. I can’t do it by myself!”

The panic was back and he pulled her back to his arms, holding tight and smoothing a hand gently over her back. “You’re not going to have to do it alone,” as he spoke he could feel a pressure in his chest at the strength he felt in his words. “I’d never leave you alone. If I have to leave, then I’ll have my mom come stay with you or something. Okay?”

She nodded at that and slipped her arms around him, holding him close and relishing in the comfort of feeling safe in his arms. “She will know what to do.” A pause. “Will she come out here even if you’re here?”

“Yes, she will and I’m sure of it. She’ll want to see her grandbaby and we’ll need her help, because I don’t know how to take care of a baby either.” He chuckled low and kissed her head then glanced to the pocket of his jeans when his cell phone sounded from it. “Meh.”

Brielle chuckled and pulled back, smoothing her shirt over the bump in her tummy, allowing him to retract his phone and answer it.

“Talk to me.”

“Alex?” Whitley Preston, his publicist’s voice came over the line.

Alex glanced to Brielle. “Oh, hey, Whit, what’s going on?”

She sighed heavily. “We’re going to need to do some serious damage control.”

He felt his heart leap into his throat. “What? Why?”

“I’ve been getting calls all morning on responses you have for the article that just came out in Top Gossip magazine.”

His brows drew together. “What article?”

“Well, it seems Renee paid a little visit to the magazine and gave them an in-depth, ex-fiancée-tells-all expose.”

“What?!”

Brielle jerked at the ferocity in his voice then her head snapped to her belly when she felt a tiny flutter inside. What was that? Holding her breath, she studied her stomach and then felt it again. It was tiny, barely noticeable and felt like something was tickling her from the inside. With a small giggle, she smoothed a hand over the bump, realizing what that had been. The baby was saying hello.

With an excited grin, she turned back to Alex, momentarily forgetting he’d been on the phone. But the grin died on her lips as she saw the anger flashing in his eyes and the vein in his neck throbbing. What was going on? Half afraid to say something for fear of that outrage being taken out on her, she slowly slipped from him and sat up fully on the couch, putting some space between their bodies.

Alex didn’t seem to even notice though. He raked a hand through his hair and frowned hard at his cell phone. “You have to be fucken kidding me! Of course she would fucken do this! I cannot fucken believe it. No, no, I can and I’m going to kill her is what I’m going to do. She has no fucken right to say any of that bullshit!”

His publicist must have said something that made sense because he sank into the couch and held a hand over his eyes, his thumb and middle finger each massaging a temple.

“What do we do?” He questioned in a calmer tone after a long moment that could only mean Whitley had been speaking. “Heh,” he snorted after a slight pause, “you’re damn right I’m going to make a statement and you’re damn right I’m going to talk to that magazine.”

Brielle frowned at that statement. Something not very good was going on and she was starting to pick up on what it might be. From his end of the conversation, it sounded like someone had been talking to the press about Alex, or his group, and it hadn’t been good stuff either. And then the realization of just who that might have been was slamming into her chest and leaving her winded. Renee.

“Yes, yes, do that. Email me the damn thing.” Alex rose from the couch and quickly strode from the room.

The blonde watched him go. Oh, this was not good at all. There’s no telling what the article said, but she could certainly imagine the horrible lies that evil woman was spreading. Wasn’t there something they could do about that if it was all lies? She could vaguely remember leaning about something like that in one of her classes in high school.

After a few moments, when Alex didn’t return, Brielle pushed herself up off the couch and went in search of him. He may be angry, but she wanted to know what was going on. This was her life Renee was probably smearing as well.

Her search ended in his office, where he was perched before his computer, one leg bouncing wildly about and a cigarette pinched between two fingers. His dark eyes were even darker than she’d ever seen and he was scowling at the computer screen, looking like he wanted to grab inside and pull the contents out to smash to smithereens.

“Alex?” She stopped in the doorway and used the most softest of voices she could muster.

His eyes jerked in her direction and the scowl softened. “Hey.”

She remained where she was. “What’s going on?”

He frowned, inhaled from his cigarette then blew the smoke off to the side. “I should have known she would do something like this.”

“Do something like what?”

“This!” He waved a hand at the monitor. “She ran her fucken mouth to Top Gossip and they printed an article about it all.”

Brielle’s brows drew together and she slowly advanced into the room and to the desk. “Top Gossip? Isn’t that a gossip rag like The Enquirer?”

“For the most part, but they focus more on celebrities and not as much on bat boy.” Then he looked to his cigarette. “Shit, you can’t be around this stuff.” And he was extinguishing it into an ashtray and waving away the lingering smoke.

“What did she say?” The blonde peered over his shoulder to the computer screen.

Alex waved a hand at it and leaned back in his chair. “Take a look.” He was giving her permission to read it and so she did, horror gripping her chest at what the article entailed.

The Two Timing Backstreet Boy?

AJ McLean may sing about true love and falling head over feet for someone, but the musician who’s one fourth of the popular musical group The Backstreet Boys doesn’t know the first thing about it. Not only has he been going behind his fiancée’s back to see other women, but now he is fathering a child with one of those women “and she’s considerably younger than he is”. His fiancée, Renee Kemp, was sure to point out when she joined us in our offices for a sit down chat.

When asked why she was coming forward, Kemp simply stated that, “It’s time for the truth to be told. I don’t want anyone else to ever feel the way I do and so I’m hoping my story may open some other woman’s eyes.”

“He’s always been a smooth talker,” she goes on to say. “He knows what to say and how to say it to make you believe every word. You feel like you’re the only girl in his world and that you mean so much. But in reality you’re one of many and you don’t mean a thing.”

“I truly thought he was ‘the one’. He was so wonderful and sweet and romantic and we just meshed together so well. But the entire time he was cheating on me and then he got some random girl from a one-night stand pregnant and suddenly she became more important than me and our wedding. We were going to plan a life together, but I guess it wasn’t good enough for him. He flew her out to California, found her a job and moved her into his house. If that doesn’t say he prefers a complete stranger over his own fiancée then I don’t know what else will.”

And what really drove the knife in deeper? “I found out I was pregnant and he acted like I had some disease. He hardly wanted to be around me or help me and he didn’t seem to care if something happened to me or the baby. And then I lost the baby and I don’t think I’ve ever seen him more relieved. He was finally free to go off and play house with her.”

And that’s exactly what he did. McLean abruptly broke things off with the devastated woman who was still trying to recover from a miscarriage and sent her packing all the way to her parents when she approached him, wondering if it might be possible to work things out, “or at the very least, talk about what happened,” She explained choking back the tears.

“Just because he’s a celebrity doesn’t mean he’s still not a jackass,” she was sure to point out. “Money, fame, power; they all go to your head and turn you into someone awful. I don’t think I ever truly knew him. But now he’s that girl’s problem and they deserve each other. He’s going to screw her over just as badly as he did to me. I’ve learned my lesson and I hope other girls out there won’t let the wool be pulled over their eyes. No one deserves to be treated that way. Not even if the guy is world famous.”

So take note, ladies. And maybe start questioning your man’s motives and whereabouts lest you should end up like Miss Kemp; heartbroken and completely alone. “I would never wish this on anybody. Losing a child, having your relationship destroyed and your trust shattered turns you into a completely different person. I now have a jaded view on love and the next guy that comes along is going to have to work hard to prove he’s not just another AJ McLean.”

Brielle was speechless; completely and utterly speechless.

Alex gave a snort and closed the webpage with an angry click of the mouse.

“I…” she turned to him with horror on her face, “can…can she do that? She’s lying!”

“But there’s no proof.” He pushed away from the desk and rose from his chair. “I’m going to have to counteract with my own interviews, so the entire world doesn’t think I’m some cheating dog that has no feelings. Bitch was never even pregnant.”

“Can’t …can’t you sue her for slander?”

Alex ran a hand over his face and took a breath, trying to rein in his emotions and not become a cursing and angry mess of a man in front of her. Though he really could use a drink at the moment. “Well, since it’s written, it’d be libel; but she’s not outright lying about anything but the baby and pregnancy and there’s no way to prove that.”

“But she’s calling you a jackass and implying that you’re a lying and cheating dog.”

He rubbed his temples, trying to ignore that thirst for alcohol that was growing stronger by the minute in his mouth. “Her opinion of how the relationship ended. Her words though were all true; I was cheating on her, though we both slept around on each other and knew it, and I did move you out here and into my place and you are having my baby. All of that’s true. She used her words carefully and it would be too hard to prove she’s just being malicious and vindictive and not simply evoking her First Amendment rights.”

“That bitch!” Brielle frowned hard and had to clench her hands into tight fists, wishing Renee was standing before her so she could attack her again. She should have punched her in the nose when she had the chance.

“All I can do now is give my side of the story; explain how I felt about things and the open relationship that was between the two of us. And tell them how I feel about you.” His eyes settled on hers and the anger in them dissipated some at the sight of her.

She wet her bottom lip slowly, her heart knocking around in her chest some. “Tell them about…us getting married?”

“No, of course not!” Alex shook his head adamantly. “That’s not any of their business right now and we need to smooth this shit over before sending everyone into a frenzy about that.”

“Oh.”

He sighed and chewed the inside of his cheek, his anger at the situation seeping back in. “Damnit, I need a drink.” Then he strode from the room before Brielle could even react.

She was hot on his heels though. “Alcohol? You’re going to let Renee of all people drive you to drinking?”

“She has always driven me to drink, always.” His dark eyes met hers and she felt the charge in them make chills run down her spine.

“You can’t let her win, Alex, that’s exactly what she wants!” She grabbed his arm and yanked him to a stop, turning his body to face hers. “She’s wherever the hell she is smirking and gloating because she knows she’s reducing you to nothing but a weak man who will drink himself to death. You can’t let her have that kind of a control over you!”

Alex watched her with hard eyes, feeling that tremble in his body at the need for alcohol and the anger at what Renee had done to him. “What…do I do,” he managed to choke out.

“Anything but pick up a bottle.”

At her words, he gripped her arms and pulled her body to his, his mouth crashing down on hers and backing them to the wall, Brielle’s back hitting it with a soft thud. Before she could even gain her senses, his hands were pushing at her pants and he was yanking them down her legs and off, her underwear following.

Then he freed himself and had her up against the wall, forcing her legs around his waist. She gave a breathless sound of surprise which turned into a hot cry as he pushed into her warmth and began to move quickly, as if he couldn’t get enough and would never be satisfied.

It was hard and hot and he kissed her even more intensely, as if he were trying to drain her very spirit. His fingers pressed into the skin of her rear and his movements forced her lower back against the wall, the thud sounding with every thrust.

It didn’t take very long before Brielle’s ecstasy was hailing down around her and when she cried his name over and over, her chest heaving hard and her cheeks flushed, he felt himself spiraling off that edge of control right behind her, her name spilling from his lips just as loud.

Alex never wanted it to end, but like all great things, it eventually did and they both floated back down to the reality around them. Slowly, he lowered her to her feet then stumbled back against the opposite wall. His legs felt weak and his lungs were crying out for fresh air, but that intense craving for a drink was gone.

Brielle’s own legs wouldn’t hold her up and she slid down the wall until she was sitting on the floor, her feet in front of her. The bun she’d had her hair tied up in was slowly unraveling and locks of golden hair hung messily in her face and spilled around her shoulders.

She looked like an angel to him, a pregnant one and suddenly he blinked and he fixed his pants then lowered down next to her. “Are you alright? Did I hurt you or the baby?” He touched her tummy in a caring manner.

“N…no,” she managed out, her throat dry and her head still spinning from the encounter. “But we…pro’lly shouldn’t do it that way again,” it was an effort to force the words out coherently. At the moment, she wanted to push him against the floor, straddle him and do it all over again.

Alex chuckled and kissed her cheek. “I’m sorry. We’ll have to research the best positions for you once your tummy starts to get bigger and we can’t reach each other face to face.”

“Mmhmm,” she smoothed her hair and rubbed her cheeks then met his eyes. “I know that ignoring everything that happened earlier is probably not the best thing, but do you wanna go upstairs?”

She didn’t have to ask him twice. “I think that’s the best idea I’ve heard all day.” He rose to his feet then gently helped her to her own before scooping her up into his arms. “And at the moment, I want to do nothing but forget about that article. In fact, how about we forget about the article the entire rest of the day and night?”

Brielle giggled as he started for the stairs. She slipped her arms around his neck and kissed his ear. “Mmkay, sounds good to me.”

Then they ascended the stairs.

Brielle/Alex: 1, Renee: 0.

~*~*~*~*~

“I think I felt the baby move earlier,” Brielle murmured as she nuzzled her head against Alex’s chest hours later after they had finished another round of ravenous love making. Her sexual appetite was going crazy and she was doing her best not to jump his bones again. Though he’d made no complaints yet.

“You did?” He lifted his head from the pillow and looked to her stomach. “What did it feel like?” Covering her stomach with his hand, he waited for any sign of the baby inside. “Can I feel it?”

“I don’t think you can yet.” She watched his hand then placed hers over the back of his. “But soon, I’m sure.”

“I hope so.” He kissed her head then turned back to her tummy. “What did it feel like?”

“Like,” Brielle thought over the best way to explain it, “like there is a butterfly inside that’s flying around.” Then she laughed because that sounded completely ridiculous. “I’m sorry, that’s not a very good description.” Slowly shifting some against him, she turned to face him more and reached out, tickling lightly at his tummy. “It feels like that.”

Alex jerked then gave a shiver and chuckled. “That tickles.”

“Well, that’s what it feels like. Like someone is tickling the inside of my tummy.”

He laughed and pulled her to him closer, hugging her all secure. “I love you.”

She giggled and wallowed in his scent and warmth. “I love you.”

“Mm, good.” He kissed her neck then finally released her and sat up, his hair sticking up in all kinds of disarray. “Are you hungry? We haven’t even had dinner.”

“It’d be more like a midnight snack now.” Next to him, she pulled herself up and smoothed her hair then reached over and fixed his. “You look like you’ve been rolling around in the hay and have the worst case of bed head ever.”

Alex smirked. “It’s all that lovin’ you put on me.” Then he slipped from the bed and reached for his boxer shorts. “What do you wanna eat?”

“A burger,” she sat up more at that thought, “Ooh yes, a nice, big, juicy burger. With cheese and extra mayo and lettuce.”

“I don’t have any burgers.”

Brielle pouted some.

Alex sighed and reached for his jeans. “Wendy’s burgers okay?”

She giggled and clasped her hands together. “You’re the best! A baked potato too, with extra sour cream.”

“You’re so spoiled.” He leaned over and kissed her head. “Anything else?”

“No, but hurry back, because now that you’ve mentioned it, I am pretty hungry.”

“Alright, love.” He pulled on a shirt next then kissed her a few times before finally tearing away and heading out of the room, calling back that he’d be quick and she better stay naked.

She laughed and watched him go then slowly extracted herself from the blankets and slipped from the bed. She needed to pee yet again and she wanted to clean up some before he returned. The evening may have not started out that great, but it was definitely ending up to be one of the best nights yet.