“Is that what you call what you look like right now? Because I’d take the beginning stages of this fight over what I’m currently having to deal with.”
“That why you left?” she asked. “Because you were done ‘dealing with me’.”
“No. I left with the kids because I was tired of you coming into the house high as a kite with no regard for how it made your family feel. I gave up everything in my life so I could be a stationary parent while you jetted around the world, and every other night I was getting calls about you being passed out at someone else’s house. Or in an alleyway. Or showing up high to your movie sets.”
“Get out of my way.”
Anya tried to push me, but she couldn't even move me. I gripped her upper arms and slowly backed her towards her car. Until the backs of her legs hit it. She fought against me. Trying to push me away as tears rumbled down her cheeks.
Then, she started to shake.
“What are you on?” I asked.
“Nothing. The pain is just-”
“How long has it been since your last high, Anya?”
“I’m not high, Jace! I miss my kids!”
“Well you won’t see them. Not like this. Please don’t make me call the police. Just tell me what you’re on and how long it’s been since you last took it,” I said.
She pulled away from my grasp and leaned against the car like her life depended on it.
“Heroin,” she said. “But that’s it. That’s the only thing, Jace. I’m getting better.”
“Only heroin,” I said with a snicker. “Okay. How long has it been since you did ‘only heroin’?”
“Don’t you take that condescending tone with me. You think you’re better than me because you only eat salads and fresh meat or whatever. Not all of us have a trimmed up and perfect life like you.”
“I gave that to you!” I exclaimed.
I raked my hands down my face and tried to get my temper under control.
“The past is in the past,” I said. “How long ago was your last high?”
“Why the hell do you care?” she asked.
“Because your shaking’s getting worse and I’m worried you won’t be able to drive back.”
“Mom?”
It was the worst sound I could’ve ever heard in that moment. I could hear the exact point where Dmitri’s heart shattered into pieces. Anya glanced over my shoulder and her eyes lit up, but I held my hand out to her the second she tried to walk towards him. I looked back at my son standing on the porch, the door hanging open behind him.
“Mom?” Dmitri asked.
“My boy,” Anya said with a whisper. “Come here.”
“Stay on the porch,” I said.
Then I turned my attention back to Anya.
“Get in your car and drive off, or I’m calling the police. You can either obey the courts and get sober, or you can get sober in prison. You aren’t supposed to be here, and I don’t want you coming around this house again. Do you hear me?”
“Dmitri. Come here,” she said.
“Anya. Look at me,” I said.
“Is that you, Mom?” Dmitri asked.
“It’s me, sweetheart. I’ve missed you so much,” Anya said.
“Jail, Anya.”
Her eyes panned back up to me as tears cascaded down her cheeks.
“I won’t hesitate to put you there if you don’t leave me a choice. I’m doing this the easy way. Rehab. Sobriety. Then children. If you don’t want to do it that way, then it’s been jail, sobriety, and children behind a plexiglass wall. Don’t make me do that. Please. This family’s been through enough.”
“What kind of monster are you painting me to be to them?” she snarled.
“Get in the car and drive off. I won’t tell you again.”
I guided her around to the driver’s side of her car as Dmitri stood on the porch. He looked helpless. Heartbroken. He longed for him mother. I knew he did. Dmitri always had a special connection with Anya. One I never quite made with him. I helped Anya into her car as tears rolled down her cheeks, then I quickly made my way up to the porch. I scooped Dmitri up into my arms and carried him back into the house, shutting the door behind me before Ivan and Michaela could see what was going on.
“Why does Mommy look so sick?” Dmitri asked into my neck.
I could feel his tears and it broke my heart.
“Because she is sick,” I said. “But I’m trying to help her get better.”
“Is that why we can’t see her? Because we’ll get sick, too?”
My jaw trembled as I walked him over to the couch in the living room.
“I’m not scared you kids will get sick,” I said. “But I am scared that Mommy’s too sick to be the Mommy she can be. But I promise, the second she gets better Mommy will come see you. Okay?”
“I miss Mommy,” he said with a whisper.
I held my son close as I rocked him side to side on the cushions of the couch.
“I know you do,” I said as I kissed the top of his head. “I know.”
Ten
Catherine
After getting breakfast with Emma, I spent the day roaming around San Francisco. Jace had given me the day off to go explore the city and take some time to myself. Not something I expected when I took this job. But I still found some things to do with my spare time. I took in a movie I wanted to see. I got a snack at my favorite bakery. I walked through some shops and picked up some things I needed. Like a new book to read and some toiletries I was running low on. I even bought myself a couple of new outfits. It felt nice, having money to spend on myself. So I pampered myself a little bit. I got a pedicure. Trimmed up my nails. Went and got my hair deep conditioned and had the split ends cut off.
It had been years since I’d treated myself so well, and it felt nice.
The great thing about my room is that it had its own side entrance. I could drive right up to the side of the house, park my car next to the door, and use my own key to unlock it and walk straight into my room. Most people found a door that close to their sleeping area unnerving, but I enjoyed it. It made coming and going from the house easier and made me feel a little more independent as a live-in nanny.
Once the sun began to set, I made my way back to the house. I picked up a bottle of wine to enjoy for the evening, and even bought the special glass that came along with the wine. Maybe I could start collecting wine glasses now that I had the money to do so. Was wine like beer? Beer had different mugs and steins and glassware that came with the brew. Maybe wine was the same way.
The financial freedom I had was mind-boggling to me.
I pulled up to the side of the house and dropped my stuff into my room. Then I grabbed the bottle of wine and made my way into the kitchen. I expected to have to put the kids down for bed before I was able to enjoy it, so that would give the crimson red wine a little while to decanter.
But the house was eerily silent.
“Jace?” I asked. “Are you here?”
“Yep.”
There was something in his voice that made me worry. And the fact that the kids were down before sunset meant something didn’t go well. I left my bottle of wine on the kitchen counter and went in search of the man with the heavy voice. I peeked into all the rooms and even checked the bathroom before I found him sitting in an alcove tucked away in the library downstairs.
He looked exhausted, and the beer he was tossing back was almost empty.
“Long day?” I asked.
“Mhm.”
“I’m sorry I wasn’t here in time to help you get the kids down,” I said.
“Ah,” he said as he waved his hand in the air. “It’s fine.”
“Getting three kids to bed is quite a feat. Especially those three.”
“You do it every night. I can do it one night.”
I pushed off the doorway and went to go sit on the couch that sat in the middle of the room.
“What’s going on?” I asked.
“Just drinking
a beer.”
“A beer that’s almost empty. That means those kids have been down for a little while now. Did they not nap?”
“They did.”
“Were they rowdy?” I asked.
“No more than usual.”
“Then what’s bothering you? Do you want to talk about it?”
I watched Jace heave a heavy sigh before he turned his eyes to face me.
“Anya came by the house.”
My world came to a full stop the second her name flew from his lips.
“She was… emaciated,” Jace said with a sigh.
“Was she high?” I asked.
“Oh yeah. She said that all she was doing now was heroin.”
“All she was doing.”
“I didn’t even know she was doing that. I thought the issue was pills.”
“Did the kids see her?”
“Yes, but they didn’t know who they were looking at. But Dmitri knew.”
“Oh no.”
“It was bad, Catherine. Dmitri and Anya always had this special connection. This close bond that I never quite understood. He knew it was her. He stood right there on the porch and got a good look at what his mother had become,” he said.
“Why in the world did she show up here?” I asked.
“Apparently, she gave an interview today while absolutely high off her rocker that she was going to be trying to get the kids back.”
“What?” I asked.
“Yeah. My secretary called me about it this morning. I didn’t even get off the phone with him before she appeared around the corner of the house. I had to threaten on multiple occasions to call the police if she didn’t leave.”
“Jace, why didn’t you call me? I would’ve come racing back to the house to help.”
“I’m not making that a habit. This was a personal issue. A familial one. It wasn’t yours to field.”
“But it is my job to help you with your children. And I think you could’ve used it today.”
“No offense, but how could you have helped?” he asked.
“I could’ve sympathized,” I said.
Jace’s eyes whipped back up to mine and I turned my body fully to face his.
“What?” he asked.
“My sister, Hannah. She’s apparently in that same rehab center your ex-wife walked out of.”
I could tell I had Jace’s full attention.
“How old is your sister?” he asked.
“Not old enough to have a drug problem,” I said. “I…”
I drew in a deep breath as I closed my eyes.
“My father is Jackson Faust.”
“As in the technological mogul, Jackson Faust?” he asked.
“Yes.”
Jace planted his feet onto the floor and abandoned his beer in favor of listening to me.
“I have a rough relationship with my parents. We don’t talk much. My father was trying to groom me to take over his business like he took it over from his father, but that wasn’t what I wanted to do.”
“You wanted to be a teacher.”
“Yes. But they kept telling me that it wouldn’t make me any money and there was no prestige and that I would always be struggling and that they would always be bailing me out,” I said. “They offered to pay for my college tuition, and I took it initially. I figured I could double-major or something. Childhood Education and Business and then just do what I wanted after I graduated. But they hovered over everything. They would call people up and donate to my school to change my schedule and ‘heavily request’ I take specific courses.”
“They did that?” Jace asked.
“Yep. So I changed my major without consulting them, and it made them irate. They pulled the funding for my schooling, so I took out loans. High interest loans in order to get the education I wanted. And we haven’t really talked since. I stopped going home for the holidays about four years ago, and that was that.”
“So what happened with your sister?”
I sighed as tears began to brew in my eyes.
“It was the last face-to-face fight I had with my parents. It was Thanksgiving and they were cornering me about my degree again and my father asked me about what he was supposed to do with regard to someone taking over the company.”
“What did you say?” Jace asked.
“I snapped back and told them to sink their greedy jowls into someone else.”
I wiped at a tear that managed to escape down my cheek.
“You blame yourself for your sister’s predicament.”
“Of course I do,” I said. “Because that’s what they did. My father started hopping all over Hannah. Trying to give her crash courses in technology and learning how to take things apart and put them back together. And she didn’t have the emotional stability to fight them like I did. She went to college and took the classes they wanted her to, and to dispel with her stress she partied and drank and threw back anything anyone gave her.”
“Catherine. You’re not responsible for what happened to your sister.”
“I am, Jace. I hate technology. I could’ve never made it my career. But I could’ve not dropped off the face of the planet. I could’ve stuck around and stuck up for my sister on her behalf. Had I kept going to the family holidays I would’ve seen what was going on. Seen the havoc it was wreaking on her life. I didn’t even know she had spiraled so far out of control until my mother called to tell me she had been admitted into rehab in the first place.”
“Catherine, look at me.”
But I couldn't. I couldn’t look at him. I knew how he felt. I understood his struggle with Anya. But the guilt was immense. I stood from the couch and walked into the foyer and I could hear Jace on my heels. I felt his hand hook around my arm as he spun me around, my body weak against his touch.
“Look at me,” Jace said.
My watery gaze panned up to his and I looked deep into the eyes of a man that understood me more than I figured he would. More than I wanted any other man to.
“You aren’t responsible for the decisions your sister made to cope with her stressors anymore than I’m responsible for Anya’s decision to cope with her stressors. I coped with my stress by exercising and throwing my energy into my theater. She coped with drugs. You coped with your stress by taking your life by the horns and living it your own way. Your sister coped with drugs.”
“She’s my younger sister, Jace. I’m… I’m supposed to protect her,” I said.
His hand came up and cupped my cheek, brushing a tear away from my skin. His touch was hot, and it made me wonder what his beautiful lips would feel like against my face.
“And I was supposed to protect Anya,” he said. “But sometimes, we can’t protect those we love from everything. Eventually, they have to take responsibility for their own life decisions.”
I nuzzled into the palm of his hand as my eyes fluttered closed.
Before I could gather myself, I felt a warmth encompass my lips. His body pressed against mine. Strong. Tall. Comforting. His hand wrapped around the back of my neck and cradled me to him, supporting me as I tilted my head back to taste more of him. My salted tears dripped down my skin. Found its death upon our connection as my hands planted onto his chest. I felt his heart racing underneath my touch. I felt the divots of the muscles that boasted of his time in the gym. The heat his body gave off made me breathless, and I fed off the oxygen pouring from his lungs.
I swiped my tongue across his lips before he quickly broke the kiss.
“I’m sorry. That was-”
I fisted his shirt and crashed his lips back to mine as his arms cloaked my back. I didn’t want him to be sorry. I didn't want him to backtrack. I drew in a deep breath of air through my nose as he finally granted me entrance. My tongue slid across his and my body filled with the sweet sensation of electricity. His hand fisted my hair. Wrapped around my curled tendrils as his other hand pressed into the small of my back. I felt his groin pulsing to life. His tongue still dripped with the afterta
ste of beer and his hot hands bled their life into the pores of my skin.
Our lips disconnected and I panted against him, my neck craning back to keep his eyes in view.
“Please don’t be sorry,” I said breathlessly. “Because I’ve been waiting for you to do that ever since the theater.”
Eleven
Catherine
He backed me into the library and closed the door behind him. His eyes darkened, filling with a lust no man had ever bestowed upon me before. His hands gripped my hips tightly, guiding my back all the way to one of the bookshelves. He pressed me against the collection, his lips falling to my neck as my hands tangled up in his hair.
“Jace,” I said with a whisper. “That feels so good.”
His hands worked diligently, stripping me down until I was bare for him. Every inch of my skin, he kissed. His tongue dipped into every crevice and had me trembling against the books of his library. The moonlight poured through the only window the room boasted of as his hands ran slowly along my curves. Tracing the outline of my waist and my hips as he sank to his knees. My hands gripped onto the bookshelf above me. I felt my legs growing weak. His tongue slid between the valley of my breasts and dipped into my belly button before he hit his knees to the floor.
I peered down at him, watching as he tossed one of my legs over his shoulder.
Then his eyes connected with mine as his tongue lapped up my slit.
My head fell back into the books and the scent overpowered me. The smell of freshly-printed ink. The crackling of spines that hadn’t been moved in years. The musky smell of dust and damp book covers. All of it, intoxicating. All of it, swirling around my head. Jace’s tongue found my clit, causing me to jump against him. My hands gripped the edge of the bookshelf as I held myself up, feeling my legs already growing weak against his ministrations.
“Jace. Jace. Jace. Oh my gosh. Yes.”
His tongue swirled around my clit. His lips puckered against it. My legs shook and my knees buckled, causing him to fist my ass in order to keep my body upright. He tossed my other leg around his shoulder, suspending me in midair as he devoured my pussy. My juices dripped onto his tongue and painted his cheeks as I rolled into him, my body pressed hard into the bookshelf.
7+Us Makes Nine: A Nanny Single Dad Romance (Baby Makes Three) Page 6