CHAPTER 13
Finn
Shit, what if she’s stealing the silver? It’s probably a good thing I don’t have any.
I find that I’m jogging more than walking toward my house. And then my jog turns into a run, and when I burst through the front door, my heart is pounding.
I stop in my tracks and put my hand on my chest to feel the thud. My normal resting heartrate is forty-eight beats a minute. I can hold my breath underwater for four minutes. I’ve run fifteen ultra marathons, and I’m one of just twenty people who’ve ever finished the infamous Barkley race.
My heart doesn’t pound from a short jog across the Yosemite Ranch compound.
Until now.
My heart begins to slow, but then I cross the foyer, get a look at the living room, and I feel my blood pressure rise. The room is different. A bit empty. A lot empty. Wait, did she steal some of the furniture?
What has she done?
I take a few more steps inside. She’s changed my whole living room! A quick scan reassures me that all the furniture is here. The rug is here. The television is still on the wall.
But the remote controls are lined up on the end table. I’ve never seen them there. And there definitely are missing things, but I can’t quite pinpoint what was here when I left this morning.
What has she done to the other rooms?
I go into my office and breathe a sigh of relief. Everything’s exactly the way I left it. I open my desk drawers to find that the wad of one-hundred-dollar bills I keep there for emergencies hasn’t been moved, and neither has the bottle of Clase Azul tequila I keep for even bigger emergencies.
I check the garage. My Jeep and SUV are still there, but the laundry room is all jacked up. Where are the piles of dirty clothes on the floor? The washers and the dryers are running at the same time, and it’s an unnerving sound. I’m not used to it. I don’t like it.
The kitchen!
I screech to a halt and go perfectly still, my whole body on alert. I was right. Emma has stolen all our dishes. Where’s all the shit that was on the counters? What’s missing? I’m disoriented. And what’s that sound?
I look down to see both dishwashers running, their lights flashing like the dash of Declan’s Bell Long Ranger helicopter. This is just wrong. It smells weird in here too, something like fresh citrus.
My eyes go to the refrigerator. Oh, hell no. I take a few steps, grab the handle, and prepare myself. I throw it open. I immediately slam it shut.
This is an act of aggression. This is not going to work.
The last time the house looked like this was the day we moved in. What’s does Emma think she’s doing? Wait. I know exactly what she’s doing—she’s disrupting our way of life. She’s disrespecting our traditions!
Bony-assed Emma is invading our personal space and fucking up our playhouse.
I need to put an end to this. Right now.
“Emma!” I wait but hear no response. I make a half turn and yell the other way. “Emma!” Nothing.
Maybe she can’t hear me over the whirring and rumbling of the damn appliances.
I step back into the living room and listen for her.
Only silence. I wonder if she’s taken off with all the dishes and called it a job well done.
That would be typical. She moves around all our shit then hits the road because the job requires actual effort, and she couldn’t find any silver to thieve.
My heart is doing the racing thing again, even though I’m standing in place.
I catch my image in the foyer mirror, then step closer.
My face is contorted like I’m in pain, which is ridiculous.
Maybe I’m supposed to have clean kitchen counters.
And if I decide that’s not what I want, I’ll ask Emma not to clean them again.
Fixed.
After all, I’m the boss. She works for me. I can fire her if she doesn’t have it on lock, just like Summer said.
I can work with Emma, show her what I need. I have lots of experience working with skittish fillies.
I decide to search for her upstairs, where I can give her a talking-to about respecting the personal space of the family who employs her. Halfway up the steps, I hear her voice. When I get to the top, I realize she’s in Jasmine’s room and she’s talking to someone.
“What about this?” I hear her ask. “You want this as a ‘now’ toy or in the memory box or the donation bag?”
“Uh… memory box. My dad gave me that for my sixth birthday.”
“Memory box it is,” Emma says.
She’s talking to my daughter.
Being alone with my daughter is against every one of the fucking rules.
What the fuck? She’s not supposed to be anywhere near my daughter!
“My room is going to be so pretty,” I hear Jasmine say, as I sneak up to the bedroom door.
“It’s good when everything’s in its place and you don’t have to hunt for what you want. You’ll be able to enjoy all these nice things even more.”
I step in to Jasmine’s doorway. She and Emma are sitting cross-legged on the floor with their backs to me, surrounded by Jasmine’s belongings. They’re studying each item and deciding how to categorize it.
“Excuse me.”
Emma startles. Jasmine smiles wide, hops up, and squeezes me in a tight hug.
“Emma’s helping me with my room! I’m going to have a pretty house just like my friend Tiffany. Can we invite her to come for a sleepover?”
“Uh…sure.”
I’m caught off guard at how happy Jasmine is. How many times have I told myself that my only wish in life is for my daughter to be happy? But not like this. I don’t want her happy because she’s enjoying unsupervised contact with a stranger. “Aren’t you supposed to be helping Aunt Phyllis?”
“It’s the day her hairdresser comes over. I got bored and came back home, and Emma’s helping me organize my room!”
I let my eyes go to Emma. She’s still cross-legged on the floor, turned slightly away and looking down. It looks like she’s inspecting the carpet fibers. That’s when it hits me…
I’m seeing the carpet in Jasmine’s room. I’d forgotten what it looks like.
I pat Jasmine on her upper arm. “How about you go back over to Grandpa’s and get a couple of his secret cream sodas and bring them back over here? Do you remember where his hiding place is?”
“In the basement behind the paint cans, but do I have to go right now?”
I nod. “The organizing can wait. Cream soda cannot.”
Jasmine’s face lights up. “He’s got Nutter Butters back there too. Should I get those?”
“You have to ask?” I ruffle her hair.
“Okay, Dad! I’ll bring back three cream sodas so we can all have one. Be right back, Emma!”
I watch her run out the door. I listen for the sound of her feet on the stairs and the opening and closing of the front door.
I turn to Emma, whose gaze has moved from the carpet to me. She knows I’m upset. Her face has reddened, and her chest is splotchy. She rubs at it absentmindedly.
“You agreed to the rules.” I’m trying to keep my voice calm. “I gave you that list. You reviewed it and agreed to the terms. I was very clear that you’re not to be alone with Jasmine until your background check is completed.”
“She… she just showed up while I was cleaning, Mr. MacLaine. I though you knew that she’d left Phyllis’s house. I thought maybe you brought her here and were downstairs in your office or something.”
Her face is growing redder and her chest splotchier by the second.
“That’s not an excuse. And don’t call me mister anything. My name is Finn.”
It is an excuse, though, isn’t it? She’s right—it’s a perfectly reasonable assumption to make. And it’s a perfectly polite thing to do to call your boss mister until he tells you otherwise.
I’m behaving like a complete dick, but this is about the safety of my daughter. So I find myself doubling down.
“Jasmine is my only child. She’s the most important thing in my life.”
Emma nods, her huge, dark eyes still on me.
“You’ve just waltzed in here and started breaking all the rules.
I can’t even find my stuff! The kitchen looks like it’s been sanitized for my protection!
And here you are, boxing up my daughter’s toys?
Are you kidding me? The toys I bought for her and that have sentimental value to us both? That takes a lot of nerve.”
“I…” She starts, but emotion makes her choke back whatever words she was planning to say.
I’m an ass. But Emma just broke the rules regarding my little girl.
Emma has fucked up my perfectly ordered world.
“Sorry.” She chokes out her apology.
“Sorry’s not good enough. I can’t have someone working in my home, sleeping down the hall from my daughter, who does not respect our privacy.”
She nods. A single tear rolls down her cheek, and I want to punch myself in the face. In this moment, I want to take it all back, tell her I’m an idiot, because only an idiot would get mad about cleared counters and a tidy and organized little girl’s room.
But I don’t say any of that. I stand with my fists clenched at my sides, my heart pounding, in a general state of rage. Emma rises from the floor and stands before me in sweatpants and a men’s undershirt. There isn’t a lick of makeup on her face, and her hair has dried naturally.
Even with the red splotches—which I’m responsible for—she’s the most beautiful woman I’ve ever seen.
“You’ll have to leave,” I whisper, barely aware that I’ve spoken.
Emma gasps and runs from Jasmine’s room.