Begrudgingly shuffling under her Anastasia themed bed cover, Maya gave me one of her best pouts. “But I don’t wanna go to sleep now. We can play one more game of Hide and Seek! I’ll let you win this time!”
“First off—” I helped yank her covers over top of her. “I don’t need you to let me win. This house is just ginormous, and I thought I legitimately lost you twice. Second, we’ve gotta get you to bed so that when your dad comes home, he’s happy and might let me come back to play with you again.”
A puff of air ruffled some flyaways of her mocha brown hair as Maya conceded, slumping beneath her sheets and getting comfortable. Her bed was a tiny twin size that felt completely dwarfed by her room that was easily double the square footage of mine and Charlotte’s. Hell, it was probably bigger than my kitchen and living room combined.
Maya rolled over in her bed to bring those big blue eyes to face me. She played with the edge of her comforter where Anastasia’s face was. “I hope you come back…”
Melancholy swaddled my heart, and an ache bloomed from inside of it just after. Damn, she was good. A sad smile tacked on my cheeks. “Me too, kiddo.”
“Shelly didn’t come back,” she murmured softly; heartbreakingly.
My chest squeezed. “Was Shelly your old nanny?”
Maya nodded.
Children should never look as forlorn as Maya did, and I immediately hated this Shelly bitch. Against my better judgement that screamed at me to not get attached to this little girl, I sat down on her bed and swept my fingers over her forehead to push back her curls.
“Anyone would have to be crazy to not want to come here and hang out with you. I’m sure Shelly didn’t mean to leave like that. You two had a lot of fun together, right?”
Her small voice was a tight whisper. “Yeah.”
“Then I’m sure she’s missing you as much as you’re missing her right now.”
Maya lowered her stare to her fingers as she pulled her covers closer to her chin. “Daddy said that, too.”
“Well, your daddy is a smart man.” And a stupidly hot cop.
Slowly, she nodded and blinked her sweet stare back up to me. I smiled at her and she smiled at me, and that ignorant, radiating ache coming from my heart surged. Dammit.
I left her room a minute later, thinking about how much I was going to miss her if I never saw her again after tonight. She was like Charlotte in a lot of ways, and then completely opposite in others.
Both had shitty moms, and both were blindly happy despite them. At least Maya seemed to have a good father. I wasn’t even sure if mine and Charlotte’s sperm source lived on this continent anymore.
Making my way back down the rounding staircase, I padded into the kitchen and over to the giant, white-marbled island at the center of it where I left the box of half-eaten pineapple pizza.
Yes, I liked pineapple on my pizza.
Actually, scratch that.
I fucking loved pineapple on my pizza.
Most everyone who said they hated it only hated it because, at some point, society agreed that it was awful. Pineapple pizza was like the band Nickelback. No one knew why they hated it. They just did.
Flipping open the box, I scooped out a lukewarm slice and brought it to my lips.
“You like pineapple on your pizza?”
“Shit!”
It all happened within a matter of seconds.
I cursed. The pizza flew. Mr. Reed’s face was there to catch it.
Both my hands slapped over my gaping mouth to hold back a gasp of horror as I snapped around to see him. If my eyes could have left my sockets, I was sure they would have, and I would have been so jealous. Then they wouldn’t have to witness the hellstorm that was about to rain down on me as my potential boss stood there, pizza sauce sliding down his cheeks and giving him a clown nose in red sauce.
Two specks of yellow fruit were caught in his dark hair too.
Oh god.
“I didn’t know you were there—”
“I know.”
“You scared me—”
“I know.”
“I’m so sorry—”
“I know.”
His words were clipped, his voice and jawline tense. Mr. Reed’s eyes were shut, and for the best, as red splatters were caught along his lashes and one of his eyelids. I swooped down to grab the culpable pizza from the floor, setting it back in the box with lightning speed.
Staring at him with the helpless beat of my heart pounding away, I floundered. “Can I… do anything or..?”
That hard-lined jaw of his ticked to the side and shut me up fast. He grumbled low in his throat. “A towel would be nice.”
“Right! Sorry,” I huffed, jumping into action and snagged a dish towel from the sink. As I laid the towel over his out-stretched hand, a daring bite of laughter tried to break through as I took another look at his pizza splattered face. Mr. Reed fisted the rag, strangling the poor thing as he brought it to his face.
The silence as he mopped his marinara-painted face was suffocating. I wasn’t a fidgeting kind of person, but this taut silence had me wringing my fingers together like a child in trouble. He let it sit for so long, and by the time he’d rid most of the sauce from his cheeks and forehead, I was dying beneath it. The silence killed my laughter, killed my appetite, and apparently most of my brain cells.
Mr. Reed missed a patch of red over his right eyebrow, and I moved. “Oh—”
Without thinking—clearly—I pulled the towel out of his hand just as he fluttered his eyes open experimentally. He jerked his head back as I came close, folding the stolen rag between my fingers. Those gunmetal eyes narrowed on me in suspicion.
“What are you doing?”
Pausing beneath his steely stare, I looked to the sauce on his head. “You missed a spot.”
A steady beat hung between us.
I didn’t wait for him to say anything more. Just got to work swiping the spot clean and doing my best not to acknowledge the body heat emitting off of him or how he felt like summer heat with eyes like a winter’s snap. Cold. Biting. Serious.
Way too fucking serious for a man with pizza sauce on his chin.
I got rid of that too, riding the edge of the towel along the defined cut of his stubbled jaw.
“Also…” A smile did its best to wiggle onto my lips as I flicked pineapple from his mass of hair. Poorly, I rolled the smile between my lips and took a satisfactory step back from him. “There. All pretty again.”
That dark gaze fell to my mouth as it twitched yet again.
“Are you laughing at me, Ms. Sanders?”
His tone was unreadable, but my will-power was failing.
“Desperately trying not to.”
One of his thick brows arched. “Do you think this is funny?”
“No.”
“Are you lying?”
A pause. “Definitely.”
Slowly, so slow I couldn’t even be sure it was happening, unmistakable humor reached up to his stare, brightening the whole thing. At the sight of it, muffled giggles started in my throat. My hysterics were choking me, and I had to let them out. Mr. Reed pulled his bottom lip between his teeth as he cast his eyes to the side, subtle shaking moving his broad shoulders.
Relief swept in fast and hard as he let a few rumbles of laughter roll around in his chest, and I let loose. Belly-aching joy threw my head back, spurred on by the low chuckles still trickling out of Mr. Reed. His laughter was soft and eloquent, deep and rich. Like velvet wrapped boulders echoing as they slammed together.
“You have to admit, that was funny shit,” I managed through laughs and gasping breaths.
A lazy grin still denting his cheeks, Mr. Reed ran a hand back through his hair. “One of the weirder ways I’ve been welcomed home, that’s for sure.”
“Well, I was always told to make a memorable impression on the person looking to hire you.”
He gave me an incredulous glance as he moved towards the box of pizza. “I’m not sure they meant to assault your boss with Italian food.”
“Assault? Wow, first day on the job and you already have reason to arrest me.”
That comment went ignored as he singled out a slice of pizza and began picking off the pineapples on top of it.
Rude.
“How’d it go with Maya?”
“Really great.” Slowly, I started gathering my things so I could get going. “We watched a movie, played some games. She even showed me where you guys keep the fireworks.”
Mr. Reed paused his hand bringing the pizza to his lips. “You two shot off fireworks?”
“Just sparklers and those popper things,” I said to calm that severe look in his eyes. “Kid’s got really good aim with those.”
He let out a breath of a laugh that sounded more exhausted than anything.
“I bet she loved that.”
“Yeah, she had a lot of fun with it. Made me pretend the sparklers were magic wands, and that we were casting spells on all the houses around us.” He nodded in amusement as he folded his pizza in half and shoved the triangle end in his mouth. “She’s got a wild imagination like my little sister.”
He chewed slowly, lips moving and jaw working up and down. Each time he dropped his jaw to chew, it outlined the high cut of his cheekbones, and I realized I was staring.
“I bet the two would get along well,” he tagged on after he swallowed.
He took another massive bite, nearly devouring the slice in two mouthfuls. I couldn’t seem to stop watching him. Thankfully, Mr. Reed was too into his pizza to notice my concentration on his mouth, and I quickly slung my purse over my shoulder to force myself out of it.
“Yeah, they would. Speaking of my sister, I probably need to head out and get home to her.”
“Of course.” Mr. Reed dropped the crust of the pizza into the box, covering his mouth with the back of his hand as he finished swallowing. “Let me walk you out.”
He went to stride towards me, but I put a hand out to stop him.
“That’s okay. I remember where the door is.” A reassuring smile tugged up on my lips at the same time that a yawn stretched Mr. Reed’s wide. I gave a short chortle. “Plus, I think you’d fall asleep before you made it to the door.”
He rubbed his tired eyes, pressing his fingers into their closed sockets and shook his head.
“You’d think, but sleep hasn’t been the easiest thing to come by lately.”
Curiosity pinched the back of my mind. “How long have you been having trouble sleeping?”
A deep breath filled his chest out, and he dropped his hand, allowing his red-rimmed eyes to find mine. “I don’t remember.”
His voice was just as beat as he was, sloggy with gravel embedded in each full-bodied note. As I stood there, an idea struck. Just be an extra bonus in my corner in case he wasn’t sold on hiring me after I went ahead and slapped him with pizza.
“Do you drink?”
Mr. Reed slanted his head. “Occasionally.”
“There’s this drink I used to make my dad whenever he wanted it after a hard day. Or any day really. He claimed it helped him fall asleep, and my grandpa said the same thing. You have a pretty full wet bar, so… if you wanted me to make it for you really quick, I could.”
His fatigued stare mixed with intrigue. “Don’t you have to get home though?”
“It will take five minutes. Tops.”
When he didn’t immediately say no, I let my purse fall from my shoulder to the ground and told him to go sit and get comfortable. Just on the other side of the kitchen sat their wet bar, another white marbled slat with double sinks, a dark cherry, overhanging glass holder, and a mini fridge that wasn’t exactly so mini.
“Whiskey or Bourbon?” I called over.
“Bourbon.”
I hummed, plucking a bottle of bourbon I’d never heard of before that had a metal horse on the top. “My dad was a whiskey guy.”
A few beats of quiet passed between us where all you could hear was the clinking of glass and sloshing of alcohol. In this giant house, the silence felt even more prominent, like its own living, breathing thing, and it set my nerves on edge.
“So, what’s in this drink that makes it so special?” Mr. Reed’s deep voice floated in from the living room.
Bustling back into the kitchen for a moment to boil some water in the microwave, I tipped a glance over to him. “I’m not telling.”
“That’s disconcerting.”
“What? Secrets are secrets for a reason, sir.”
As the microwave hummed behind me, a peculiar expression shadowed his chiseled face. “You don’t have to call me sir, Ms. Sanders.”
Leaning back against the counter, I asked, “What would you rather I call you?”
“Dominic or Mr. Reed. Whichever you prefer.”
“What if I prefer sir?” The pointed look he gave me from across the room peeled a stupid grin up my face. “Kidding,” I quipped. Kind of.
I’d get a hell of a kick out of calling him ‘sir’ and watching those melted metal eyes turn punishing. I wouldn’t do it though, obviously. Probably…
I liked his name. Dominic. It was strong and masculine and sounded like royalty on his tongue. Part of me wondered how the syllables of his name would feel rolling around my mouth.
“So, are you going to tell me what’s in this drink?”
Dominic stole my focus back to him, and I turned away from him to face the counter.
“What’s the fun in that?”
“What if I’m allergic to this secret ingredient?”
I rustled through the cabinets for some honey. “Well, what are you allergic to?”
A long beat resonated between us.
“Cats.”
The prolonged beep from the microwave punctuated Dominic’s revelation, and a smile slid up my lips. Yanking the microwave open, I said, “Well, lucky for you, this drink is free of all things feline.” I craned my head back to him. “Where do you guys keep tea bags?”
He pointed to a tall pantry on the other end of the kitchen I’d yet to make my way over to. I nabbed a lavender chamomile tea packet and sunk it in the boiling water, taking that and the honey back with me to the bar. My dad always preferred ginger tea while my grandpa liked chamomile in this particular drink.
Me? I fucking hated tea altogether.
As the drink was steeping, I fished lemon juice out of the not-so-mini fridge. These people really had everything. Throwing all the ingredients together in the piping hot glass, I made my way around to Dominic who sat in his crimson lounge chair, arms resting on both sides and a tall lamp hovering over him.
It cast this dark shadow over the top of his face, drowning the gray of his eyes to a near black as he watched me approach. I held the glass out to him, and he reached to take it, but stopped mid-motion and put his eyes on me.
“There aren’t drugs in here, are there?”
My head reared back as offense punched through my body. “Yeah, because I’m really going to drug my potential boss on my first day.”
“I don’t put anything past anyone these days,” he replied casually. So casually in fact, my nostrils flared at the accusation of it, and I had to bite back my rising temper. Through clenched teeth, I rolled my eyes back and brought the glass to my lips, letting the warm, honeyed liquid wash across my tongue.
God damn, I made good drinks.
The pleasant burn slid down my throat, and a delighted shiver wracked my spine as the alcohol touched my blood. Dominic never let his dark-eyed focus on me waiver, and I held the drink out to him once more.
“Trust me now?”
Slowly shifting forward in his seat, the angles of his face grew sharp in the new lighting. “That’s a loaded question, Ms. Sanders.”
He took the glass between his long fingers and raised it to his lips. I watched him, and he never took his eyes off of me either as he took a considering sip. The intensity of his prolonged eye contact burned as he tasted the drink I made for him. I felt the need to shift from foot to foot in front of him, but held my ground even as the dark liquid washed over his top lip. His tongue slipped out to clear the residue, and my mouth drew parched.
The heat that had poured through my body thanks to my one sip found its way to my stomach, pooling there as I watched a surprised gleam appear in his shaded stare.
“Do you like it?” I asked, quickly clearing my throat that had dropped to a murmur.
“Very much.” He gave the drink a whiff before testing another sip. A curiosity plagued his stare as he flashed his focus back to me. “You said you were only twenty, right?”
Of legal age for all sexual acts? Why, yes. Yes, I am.
“Yeah, I’ll be twenty-one in a few months.”
What appeared to be amused suspicion narrowed the sides of his eyes as he leaned back in his chair. “So you’re not allowed to drink yet.”
The arousal I was feeling smothered itself at his question, and my hip popped out in rebellion, an uneasy fire brewing in me.
“Are you going to arrest me for taking a sip of alcohol in front of you?”
Dominic raised an eyebrow and held a scrutinizing beat between us.
“No. Just thinking about how you said you made this drink for your father, and you’re not legally allowed to even drink yet, so I’m wondering how that worked.”
“Because he was a shitty father?” I chuckled like it was obvious. “I knew how to make about fifteen different drinks by the time I was thirteen. It was our way of bonding.”
“You said he’s not in the picture anymore, right?”
“Yup,” I replied, voice clipped.
Sincerity creased his brow line, dipping into his stare. “I’m sorry to hear that.”
“I’m not. All he did was make me into a walking cliche of daddy issues.”
Dominic nodded, tipping back another gulp of the drink. “I try my best, but I have no idea how to not pass any ‘issues’ onto Maya from me.”
“Just don’t be a piece of shit, and you should be golden,” I said with a cheeky grin.
For the second time tonight, a rumble of soft laughter that sounded so unpracticed, so unfamiliar to his own vocal cords, drummed in his chest, and he tilted a humored look up to me. A sleepy humored look, and my pride jumped. He relaxed back into his chair, running one of his hands thoughtfully over his trimmed scruff as he stared at me with a lazy smile.
“You’re funny,” he said.
“And you’re sleepy.”
“I am.” Surprise linked his words together as his eyelids dropped heavier, and he stretched his long legs out in front of him as he got comfortable in the chair. In the back of my head, I wondered if he’d be going up to his and Heather’s bedroom or if he slept down here sometimes. He certainly seemed at home in the big red chair.
“All right. I’m gonna get going before you pass out.” Locking my grip around the handle of my purse again, I pulled it up to take my leave when a thought stalled my feet out. The words rolled around in my head for all of three seconds before I said fuck it and snapped around to a nearly sleeping Dominic.
“Do I have the job, by the way?”
Part shock, part mirth lifted his eyebrows about an inch. As the seconds passed, the amusement pushed the surprise out of the way until this gaze was nothing more than fatigued enjoyment.
“See you Monday morning, Ms. Sanders.”
