Page 42 of Contracted and Claimed By The Boss

And he would, he reassured himself quickly, determined not to worry about something he wouldn’t allow to become a problem.

Besides, by the time Paige had to leave, he’d have worked her out of his system. It was just the newness of this. The connecting with someone after a period of such isolation and celibacy. Of course that was drugging and hypnotic. It wasn’t really about Paige at all, so much as how pleasant it was to have another adult in his life to share things with.

Temporarily.

Only right now, that other adult was doing her level best to avoid him, and he was fed up with it.

Max Stone was not a man to be ignored.

Growing up, Paige had been surrounded by luxury, from the hotels she’d stayed at on location to the Hills home her parents had bought. But this was a whole other level. From the private jet to the limousine that had brought them through the stunning, modern city of Singapore and to this old-fashioned hotel on the harbour, to the presidential suite that was brimming with grandeur and classic elegance. It was also enormous, boasting four huge bedrooms, each with their own palatial bathroom, a ten-person dining table in the intimidatingly formal dining room, a small home cinema, a state-of-the-art kitchen and plush lounge room. There were several balconies, each boasting glorious views of the city in one direction and the water the other, so every angle held a feast for the eyes.

It was a level of decadence that Paige might have enjoyed if it weren’t for her frustration with Max.

She knew what he was doing, and why. This was a knee-jerk reaction to what had happened with Amanda at school, and she supposed it was understandable that he’d respond this way. He could afford to, and there was no harm that could come from it. Probably. At least, not to Amanda.

But for Paige, it was the absolute opposite of what she’d wanted.

She’d taken the assignment in the far-flung Australian outback to get away from this sort of built-up civilisation. She’d wanted to be as removed as possible from the tabloids and TV shows, from the possibility of being recognised, of seeing herself on a book cover.

And instead, he’d brought her into the lion’s den.

Which he had every right to do.

When she’d accepted this job, she hadn’t specified an aversion to travel. This had been reasonably foreseeable, in fact, given Max’s situation. She’d often accompanied families on holiday. And until now, that hadn’t been such a troublesome concept. But Paige wanted, desperately, to hide out. To hide away.

And on the farm, in his tree house, she’d come to feel safe.

With just Max and Amanda forming the walls of her world, she’d felt in control of who she was, of how she was perceived.

This trip put her right out there again. Max probably hadn’t even noticed but Paige had been horribly aware of lingering stares, of people looking at her today, wondering where they’d seen her, just as Max had. She felt more exposed than she’d been in years, all because of Max.

It was a blessing that no one had actually come up to her and asked if she was Aria Gray, but that didn’t mean some enterprising person hadn’t used their phone to snap a picture, which they’d on-sell to a tabloid paper, and the media frenzy would begin again, but worse, because she’d been with Max and Amanda and the possibility of their being linked would add so much fuel to the fire. All Paige wanted was a quiet life—and she would never have that if she was in a job that would involve this kind of trip.

She curled her fingers around the railing, breathing in the humid, tropical air, wishing with all that she was that she was back in Australia, or, really, anywhere other than this.

Misgiving swirled inside her and she couldn’t quite put her finger on why she should be so annoyed with Max. True, he’d thrown her into a situation she’d specifically wished to avoid, but this was still Paige’s job. He hadn’t asked her to do anything outside the bounds of normal nannying work. He had simply been acting in what he perceived to be Amanda’s best interests.

And not Paige’s.

Realisation dawned and Paige made a little noise of surprise.

He had booked this trip without considering Paige. She’d told him about her life, her parents, the book, why she’d taken a job on the edges of the earth, and he’d booked this trip anyway.

He hadn’t thought about how this might affect her.

And why should he have?

They were just sleeping together. They’d both been abundantly clear on that score. Why should he factor in Paige’s needs at all? Let alone allow her needs to influence his plans? That would speak to a more significant relationship, to his actually caring about her; and that wasn’t what their relationship was.

She swallowed past a wretched lump in her throat, surprised at how deep that wound went, at how his actions had been able to cut her deeply.

Worry began to fray the edges of her mind.

Worry because her whole philosophy in life was predicated on emotional detachment, on having the ability to control her connections to people and walk away whenever she needed to.

What if that was in jeopardy now?

She’d become good at caring for children without letting them claw too deep inside her heart. She clearly delineated what she did—as a job—and while she gave herself to it one hundred per cent, she never forgot her place, never forgot that she’d be moving on.

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