“Wyn.Look at me.”
“No.”I swiveled my head in the opposite direction so I couldn’t even see him out of the corner of my eye.
But I felt the heat of him.Smelled the scent of him.Warmth and sandalwood.
I gripped the counter and swayed.
“You sure you don’t want bourbon instead of tea?”he whispered, his breath teasing my hair.
“Definitely not.”
With a sigh, he stepped back and gave me space.
I wished he hadn’t.
I wanted him to set the bottle of bourbon down and splay his large hands on my hips and pull me toward him.
Instead, he uncorked the bottle and poured himself a glass.
The smart thing to do—purely from a self-preservation angle—was to leave and let him mull and drink in peace.
But I had never been very good at self-preservation.
I held in a sigh.
“Give me advice,” he said.
“Advice about what?”
“Lenni.Raising a girl.All that stuff.I feel like I’m failing.”
“You’re not failing.It’s barely been a week, Archer.”
“Jesus, has it really only been that long?That short, rather?”
“Yeah, I know, right?”I said with a laugh.
“Why do I feel like I’ve lived a lifetime?”
“Because emotions are exhausting.You’re too hard on yourself.”
“I just want to do it right.”He looked at me, his eyes earnest.
I held up one finger.“Happy.”I held up a second finger.“Safe.”I held up a third finger.“Loved.Those are the only things that really matter to us.Not just as kids, but as adults too.”
I frowned as I reached into a cabinet for a mug.
“What’s got you frowning?”
“I was just thinking about the kid I nannied for before Lenni,” I said.“Parents were rich as sin.Owen will have the best of everything that money can buy, but I was the one who held him after his nightmares.He’d run intomyroom for comfort.Not his parents’ room.He was only five, but he already knew his parents didn’t have time for him.They don’t care about him the way you care about Lenni.”
I unscrewed the mason jar of loose-leaf tea Muddy had given me and I yanked open the drawer that had the tea strainer.
“Why’d you become a nanny?”he asked.
“I like kids,” I said.“But I didn’t want to be a teacher.Controlled chaos I could handle.A room full of hyper kids?Not so much.”
He smiled slightly and took another sip of bourbon, but he didn’t reply.
