Something relatable.
But instead of elegance and polish, I have a yacht covered in handprints, an escaped parakeet with a musical theater obsession, and a nanny with a vendetta.
“I want a trial period,” I snap.“If she even looks at me the wrong way, she’s gone.”
“She already signed the contract for the month of August.First week’s salary is already paid.Her suitcase is being delivered from the taxi as we speak.”
I jerk around.“She’s here?Now?”
Claire shrugs.“Said she’d be here by dockage.Should be boarding any minute.”
As if on cue, Captain Martinez’s voice crackles over the intercom.“Mr.West?We’ve got someone on the dock requesting permission to board.Says she’s the new nanny.”
I step to the bridge window.
There she is.
Mia Rossi.
Petite.Poised.Dark hair pulled into a dense ponytail.
One hand grips her suitcase handle, the other shading her eyes as she surveys theWest Windlike she’s assessing the world’s most wasteful tax write-off.
Even from this distance, I can feel her judgment.
“Permission to board?”Martinez repeats.
I sigh.“Granted.”
Claire grins, already halfway down the stairs.“I’ll go introduce her to Captain Feathers.And the deck schedule.She’ll want to coordinate nap times with housekeeping.”
“Claire?”
“Yes, Mr.West?”
“You’re fired.”
“No, I’m not.You’re too deep in shit to fire me.Also, someone’s got to prep Mia for meeting the world’s grumpiest billionaire who’s currently covered in sparkles.”
She vanishes down the companionway, and I’m left alone on the bridge—surrounded by bedlam, covered in paint, and fully aware that the only person who’s made Isla smile in weeks thinks I’m a walking trust fund with control issues.
This is going to be a long month.
2
CHAMPAGNE AND CATASTROPHES
MIA
The late afternoon Mediterranean sun glints off Monaco's harbor like scattered diamonds, and I'm standing on a dock wondering how my life became a cautionary tale about mixing business with pleasure.
Again.
"You're overthinking this," Julianna's voice crackles through my phone, tinged with that older-sister authority that's kept me out of trouble for forty-three years."It's just a job, Mia."
"A job working for a man who probably thinks I'm some kind of anti-wealth revolutionary.”I adjust my grip on my single suitcase."Did I mention his assistant said he’d be reading my interview transcripts after the interview was over?”
“Yikes.You mean the interview where you compared him to an ‘investment portfolio that grew legs and glared’?”My younger sister Bianca chimes in from the three-way call, and I can practically hear her grinning from her art studio in Nice."Because honestly, that might be your best pickup line yet."
