Chapter 21
***Memphis***
After Remy left the bathroom, the energy shifted.
It was like I’d forgotten my place with all of his sweetheart talk.
His departure reminded us all that I was an employee and nothing else.
We were having sex to get me pregnant. I’d dried off clumsily and gotten dressed at breakneck speed.
I gave Boone and Wells an excuse about needing to get back to the guest house to check on something I’d left in a crockpot.
I didn’t even know if the little house had a crockpot, but I didn’t care. That’d been two days earlier.
Sitting in the swing in the backyard, I put my finger in my book to hold my place and leaned into the thick rope.
The flowers surrounding me made me feel like a fairy, but my emotions were quick to bring me back to Earth.
It was silly of me to feel upset about not being sought out again after the afternoon we’d spent together.
I wasn’t their girlfriend. I’d never done anything like that, though, and all the strong, sexy emotions I’d felt in the moment were gone.
All that was left was a lot of self-doubt and questions about what was wrong with me.
The wind blew and gently rustled all the nature around me.
I had no business feeling sad when my position in life had changed so drastically without any real work on my part.
I’d spend a few years living in the most beautiful space I’d ever seen and then I’d be set for life with the money I made.
I’d be able to do everything I’d ever wanted to do.
If the Hawke brothers knew that everything I wanted to do in life centered around going to college, I was sure they’d think I was a joke.
Sighing, I ran my finger over the spine of the book in my hands.
The money Charlie had stolen from me had been my life savings and it’d all been meant to pay for college.
I didn’t care that I wouldn’t be going until I was over a decade older than other freshmen.
I only cared that I went. Charlie never understood my dream.
He thought college was a waste of money when I could make us money just fine without a brain in my head.
His words, not mine. I wanted more, though.
I wanted to graduate college and experience walking across a stage.
More than even that, I wanted to find a job with my new degree as a librarian.
I’d spent so much of my young life in the library back home that I’d inevitably grown close to the librarian who worked there.
On the days that I showed up dirty and hungry, she wiped my face and snuck me into her office to give me snacks.
She got me a backpack when it became clear that the stacks of books I took home were too heavy for my small arms. She’d been nurturing when no one else had.
I’d loved books before her, but after her, the keeper of the books had become a coveted position.
No matter how much older I got, no matter how ugly the world was, my view of librarians had never changed.
They held a superhero status in my mind.
I wanted to be that person to other little kids.
So, really, I had no reason to be sad about the Hawke brothers ignoring me after our sex session. I was on the road to becoming everything I wanted to be in life. I just had to spend a few years having kids and living like a queen first.
Still, my feelings were on my sleeve, as they’d always been.
They were hurt. I’d had to stop myself from walking up to the main house multiple times, just to ask them if I’d done something wrong.
I was terrified that my behavior had shown them my true roots.
Did Ivy League women ask to screw three brothers at the same time?
It felt like a stereotype put on trashy women, and I’d forever felt trashy, being the poor kid from the trailer park with no active parents.
Did the men know that I wasn’t a proper lady with pearls and family wealth?
Were they figuring out how to get rid of me, even as I planned my future?
I was driving myself insane and being so alone wasn’t good for me when I was worried.
Unfortunately, I’d read so many novels in my life that I had a million ways any given situation could crash and burn.
My imagination had been nurtured into a giant, muscled beast. It could leap to conclusions in single bounds with the best of them.
I heard movement in the house and jumped up.
I’d gotten used to Bea coming in and out and looked forward to her visits.
Funny how quickly a person’s privacy could expand to include others.
When I rushed through the back door of the house, I startled Bea, who’d been bent over with her head in the fridge.
She jumped up and spun around to face me with her hand clutching her chest. “Good grief! You just about gave me a heart attack! You can’t sneak up on a woman like that. Especially not when I’ve been working in the main house all morning. That place wrecks my sanity. I swear it’s haunted.”
I grabbed the cloth she used to wipe my counters and started doing just that. “You think it’s haunted? Really?”
“Memphis, how many times do I have to tell you? I clean, you don’t.” She tried to grab the cloth from me, but gave up when I made it clear I wasn’t letting her have it.
“How many times do I have to tell you that I’m not just going to sit here and watch you clean up my mess? That’s weird.” I shuddered. “And awkward. I can’t even imagine.”
She shook her head, but I could see her fighting a laugh. “I don’t know what to make of you. I can assure you that you’re not like any of the other women I’ve ever seen around the brothers. They would not mind watching me clean up after them. They’re much messier than you, too.”
I frowned at the thought of the other women and wondered if that was still happening. Did I have a right to care? Probably not. Definitely not. Still, I couldn’t help myself. “Do they still have women coming around?”
Bea cocked her head to the side at me and wagged her finger. “Is someone jealous?”
I scoffed. “No. Of course, not. Why would I be? I’m just the surrogate.”
“Uh huh.” She went back to stocking the fridge. “The answer is no. I haven’t seen any traces of another woman being in the house. Just you.”
My face burned with shame and I made myself busy with the counters for a few minutes. When the silence had gone on for long enough, I cleared my throat. “So, you think the main house is haunted?”
“Nice change of subject. Watch this, though.” She smirked at me and pushed her dark hair out of her face.
“I really do think the house is haunted. It always feels like something is watching me while I’m working there and a couple of days ago, I kept hearing this moaning coming from upstairs.
It was loud and it lasted a long time. There was even some screaming.
It couldn’t have been anything but a ghost. Right? ”
I scrubbed at the counters harder, fear of being judged strong enough to make me panic. “Um, yeah. A ghost...”
She placed her hand over mine and laughed. “Relax, Memphis. I’m just teasing you.”
Meeting her gentle gaze, I swallowed. “You’re not judging me?”
Bea threw her head back and laughed. When she looked back at me, her eyes were bright. “Hell no. I’m jealous. I’d let you clean this entire place while I sat around watching if you agreed to give me some details.”
I groaned at the sensation of my entire body blushing. Rubbing my cheeks, I looked at her through my fingers. “I don’t think I’m mature enough to talk about it. Look at how hard I’m blushing. I’m such a dork.”
She rolled her eyes and waved a cucumber at me. “Speak through the blush, honey, because momma hasn’t gotten laid in months and I need to live vicariously through you.”