Page 26 of The Nanny Next Door

Maybe we would have gone again if it wasn’t so late, if I didn’t have to be up early in the morning. Instead, when we’d finally accepted defeat, Felipe’s jaw cracking with the strength of his yawns, I made him kiss me goodnight, and he made it linger, telling me in a whisper, “I would love nothing more than to kiss these perfect lips forever.” My heart wanted to explode.

Though my body was perfectly exhausted and deliciously sore, I was too wired, too filled with excited joy to fall asleep just yet, even as I heard Felipe’s breathing even out beside me. So, instead of rolling over and closing my eyes, I reached for my phone on the nightstand, opening my group-text with Gina and Christine.

Lila: Big news, guys…

A bubble with three typing dots popped up immediately, and Gina’s message came through first.

Gina: Pls tell me you hit that delicious Chilean billionaire

Christine: OMG DID Y’ALL BANG

It was hard to keep from laughing. Surely, it would be a loud, snorting kind of laugh, and I didn’t want to wake Felipe. Instead, I muffled my giggles as I shook against the mattress, and he stirred but didn’t rouse.

Lila: You guys can retire from your mission now. Lila Dawson is a virgin no longer!

My screen lit up with multicolored balloons, my friends having too much fun with the message effects. But no part of me was embarrassed by their excitement. I hugged my phone to my chest and lay back beside Felipe, smiling so hard my cheeks hurt.

17

MILES

When Lila arrived at the house bright and early for family day, her hair was disheveled, her eyes smudged with leftover makeup, and there was a faint red hickey on her neck. Clearly, someone had had an eventful night.

Right. That must have been the aftermath of her date with Felipe. My best friend, and now the man I envied most in the world. Every time I thought about them together, a sharp pang of jealousy and longing surged through me, twisting my insides. Not that I begrudged Felipe his happiness—but Christ, I needed to get my attraction to Lila Dawson under control.

"Good morning," Lila greeted, her voice bright. Her smile was radiant, and even with her smudged makeup, she looked effortlessly beautiful. Was I imagining the added pep in her demeanor, or had her date with Felipe really been so great?

"Olivia is in her playroom," I replied abruptly, trying to keep my tone neutral. Lila frowned, but I pushed through, wanting to get this day started already. “She’s, uh, excited about Family Day.” I cleared my throat, avoiding Lila’s chocolate brown eyes despite my natural inclination to gaze into them.

“Yeah, me too,” Lila said slowly. Clearly, she could sense that something was off, but perhaps the near-miss almost-kiss that time she hugged me had taught her not to pry. “I’ll, uh, go get her ready, and we can head out.”

“Fine,” I said.

As she walked away, her perfume lingered in the air, sweet as candy and painfully her. I watched Lila disappear around the corner, struggling to fall back into my compartmentalization habits that had always kept me safe. But Lila Dawson was a big, red DANGER sign, jumbling my neat brain into a mess of confusion. She stirred feelings in me that I thought were buried with Janessa, and that terrified me to no end.

Lila and I both preferred to travel by subway, so as we walked to the station, I carried the neatly-packed bag of Olivia’s things and the quaint picnic basket while Lila held my daughter’s hand. The train itself was crowded, the usual cacophony of city sounds and voices enveloping us the second we stepped into the car. Olivia was excited, her chatter filling the space between us, and she surprised me by grabbing my hand in the small one she still had free, creating a link between Lila and me.

“I love the park, Daddy,” she said just to me as we found a place to stand, sounding more than a little shy. My chest tightened. My own child was afraid to talk to me, even about something so simple, and I knew it was my fault. Today was supposed to be the first step toward fixing it.

“I know, sweetheart,” I said slowly. “You’re going to have lots of fun today.”

It was the best I could come up with, flat and unenthused as it was, but Olivia smiled like I’d told her I was buying her a pony. My poor child, so easily impressed by the bare minimum of attention from her father. Guilt was a bitter taste in my mouth, but I told myself I was trying—a truth that went down easier when Lila gave me an encouraging nod.

As we swayed with the motion of the train, Lila knelt beside Olivia, whispering silliness into her ear and making her giggle with mirth. I marveled at her ease with my daughter. She made it look so effortless, the way she engaged with Olivia on a human, equal level rather than as an authority figure or someone to fear. I watched them closely, as if trying to gather tips for being warmer and more involved with my child—I was a scientist through and through, and evidence-gathering was my greatest asset.

As we neared our stop, a kind older woman seated across from us began to take notice. She wore a bright purple pair of glasses on her prominent nose, a colorful scarf wrapped snugly around her neck. Her watery blue eyes met mine across the aisle with interest. "What a beautiful family you have," she said, her voice warm and sincere as she looked at Lila, Olivia, and me.

The comment hit me like a knife to the heart. To this outsider, we looked whole, unmarred by the loss that was still so hard for me to shake. This woman maybe even thought that Lila Dawson was my wife, that Olivia was our adopted child, with her deep skin tone and thick curls that favored neither Lila’s golden paleness nor my lab-grown pallor. For a second, the idea of it was overwhelmingly beautiful to me—Lila as Olivia’s adoptive mother and my partner, the brightness to pull me from the shadows. It was so appealing, in fact, that something came over me, and rather than correcting the stranger on the train, I pulled Lila under my arm and said, “Thank you.”

I felt Lila stiffen in surprise for a split second. But then she relaxed, her hand coming to rest on my chest as if we were indeed a couple. “Thanks so much,” Lila agreed, smiling up at me with a genuine sweetness that made me stop breathing for a second. It was a charade, of course, and I knew that. But for a moment, with Lila pressed against me, it felt so natural, so right. Her touch was warm, and I could feel her heartbeat against my side, syncing with mine.

When we got off the train and Olivia ran a few steps in front of us, the park in sight and her excitement uncontainable, Lila looked up at me with a playful glint in her eye. "So, we're a family now, huh?"

Embarrassed and overwhelmed and surprisingly happy, I laughed. Damn, it had been a long time since I’d laughed—that was, until this surprising young woman had stepped into my life. Lila laughed too, a musical sound that made my heart feel like a helium balloon. The tension between us seemed to break for the first time all morning.

"Sorry, sorry. It just seemed easier than trying to explain, so I thought I’d let her have her fantasy for a second.” I looked down at Lila walking next to me, feeling strangely giddy. She was watching me, smiling softly as if she had something to say. “What?” I asked.

"I was just thinking that you have a really cute laugh," she told me shyly.

---