He seemed to notice.
“You can touch them if you like,” he remarked.
Her face burned as she shook her head. “No, no, I should get going—" She turned to walk out the bedroom door.
She crashed into Angela.
The woman frowned then glanced at her husband over Bianca’s shoulder.
Bianca shuddered. If she’d heard the way her husband had just been talking to her, she would surely have been furious. The last thing Bianca needed right then was to invoke the rage of her new boss.
“I was just going to say,” Angela remarked. “I can send the driver over to help you with your stuff if you want. You must be settled in and ready when we go.”
“That would be great,” Bianca replied and smiled at Angela apologetically. She couldn’t believe Zev had been talking to her like that with his wife lurking within earshot.
It was always bad news when married men took too much of an interest in young women like her. She had no intention of opening that door, not for anyone. Not even for his toned arms or the dashing smile that curled his lips when he looked at her.
“And let me know if you need a hand with anything else,” Zev finished up.
His words were innocuous enough, but there was the slightest stress on the word anything.
Did he intend it to contain a secret meaning?
She smiled at him briefly, then slipped out the door.
Chapter 3
He's a nonsense man
Bianca let out a long sigh.
She padded into the kitchen. It had been a hell of a long day. Not a bad one, exactly, just a long one, and she was glad the kids were finally in bed. She could now enjoy a little time to herself.
It had been four days since she’d started working for Angela and Zev. It felt as though someone had slammed an accelerator up to a hundred miles per hour. She’d barely had time to catch her breath.
The children, Isla and Todd, were sweet enough, and she quickly grew to like them which was distinctly lucky, because she was around them pretty much all day every day.
They played together in the morning, ate lunch in the kitchen, then tidied up afterward under her watchful eye. The afternoons were spent running around going to playgroups and lessons, everything Angela had insisted they be signed up for.
Zev and Angela had flown off on their exotic vacation together the morning after Bianca had moved in.
She’d heard them making their way to the car outside and had felt a twinge of jealousy once more. This time, it was clearly aimed at Angela. The woman had it all and was headed on vacation with her gorgeous husband--the cherry on the perfect cake.
The rest of the staff had been coming in and out making sure the house stayed in order while the Anagnos’ were away. Bianca had chatted with a few of them about her new employers, hoping to get the inside scoop on what they were really like. What she could expect from them.
“I really like the both of them,” Jeanette, the cook, an older lady with a crisp, grey bob and sharp blue eyes, answered. “I’ve been working here for five years. I wouldn’t have stayed if I didn’t think they were worth it.”
“I suppose,” Bianca agreed. “What do you think . . . uh, how have you found them both . . . individually?”
She wanted to just come out and ask about Zev but knew that would have been too obvious. One of the staff members had already caught her lingering over pictures of him in the clusters of family portraits around the house. She was screwed enough as it is without giving away anything else about her attraction to him.
“Angela’s no-nonsense, but I’ve always liked that,” Jeanette tilted her head to the side, then narrowed her eyes and let out a long sigh. “Zev, on the other hand, is all nonsense.”
“What do you mean?” Bianca prompted her, intrigued.
“He’s a good man, don’t get me wrong,” she held her hands up. “But… well, you’ll see. You’ll understand eventually.”
With that, she left, leaving Bianca to try and make sense of everything she’d told her.
At least the Anagnos’ would be away a little while longer, so Bianca wouldn’t have to worry about running into them around the house. She’d checked the schedule, they weren’t due back for five days, giving her time to get used to the place without having to think about how good Zev looked without his clothes on.
Stepping into the kitchen, Bianca pulled her phone out and started scrolling through it.
She felt as though she’d barely had a moment to herself in the past few days. Though she knew she should have taken some time to eat or catch up on a little sleep. She just needed time to unwind, to not think about anything at all.
Staring at her friends’ social feeds she let the blandness of it wash over her, relax her. She had just taken a shower and had tossed on an old shirt. It was enormous, reaching just below her ass.
Since the kids were asleep and there was no one else in the house, she felt comfortable not putting anything else on underneath.
Yawning and stretching, she thought about grabbing something from the refrigerator when a voice took her by surprise.
“Oh, I didn’t expect you to be up.”
She turned to find Zev standing behind her—this time he actually had clothes on. Her cheeks blossomed with warmth, and she tried to pull the hem of the shirt down. Quickly, she realized she was likely just drawing attention to how little she was wearing by doing so.
She smoothed her hair and tried to act casual.
“Oh, Zev,” she greeted him with a raised brow. “I thought you weren’t coming back until tomorrow.”
“I wasn’t supposed to be back, but some urgent business came up,” He shrugged, running his hand through his hair.
“And Angela?” She asked, hoping it sounded casual.
The thought of being alone with him, the only two adults in this enormous house, sent a little thrill of excitement up her spine.
“She stayed the extra day,” he waved a hand. “We had obligations, and she didn’t want to skip out on them entirely.”
“Oh, right,” Bianca nodded.
So, that was it. They were alone together.
Her head spun. The fact that she was practically naked became more prevalent. Guess it’s my turn to surprise him with my birthday suit. He didn’t seem to mind one little bit though. He eyed her like she was something impossibly tempting.
His eyes moved over her bare legs, following the curves of her body to her bosom where the thin fabric of her shirt barely hid her perky peaks. Suddenly, he moved toward her, and for one crazy moment, she was certain he was going to kiss her.
“I’m starving,” he told her, holding her gaze.
Bianca’s eyes widened and were drawn to his mouth; he had a sweet, soft mouth. The kind she knew would feel so good on her own. With lips that knew how to tease and tempt and torture.
“You want something to eat?” He brushed past her. She could smell his expensive aftershave—classic, clean, and masculine. It suited him. She instantly committed the smell to memory.
“Yeah, sure,” she nodded and swiftly moved away from him before she could do something seriously stupid. He was her boss, after all, and the last thing she needed was to find herself in a compromising situation with him.
He pulled two plates down from the cupboard and loaded them up with olives, crackers, crumbly cheese, and tzatziki. She watched him move around the kitchen and was surprised to find herself drawn to the way he did things, the way he laid things out and set things up.
Zev handed her a plate, then poured them both a glass of wine. He took a seat at the breakfast bar. She wasn’t sure whether she should have taken the plate and retreated up to her room or if she should have joined him. Before she could decide, he pointed to the spot across from him.
“Sit,” he told her firmly. “I’ve been traveling all day, I could use some real human contact to unwind.”
“Sure,” she agreed.
He grinned and nodded at her as she sat
.
“What?” She asked, taking a sip of wine hoping it would take the edge off.
He shrugged. “You Americans, you always sound so perky,” he remarked. “I just think it’s cute, that’s all.”
She speared an olive on a cocktail stick and took a bite. The bitter flavor filled her mouth. As she savored, she realized he was watching her.
His eyes flicked down to her mouth for a split second but she brushed it off.
It wasn’t anything. It couldn’t be anything. He was married, for goodness sake. He was probably just enjoying the view of his barely clothed new hire. Nothing to read into.
“Where do you come from?” he questioned suddenly.
“That’s kind of a loaded question,” she joked, hoping to deflect him. Bianca really didn’t want to talk about her past. Hell, she’d struggled a long time to come to terms with it herself, never mind what other people would think.
“Are you going to answer?” He asked. He had this easy way about him like he didn’t mind whether or not she answered the question, but was still interested in finding out more about her.
“I came from a small town upstate,” she replied, shaking her head. “I grew up there, my whole life. And then… well, I decided I should get out, so I came to the city and signed up at the agency, and that’s how I ended up here.”
He fell silent for a long moment staring at her.
She could tell he didn’t really believe her, but he didn’t press any further. For now at least.
Suddenly Bianca noticed their knees were pressed together beneath the breakfast bar and the feeling sparked something deep in her belly, lighting a fire she’d never felt before.
“What about you?” She asked, deflecting the attention onto him instead. “How long have you been here?”
“Oh, about half a decade,” Zev shrugged. “My father and my entire family live in England, which is where I was born and educated. It’s where Angela and I first met. Because we were both from immigrant families, we hung in the same social circles.”
“How long have you two been together?” Bianca ignored the jealousy that pulsed briefly through her mind as she glanced down at the ring on his finger glinting in the soft light.
“Nine years,” he replied.
She could hear the reverence in his voice, as though he could hardly believe he’d held on to her for that long.
“Married for six. I knew she was the one for me as soon as I met her. But...” He stopped himself short before he could come out with whatever was on his mind.
She leaned forward interested, then realized it wasn’t her place to delve into the personal problems he had with his wife.
She could, however, sense a crack in the foundation, one that perhaps she could exploit.
Chapter 4
Nobody has to know
No, Bianca would not go there again. She would not think of Zev that way. She would not exploit whatever issues may or may not be in his marriage with Angela. She would not let herself get caught up in such a mess.
Her face dropped, and Zev seemed to notice.
“What’s up?” He asked and seemed genuinely concerned.
She shook her head. “Nothing, really,” she replied. She took another sip of her wine and felt the alcohol warm her belly.
He didn’t seem to take her at her word. He leaned back eying her, and she felt as though he was looking deep into her soul. She wasn’t sure she liked it, but she wasn’t sure she hated it, either.
Something about the intimacy of this surprise meeting was nice. Zev seemed genuine. Maybe the way he’d been the first time they’d met had been nothing more but playful posturing, an attempt to deflect the awkwardness of the fact that she had just started working for him and had already seen him bare-ass naked.
“So why did you leave?” He asked.
Bianca felt her stomach drop.
“You don’t want to hear the answer to that question,” she replied, managing a chuckle, but there was no humor in it. Even the thought of why made her heart hurt.
“Maybe I do,” he shrugged. “You don’t have to tell me. But you might feel better?”
She stared down at the food in front of her; her appetite had suddenly vanished. She picked up her glass and gulped the rest of her wine. Zev got to his feet to pour her more, and when he sat down opposite her once more, she took a deep breath. “You really want to know?”
He nodded. “I really do.”
She closed her eyes for a moment and gathered the strength to come out with it. To tell him the truth.
“So, I come from a religious family,” she began, haltingly. “Like, really religious. My father wasn’t just a pastor, he pretty much ran the roost of all the churches in our county. Even the state.”
“Holy shit,” he narrowed his brow. “Don’t know if I could handle that. So many rules in religion.”
“Yeah, I know,” she sighed. Her finger trailed around the rim of the glass. “But I was alright with it for a long time. I mean, if you just played by the rules, then everything was fine. I had no reason not to, for most of my life, anyway.”
“What changed?” He asked.
She allowed her mind to drift back to the truth, the truth she’d been fleeing from for so long. “I met this guy,” she admitted. “Five years ago. I was nineteen, and he was a lot older than me. He was married, actually, with kids.”
“Oh,” he bowed his head.
She realized describing the man was, on the same note, a description of Zev. The wine had soothed the sharp edges of her worry, and she decided to just carry on, but not to acknowledge the coincidence.
“We got close,” she carried on. “I mean, nothing ever happened between us, I want to make that clear. I never would have let anything happen between us, though sometimes I think he wanted something to.”
“So, if nothing happened, what’s the problem?” Zev’s brow furrowed.
“We were meeting up secretly,” she confessed. “I knew we shouldn’t have.” Bianca huffed out a heavy sigh. “He would come to Sunday service and afterward the two of us would sneak off together to talk. I liked him. He seemed more mature than any of the guys my own age, the ones my mom tried to set me up with.”
“Let me guess,” he tipped his head to the side. “His wife found out?”
“Yeah, she did,” Bianca nodded, eyes downcast. “And . . . even though nothing had happened between us physically, I guess she wasn’t happy at how close we’d gotten. And I get that. If it had been my husband, getting that personal with a woman so young I know where my mind would have gone.”
“What happened when she found out?” He asked.
Bianca paused for a moment but figured she’d already told him enough. She’d never shared this with anyone, not really, not from her point of view. It was cathartic actually, just telling the truth.
“She was furious,” a flicker of a smile passed across her face. “And rightly so. He was being a jerk, I see that now, even if he never laid a finger on me. And she told everyone. The entire congregation, and of course my parents found out.”
“Jesus, that can’t have ended well,” Zev remarked.
Bianca shook her head. “No, it went about as well as you’d imagine,” she sighed. “And the rumors started coming so fast, I couldn’t keep track.”
“Like what?”
She ticked them off on her fingers. “That I’d kissed him. Then it turned into me giving him a blowjob in church. And that we had sex, then that I was pregnant with his baby and that I was trying to tear the family apart.”
“I frickin hate small towns,” he replied emphatically, shaking his head.
“And of course, my parents thought that it was all true,” She continued wondering why she wasn’t feeling upset recounting this. She felt some sort of removed distance from the story she was telling, though she had lived it. “They all went after me, called me a homewrecker, a slut, and a whore and told me I didn’t deserve to be part of such a holy family . . .”
<
br /> She trailed off and suddenly could picture exactly the expression on her mother’s face when she had cast her out. Her mouth twisted with anger—how could her own mother do something so awful to her daughter.
“They kicked me out, long story short,” Bianca finished up. “So, I came to the city. I had no idea where else to go. I just wanted to be somewhere nobody knew me, somewhere I could start over and not have all of that following me.”
“The city’s good for that,” Zev nodded. “You can be whoever you want to be.”
“I went to university and got a degree in early childhood education,” she shrugged. “But now my loans are catching up on me, and I need work. I thought I would be able to rely on my parents when it came to stuff like this, money stuff, given how well-off they are, but they haven’t been in touch with me since I left. I think that’s probably for the best.”
“Probably,” Zev nodded again.
The way he was looking at her, their knees still pressed together under the table, the fact that she’d just shared something so personal, it all felt so right. It was doing something to her.
He reached out to touch her hand.
The skin-on-skin contact was so intimate, so sweet, Bianca could hardly bear it. She wanted to pull away, to shut down the mess of attraction going on in her head, but more than anything she didn’t want it to stop.
Zev looked at her with such attentiveness, such care, as though she was the only thing in the world to him.
She loved the way it felt. More than she should have.
The sweetness of his attention, the power of his touch.
Her spine tingled from top to bottom.
She had to remind herself that his children were upstairs, that she didn’t just get to pursue this. But she didn’t move her hand.
“I’m so sorry you went through all of that,” he told her.
There was a sincerity in his voice that warmed her all the way through. She looked down at the food and the wine realizing she was getting way too close to this very attractive man. “I should get to bed,” she muttered, and got to her feet, tugging the shirt down once more, trying to cover herself.
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