Ties That Bind

By Reese Patton

A not quite dark but definitely humorous and heartwarming accidental pregnancy romance

No last names. No strings. No promises.

Connie Nazario is the heir to the Nazario family “business” and doesn’t have time for anything more than one night stands. He can’t afford a relationship and he certainly can’t afford to fall in love. Not if it means bringing someone he cares about into his dark world of crime.

And then he finds Greer at Defututa. She’s different from all the other women at the night club—elegant, refined, and out of her element. He decides he wants her, even if it can only be for one night. She’s not meant for his world and deserves someone better than a crew boss in the mob.

But fate has other plans for him. One night of passion has an unintended consequence—an unplanned pregnancy. Can Connie find a way to bring Greer safely into his world or will his world destroy the woman he’s falling in love with? 

• Language: English
• Publisher: VoxAmoris Books
• Release date: Oct 5, 2017
• ISBN: 9781386240198

Book preview

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About Ties That Bind

A not quite dark but definitely humorous secret baby romance novel.

No last names. No strings. No promises.

Connie Nazario is the heir to the Nazario family business and doesn’t have time for anything more than one night stands. He can’t afford a relationship and he certainly can’t afford to fall in love. Not if it means bringing someone he cares about into his dark world of crime.

And then he finds Greer at Defututa. She’s different from all the other women at the night club—elegant, refined, and out of her element. He decides he wants her, even if it can only be for one night. She’s not meant for his world and deserves someone better than a crew boss in the mob.

But fate has other plans for him. One night of passion has an unintended consequence—an unplanned pregnancy. Can Connie find a way to bring Greer safely into his world or will his world destroy the woman he’s falling in love with?

Also by Reese Patton

Billion Dollar Headline Serials

The Girl in the River: Page One

The Girl in the River: Page Two

The Girl in the River: Page Three

The Girl in the River: Page Four

The Girl in the River: Page Five

Copperwood

Dirt - A Copperwood Novel

Pick - A Copperwood Novel

Honor - A Copperwood Novel (Available Fall 2017)

The Barnes Family

The Rebound - A Barnes Family Novel

Immaculate Reception - A Barnes Family Novel

The Rescue (Coming Soon)

The One with the Thanksgiving Turkeys (Coming Soon)

Crown of the Gods (as Reese W. Patton)

Love & Pain (as R.W. Patton)

TIES THAT BIND

A not quite dark but definitely humorous secret baby romance novel.

REESE PATTON

This book is a work of fiction. The characters, incidents, and dialogue are drawn from the author’s imagination and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events or person, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

TIES THAT BIND. Copyright © 2016 by Reese Patton. All rights reserved. Printed in the United States of America. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews. For information contact: [e-mail].

Table of Contents

About Ties That Bind

Also by Reese Patton

A Note From Reese

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Eighteen

Chapter Nineteen

Chapter Twenty

Chapter Twenty-One

Chapter Twenty-Two

An Excerpt from The Rebound

About Reese

A Note From Reese

At first glance, Ties That Bind might not look to be humorous and heartwarming, but I promise you it is both. However, there might be a few darker moments and some spicier bits than my usual fare. When I began writing about Constantino and Greer, I never planned for the funny bits. And yet, I couldn’t stop them from appearing on the page, no matter how hard I tried. So Ties That Bind turned into a humorous and heartwarming not quite dark romance, and I ran with it.

Once I finished with Connie and Greer’s story, I didn’t plan on visiting their world again. But we all know what happens to plans—they almost never go as expected. By the time I finished writing, I fell in love with Greer and Connie, the characters surrounding them, and Connie’s play-list (you can find some of the songs at the end of this book). It’s no longer a question of if they will return, but when!

Warm Wishes,

Reese

P.S. Sign up for my reader group and you’ll be the first to know when my next book comes out!

Yes, I’m drunk. And you’re beautiful. And tomorrow morning, I’ll be sober but you’ll still be beautiful.

– The Dreamers

Chapter One

Greer

I closed my eyes and the pounding bass of the music thrummed through my body. The beating of my heart and the throbbing within my head matched the beat of the music. I wondered again why I let my best friends from college, Hilary and Lisa, convince me to go to a dance club. I might use the word let, but in reality, they got me out of my apartment under false pretenses. They promised me a nice evening at an upscale wine bar. It was how they convinced me to squeeze into my standby little black cocktail dress and slip on the stiletto heels high enough to force me to concentrate while I walked.

And yet, despite those promises, I now sat at one of the high-top tables sporadically placed around the perimeter of a dance floor in the middle of a trendy nightclub watching my friends make asses of themselves while they ground up against the strangers groping them.

I couldn’t even remember the name of the club, mostly because I couldn’t read the neon script, and only wanted to leave as soon as I stepped out of the cab. Unlike the rest of my friends, I found a job right out of college and I had to go into work in the morning. I kept on telling myself to leave, but I hadn’t made any move towards the door, much less off my chair.

I took another sip from my drink. Not knowing what else to do, I looked up at the second floor. The club owners roped off the stairway, keeping the VIPs safe from having to rub elbows with the mere commoners on the ground floor, but we could still gaze up at them in adoration. Maybe it was because I could feel someone staring at me, or maybe it was just because I wanted to see if I could spot a pseudo-celebrity, but I spent energy trying to recognize some of the faces belonging to the bodies standing around the balcony.

My gaze moved right to the figure in the dark suit, holding his glass between his hands while he scanned the floor below him. No doubt, he was just looking for some drunk girl to send one of his cronies to so said crony could invite her up into the VIP section. He wasn’t a hanger-on from the way others deferred to him. Even in the crowded section, everyone gave him wide berth.

The man’s dark hair was slicked back, and I barely made out on the dark shadow on his cheeks hinting at whiskers. His wide shoulders tapered down to a narrow waist and hips and even though he stood far enough way for me to have difficulty making out the details, I could still tell he was muscular from the stretch of his suit around his broad shoulders. I had no idea who the man was. He didn’t look like anyone I had seen in the gossip pages or tabloid websites, but he was gorgeous in a dark brooding kind of way. The same dark brooding kind of way that was catnip to women. So I was a bit fascinated by the fact I couldn’t see any women hanging off his arms already. I imagined he was the type of man who lifted his chin at a woman and she’d cave in at his bad boy glower.

Any man who looked like him had no business being alone, and I had no business worrying about it.

I couldn’t stop looking away from him and he caught my gaping. He looked down at me. Right at me. Or maybe he stared down at one of the women flailing around on the dance floor in front of me. My breath caught in my throat and I took a quick drink from the overly sweet concoction Hilary had ordered for me when we first walked into the club. Instead of helping, the alcohol slipped down the wrong way and my body responded with full force in an attempt to remove the wayward liquid. By the time I stopped coughing and looked back up at the balcony, the man was gone.

I tried to push his image out of my mind and distracted myself by looking for Hilary and Lisa on the dance floor. Even with the number of dancers on the floor, I found them quickly enough—men circled around them, vying for their attentions. Men always flocked to them.

Lisa looked like Jessica Rabbit come to life, and Hilary was practically the reincarnation of Grace Kelly.

Crossing my leg over my knee, I leaned back in the chair and nursed my drink while I returned to the task of finding the mystery man from the balcony. Not that I wanted to see him with whatever arm candy he had found, but looking at him was a nice way to pass the time before I garnered enough courage to say goodnight to my friends and head home to my comfortable bed. Alone.

Greer! Hilary dragged out the E’s in my name and flailed around in front of me like one of the Tarantella dancers. We didn’t bring you out to keep a chair warm!

In order for me to hear her over the music, Hilary had to yell, and I had to lean forward. I’m drinking! I held up my half-full glass and shouted back at her.

Hilary took the glass from me and set it on the table before grabbing my hand and pulling me to my feet. The traitorous heels betrayed me and threatened to send me flat on my face, but Hilary continued to drag me to the dance floor, oblivious to my precarious predicament.

I’d give them five minutes tops, then I would head out. Sitting in a club was bad enough, but surrounding myself with a bunch of twenty-somethings who had nothing more to worry about than how drunk they could get and who they were going home with that night. I was more worried about how many hours I had left to sleep before I had to force myself out of bed the next morning.

I threw myself half-heartedly into dancing and from the odd looks of the men surrounding Lisa, I must have looked like their mothers when they danced to a top forty song at a wedding. Lisa and Hilary ignored my less than graceful movements and laughed with the joy that comes from letting loose. Their enjoyment infected me and I found myself getting into the music, letting the beat roll through my body as I moved with it.

I noticed the men didn’t grope me the same way they grabbed hold of my friends, but then most men didn’t glance twice at me when I was with Hilary and Lisa. I didn’t let it bother me any other time, and I wasn’t going to start now. I didn’t look like a cartoon come to life or a Hollywood starlet turned princess.

I raised my arms up over my head like my friends and copied their gyrations, swiveling my hips and twisting my body in accompaniment to the rhythm of the music. I threw my time minute limit out the window along with my inhibitions, not caring if the hem of my skirt rode higher than what I was comfortable with.

Large hands grabbed my hips and pulled me back against a wall of muscle belonging to a very large man. I tried to turn around and look at my new dance partner, but he held me in place. I resorted to trying to pull away, but he wasn’t letting me go. His warm breath caressed the skin of my neck just below my ear and I shuddered as a charge raced through my body.

Don’t. His low voice rumbled through me, competing with the bass and winning. Just enjoy.

My stranger ground his hips against my ass and either a very large flashlight in his pocket or the evidence of an erection, the size of which could only confirm that the man was big all over, pressed against me.

One arm slipped around my waist, pulling me tight against his body, while the hand on my hip guided my movements. His breath returned to my neck, but instead of speaking to me, his lips brushed against me and the tip of his tongue danced over my skin. Normally, I would have slapped a man who presumed to touch me the way this stranger was, but I couldn’t ignore the quiet voice in the back of my mind wanting him to continue.

I didn’t even know what he looked like, or his name, or anything else about him. But what I knew is that I didn’t want him to stop. Jesus, what was in that drink Hilary ordered for me? Either I was more drunk than I thought, or I was horny enough to throw all caution to the wind and turn into one of those twenty-somethings who worried about who I was going home with that night.

My partner pulled me further away from friends, closer to the tables along the edge of the dance floor and I did nothing to stop him. During our slow movement away from the mass of writhing bodies, he never once stopped his own movements.

His lips found my ear and his voice once more teased me, urging my thoughts to a decidedly naughty direction. How brave are you?

How brave was I? What the hell kind of question was that? I tried to turn around and face him, but again, he held me tightly, using his arms and muscular chest to keep me from turning my body. His whisker-roughened cheek and mouth kept me from turning my head and looking over my shoulder.

I’m still dancing with you.

His deep laughter rolled through his body and vibrated against my back. Yes, you are. His lips brushed my neck again and I might have melted back against him. Come with me?

Where?

Away from here. Somewhere more quiet.

I came with friends. We both knew why I mentioned my friends. I wanted to warn him I would be missed. I also had an irrational worry I had offended him and I would lose out on whatever he had planned.

We won’t leave the club.

I had no idea what came over me, but nodded. I guess I’m very brave then.

He laughed again, rewarding me with another wave of pleasure rolling through my body from the sound of his laugh and his chest vibrating against my back. He let go of my body, but his hand found mine. Without another word, he pulled me around the perimeter of the room towards the stairway.

For the first time, I saw my unknown admirer. I caught sight of the man who convinced me to throw all caution to the wind and follow a complete stranger. My stranger was the man from the balcony. I almost fell over. I was going to be the arm candy I was jealous of earlier?

He must have felt me stumbling because he looked over his shoulder and he smiled. Only the right corner of his mouth lifted, so the smile was more of a crooked grin, but it added to his sexiness. He pulled my hand until I was close enough for him to wrap his arm around my waist and continued moving towards the forbidden area beyond the red rope that kept people like me away. Despite the warmth of his body, I shuddered from the gesture.

Before my