Chapter 7 – Bellamy #2
“Fine. We’re new to each other and new at this.
Truth, I don’t care if you like me. You’re hardly my favorite person either.
I’m here because you forced me to be. But you don’t have to be a jerk just because you can be.
I’m not playing a game. If I do a job, I do it right and with everything that I am.
I worry he’ll fall. Those stairs are made of ancient stone. ”
He tilts his head, studying me further. “You’re genuinely worried about him? You just met him.”
“So?” I snap, scowling at him, hands on my hips because I’m annoyed at how much I want to touch him instead. He still has those purple stains beneath his eyes. I digress. “He’s a small boy. Of course I’m worried. Plus, he’s my charge.” And too cute for words.
He glares, nonplussed. The severity of it has me shifting my weight. After a long, tense beat where I refuse to break eye contact, the king shakes himself out of whatever thoughts are storming through his mind. “Listen, you need to wear something less…”
“Less? I thought you just said more?” I press, smiling sweetly when he leaves that hanging.
“Less transparent,” he grits out as if the words are poison in his mouth.
Oh. Transparent. I hadn’t realized that.
I mean, I knew my shirt was pushing the mark on thin, but transparent…
eeek. That was not my intention. Nothing like flashing the king of Messalina and his children first thing in the morning to start your day.
Then again, it’s the most action my breasts have gotten… well…ever.
Virgin territory, so to speak.
Even so, he has a point. I’m the nanny, and dressing appropriately comes with that.
My arms fold over my breasts. “My apologies, Your Majesty. I’ll be sure to wear something more suitable to bed next time. I didn’t realize your children would come in so early.”
He sighs. An unhappy sigh. “Suddenly you’re agreeable?”
“Consider it a gift. I didn’t exactly mean to flash you my tits.”
His eyebrows shoot up to his hairline at my vulgar use of language.
He curses under his breath in Latin and then clears his throat. “The prime minister is coming today and staying the week. Stay out of our way. Keep the children occupied and away from us.”
“The prime minister?” I still don’t know how to wrap my head around all this. I mean, at my core, I consider myself an American. So, to me, this is the equivalent of meeting the president and King Charles—if he were young and seriously hot—at the same time.”
“Yes. The prime minister. I’m speaking in English, so I know you understand me.”
“Don’t bait me,” I throw his words back at him, and he growls like the beast he is.
“For fuck’s sake.” He runs an agitated hand through his hair, and I wish he hadn’t because now it’s all messed up whereas before it was pure delicious perfection. “Shut your mouth and listen for once. This is not a joke. I mean it, stay away from him.”
The roughness of his voice and the on-edge, slightly wild way his eyes bore into mine tell me he doesn’t like the man.
I never voted for him. I’m not a Messalinian citizen.
I think I’m still technically a US citizen, but they’re way cooler about that stuff here than they are in the United States.
All I know about the prime minister is that he’s young, handsome, and refined.
Sort of like our king, but not nearly as broody and godlike. What is it about grumpy, broody, gorgeous men that turns panties into ashes?
“Okay, Sebastian. Got it. Stay away from the prime minister.”
I realize I just called him Sebastian instead of Your Majesty or sir, and it’s not lost on him either.
In a flash, he presses his forearms onto either side of the doorway, caging me in my room.
Have I mentioned how good he smells? Or how fucking dangerous it feels when he stands like that, looming predatorily over me?
My vagina seriously needs to get a clue that he’s a no-go for action and penetration.
Shame, my cherry could use a good popping by this point. But for real, I need to get a grip, and I need to get it fast. He’s not a safe man.
“Sebastian?” He raises his eyebrows. I’ve shocked a king, and now my day is complete. “Is this part of some game you’re playing?”
“No game. It simply slipped out.”
He doesn’t look convinced.
“I liked calling you that. Am I not allowed? It is your name.”
He continues to stare at me without answering.
Exasperated, I throw my hands up and then remember the boobage situation and quickly re-cover them. “Fine. No Sebastian, even if I liked it. Be thankful I didn’t call you Seb.”
He wheezes out what I think might be a laugh. Holy shit. I think that’s what it is until it’s gone just as fast as it came. A mirage in the desert, maybe I imagined it. Maybe he was having an asthma attack instead.
“Seb?!” He’s shocked. “No. No one has ever called me that.”
“Pity. Maybe a nickname would soften you up a bit.” I roll my eyes when he half snarls at me. “Fine. Forget it, Your Majesty. You seem like you’re not a man to be pushed at this particular moment.”
“I am not.”
“Not excited to see the prime minister, then? Does he have bad news for you?”
“Not that I’m aware of.”
I’m shocked he’s still standing here speaking to me. I would have thought he’d chastise me for my outfit and go. He’s already made it quite clear I’m not his favorite person.
“Still tired? Not much sleep again?”
No answer, but he’s not moving and damn.
“Not into peopling then? I get it. Well, not really. I like peopling, I just don’t have people to people with, if that makes sense.
” I’m babbling. The man makes me as nervous as a cat in a room full of rocking chairs.
“You look handsome though. Be confident in that if nothing else today.” I straighten his tie only to jerk my hands away.
What in the Sam Jesus am I doing touching him? Again!
He emits an incredulous, slightly bemused grunt. I haven’t heard anything close to it from his lips before. It’s husky and a bit rough and makes my skin tingle.
“Are you always this bold and unrefined?”
“Usually,” I admit. No. Never. I simply like pushing his buttons.
“Americans,” he grumbles.
“Yes, we’re quite the breed.”
“Don’t touch me again.”
“Even if you liked it?”
He does that swearing in Latin thing I’ve noticed he does. Probably because he doesn’t know what to make of me. I’m flirting with him, which is absurd but fun all the same simply to see his reaction to it.
Pushing away from the door, he turns and walks away from me, heading down the hall and toward the stairs. “I never said I liked it.”
“You never said you didn’t.” I gnaw on my bottom lip to fight my smile. “Good chat, boss.”
If he’s going to keep me here, give me this bullshit ultimatum, the least I can do is have some fun with him.
Worst case, he fires me. But I don’t think he will unless I seriously fuck up.
I scurry back into my room, take the fastest shower in the history of the world, brush out my long hair, forgo the makeup since I’m running late, and get my ass downstairs.
Everyone is already in the breakfast room eating, so I help myself to a plate and fill it with meat, cheese, baguette, strawberry jam, and a hard-boiled egg.
I take my seat beside Althea, who is very gracious when I ask her if I can crash her yoga sessions.
I talk with the children, asking them a million questions about what their normal days are like.
After breakfast, I feel like I’m getting into a groove.
Phaedra got out the door with minimal whining.
Javier drove her along with royal attendants for her safety to the small building they set up as a school.
Per Emily, the king wanted her homeschooled in the main palace, but she begged and pleaded, and this is how it turned out.
Attending a makeshift school as the only child along with three guards.
I help Zayer get dressed, and Sabrina puts on one of her “princess dresses,” as she calls it, and demands we start playing immediately.
Armed with a thermos of coffee, I feel ready. So far, hanging out with kids all day feels easier and way more fun than teaching them in school.
Or so I thought.
Because I had no clue that by agreeing to a simple game of hide-and-seek, everything was about to get fucked up.
I counted to twenty and then went looking for Sabrina and Zayer. Believing that first of all, they couldn’t have gone all that far in twenty seconds, and that second of all, they’d be easy to find. They’re children, and children make noise. They giggle and call out for you.
Not these children.
Because now I’ve officially been looking for them for an hour.
A freaking hour! And if I didn’t already know after nearly getting lost twice this morning, this palace is huge.
The children are supposed to sit down for lunch in about ten minutes, and I can’t find them.
I coyly—likely not coyly at all—asked Emily if the children have a favorite hiding spot, and she said the palace.
As in the entire palace. Then she gave me a good-luck pat on the shoulder before going back to her job.
Althea’s answer was something similar.
At this rate, it will take me years to explore every possible place they could be.
But them being lost isn’t the only issue.
The prime minister is here, along with some parliament members, and they’re situated in the smaller ballroom that just so happens to be smack-dab in the center of the palace on the second floor by the grand staircase.
So I can’t call out to the children as I normally would on the second floor or even the first, since sound carries in this place.
Even behind closed doors, I have no doubt they’d hear me.
I’ve never played hide-and-seek myself, only seen versions of it on television or at school while other children played it.
You have to have siblings or friends for that.
It was me and my parents, and my parents were…
well, I don’t want to use the term stifling since my mother is dead and my father is unwell, but that’s exactly what they were.
So, while I was excited at first to play a game everyone in the world has played but me, now I’m regretting my exuberance to count first.
I’ve officially searched the entire third and first floors except for the king’s forbidden suite. Room after room, and no children.
Now I’m on the second floor, creeping by the king’s study, where I spent my jail time on Saturday, and past his office, a sitting room, and another sitting room, and how many fucking rooms does a palace need?
In any other situation, I’d find this funny.
But there is nothing funny about this, and panic is starting to sink in.
Because if I don’t find them soon, I’m going to have to fess up that I lost the children and that’s why they’re late for lunch. Which is not how you want to start off on your first day.
Slinking past the ballroom, I hear the king speaking heatedly with someone about some sort of bill he won’t sign when I catch a sound. Zayer, thank God. Only instead of giggling, he’s crying as Sabrina shushes him.
“Papa,” he wails. I get on all fours and crawl toward the sound. Peeling back a massive—probably priceless, knowing this place—tapestry, I discover Zayer bleeding from a small cut on his knee. His big, watery blue eyes meet mine, and the tears come out in full force.
“Oh, hey, little man. Shhh. It’s okay,” I soothe, running my hand along his hair while assessing the cut.
“No. Papa!” he screams. “I want Papa!”
Behind me, the door to the ballroom opens, followed by footsteps, and then, “Well, what do we have here?” The prime minister takes me in on all fours in my skirt, a glint to his eyes and a smarmy smirk on his lips.
Beside him is the king, his face hiding none of the rage he’s feeling toward me. No way this ends well for me.