[Quantum 01.0 - 03.0] Boxed Set

by Marie Force

  “I know what’s wrong with her.”

  “Care to share?”

  “She’s jealous. She can tell I like you and you like me, and she’s put out by it.”

  Fluff growls and snaps, which makes me laugh even as I hold her back from attacking him again.

  “It’s like you’ve never had a boyfriend before.”

  Fearful of giving too much away, I roll my bottom lip between my teeth and drop my gaze to focus on Fluff rather than him.

  “Natalie?”

  I look up to find him watching me closely. “Yes?”

  “You’ve had a boyfriend before, haven’t you?”

  I’m immediately frozen with indecision. Do I tell him the truth, or do I go with the version of the truth I’ve created to match my new life? My moment of hesitation is apparently all he needs to draw his own conclusions.

  “Never?”

  “It’s complicated.” That’s the truth.

  “How complicated?”

  “It’s a story for another day.”

  He leans in so he’s nose to nose with Fluff. “Get used to me. I’m not going away.”

  She replies by showing the ten teeth she has left and growling again.

  All I can think about is Fluff taking a piece out of that picture-perfect face of his, so I tighten my hold on her.

  Flynn leans around the snarling dog to kiss me again. “I’ll talk to you tomorrow.”

  Thankful he’s decided not to immediately pursue the subject of my past dating life—or lack thereof—I close the door behind him and lean my head against it. He’s too perceptive for my own good. If I continue seeing him, I won’t be able to hide the truth from him for much longer.

  I like to think I can walk away at any time, but I’m in his thrall, especially after kissing him. I don’t want to walk away. For the first time, I want to push my fears aside and attempt a real relationship with a man. Despite his fame and all that goes with it, I already feel like I can trust him to protect and care for me, especially if my demons try to ruin everything for both of us.

  The minute I return from taking Fluff out for a quick trip to her favorite peeing spot, I pull off my coat, scarf and gloves, and rather than heading for bed, I boot up my laptop to log into the automated system at school to request Monday off. Thankfully, I don’t have to go through stone-faced Mrs. Heffernan to get the time off. I make the request for a personal day on Monday and submit it before I can talk myself out of this madness that’s overtaken my life.

  With Flynn’s warnings on my mind, I Google my name and scroll through the few mentions that appear, all of them attached to my current school and the college in Nebraska where I got my teaching degree. Since I haven’t done an Internet search in a while, I’m relieved to find no connection at all between Natalie and the person I used to be. As far as anyone can tell, Natalie Bryant is a teacher in New York City. That’s all she is, and that’s all the paparazzi will find if they dig into my life.

  Leah comes in as I’m logging off the computer. “What’re you still doing up, Ms. I Need My Beauty Sleep or Else?”

  “Just finishing up some work.” That’s when I remember I didn’t do any of the correcting I brought home with me. Tomorrow is going to be a very long day. “Where’ve you been?”

  “At the gym and then dinner with some friends from the bar.” She drops down onto the sofa. “I gotta tell you something.”

  “What?”

  “I think I’m going to quit teaching.”

  “No. You can’t. You have a contract.”

  “One of the guys who hangs out at the bar is a lawyer. He’s looking at it for me.”

  “But why, Leah? It’s only your first year. You have to give it a chance.”

  “I hate it. I hate every second I have to spend in that building with those kids. They deserve better than a teacher who hates them.”

  “You don’t hate them.”

  “I’m starting to. And don’t get me going on the parents.”

  I couldn’t argue with that. Leah had gotten some of the worst parents any of us had that year. They ran the gamut from overly involved to hands-off to a fault—until their precious child got in trouble, and then they were parents of the year.

  “Nothing will happen until the end of the year. I’ll see it through, but I want out. Teaching isn’t for me.” She glances over at me. “What’d you do tonight?”

  I hesitate because if I tell her I saw Flynn, I won’t be getting to bed any time soon.

  “Did he call?”

  “Not exactly.” I fill her in on our visit to Aileen and the rest of our evening.

  “You’re really going to the Golden Globes.” At least she doesn’t scream, for which I’m grateful.

  “If I can get Monday off.”

  “You will. You’ve got the time.”

  “I’m not getting excited until I know for sure.”

  “That was nice of him. With Aileen.”

  “He was amazing. He’s nice to everyone.” I tell her about the cab driver and how he posed for pictures with the driver and the Bugatti. “He warned me if I go to the Globes with him, things will get crazy for me with the paparazzi. They’re apt to come after you, too.”

  “So we’ll be famous? How cool is that?”

  “I think it’s cooler on paper than it is in reality.”

  “I look forward to finding out.” She yawns loudly and stands. “We’d better get to bed so we’re ready to face the monsters tomorrow.”

  I want to tell her not to call them that, but I know she doesn’t want to hear it. I’m saddened by her decision to leave teaching, but I understand how it’s not for everyone. Maybe if I get a room full of misbehaving kids and their parents next year, I’ll hate it, too.

  We say our good-nights, and I’m awake long after I should be asleep, thinking about Flynn and the trip to LA and the kissing… The kissing is amazing, and I can’t wait to do it again. I wonder if I’ll see him tomorrow—or today—I note with a groan as I glance at my beside clock and see that it’s long after midnight. Even in the dark, with my eyes closed, his face is all I see. That adorable tip of his head, the shy, sexy grin, the way he lets loose with laughter.

  I’m anxious about what will happen if I attend the Globes with him. I won’t deny that, but I refuse to live my life in fear of what might happen. I spent years leaving fear behind, and this is no time to start regressing, especially not when I’m enjoying the present so much.

  The alarm provides a particularly rude awakening in the morning. If you’d asked me, I would’ve said I hadn’t slept at all, but apparently that isn’t true. The first thing I do is reach for my laptop to log in and find out if my request has been approved. Nothing yet.

  I check again minutes before my class files into the classroom, but still nothing. I’ve never requested a day off before, so I have no idea how long to expect it to take. I plan to ask the other teachers at lunch, if I can only get through the morning. Right before lunch, I check again, and the request has been approved. I sit and stare at the screen as a variety of emotions overtake me all at once: relief, excitement, anxiety and desire.

  With the kids occupied with an assignment, I reach for my phone to text Flynn.

  You can breathe now. I got Monday off.

  He writes right back. Thank goodness. I was starting to get light-headed. Pick you up from school today? 3:30?

  I think about it for exactly one second before I write back. 4 would be better. As much as I want to see him again, I have to get some work done.

  4 it is. See you then. Can’t wait.

  I read those last words over and over again. Flynn Godfrey can’t wait to see me. I think about my sisters and how excited they would be to know I’m seeing Flynn, a movie star they both admire, and I’m filled with sadness for all I’ve lost. Maybe they’ll see a photo from the Golden Globes in one of the celebrity magazines they love to devour. I dismiss that thought the minute I have it. I look so different now, they probably wouldn’t re
cognize me as their long-lost sister. Or maybe they never think of me at all anymore and won’t care who I’m dating.

  The notion of them forgetting about me depresses me profoundly, so I try to stay focused on all the things that are going right in my life now, including a budding romance with a man who can’t wait to see me.

  I did what I had to do for myself and for my sisters. Maybe someday they’ll realize that. In the meantime, I have an afternoon to get through with a room full of third-graders who are hopped up on sugar thanks to the cupcakes Micha’s mom brought in after lunch to celebrate his birthday. As much as I dislike what the sugar does to my plans for the afternoon, I’m thankful that the parents participate the way they do.

  Micha’s mom stays for the afternoon to help out with a science project, and we end the day with her reading them a book. Her cheerful presence helps the day go by faster than it would have normally, especially when I know I’ll be seeing Flynn.

  After the kids leave, I make quick work of cleaning up my room and correcting the papers I never got around to doing last night as well as today’s classwork. The whole time, I’m watching the clock creep closer to four. At ten till, Leah ducks her head into my room.

  “Working all night, loser?” she asks with a teasing smile.

  “Nope. Just for ten more minutes.”

  She looks at me suspiciously. “And then what?”

  “A little of this, a little of that…”

  “You have a date with the movie star!”

  “Shush, will you?”

  She comes into the room, letting the door slam behind her. “Where’s he taking you?”

  “I don’t know. We’ll probably hang out at his place. It’s easier for him than going out.”

  “This whole thing is so fucking cool, Nat.”

  “Don’t say fuck at school.”

  “Why not? There’re no little ears around to hear it.”

  “Mrs. Heffernan is always listening with her big elephant ears.”

  Leah snorts with laughter. “She’s probably got every room bugged.”

  “Which is why you shouldn’t swear at school.”

  “So I heard something I thought would interest you.”

  “What’s that?”

  “Someone made an anonymous donation to Aileen’s fund—a big donation. Like half a million bucks big.”

  I stare at her, trying to process what she’s told me. “Half a million dollars?”

  “That’s what Sue said.” Leah is friends with the woman who runs the main office and gets all the best gossip from her. “Who else could it be but your friend Flynn?”

  “God… I can’t believe he did that. He said he wanted to help them and asked if there’s a fund or something. But I never imagined…” Tears fill my eyes when I imagine Aileen’s reaction to receiving that kind of money.

  “It’s good of him,” Leah says.

  “It’s amazing.” I’m stunned and overwhelmed and more eager to see him than I was before.

  “Pull yourself together. You’ve got a hot date with a hot man in five minutes.”

  Still reeling from Flynn’s incredible gesture, I force myself to calm down and try to relax. “What’re you up to tonight?”

  “I picked up a shift at the bar. Still trying to pay off Christmas.”

  “Which means you’ll be a wreck tomorrow.”

  “It’ll be worth it to pay off that beast of a credit card. No tutoring today?”

  I shake my head. “Myles’s grandfather is in the hospital, so we’re not meeting at all this week. But get this—his mom is still paying me because it’s not my fault we couldn’t get together.”

  “You have all the luck lately, Nat. We should call you Lady Luck.”

  If only Leah knew what a huge price I paid for any luck I may be receiving now. For the longest time, I wondered if everyone else had gotten my share of the luck quotient. But lately… Lately things have been good, and I hope they stay that way from now on. No matter what happens, however, nothing could ever be as bad as what I’ve already been through. Knowing what I’m capable of gives me the courage to face each new day and every challenge that comes my way.

  “I need to make myself pretty,” I say to Leah.

  She rolls her eyes at me. “Puleeze. You were born pretty.”

  Though I was born a redhead with green eyes and freckles, I bear no resemblance whatsoever to that girl anymore. I wear special contacts that give me brown eyes, and I regularly color my hair, which is much longer than it used to be, to keep it dark. Other than a once-a-month change of contacts, I never see my green eyes anymore. I’ve gotten used to my new look, but it didn’t happen overnight. The new looks were nearly as hard to come by as my new identity, not that Leah would have any way to know that. “Whatever you say.”

  “Can I stay until he gets here?”

  “Sure.”

  “Am I allowed to talk to him?”

  “Yes,” I say, laughing, “you can talk to him. I already know him well enough to know he’d want you to be normal around him.”

  “Not sure I can promise normal, but I’ll try.”

  While I run a brush through my hair, she finger combs her much shorter locks and makes funny puffy-lip model faces that have me laughing so hard I worry about tears sending streams of mascara down my face. “Knock it off, will you?”

  “Hey, Nat, do you think you’ll ever look at him and say to yourself, oh, there’s Flynn? Just Flynn. Not Flynn, the movie star?”

  I think about that for a second. “I already do think of him that way sometimes. When we’re sitting on the sofa chatting about a movie or how we like the same food or something one of his sisters said in a text, he’s just Flynn, just a regular guy. Then he gets a call from Marlowe Sloane, and I remember who he is to the rest of the world.”

  “I don’t think I could ever forget that. And Marlowe Sloane… Watch out for her. Rumor has it they’re a hot item.”

  “All rumor, according to him. They’re close friends.” I hold up a mirror from my purse and apply a light coat of plum lip color. “And besides, what’s the point of spending time with him if I can’t separate the man from the fame? There’s much more to him than his career, you know?”

  “Is that right?” She eyes me shrewdly. “Have you kissed him yet?”

  I look away, intently focused on my mirror. “Maybe.”

  She pounces on that immediately. “That’s not a no!”

  “Shut up, Leah!”

  “Tell me everything, and don’t leave anything out.”

  “Sorry, no time for that. Gotta go. If you’re walking out with me, try not to act like a freak.”

  She links her arm through mine. “Oh, I’m walking out with you, and no promises on the freak thing.”

  “Great.”

  Chapter 9

  Sitting outside Natalie’s school in the Range Rover, I debate at ridiculous length whether I should wait for her in the car or get out and risk someone recognizing me. That it’s fucking freezing keeps me in the car until I see her emerge from the building with Leah.

  They’re both so young, they could easily be mistaken for students if this were a high school rather than an elementary school. I experience a pang of guilt when Hayden’s words resurface to remind me she is way too young and unspoiled for the likes of me. Yet, even knowing that, I can’t walk away from her.

  She spots the car and heads toward me.

  That’s when I get out and go around to meet them, bowing gallantly. “Ladies.”

  “Hi there.” Natalie’s lips are glistening with some sort of purple gloss that I want to lick off as soon as possible. Yes, that’s my first thought, and no, I’m not proud of that.

  I kiss her cheek. “How was your day, dear?”

  She dazzles me with her smile. “Excellent, you?”

  “Long and boring waiting for school to get over. Reminds me of the not so good old days.”

  “See?” Leah says. “He agrees with me. School sucks.”
<
br />   “Lovely to see you again, Leah.”

  “Mmm,” she says suggestively, “same here.”

  “Can we give you a lift somewhere?”

  She eyes the car longingly and then glances at Natalie. “Home?”

  “We can do that,” I say before Natalie has a chance to reply. I open the back door for Leah and the front passenger door for Natalie.

  When I get into the driver’s side, I notice Natalie giving me an odd look. “Do I have something on my face?” I rub the cheek I recently shaved in anticipation of seeing her.

  “No,” she says, laughing.

  “Then what?”

  “I’ll tell you later.”

  “When I’m not here,” Leah says from the backseat.

  “Then let’s get rid of her ASAP,” I say.

  “Hey! That’s not nice.”

  Natalie laughs at Leah’s pretend outrage. The two of them amuse me. Leah is as mouthy and ballsy as Natalie is reserved. They make for an odd pairing that seems to work well despite their differences.

  Natalie’s cell phone rings, and she glances at the caller ID. “Aileen,” she says, glancing at me. “Hi, Aileen.”

  I can hear the other woman’s high-pitched screams coming through Natalie’s phone.

  “I heard about that,” she says, looking over at me again.

  I feign ignorance as to what’s happening even though I know all about it. The donation was made anonymously because I don’t want anything from it other than to know that Aileen and her kids are taken care of during this difficult time.

  “I’ll tell him,” Natalie says after several minutes of mostly one-sided conversation. “Talk to you soon.” She ends the call and stashes the phone in her purse. “Can you believe someone made a half-million-dollar donation to the fund we set up for their family?”

  “I wonder who could’ve done something like that,” Leah says.

  “That’s great,” I add. “Good for them.”

  Natalie gives me another of those looks that lets me know I’m not fooling anyone. That’s okay. The best thing about having money is being able to help people who truly need it.