Chapter 1
BEAU
I feel like my stomach just dropped below sea level, especially at finally seeing the baby through the glass of the nursery, wrapped up in pink. I don’t know why I came here.
Well, I know, but it makes the weight of the folded-up papers in my pocket feel like a brick ready to weigh me down as I sink into my ocean of bad luck.
“You look about as devastated as I feel,” a low voice says, as another man takes the seat on the bench beside me. I hadn’t been aware of my surroundings enough to see him coming.
He makes me immediately self-conscious of my appearance, because he looks like a model or actor, complete with chiseled features, a slick dark suit, and he smells amazing.
Is that cedar and vanilla? The phrase “tall, dark, and handsome” was invented for guys like this, the James Bond types, without a hair out of place.
He’s either Bond or Bruce Wayne with his flawless black hair and piercing blue eyes.
Comparably, I must look like a schlub in my old paisley tie that could just as easily be from the 1980s as the 2010s. Not to mention the hole in the seam of my slacks on the side facing him.
I run a hand back through my messy brown curls in a vain attempt to look presentable. “Devastated?” I repeat.
He gestures through the glass, as a nurse goes in to set a blue-wrapped bundle in the bassinet beside the one I’d been staring at. “I’m the father.”
“Oh. I’m not.” I feel the weight of the man’s eyes on the side of my face.
It’s easier to keep staring forward, as I lift a hand toward the pink bundle.
“My ex-wife’s. Almost ex. She thinks ex, but I…
I’ve been awful, and I haven’t finished signing the paperwork or sent it to the judge yet to make it official.
She was four months along before she told me the baby wasn’t mine.
I guess I just needed to see it—her—in order to let go.
” Reaching into my pocket, I pull out the divorce papers to stare at them instead.
“You brought the papers with you? Maybe you’re more devastated than I am.”
I sniffle, shaking myself from my reverie. “Sorry. But wait. Why are you devastated? Not ready to be a dad?”
“Hardly,” the man snorts. “I didn’t get the luxury of four months. My ex—long past ex—called a few weeks ago. I’m getting full custody, and it may be the biggest mistake of my life.”
“She doesn’t want the baby?”
“We broke up for many reasons, but her being less than responsible played its role.”
“But you asked for full custody?”
“The request spilled out of me, and during these weeks when I could have taken it back, I didn’t.
I’m bringing it home—him home. I have no idea what I’m going to do afterward.
I’m not usually family friendly.” He grins.
He is devastatingly handsome. Like, the kind of handsome that makes me wonder if Bellamy has a point about trying guys again.
I can’t flirt with the random man I met in the maternity ward though.
He just became a dad! He’s probably straight.
I notice he isn’t wearing a tie when he reaches up to undo his top shirt button.
I wonder if he was wearing one earlier since he is so otherwise put together.
“Well, you’re here,” I say. “You’re going to bring him home.
That’s a good start. I couldn’t wait to be a dad.
I’ve always wanted a family of my own. I guess I wanted it so badly, I didn’t realize how one-sided my marriage was until it was over.
Now, I have to let her go. Both of them… ”
After taking a deep breath, I start patting myself down for a pen. I could have sworn I brought one with me.
A very nice and expensive looking pen is thrust in front of my face.
I take it, noticing the lettering on the side that says Anders Enterprises.
“Thanks.” I sign the papers quickly, messily but legible.
“Anders, huh? You work for them? It’s like a really big player in investments or something, right? ”
“Or something.” The man holds out an empty hand after I pass the pen back to him. “Ariel Anders, but I go by Arik.”
“You’re Anders?” I gasp, even as I accept the firm handshake. “You’re, like, a millionaire.”
“With a ‘B’, actually.” He grins wider. “And you are…?”
“B. I mean Beau! Sorry. I’m a mess on a good day, and you’re, like, huge deal high society, while I’m trying to finish grad school, totally broke and jobless, and… divorced,” I finish sourly, turning back to look at that pink bundle again. “Just what I wanted on my resume before thirty.”
Arik snorts again. “If it makes you feel any better, I didn’t just walk into my life.
I worked hard to get where I am, and the sacrifices I made along the way weren’t always worth it.
While I can more than provide for this child, money and possessions don’t make up for the time I don’t have to spare or how I am doomed to be terrible at this.
” He looks handsome even wearing a grimace, because his eyes say he doesn’t want that to be true.
“Sounds like you need to allow yourself some leeway. Take the time you need away from being a busy billionaire to also be a dad. You can do both. Though maybe get a nanny.” I snicker. I’m sure he can afford one.
“Is that an offer?”
“Huh?” I figure he must be joking, but Arik turns to me, looking very serious.
“You said you were broke, jobless, and love kids, right?”
“Y-yeah but—”
“Any experience?”
“You just met me!”
“I run a multi-billion-dollar corporation, Beau. Anyone I’d hire I’d have only just met. And the last thing I need right now is to subject myself to a string of interviews. Experience?” he asks again.
“With kids? I mean, sure, my degree is in childhood education, but—”
“You’re hired.” He stands abruptly, completely at ease offering a stranger to come into his home to take care of his infant son.
“There is a coffee shop one floor down. I have some paperwork to get through, and you have some to mail.” He points at the divorce papers still clasped in my hands.
“Afterward, meet me down there and let me buy you a cup. We’ll talk terms. Agreed? ”
This is not how I planned for my day to end.
Of course, several months ago, this was not how I planned for my marriage to end, or where I thought my life would lead. Working as a nanny for a billionaire wouldn’t be the worst detour.
“Okay.” I follow Arik down the hallway. “But I am half-convinced you’re crazy.”
Arik flashes me his dazzling movie star smile, and my knees go weak.
Definitely not a good idea to get a crush on my future employer.
“Perfect,” he says. “Then you already know me better than you think.”
ARIK
“Are you going to just stand there all day?”
I startle, not having realized Clara noticed me enter.
I’m in her hospital room now, and the baby has been brought back in so he can eat. I didn’t expect to find her breastfeeding. After all, it won’t be the norm. He’ll be straight to formula once I get him home.
“Come on, you coward,” Clara teases me. “Come meet your son.”
That is another cold dose of reality—my son—and it at least marginally helps that I have someone lined up to aid me in caring for this child. I’d meant to consider a nanny earlier but hadn’t had time, and it was one thing I didn’t want Skylar to do for me.
Anyone else might think I jumped the gun hiring Beau—or that his unruly curls, smooth chestnut skin, and tall toned body influenced my decision.
It did. It’ll be nice to have some eye candy around amid the diaper genie and spit rags.
But I am excellent at reading people. It’s part of the job when you deal in billions.
“So Beau,” I’d begun when we met for coffee a few minutes ago. “I caught the surname from those papers of yours. de León? Spanish or French?”
“Um… both, I think?” He blinks his warm brown eyes that are giving off a golden glow from the fluorescents above us. His curls are just long enough to fall past his eyebrows and dance against his eyelashes, forcing him to expel a puff of air now and again to get said curls to cooperate.
It is unfairly enticing the way his lips pout when he blows like that.
“My mom’s from Guatemala,” he finishes.
“Ah. He estado en Guatemala muchas veces.”
Beau blinks at me again. “Yeah…” he drawls out slowly, “my sisters grew up bilingual, and my brother is close to fluent, but our parents kind of got lax by the time I was born, so I suck at Spanish.”
“Aren’t you an aspiring teacher?”
“History not Language!”
I suppress a laugh. He is quite adorable when he’s flustered.
He is quite adorable period. It’s possible that alone makes this a bad idea.
If he ends up as good at this job as I suspect he will be, I wouldn’t want to spoil things with ill-timed sexual advances.
I need to behave myself. I managed to when I first hired Skylar and was tempted to bend him over my office desk.
Instead, I introduced him to his now husband.
There is always the chance that I have nothing to worry about. Beau is almost certainly straight and immune to my flirtations. Although the way his gaze occasionally rakes over my face and the bit of clavicle showing with my shirt undone hints otherwise.
If he isn’t immune but ends up unsatisfactory at the job, I will definitely be plucking his underwear off my ceiling fan before kicking him to the curb.
He is that type of demurely good looking, hunched in on himself like he thinks he needs to hide.
Probably the gangly geeky kid in high school who got tall before he gained muscle and doesn't realize he had a glow up.
The lack of vanity makes him even more appealing.
“Let’s cut to the chase,” I said. “For obvious reasons, mainly my busy schedule, this will be a live-in position, and you will start bright and early tomorrow. Unless you have any reservations about that, let’s talk salary.”
I had no doubt my offer would make the self-proclaimed destitute teacher salivate and accept the position on the spot. He did, and I gave him all the necessary information to meet me at my penthouse tomorrow and forwarded all other pertinent information to Skylar.
Done and done—before I made my way back up to the maternity ward to see Clara and hold my infant son for the first time.
I don’t remember the last time I held a newborn. The blue-wrapped bundle feels impossibly light in my arms, further accentuating how fragile he is. He has a tuft of black hair like mine instead of Clara’s blond. Given hers is likely not natural, that isn’t a surprise.
I hold no ill-will toward my ex. I considered her a friend after we split and still do.
She is gorgeous, tough, and like me, knows what she wants and makes sure she gets it.
She is a confirmed party girl the way I am a confirmed bachelor.
We clicked when we met, both wanting to just have fun and not be tied down and ended up being one partner we each dated longer than any other—while not being exclusive—only for one of my strong swimmers to go for gold the last time we slept together.
“Now, there’s a sight I haven’t seen in a while,” Clara says, watching me intuitively sway while holding this new life we made together. I know she means the smile that has wormed its way onto my face.
“Your tits are out,” I joke, and she laughs before straightening her gown.
“I figured the kid deserved the breast a few times if this is all going to dry up soon. I know they are rarely your first choice.”
“60/40.” I shrug. “Though when it comes to nice thighs, 100% to any gender.”
“I remember. You know, that almost looks natural. The great Arik Anders with a babe on his hip.”
I look down at the baby again, little raisin that he is, blinking sightlessly and squirming in my arms. “We’ll see. Full custody or not, you are always welcome to visit.”
“I know. And I might. From time to time. I’m more the cool auntie type than a mother. He’ll be better off with you.”
An initial series of whines from the baby turns into full-on fussing. “I guess he’s not so keen at having his lunch interrupted.” When Clara opens her arms, I pass him back to her. “I have a lot to prepare for back at the penthouse, but… tomorrow?”
“We’ll be here. And Arik?” she calls before I leave. “You’re going to do fine.”
I nod. Internally, all I can think is, I hope so, but at least I won’t be doing it alone.