by Brynn Paulin
“Shit,” Adler ground out. His head swung toward me. “Stay there until I come to get you. Leave your backpack in the car.”
“Okay,” I gasped, trying to control my breathing. They couldn’t see me through the tinted glass, but soon, I’d have to face them.
“They can’t touch you,” he told me. “Don’t stop. Don’t answer anything, no matter what they say or ask. Keep your head down and just let me guide you inside. Understand?”
I nodded, and he left the car. I watched him circle the vehicle then my door was opening and he was guiding me out. The flashes were blinding, overwhelming me.
“Head down,” Adler reminded me under his breath.
The people screamed questions about my name, who I was, how I met Booker, if I was from Zenderland, how long we’d been together. Adler kept me moving, right past the phalanx of cameras and into the building.
Security let us through then blocked anyone who might try to follow us. I straightened and followed my bodyguard across the tiled space and around the corner to a side corridor. I fought the temptation to look back, and I was more grateful than ever that Booker had insisted on protection. I hadn’t understood before, but I sure did now.
“Booker’s offices are down this hallway. Will you be okay getting there on your own? I need to go back and take care of that.”
“Yes, I’ll be fine,” I assured him.
Then I was alone. I leaned against the wood-paneled wall, closing my eyes and summoning calm. Maybe if my stepmom saw the pictures of me and Booker, she’d slink out of the woodwork. She’d see money and come sniffing around. If she did, I’d find a way to bring Linzey to live with me.
That idea brought me peace with the situation. I smiled and started down the hall, checking out the brass nameplates on the doors as I went. It was so quiet, my footsteps sounded loud on the carpet. The silence was broken by the jarring sound of my phone going off.
“Hello?”
“Miss Grey?”
“Yes?”
“This is Christine at the Playwell Child Development Center.”
“Oh, hi. Did you need me to come in to complete my paperwork?”
“Well, no, actually. We had a couple parents who volunteer here bring it to our attention that you’re all over the gossip papers today.”
Great, so apparently, someone had my name already.
“And we can’t have that sort of upheaval around here. We pride ourselves on the peace and serenity of our facilities. If you continue your relationship with Prince Booker, as I’m sure you will, we will be dealing with a circus around our grounds. We can’t have our children exposed to that.”
They were firing me, before I even started.
“So we’re going to withdraw the offer of employment. But that shouldn’t be a problem since you haven’t started work here or completed our paperwork yet.”
“I…”
“We wish you all the best. Good luck with Prince Booker,” she said in a cheery voice that actually sounded sincere, even though she’d just pushed me off a cliff. Before I could so much as utter a syllable of protest, she disconnected.
What the hell was I going to do now, with no job?
At least I still had a roof over my head. Booker had made it clear I could stay as long as I liked…or something to that effect. Guess, I had to suck it up and go tell him I’d be with him awhile, and it would be longer until I could pay him back for my school supplies.
Booker’s office was halfway down the swanky, soft-lighted corridor. To my surprise, the pediatric waiting area was completely opposite. Brightly lit with child-friendly colors and lots of toys and books, it invited kids to come in and be comfortable.
The receptionist seemed less friendly. She eyed me as I approached. “Can I help you?” she asked, her tone professional.
“I’m…here to see Booker, um, Dr. Grammer?”
“Do you have an appointment?”
“Sort of? He’s expecting me.”
“Uh-huh,” she said, nodding and looking completely disbelieving.
“Could you just tell him Marigold is here?”
“I’m sorry. Without an appointment—” She slid the glass closed between us, and I stared at her in disbelief, my mouth dropped open.
What the heck?
Well, fine.
After giving her a glare—which she ignored—and a shake of my head, I turned and took a seat in the empty waiting room. Booker’s receptionist eyed me like I was a terrorist or something. She lifted the phone, keeping her stare on me, and I got the feeling she was calling security.
Probably, I was overreacting because of the media circus outside and being fired—was it being fired if you’d never even started?
When some rent-a-cops, stormed through the door as if they were FBI, I knew I was screwed. “Come with us,” one of them said, pulling me to my feet.
“I’m not doing anything wrong,” I protested, trying to pull away as they tugged me toward the door. “I’m just trying to see…” What was Booker to me? “My boyfriend.”
“We don’t put up with people stalking the prince,” the other guy said.
“I’m not!”
“Marigold!” The door slammed against the wall then Booker’s long legs devoured the distance between us. “Get your hands off my woman!” he bellowed, then yanked me to him. My big caveman had me clamped to his chest—the best thing that had happened in the past few hours.
“Told you,” I couldn’t help telling the security guards.
“Come with me,” my man demanded.
Next thing I knew, Booker was taking me through the door he’d just exited. He stopped at the desk. “Emma, this is my Marigold. When she comes in, you will buzz her through so she can come back to my office.”
Emma appeared a little green, and I wondered if she feared for her job. I didn’t wish her ill, but bitch, please…
Silently, he led me down a hallway that matched the waiting room, bright and colorful. Though his warm hand around mine was distracting, I tried to pay attention so I could find my way to his office next time. I couldn’t help it, though. My gaze kept drifting back to him. Each time, he met my eyes, his were hungry yet affectionate.
I briefly spied Carson before Booker turned me into an office that matched the outer corridor, with dark wood and warm lighting. Before I could take it in, my back was against the closed door and his mouth was on mine. He lifted me and my legs went around him.
We were breathing hard when he pulled back slightly, but that steel rod was still pressed against me, making me embarrassingly wet for him. His forehead tilted to mine.
“Are you okay?” he asked. His fingers stroked my cheek as he peered into my eyes as if looking for answers. “I was in with a patient when Adler messaged me and told me what was going on. I had to get to you.”
“I’m okay now. Thanks for rescuing me again.”
“That should never have happened,” he growled, referring to what had happened outside his office. “I’ll be speaking with Emma.”
“She thought I was a royal stalker.”
“I have had a few of those.”
He held me in silence, cradled against him, rocking slightly and somehow, sapping away my stress. The quiet surrounding us thrummed with the tension between us, but it was…pleasant. Binding. Wrapping us together.
Booker sighed. “I have a bunch of patients and their parents waiting in exam rooms. As much as I want to stay here with you, I need to see to them so we can be on our way this evening. Do you want to stay here or have Adler take you home?”
No way did I want to run that gauntlet again so soon. “I’ll hang out here. Can I use your computer? I need to start looking for a job.”
His brows drew together. “We’ll talk about that when I get back. You can sign on as a guest.” He brushed his lips over mine before stepping back. “Do some schoolwork. I’ll be back in a little bit. Just…don’t worry about anything. And stay off the gossip sites, okay? You probably don’t wa
nt to know. It’s never good. Trust me.”
Oh sure…dangle that carrot. Now, I really wanted to know.
He lifted my chin with two fingers. “Marigold.”
“Yeah.”
“I mean it. I promise, if there’s anything you need to know, my people will tell you.”
I sighed. “Okay.”
Chapter Seven
~ Booker ~
I watched Marigold looking around the family restaurant while we waited for our meals to be delivered. The place was part of a chain and ranked a solid zero on the glamour scale. This was a place I could prove I was a normal guy.
They’d placed us in a booth toward the back. Of course, I’d been recognized—no conceit there. It just was what it was. Pictures of me had been all over the press since nearly the day I was born. Chances of me not being recognized were slim.
Though our protection detail sat at a different table, affording room for Marigold and I to take separate sides, I sat beside her. The place was busy, but we’d been seated immediately. People stared at us, some trying to covertly snap pics with their mobiles. I was used to it, but Marigold was clearly uncomfortable.
I held her hand where it rested on the seat between us. My thumb stroked over the back of her soft fingers. “Just ignore them all, okay. Relax. Tell me about your day.”
Her free hand fiddled with her napkin. “It was good. I just had the three classes today.”
“Did you get everything you need from the bookstore?”
She nodded then looked up at me, regret in her gaze. “I won’t be able to pay you back for a while. The job I was supposed to start working… Well, they fired me this afternoon, before I could even begin.”
My eyes narrowed. I was pissed for my girl. “Why?”
“The media thing. They can’t expose kids to that—I was supposed to be working at a daycare.” Her chin trembled and I leaned in, resting my forehead against hers. I don’t know why I did that. I never had with another person. With Marigold, it just grounded me and seemed to calm her. She had to know someone cared about her, someone would finally take care of her.
I’d had my lawyer’s staff look into her background today—not because I didn’t trust her, but because I wanted to know her past. Probably not my best move but I wasn’t entirely patient when it came to wanting the best for people I cared about. Part of that was information.
Her mother had deserted the family when Marigold was a toddler. Her father, Peter, had committed suicide after he’d been implicated in a Ponzi scheme that had taken down a Wall Street mogul. Rumor was, the father had been in deep. Dirty. He’d left her and her half-sister, Linzey, behind with the stepmother, Gloria. He’d married Gloria when Marigold was three. Gloria had already been pregnant. Maybe, that was why the mother had left? Who knew? Probably Peter.
There were other sordid details the press would love to drag out in the open. The investigations, her stepmother’s alleged drug use… Linzey and Marigold had been good kids though. Never in trouble. Got good grades.
I squeezed my girl’s hand. I had a good one.
She couldn’t control who her parents were and what they did any more than I could control my snobby relatives and their overbearing ways. If I had my way, Marigold would never have to be ashamed of her time with me. From here on, I wanted to provide her happy ever after—I wanted to be her happy ever after.
It had been one day. Barely twenty-four hours and my feelings for her were so strong already. What would they look like in a year? Twenty years? Fifty? God willing, I’d be there to find out. Because there was no way I’d voluntarily let her go. My grandfather had always said, when you know you know. He’d said it wouldn’t hit like lightning, but it would be as if my whole world had shifted to make a space for her by my side. And from that moment on, nothing else would fill it. I knew he was right.
“I don’t want you to worry about a job,” I told her. Might as well start laying the groundwork for our future right now.
“But I need to work. I can’t sponge off you.”
“No, but you can let me take care of you. It’s different. Do you feel it, precious, this thing between us? I didn’t like you being away from me for school today.”
“But…”
“I know. It’s unrealistic to think we’ll be together 24/7, not that I’d mind it. But I have my work. You’ll have things to keep you busy, too. In fact, I have the perfect project—if you’re interested.”
“What is it?”
“Would you consider working for me—when you’re not in classes, that is.”
Her cute little brow furrowed. “Doing what? I don’t know anything about medical offices, certainly nothing about nursing.”
I chuckled. God, she was cute. She’d probably smack me if she knew I thought that. “Actually, I have a different project… I own most of the lower floor of the building. I’m considering putting in a childcare center. There isn’t one nearby and what better location than right next door to a pediatrician?”
It was something I’d considered from time to time but back-burnered for lack of time or drive to implement it. The project could be perfect for Marigold.
“I don’t know…anything about doing that.”
I shrugged. “We’ll figure it out. You can work in my office, and we’ll brainstorm it. Bring in people to help. You worked in a center before, so you have to have some idea what’s needed.”
Her eyes narrowed and she pulled back to stare at me. “How do you know that?”
Shit. “A guess?”
“First rule between us,” she said, shaking her head. “Don’t lie to me. I… Just don’t lie to me.”
“All right. I’m sorry.” I huffed a breath. “I had my legal team look into you—not because I was worried you’d murder me in my sleep or anything. I just… Look, I care about you. I wanted to know about you.”
Marigold turned from me, and of course, right then, our food was delivered.
“Can I get you anything else?” the waitress asked. I scowled at her because she was doing that eye-fucking thing that pissed me off. Even when I was single, I found it annoying and inappropriate.
“Darling?” I asked Marigold, slipping my arm around her. Her entire body stiffened. Well, fuck.
She gave the server a forced smile and shook her head.
“We’re fine,” I added. “Maybe, drink refills in a few minutes.”
“I’ll be back,” she sing-songed.
Great.
I refocused on my woman.
“You looked into me and you still want to be with me?” she whispered.
“More than ever. You need me almost as much as I need you.”
She looked up at me, her eyes watery. “What?”
“Love, you have no idea. I saw you, and my world shifted.” Using my grandfather’s words seemed appropriate. “I can no longer imagine a life without you in it.”
“Booker,” she whispered. “Are you sure?”
“Absolutely. Completely. ‘Til our very end.”
“That’s a little morbid,” she laughed.
I shrugged, grinning. “I intend for it to be a long time away. So…you didn’t answer my question.”
“What was it?”
“Come work for me? Help get the daycare center set up? Maybe run it?”
Her teeth sank into her bottom lip while her gaze grew distant with thought. Then suddenly, she smiled. “So you’re going to be my boss?”
“If you say yes.”
“So are you going to sexually harass me?”
“I sure hope so.”
Marigold giggled, her cheeks flaming. “I can’t believe I said that.”
“Love, you can say anything to me. I want to be your friend, cohort, boss, lover…everything.”
She nodded. “I’d like that, too.”
I stared into her eyes, wanting her so badly. “I want to kiss you right now,” I growled. “But with this audience, I dare not.”
“I want that, too, but I u
nderstand.”
“As soon as we’re alone, all bets are off.” I closed my eyes, breathing shallowly as I grabbed at control. When they reopened, I pinned her with my stare. “Tonight, I want more.”
Her hand took mine again. “Yes.”
* * * *
~ Marigold ~
One little word.
With one word, I’d opened the door that would change my future. Whether we stayed together or not—and deep in my heart, I had to believe we would—tonight would change me. I’d give him part of myself I could never get back. I wanted him to have it. It was his.
We’d finished our meals in tense silence, but it wasn’t uncomfortable. No, we vibrated with anticipation. Throughout, I’d noticed Booker, keeping an eye on the protection officers, who were also eating. It took me a moment, but I figured out he was timing the end of his meal to the completion of theirs.
The silence continued in the car, Booker as far from me as possible. It was as if he’d put touching off limits, that if we brushed against each other, he’d lose control and take me in front of the bodyguards, driver and anyone else around.
There were cameras outside Booker’s building when we arrived.
“I’ve got you.” He told me. “Just ignore them. Try not to look scared.”
“I’m not really scared.” I had been earlier. Not now, though. “They’re annoying. Your life is none of their business. It’s nobody else’s business.”
“It’s yours,” he said, kissing my temple before he opened the door and climbed out. The questions and flashes started immediately. I focused on Booker and just let him, and the protection officers flanking us, get me inside. My prince didn’t pause as he rushed us toward the elevators.
Unlike last night—had it really only been the night before?—Carson and Adler accompanied us upstairs. When we went into the penthouse, though, they didn’t follow. Booker immediately swung me up into his arms and carried me bridal-style.
“What are you doing?” I laughed.
“Taking what’s mine.”
I gasped, not from surprise but from the reaction that shot through me at his words. My arms went around him and my face pressed into his shoulder, hiding my wide smile. My teeth sank into my bottom lip. I never, ever would have seen myself here, but I didn’t have any questions about it.