Chapter 38
***Ada***
“You have to tell me everything! This is all the other nannies in the neighborhood can talk about!” Jules showed me the photo on her phone and jabbed her red-painted nail at it. “This is a picture of you, my friend, kissing Collin Carrington!”
I grabbed the phone and gasped. Yeah, that was a very detailed picture, alright.
Part of me wanted to save it and stash it so I’d never forget just how good Collin and I looked that night.
The rest of me was horrified that I’d been photographed making out with one of my bosses and it was going around the neighborhood. “I am mortified.”
“Why?! You reeled a big one in, lady! He’s kissing you in public, where he knew it could be photographed. That means it’s serious!” She fanned herself and leaned back on the kitchen stool. “You two look hot together. I can feel the tension through the phone.”
The pressure of my parents coming and having all three Carrington brothers spending more and more time around me paired with the photo made me crack. I dropped my head to the kitchen island and groaned. “I don’t know what I’m doing, Jules!”
“You’re bagging yourself a very wealthy man, that’s what you’re doing.”
I shook my head. “It’s not that simple...”
“Why not? What else-” She stopped. “Wait. Is there someone else?”
I couldn’t admit to her what I was doing. It was too crazy. Yet, I had to say something. I felt like I was going to scream if I didn’t get something out. “It’s not... It’s just complicated. I think... I think I have feelings for all of them.”
Jules’ face went blank. “What?”
I rubbed my eyes and blew out a shaky breath. “I just see all of them a lot, you know? And I think I feel something for all of them. Not that they know, of course. It’s just not as simple as I kissed Collin and now we’re getting married.”
“Whoa.” She reached out and took my hand. “You seem sad, Ada. Are you okay?”
It’d been so long since I had a close friend. Work and Camden had come first for so long that my friends and I had all just drifted apart. Jules had been there for me every week, though, and she was so kind. “I am a little sad. My dad calls me Sad-a when I’m like this.”
She squeezed my hand. “What’s wrong?”
“I don’t want to like them. They’ve been jerks. They haven’t always been very good fathers. And then there’s the fact that there’s three of them! I can’t feel something for three men at the same time! I’m a Catholic!”
Jules snorted and then we both laughed at how ridiculous I was being. “Ada, you can’t help who you like. It’s obvious that Collin likes you, though. What about the other two?”
I looked away and shrugged. I didn’t want to say too much. I didn’t know what was okay to share and what wasn’t. “I don’t know.”
“They do! I can tell by the look on your face! Are you going to break up the Carrington brothers? Ada!”
That sobered me right up. “No. That’s not happening.”
She held her hands. “Okay, fine. You’re not going to break up the family. Are you going to sample them all at least? They’re so hot, Ada. If you don’t, it’s a crime against women everywhere.”
I rolled my eyes and shook my head. “I just don’t know what to do. I hated them just a little over a month ago. Now they’re having these moments of sweetness that melt me and I don’t know what to do. I should probably just leave. But I love the kids.”
“You love the kids?” Jules laughed. “Sorry. I just... Kids are great, of course, but... You’re clearly a very good woman.”
“I do love the kids. They’re great kids and I don’t want to leave them.
Plus, Joe says I can’t leave. Which is infuriating because he’s such a controlling jerk sometimes but it’s also kind of hot.
I feel like I’m going crazy. Tell me what to do.
No, wait. You’re terrible. Your advice would get me in trouble. ”
She wagged her eyebrows and nodded to the bottle of wine she’d tried to get me to drink when I first showed up looking stressed. I’d come for coffee, though. It was mid-morning. “My advice would get you tipsy and laid.”
“Trouble!” I laughed and waved her away.
“Sorry, I’m just processing what you said. Joe says you can’t leave?” She frowned. “That’s weird.”
“No, it’s not like a kidnappy type of thing. It’s usually when I’m threatening to quit because he won’t do something I think he should.” I saw her eyes go wide and winced. “Yeah, I think I’m a terrible nanny.”
“I think you’re a terrible employee!”
Groaning, I put my head back on the countertop. “No! I’ve always been a good employee. Until them. Now, I think I might be a monster.”
“It seems the Carrington brothers have a thing for bossy women, huh? I could be bossy.” She grinned at me when I looked up and narrowed my eyes. “What? If you don’t want them, someone else surely will. Those men are fine, Ada. Capital F fine.”
“Thank you. This has been a giant help. You’ve clarified everything for me.
” I groaned again and forced myself to my feet.
I’d walked over and I had to walk back but I didn’t feel like it.
I felt like throwing myself a pity party instead.
My parents were coming. It could only end in disaster. “I’m going. I’ll see you later, okay?”
“Text me if anything changes! I need to live vicariously through you!”
I waved goodbye and slowly made my way back to the mansion. I was almost at the garage entrance when Joe walked out, a frown on his face as usual. When he saw me, though, his lips tilted up in the slightest smile and my stomach erupted in butterflies.
“Hey. How was your walk?”
I locked my fingers together behind my back and rocked forward on my toes as I answered. “It was good. Not super helpful, but good. Where are you off to?”
“Walks are supposed to be helpful?” His eyes moved down my body and back up. “I was going to run to my office, the one in the city, but I could be talked out of it.”
“Am I hearing this correctly? The great Joe Carrington is offering to blow off work for once? Are you sick?” I reached up to feel his head and laughed when he batted my hand away and wrapped his arms around my waist, catching me against his body.
“One, I’m glad you think I’m great. Two, I’m willing to blow off work if the price is right.” He quirked an eyebrow at me and his slow smile was so sexy that I nearly melted on the spot.
I licked my lips, which were suddenly desert dry, and swallowed down the urge to say ‘yes, please’. “So all those times I tried to get you to come to family stuff and you wouldn’t, all I had to do was name the right price?”
His hand dipped low, his fingers rested on the swell of my ass. “I plead the fifth.”
“Well, then, I plead you can go to the office by yourself. I have to go get Milo from Jud anyway. Have fun, though.” I stretched up to kiss him on the cheek but he shifted at the last second and our mouths connected. As soon as they did, it was like fire scorching its way down my spine.
Joe held my ass in one hand and gripped the back of my head with his other and took my mouth in a heated kiss that promised so much. He growled against my lips and then he was walking me backwards until my back hit something hard and I was pinned.
I arched into him and wrapped my leg around his hip, already consumed by my desire for him. Then, the sound of a car horn exploded through my brain and I pushed Joe away like he was contagious.
He shot me a dark look before looking over his shoulder and swearing. “Fuck.”
“Oh, my god! If you’re going to do that, do it inside where all my friends can’t see it!” Kendall sounded pissed off and I was immediately terrified that I’d just done irreparable damage to our bond. “Wait. Ada? Dad! You’re making out with Ada?! That’s cool, I guess.”
I glanced around Joe’s shoulder and cringed. There were at least six teen girls watching and laughing. Kendall leaned back in the car and kissed the girl in the front seat on the mouth before closing the door and walking towards me and her father.
I grabbed her as soon as she was close enough. “Was that...?”
She nodded, cheeks going darker red than I’d ever seen. “Um... I’m going to go up to my room and pretend I didn’t see my dad making out with someone. Bye.”
I tugged her in for a quick hug and shook her a little. “I’m so happy for you, Kenny. Tell me everything later?”
She glanced at her dad and nodded before running into the house. The door slammed and I turned to Joe, not sure what to expect. He’d just seen his daughter kiss a girl and I was pretty sure he had no idea she was gay.
His face was pinched in anger. I prepared myself to hear something terrible and got ready to fight to my firing for Kendall.
Joe turned away from me and paced the driveway in front of the garage.
“Was that her first kiss? Has she been kissing people? She’s a kid!
Jesus, she’s kissing people. I think I’m going to have a stroke. I’m not ready for this.”
I didn’t even realize I was smiling at him like an idiot until he stopped pacing and glared at me.
I charged him and wrapped him a tight hug, even though my arms wouldn’t reach all the way around him.
I pressed an embarrassing amount of kisses to his face and only pulled back when he wasn’t frowning anymore.
“What the hell was that?” He was fighting a smile and even made a big show of wiping his face.
“You’re not so bad after all, Joe.”
“You’re nuts. One of these days I’m going to wake up and you’re going to be standing over me with a clown mask and a bat.
You’re way too fucking happy all the time and you don’t make any sense.
You’re so goddamn bossy and everyone around you just listens because you smile that pretty little smile at them and you’re driving me crazy.
You know that?” He growled out the words and then studied my face like he thought he’d hurt my feelings.
When I just kept smiling, he shook his head. “You’re absolutely nuts. I have to go.”
I kissed his cheek one more time and then backed towards the house. “See you later, Joey.”
He paused. “Unless you want to...”
I laughed and shook my head. “I’m busy, Joey. We can’t all take so much time off of work, you know?”
His growls of frustration followed me into the house.