Delivering His Package: A Secret Baby Romance by Jamie Knight (best love novels of all time txt) 📗

book sale. Library volunteers at small plastic tables in the parking lot hawked them for a dollar or so each, not a bad way for the library to add some money to its sparse budget. But a brand-new donation of a brand-new book shipped directly from Amazon; that was unusual.

“I made sure it was shipped UPS, so I could deliver it to you in person.” Aiden’s eyes shimmered.

“Wow.” That was all I could think to say.

“I came here on Saturday, but your colleagues said you only work weekdays.”

“You came here—” I started to say. Claire made a gesture of covering her eyes, then her ears, shrugging.

“So, ordering this book for you on Amazon was the only way I could see you on weekdays. Since I’m making deliveries all day.” Aiden waved his UPS handheld at me as if I had forgotten that Aiden was, in fact, a UPS delivery driver.

“So, you just sent me a book—”

“Yeah.”

“You just sent me a book of romantic poetry—”

“You know Khalil Gibran?”

“I’m a librarian. Yeah, I know Khalil Gibran.”

“You didn’t have him in your collection, so I thought maybe you didn’t know—” Aiden’s eyes scanned around the room. The scruff on his face was sexy. He had just enough of a tan to show that he went outside sometimes, without being burned — and just enough wear on his face to show that he’d done some manual work, without being rough.

“We keep buying that book, and it keeps walking out of here.” I gestured toward the exit door. “People like it too much.”

“It’s one of my favorites.” Aiden smiled. This UPS driver read Khalil Gibran? Was Claire playing a prank on me? Were there hidden cameras around? It was my fantasy of fantasies. It was as if someone had read my mind.

“You, seriously, you know the book?” It wasn’t the politest thing to say, but I still wanted to make sure.

“No, I just clicked at random on Amazon, and that’s what came out. You know us UPS drivers, no education, never read any books.”

“I didn’t mean that — just that—”

“Come on. Everybody knows Khalil Gibran. Even the UPS driver.”

“You like to read?” My question was direct. It sounded like a dating qualification question. Which it kind of was. I loved to read. Working in a library somehow hadn’t extinguished my passion for books, despite all the stories I’d heard about people who lose their passions once their passions become careers.

“Well, this UPS driver has a Ph.D. in English literature, so I guess yeah, I like to read.”

“No shit.”

“Yeah, no shit.”

“Seriously?” I still had the feeling of being pranked by the world, as if someone had sent me a poetry-reading, PhD-holding buff hunk just to mock me and my loneliness.

“Driving for UPS pays better than teaching, if you haven’t heard.” Aiden raised his eyebrows.

That wasn’t all that surprising to hear. It was one of the reasons I hadn’t gone to graduate school myself. Working as a librarian afforded me even more time with books than teaching would have. It also paid as much as a professorship, and it didn’t require anything more than a BA.

“Do you enjoy it?” That was also a dumb question. But what else could I say?

“Yeah, I enjoy it — oh, oh shit, I have to go.” Aiden tapped at his watch, then at his handheld computer. He must’ve been on a delivery schedule. He turned and started walking away.

I called after him. “You want to?” I couldn’t believe I was doing this. But I was. I couldn’t let this guy get away.

“I want to?” Aiden looked at me, puzzled.

“Do you want to come back after work, and we can have coffee?”

Again, I couldn’t believe that I was doing this, saying this. Here I was, outwardly, openly asking out the UPS driver.

Before this day, I had never asked anybody out. I’d always been the one asked out. But I felt something for Aiden, something like an attraction that was driving me. I knew I had to act on it.

Chapter Three - Aiden

Seven P.M., an hour before library closing time, I got there as fast as I could. I changed out of my UPS uniform into jeans and a t-shirt in the back of an Uber car.

Once I arrived at the library, the nosy desk clerk was nowhere to be found. Good, for some privacy and discretion. Bad, because Eleanor wouldn’t be handed to me on a silver tray by the clerk as she usually was. I would have to fish her out from wherever she was hiding before bringing her out to coffee at whatever place the Yelp app recommended.

Alone amidst the tall Roman ceilings, I had to ring the front desk bell by myself and whisper-shout, “Eleanor! Eleanor!” It was the year 2021, and the New York Public Library was still using a simple mechanical bell? Maybe it was intentionally quaint, New York style.

Eleanor peeked her head out from the back room. Then hid again and closed the door like a groundhog. Then peeked out again, this time waving for me to come to the back area with her.

A waist-high door blocked me from going to the employee area. I silently pointed down at it. Eleanor shrugged and pantomimed for me to push open the door. I did. I was behind the library counter. It felt like sneaking into the principal’s office after school. She waved me to go into the back area. I followed.

The back area wasn’t much; gray carpet, dim fluorescent lighting, generic inspirational posters, and a soda vending machine. It resembled the “office” area of the UPS processing center that loaded my truck every morning.

Eleanor smiled. “Here, I’ll show you my hideout.” She took a right, a left then turned her key in a door lock. Inside the door was an office, windowless, with an overfilled bookshelf, a desk holding a laptop, a space heater for chilly New York mornings, and an espresso machine. The Khalil Gibran book was on the desk, next to