She smiled at me and continued the serious business of stacking blocks.
I watched the little girl move back and forth across the room, smiling and babbling the entire time. When my phone rang, I pulled it from my back pocket, my gaze still fixed on Violet, and answered without thinking. "Hello?"
"Rosie, baby, thank God you answered!"
Jason. My spine stiffened, and my jaw clenched. "Jason? What do you want?"
"I need you, baby. I need you to come back to me."
I laughed, pulling back and staring at the phone as if the caller spoke a foreign language. "That's not happening. Ever."
"Come on, Rosie. I need you, baby. You're my good-luck charm."
I nodded because now it was all becoming clear. "Bull."
"Seriously, you're so good at charming people, and I need you to do that. I have an important meeting in two weeks, and I need you at my side, charming the suits into opening their wallets for me."
I rolled my eyes. "No."
"Rosie, please! I need you. I'm desperate."
"Yeah, well, maybe you should have thought about that before you did what you did. You never once apologized for your terrible behavior or for the way you treated me. You didn't care about me then, and I need you to keep that same energyfrom now until forever. Find some other sucker to fall under your spell." I ended the call with a satisfying smack of my index finger against the screen and quickly blocked his number before he could call back to beg, or worse, apologize. "Boys are stupid, Violet. Don't ever fall for their charms."
She babbled in my direction with a wide smile and handed me one of the blocks. "Ba-ba-ba-ba!"
"Yeah, I know you're too smart for that. Stay that way." My heart donkey-kicked my chest at the thought of just how silly I'd been when it came to Jason, allowing him to lead me and following him willingly. I let him use me until there was nothing left for me, and when I left, I promised myself I would never do that again.
Yet here you are, doing everything possible to make Xavier's life easier.
I could lie to myself that it was all about Violet, but the truth was just that this was how I was built. I was a natural-born nurturer, which was why I was such a damn good assistant. I could anticipate my boss's needs without his input, giving him or her what they wanted before they even knew what it was they wanted. It was my superpower, so to speak, and during my first career, I'd lived to regret it.
Now here I was, doing the same thing for Xavier while he snapped and growled at me as if I were an annoyance. The more I thought about it, the madder I got, and when Violet finally wore herself out, I disappeared into my room and stayed there most of the night, only venturing out for a sandwich because we were all on our own for dinner tonight.
It was just one step, but it was an important one that I promised myself I would keep up when I received my next placement.
If I did, considering what I'd done.
Chapter 15
Xavier
"I'll be back. Late," I growled to Rosalee as I shoved my feet into a clean pair of boots and shuffled from the house without another word or a look back. It was my second of two nights off, and I needed to blow off some goddamn steam.
To her credit, she said nothing. She didn't even acknowledge my words, never mind asking me where I was going, which was impressive even if it stung. A little.
I only thought about Rosalee once every twenty seconds as I made my way down the mountain and along a long, dark, unpaved road that took me exactly where I needed to go. After a few miles, the fluorescent red lights of the Triple Horn lit the remainder of the path. I pulled into the gravel parking lot and killed the engine, staring up at the three horns of the bull with beads of liquid dripping from them suggestively.
Usually, by this point in my visit, I was already rock hard, throbbing in tune with the beat inside the club, eager to slip inside something hot and wet and tight. But tonight my cock was being shy.
What the fuck was happening?
I silently asked myself the question, and my cock knew the answer. Rosalee happened. Rosalee and that damned kiss which she'd apologized for and hadn't attempted again. Rosalee and those racetrack curves, her sweet blond hair and sparkling honey-brown eyes. Her sassy mouth and those lush lips were all I could fucking think about. Her, not any of the willing women inside who would give me exactly what I needed—what I wanted. It was the nanny I shouldn't even want, but I wanted her so bad that I could practically taste her on my tongue.
"Dammit." I smacked the steering wheel and turned over the engine with more force than necessary before I exited the Triple Horn parking lot as quickly as I'd entered, stopping at the grocery store in town before I made my way back up the mountain, angry and frustrated and so goddamn horny I wanted to scream.
Halfway home, it started to snow again. The clouds rolled in slowly at first, but by the time I grabbed the bags and stomped up the steps, they were moving faster. The storm was coming quickly, and it was probably gonna be a doozy.
Rosalee was curled up on the sofa with her e-reader a foot from her face, a smile on her lips and Violet's monitor just beyond the e-reader in view. A fire roared in the fireplace, and it was a picture-perfect setting; the only thing missing was me.
