Chapter 16
Chapter Sixteen
Flora
“Good morning,” I called merrily as I entered the kitchen. It was early, so early that Bea hadn’t yet arrived and the children were still sleeping meaning it was me and Maurice.
He looked a little awkward and flustered. “Morning.”
I reached for the kettle and made tea for us both. “Thank you, for last night.”
He looked beyond awkward now. “Last night?” he almost stammered with a slightly awkward expression crossing his face.
“I may have been a little tipsy.” I laughed.
Surely if either of us was going to find this morning difficult, it should have been me, not him.
Unless it was because we had shared another weird, almost kiss moment where he had yet again told me to tell him to stop. I wasn’t sure I had last night though.
“Ah.” The penny dropped. “No problem. Any time. Did you sleep well?” The uneasiness had returned with his last question.
A yawn and a stretch seemed to come out of nowhere, startling us both. “I did, thank you.” I could feel the magnitude of my grin as I recalled lying in bed before sleep. “You?” I asked, wondering if either of us was going to raise the topic of our obvious attraction and strange interactions.
“Eventually,” he replied with a far-off smile that prompted a big, bright, cocky smile from me too, and in that second he seemed to regain his equilibrium. “I enjoyed last night.”
I was thrown slightly, unsure what to say in response. “You did?”
“I did.” He was up on his feet and standing behind me, close enough that his front almost covered my back.
I could smell him and as usual his scent assaulted my senses. In that second I wanted him. My body wanted him, and he knew it.
“We should do it again.”
“Again?”
“Hmmm, all of it.”
“All of it?” I needed to find my confident self again, the one with the upper hand or there was a good chance I’d need to change my knickers before the children woke. Everything was pulsating and preparing for pleasure.
“Every second. We could even make it last a little longer, together.”
Fuck. He knew. “It?” My confidence had clearly gone into hiding or hibernation, not that the latter was likely as it was anything but cold around here.
“It.” He emphasised each sound in the word and if even that wasn’t sexy as fuck.
“It.”
“It.”
I wondered if this conversation was ever going to move forward from us each repeating the word it.
“With a nice bottle of wine and more conversation and everything else from last night.”
Any remaining doubts I might have had about his knowledge of last night disappeared at that very second. He knew. That is why he was a little shaken this morning. He was embarrassed or uncomfortable, but now, he was enjoying this cat and mouse game with me.
“Daddy!” Rosie’s squeal broke the moment and the atmosphere, and not a second too soon for me.
“Until it,” he whispered, so close to my ear that the skin there and all along my neck came up in goosebumps. His hand rested on my hip and as his fingers gently squeezed, I let out a tiny gasp while my body softened and moistened further. Yes, new underwear before breakfast was needed.
“How’s my beautiful girl this morning?” he said and for a second, I wondered if he meant me, but turning, I watched him scoop his daughter up into his arms and not that I thought it was possible, he became even more attractive which was the last thing my imagination, libido, addled mind, or increasingly damp underwear needed.
Bea and I had met up with Carrie for lunch in the park and my mind was anywhere but with them.
I gazed into the distance and watched the children playing with bats and balls.
Not one of them had an accurate aim with the ball or a decent return with the bat, but as they laughed together, none of that mattered. They were happy and having fun.
“Boo!”
“Jeez!” I shrieked, jumping from my seat at the picnic bench in response to Carrie’s immature act.
“Sorry. I didn’t mean to scare you half to death, you just looked deep in thought.”
“Are you okay?” Bea asked, sitting next to me so I was flanked by her and Carrie.
“I’m fine.”
“You’re quiet,” Carrie said.
“She has been all day,” Bea added.
“Bloody hell, the tag team are back.” I laughed, which seemed more like a huff at this moment in time.
“Are you hanging?” Carrie suddenly asked.
“She didn’t look to be when I arrived this morning, her and Maurice were . . . shit! Is it you and Maurice?”
Bea had arrived at the split second he had picked Rosie up meaning she had walked into an atmosphere that was probably thick with sexual tension.
“Did something happen between you two?” Carrie asked, taking what appeared to be her turn to speak.
“We’re all friends here. You can trust us,” Bea said with a sincerity I totally believed. She had been nothing but nice to me since I’d arrived. “I know you’re probably unsure about that, especially after my offhand response when you asked about Sophie, but you really can trust us.”
“Seriously, Flora, it can be lonely if you bottle things up when you’re new to town with no family around you. We are here for you if you want us to be.” Carrie rubbed a hand over mine.
I felt guilty at holding out on them and while I didn’t want to divulge all of the details of what had happened, I did want to share something, if only to try and order things in my head.
“We almost kissed.”
“O-k-ay,” drawled Carrie.
“Like a friendly kiss?” Bea asked.
Her question, while aimed at me was responded to by Carrie with a loud guffaw.
We both turned to look at her. She looked completely unapologetic. “If it was a friendly kiss, we would not be having this conversation.” She turned to me. “Tell us what happened.”
I explained what had happened when I’d returned home. Everything until I went to bed.
“What holds you back?” Carrie asked while Bea said nothing.
“Everything. He scares me and it would be wholly inappropriate. He’s my boss.”
Bea still said nothing, unlike Carrie, “I can relate to that, all of it. I was in exactly the same position with Gabe and look how that turned out.” She grinned and rubbed a hand across her bump.
Bea did speak now. “Carrie, with all due respect, you and Gabe are not the norm. Far from it. I reckon there are hundreds, even thousands of nannies who have fancied their boss, shagged him and then ended up on the wrong side of the fallout.”
I nodded. I agreed with what Bea was saying and although reluctant to, Carrie did too. She didn’t need to say as much, her face said it all.
“So, what’s the advice, ladies?”
“Talk to him and see if there’s a way forward.”
I smiled at Carrie’s optimism.
“I’m going to sound like a bitch now, but what I am about to say is for you, for your wellbeing, professionally and personally.
Do not talk to him in any way that isn’t professional.
Move on. Find a boyfriend or a hobby or anything that doesn’t involve Maurice.
He is a lovely man and a wonderful father, but those children do not deserve to be stuck in the middle of any of this and that is without considering Sophie. ”
“Sophie?” I had no idea why she would impact on anything moving forward as she and Maurice were separated and she had already move on.
“Yes, Sophie. Despite how things are now, she is still their mother and she loves them.”
I was beginning to regret sharing any of this with them.
Was I really being given wise words of advice or being warned off Sophie’s man?
“She might still be their mum, but what I find strange is the lack of an appearance since I’ve been here.
” Unsure where my words or the accusatory tone that carried them had come from, I immediately felt awkward.
Carrie nodded while Bea shook her head. “It’s hard for her.”
I frowned and realised that perhaps Bea and Sophie’s closeness wasn’t in the past and I now suspected that she may be in contact with her. Despite her claims that I could trust her, could I?
Carrie was clearly on the same page as me. “You need to be very careful, Bea, or you may well find yourself on the wrong side of this. You cannot play both sides and come out unscathed.”
Bea considered her, and suddenly this felt different, as though it was nothing to do with me anymore.
“Oh,” Carrie said now as if fully realising that Bea had indeed been playing both sides. “Whilst I can’t say that I know how it feels for Sophie, or how hard it is, I know it’s considerably harder for the kids, so she needs to get her head out of her arse and step up before it’s too late.”
I liked Carrie. I mean, I liked Bea, but I liked that Carrie looked at this from the point of view of the kids who were the truly innocent ones in this.
Bea looked back to me and continued. “I’m just saying, it’s not been very long since the split and it must be hard for him, knowing that she left for another woman. Maybe he sees you as a conquest, an ego boost.”
“Ignore her,” Carrie said with a scowl aimed at Bea. “Her hormones have hardened her to romance and love.”
“And hormones have made you even soppier than before.” Bea looked back at me again. “Only you can decide what you do but be careful with Maurice. He’s lonely . . .” Her voice trailed off and I observed a glance being exchanged between the other two.
“What? If I am missing something here, please enlighten me.”
Carrie looked across at Bea, almost in deference.
“Shit! It seems like a long time ago and it wasn’t anything, not really. A mistake, misunderstanding, call it what you will.”
“Go on.” My guts churned and my head began to pound as I felt nervousness rise.
“When Sophie first left, Maurice struggled. Kind of carried on as normal and some of the responsibility for the children fell to me. More than it should have. Carrie warned me that the lines could blur for him, that he could replace Sophie with me.”
“Right . . .” I felt sick, suspecting what was coming.
Had he done the same with Bea as he was doing with me?
Saying all the right things and I was falling for it, hook, line and sinker, unlike Bea it seemed.
How stupid was I to think he might have liked me as I liked him? That this was in anyway real.
“He, erm, made a couple of passes at me. Clumsy, drunken passes that he apologised for and they were no more than that.”
I nodded, although, I was fighting the urge to cry.
“Are we going home to make biscuits?” asked Rosie as she appeared at my side.
“Yes, we are, so let’s make a move.” Already on my feet, I called Craig over, happy to be leaving this conversation and regretting ever being drawn into it. how was I ever going to make sense of everything now?