by K. K. Allen
“Consider Chelsea my employee,” he added. “She’s become quite important to our family. I would hate for anything to go wrong between you two. Bridget and I don’t have time to deal with whatever fallout would come from that.”
“Thanks for the confidence, Simon.” My tone was dry, but I was on the verge of getting angry. Did no one in my life believe in me?
Simon sighed and shook his head. “This wasn’t how I intended this conversation to go. I love you like a brother, which is why you’re here. You’re going through a lot of shit back home, and I opened my doors to protect you from it, but I can’t have you bringing any of that mess into this family. Do you hear me?”
I nodded, my jaw clenched. “I hear you.”
Simon clapped a hand on my shoulder and smiled. “Good. Now that that’s settled, have a fun day, but don’t rush home.” He winked, insinuating he was all too eager for us to leave.
After I had showered and changed, I met the girls in the driveway. Bridget was helping strap the girls into their car seats when I slipped into the passenger seat. Keeping my eyes focused forward, I listened as Bridget kissed the twins on each of their cheeks then waved us off.
Forward, that was where I intended to keep my eyes for the rest of the day. And my plan was working until Chelsea turned on a kids’ music station and sang along to the radio with the girls in the back seat. I wanted to watch her, and I might have leaned back slightly in my seat so I could catch her smiling face in my peripheral. I didn’t expect my heart to react the way it did with just the slightest glance. How was I going to manage an entire trip to the zoo?
When Chelsea parked the car, I unbuckled my seat belt, and I faltered at my mission. It felt so instinctive, so natural, the way my gaze found hers. My next breath stopped. I wasn’t blind to Chelsea’s beauty, but there was something different about her now, something more.
She’d thrown her red hair up into a messy ponytail. Her face was clear of makeup, leaving her freckled cheeks and lightly sun-kissed skin exposed. A spot of red touched the tops of her cheeks, telling me she’d recently spent some time outdoors. My mind began to wander down a rabbit hole of where she’d been for the past two days.
Chelsea broke our eye contact to unclick her seat belt and turned to beam at the girls in the back. “Who’s ready to see the chimpanzees?”
Elizabeth and Eleanor shot their hands in the air and let out giggle-squeals that were infectious. I couldn’t hold back my smile as we all gathered at the front of the car. Chelsea stood between the girls, took each of their hands, and started forward.
I trailed behind them, catching a glimpse of Chelsea’s outfit. Black jean cutoff shorts, a long, baggy white tank top tucked in at the front, and bright-yellow sneakers. Our stroll around the zoo reminded me of the day we toured downtown Providence. We’d looked like a couple that day, and we’d kissed like one too.
Shoving all thoughts of Chelsea and what could have been to the back of my mind, I put my energy into helping her with the girls—buying the twins ice cream and hot dogs and helping Eleanor on the pony ride while Chelsea tended to Elizabeth. We laughed at the ostriches trying to mate while the girls laughed at the “giant birds fighting” without a clue as to what was truly going on. I loved watching Chelsea’s face turn that deep shade of pink that made it impossible for her to hide her emotions. We stopped to watch the chimpanzee show and kept moving until it started to get late. We fed the girls dinner, and within seconds of crawling into their double stroller, they were fast asleep, leaving Chelsea and me alone on our stroll through the weaving path around the gardens.
We were silent at first, awkwardly so. It was obvious she was planning to keep up the silent treatment, and I hadn’t been any better. Of course, with the girls awake, entertaining them had been our number-one priority. Distractions had been easy.
The Japanese garden path ended, and I nodded to an area where we’d watched the elephants play in the water earlier. The animals were much calmer now with the sky beginning to lose its color and the crowds thinning out. I led her to a park bench that overlooked a large pond with a man-made waterfall where an elephant slowly walked by.
She placed the stroller between us as we sat, and I couldn’t help but wonder if it was a strategic move on her part.
“You’re good with the girls.” It was a simple start, an icebreaker of sorts, but it got her to look at me.
“Thanks. I guess I’ve been nannying for a long time now. Plus, the twins make it easy.”
I nodded, agreeing wholeheartedly with that sentiment. “They are happy girls, indeed.” More awkward silence passed between us before I finally gave in and turned to her, ready to have it out. “I’m sorry I left your place like that the other night. I should have explained.”
Chelsea let out a breathy laugh, her eyes pointed forward while she shook her head. “It’s fine, Liam. We’d been drinking. We got carried away. It was nothing.”
“It wasn’t nothing. It was quite the opposite, I’m afraid. It wasn’t a mistake either. I never should have agreed with you there.”
She looked at me, her eyes searching mine, then she smiled, her face softening. “Well, whatever it was, it can’t happen again. I think you know that.”
Did I? Because I was selfishly making a list of excuses as to why it absolutely should happen again despite all the reasons why I knew it was wrong. “If it’s about my reasons for being here—it’s complicated.”
She laughed again and leaned back on the bench. “I’m sure it is, Liam. Don’t worry. I had no business asking you for your reasons—or anything about your past.”
“I like you, Chelsea. I like you a lot. My reasons for being here aren’t of the honorable variety. I had planned to keep my secrets. It was why I came here to begin with, but things have changed. I met you, and I think you should know the truth, whether you still like me or not.”
She didn’t say a word as she stared back at me, her chest rising and falling in slow and deep breaths. “I already know the truth, Liam. You don’t need to tell me anything.”
And just like that, my worst nightmares were confirmed.
“I saw you on television,” she said. “And then I saw what the media said. I know what you did. I get why you’re here. I know enough, and I think it’s best that we don’t get involved any more than we already have.”
18
Chelsea
Brendan was already in the pool by the time I got the twins in their swimsuits and floaties. We stopped by the kitchen so I could pack up some snacks and waters, then we made our way out to meet their brother. As soon as we neared the gate, I heard a pair of male voices laughing, and my gut churned with a flurry of emotions. Liam was swimming with Brendan, and as much as I was excited to see him, I dreaded it at the same time.
Forcing a deep breath and plastering a smile on my face, I rounded the hedge with the twins trailing behind me and opened the pool gate to let them through. “I brought snacks if anyone is hungry.”
My shift had started a little after ten today, when Simon was called into work. Bridget was already at the hospital, so the kids were in my care until seven o’clock that evening. We usually loved spending our days at the pool then retiring to their playroom to hang out and watch movies before it was time for me to make them dinner. Bridget would usually come home during their bath time and take over. But today didn’t feel like a normal day, not with Liam’s eyes on me from the moment I walked through the pool entrance gate.
Brendan, on the other hand, practically jumped out of the pool at the mention of food. The kid could eat anything and everything. It was like he was constantly going through a growth spurt. He opened a block of string cheese and snarfed it before doing a cannonball back in the pool, splashing the twins and me.
I laughed and looked down at my swimsuit cover—a long gray shirt knotted on one side above my knees. Now it was drenched. I pointed to Brendan when he poked his head out of the water. “I’m not above payback, mister. Watch yourself.”
He stuck out his tongue then tapped Liam and asked him to race. After a second of hesitation as he took his eyes off me, he nodded and swam to the start line Brendan had set up.
While the guys swam, I walked the twins to the steps and followed them into the pool, instructing them to stay in the shallow end so I could keep an eye on them. They were already decent swimmers, but I made them wear their arm floaties anyway, the fear of anything bad happening on my watch too dreadful to bear.
We were like that for a while, with the boys pairing off, having swimming contests that Brendan miraculously won every now and then, the girls strengthening their skills in the shallow end, and me sitting at the edge of the pool.
“Why aren’t you coming in, Chelsea?”
Brendan’s question was so innocent, but I couldn’t give him an honest answer—that I hadn’t expected Liam to be in the pool, and what I was wearing beneath my cover-up was unsightly at best.
“Yeah, Chelsea,” Liam added. “Why aren’t you coming in?”
Liam’s gentle tease was all it took for my neck and cheeks to heat, but there was no getting out of this, especially not when the twins joined in on the peer pressure. So, with an inward growl, I raised my ass off the pool edge, lifted my cover-up, and tossed it aside, revealing a very unflattering one-piece bathing suit.
The kids had seen me wear this same thing a hundred times, but Liam—I couldn’t even look at him. I didn’t want to see his reaction to the baggy black-and-pink floral material or the attached skirt that wrapped around my waist and reached midthigh. If our last two encounters hadn’t already turned Liam completely off of me, then this would do it right here.
In fact, maybe I should’ve enjoyed the moment rather than hating it.
Ignoring Liam’s eyes at all costs, I let the girls crawl all over me while we swam. When Brendan announced he had to use the restroom, I suggested he take the girls too. Brendan scooped them up on his way out and hustled to the side door of my pool house that led into the bathroom.
“Wow,” Liam said as soon as they were out of earshot. “You really know how to pick your swimwear.”
I rolled my eyes and turned to face him for the first time since I’d jumped in the pool. Liam’s grin was too much to bear. “Yeah, well, it’s better than waltzing around in a string bikini with a twelve-year-old walking around. I’m just trying to be respectful.”
I hadn’t paid attention to the fact that Liam was closing the distance between us until he was almost to me. I backed up, but in less than a step, I was flat against the wall, and his grin widened.
“That’s admirable. It really is.” The tease in his eyes glimmered in the sun, and my insides felt like they were running in every direction, trying to escape. “But couldn’t you have picked something a little less—”
“Hideous?”
He shook his head and lifted a hand to a thick strap around my shoulder. “I was going to say sexy, but if you want to go with hideous, that’s fine with me.”
I narrowed my eyes, embarrassment swelling up in my chest and heating my body. “Not all of us can look perfect every second of the day.”
“C’mon, Chelsea. I’m just taking a piss. You could never look hideous.”
He might have been harmlessly teasing, but the flirtation was what sparked my frustration. He was so charming when he wanted to be, and I hated that he was so good at it.
“Is that how you got those girls to fall for you?”
His smile faded as my words sank in.
“Did you flatter them with your lines too?”
“Chelsea—” he started, but I cut him off.
“I’m not a contestant on a dating show, Liam. I didn’t sign up for this.” I wasn’t the type to be passive aggressive. If he hadn’t guessed by then, I wanted to make it very clear that I knew what he hadn’t had the guts to tell me himself.
Hurt flashed across his features, and his already fading smile dissolved into something darker. “Not everything is as it appears on your television screen, Chelsea. I learned that the hard way. Luckily, you don’t have to.” With that, Liam pushed himself out of the pool, grabbed a towel from a nearby chair, and headed toward the house.
Later that evening, while the twins were playing in their room, I recruited Brendan to watch them while I started dinner. Once they were settled, I walked out to the kitchen to find Liam standing in the pantry.
“I’m making spaghetti tonight if you’re interested,” I said, coming up behind him.
He stiffened a little, like he was surprised to hear my voice, but he didn’t turn around. Instead, he shook his head and reached for a box of fruity cereal before squeezing by me to get out.
I let him walk by, realizing my olive branch of a dinner offer wasn’t enough of an apology for the harsh assumptions I’d made about his past. I hadn’t even given him an opportunity to explain his side of the story, and I realized now how wrong of me that was.
In my defense, he hadn’t tried to argue either. He’d walked away when he should have told me the truth from the beginning. I was hurt that he’d hidden his reasons for being here from me, and I was disappointed that what I’d thought I was feeling for him just days before all felt like a lie now.
The Liam I’d originally gotten to know wasn’t anything like the guy the media had made him out to be. Even as I was researching him and digging up past episodes of British Bachelor to watch, none of it sat right with me. But in the end, I knew I owed Liam an apology for my reactions.
After grabbing the ingredients I needed from the pantry, I joined Liam at the island and laid everything on the counter. Liam ignored me while I turned to face him, and he poured out his cereal. I crossed my arms and waited for him to look at me.
When he didn’t, I rolled my eyes and sighed. “Liam, let me make you dinner.”
He turned to me with bent brows, the milk carton in one hand and the cereal box in the other. “What’s wrong with the dinner I’m making?”
I let out a laugh and took a step closer before sliding the bowl farther away from him on the counter. “I’m sorry about earlier, okay? My assumptions were stupid and probably hurtful, and I’m sorry.”
His lips tugged up at the corner. “You think I won’t let you make me dinner because of your assumptions? Trust me, I’ve dealt with much worse things as of late. And I happen to really like cereal.” He pulled the cereal bowl back and completed his mission. When he was done, he retreated out of the kitchen and down the stairs toward the guest room in the basement.
19
Liam
Two nights after the spaghetti versus cereal conversation, I finally broke free from my dungeon and made my way upstairs. It was late, so I knew everyone in the house would be asleep. I’d managed to avoid the redheaded temptress all day, but I was getting restless in my effort to hide out. My stomach was grumbling, and I was craving a little exercise. I would grab some food from the pantry, take a light stroll around the block, then head to bed.
It all seemed like the perfect plan until I made it to the top of the stairs. Chelsea and the twins were sleeping on the sofa in the living room. Elizabeth and Eleanor were on either side of their nanny with their little arms wrapped around her middle. It might have been the only time I’d ever been envious of toddlers.
I almost missed that Brendan was on an adjacent chair until he yawned and stretched before opening his eyes. “What time is it?” he mumbled.
“After midnight, bud. Should we take the girls up to their room?”
Brendan rubbed his eyes and nodded then got up to scoop Elizabeth into his arms while I grabbed Eleanor. Once they were safely tucked in, Brendan handed me the baby monitor. “Chelsea likes to keep that next to her if she’s downstairs while they’re sleeping.”
Then he threw me the peace sign before retreating to his own room.
Back downstairs, Chelsea’s eyes were closed, her breathing heavy, and her long red hair was covering half of her freckled face. Even sleeping she was beautiful in the most endear
ing way.
I walked into the living room and grabbed the remote to turn down the television volume. Then I stood over Chelsea, unable to stop my smile as a cute moan slipped past her throat. I pulled the fallen knitted blanket over her, set the baby monitor on the table in front of her, and started to walk away when her eyes fluttered open.
“Liam?”
I froze, unsure what to do next. I was keeping to myself in the basement for a reason, and it had everything to do with the woman with the long eyelashes and perfect knockers. At least I had imagined how perfect they were while staring at her in that hideous bathing suit the other day.
“Sorry if I woke you. Go back to sleep.”
Then she gasped and jerked awake, her head snapping in all directions. “The girls. They were with me when I fell asleep.”
I placed my hands on her shoulders and steadied her with my eyes. “They’re in their beds, safe and sound. The monitor is there.”
Chelsea swiveled to find the baby monitor and exhaled a huge sigh of relief, her palm floating to her chest. “Jeez. Thank you. And Brendan?”
“He went to bed too. Looks like it’s just you and me.”
She laughed and shook her head. “Yeah, well, I’m sure you have more interesting things to do than to stare at a baby monitor all night.”
I shrugged. “You’re probably right.”
I started to leave again, but a hand slid into mine and squeezed. “No, wait, Liam. Don’t go. Sit with me. We can watch a movie.”
Bad idea, I told myself. The warning bells were dinging loudly in my mind. But could I really deny her? I hesitated, trying to convince myself to leave. She’s just like the others. Simon forbade it. I’ll be going home soon.
Excuse after excuse played out in my mind, and I found myself rationalizing each one. Chelsea Banks is certainly not like the others. She’s a gem in a world full of fool’s gold. And why does Simon get to determine who I can and cannot have a relationship with? The last time I checked, Chelsea and I were grown adults—adults with needs that could easily be satisfied by each other. Even if it was only for a short while. I’d had casual flings before. Why couldn’t I have one with the bombshell nanny who had a brilliant mind and a witty tongue?