Page 28 of Even if It Hurts

“Which is fine,” she hurried to assure me at the gruff question, “but I don’t know how you expect me to help you when I only worked for you for a day.”

“I didn’t fire you.”

A soft sound that was equal parts frustration and amusement left her. “You were mad at me, and you very irritably told me to give you the receipts of the things I bought?—”

“Which you didn’t,” I said over her, but she continued speaking as if I hadn’t.

“—then told me to leave.”

I waited for her to go on, but when she didn’t, I ground out, “Leave, as infor the night.”

“That was not the implication either of the times you demanded I leave, Mr. Briggs.”

“My name is Asher,” I reminded her, trying and failing to speak to her in the same gentle tone she continuously offered me. “And whatever you took from my words and tone, I assure you, it wasn’t meant to be there. When you left my apartment this evening, I fully expected you to be back in the morning.”

I left out the part about me starting a mental countdown as soon as she’d left.

A hesitant sigh started leaving her but cut short when Kaia’s next scream came through even louder than the others, causing me to wince.

“How long did you say she’s been like that?” Lainey asked.

“Since you left,” I informed her. “Wouldn’t eat. Won’t sleep.” When Lainey didn’t offer advice or reply in any way, I added, “I’ve never asked someone for help before. Don’t make me ask again.”

And yet, the longer I waited for a response from her, my lips parted to do exactly that just as she abruptly said, “I’m on my way,” before ending the call.

Igot to Asher’s apartment building much faster than the first time I’d driven there and back. Then again, I was driving in the middle of the night versus rush hour traffic. But that wasn’t the biggest difference in my drives to or from downtown Dallas in the past twenty-four hours. It was that I felt like I couldn’t get there fast enough when just hours before, I hadn’t been able to get away quick enough to hide how oddly devastated I’d been over losing that job.

Sure, it wasn’t what I wanted to do forever, and it’d only been a day, but I’d loved it.

I’d loved learning everything I could about Kaia’s age and what she should be doing at this point in her young life. I’d loved the time of trying to get her to crawl toward me and reading to her. I’d loved just holding her and trying to soothe her, even though her cries had worn on my heart and nerves. And, if I was being honest with myself, I’d loved knowing that I’d foundhim.

But with a few cruelly delivered words and cold looks, it had been taken away from me as quickly as it had been offered to me.

I’d made it to Jackson’s apartment before falling into his arms and crying over losing a potentially amazing opportunity—then again, I might’ve just been exhausted from the day withKaia. And after holding me for long minutes, Jackson had uttered the most unexpected words.

“You’ll find something else.”

Not a word about the farm. No more jabs about how teaching and being a nanny wasn’tme. He’d offered comfort and understanding the way he always had, but in a time I’d least expected him to.

And now I was back.

Once the smirking doorman got me onto the elevator, and I was heading up to the top of the luxurious skyscraper, I wondered if all Jackson’s comfort and understanding would still be waiting for me the next time I talked to him.

But all thoughts of my boyfriend fled the second I stepped off the elevator and was met with a stone-faced Asher Briggs and a pitifully crying Kaia.

“Why?” was all he said as he stared at me—glared. He was glaring.

It was unnerving.

“Why did I think you fired me?” I asked as I reached for Kaia when he held her out to me. “I already?—”

“No,” he ground out.

I see we’re back to cutting me off.

“Why is she doing this?”

“Babies cry,” I said, repeating my words from our call not long before.

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