Page 78 of Bad Nanny

He started pacing, looking between me and the puppet as he practically burned a path into the floor. “It all stops. Right now.”

“No.” My fingernails dug into my palms. “You don’t understand it.”

“Instead of focusing on my daughter, you’re playing with your puppets! You’re telling me you’ve never once worked on something with them while she’s been in your care?” He glanced over at my computer that I’d been working on during Delaney’s nap. “I knew this would be a mistake.”

I thought the comment about me playing with my puppets hurt, but calling me a mistake was like he’d reached into my chest and yanked out my heart.

“I’m sorry you feel that way.” I swallowed the lump in my throat. “I’ll start packing tonight.”

He stopped at the door, his hand paused on the handle. “I need to think.”

Stop him,my mind screamed, but I stood there, at a loss for how to fix this. How to fix my family. WasI part of his family? Because my feelings for him and Delaney were as real as anything I had ever felt.

He opened the door to leave, and Honeybun darted in, jumping onto my bed and resting her head on Sarah.

I was glad when Gabriel didn’t look at me as he shut the door behind him. I didn’t want him to see me break.

Chapter 25

Puppet Show

Gabriel

“I’ll start packing tonight.”

Josie’s words played on repeat as I sat on the couch, my whiskey glass forgotten on the counter and the bottle in my hand instead. Everything had been perfect until that fucking barrel of lube had shown up.

I grabbed my phone from the cushion next to me and opened the group text with my brothers.

Me: Josie is Sarah Swoon. I found out via a barrel of lube.

Lex: A barrel of lube? What have you two been getting up to?

Noah: Your cock isn’t big enough to need that much lube.

Me: Didn’t you see what I said? She’sSarah Swoon.

Noah: And...? Did you behave like an asshole about it? Is that why you’re up past your weeknight bedtime?

Lex: For being the big brother CEO, you sure do freak out a lot. Maybe we should discuss me taking the helm.

Me: You’d run the company into the ground.

Lex: Ouch.

Noah: Don’t be an asshole.

Me: That’s my MO tonight. Gabriel Asshole Badden, at your service.

Noah: What did you say?

Me: That I wanted her to stop with the Sarah Swoon stuff...and that this was a mistake.

Noah: What was a mistake?

Me: Her being the nanny, me pursuing something with her.

Noah: You falling in love with her is a mistake?

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