Page 28 of The Billionaire and the Nanny

Lilly Belle snatches the ring from my hand. I feel good to have helped somehow, but then she tosses the fucking thing to the floor and starts crying even harder. What thehell?

“It has to be washed first anyway, Ethan. And kept cool in the fridge. It’s the cold that soothes the gums, but thanks for bringing it. I’ll try using it later.” She paces across the room with the baby while I stand there helpless.

“I brought scones, too, for you whenever you want.” I hold up the bag, knowing that’s going to make her happy to have her favorite blueberry scones, but Penelope only gives me a forced smile then sits in the gliding chair to try a different quieting tactic.

So much for trying to be thoughtful. It didn’t work, but it felt good while it lasted.

* * *

I’m sittingin the living room listening to a podcast on the steel industry when she walks in with Lilly Belle twenty minutes later. “I’m going to try going for a walk with her. I don’t know what’s wrong, and we all need some fresh air. Do you want to come withus?”

As she opens the closet, unfolds the stroller and loads the baby in, all single-handedly while I sit there like a king on his fucking throne, being a useless dick, I think about her question. It’s an easy question, but the answer has all sorts of implications. Yeah, I’d like to walk with her, but do I want everyone seeing us together? No one may know who I am on the train downtown, but at the park across the street there are women. Women who know me, and I know them. I even know some of their husbands. What will they think when they see us all together taking a nicewalk?

Who fucking cares?

Do I care about their feelings or Penelope’s? That sealsit.

“Sure, I’ll go,” I say, slapping closed my iPad case and heading out afterher.

It’s close to sunset and the colors are insane. Orange, yellow, red, and all sorts of amazingness. Though I already went for a walk earlier, this time’s different. We may not talk about it, but it’s clear we’re doing this for the first time—going outside together. In public. The baby quiets immediately. Amazing what a simple trick going outside can do for a crying baby. So many high-tech toys for what? The air is free. The leaves are free. The paved park roads arefree.

I think I even feel a smile emerging on my face. It can’t be. It must be hay fever.

I know Lilly Belle loves the walk, because she’s sucking on the ring I got her. “She loves that chew toy,” I tell Penelope. “We should’ve brought the scones.”

“It’s called a teething ring, not a chew toy.” She laughs.

Penelope pulls out a small bag from her pocket. She breaks off a tiny piece of scone and hands it to Lilly Belle who devours it and asks for more. This woman thinks of everything. So prepared, like a Girl Scout. She offers me one. “You know, I’m amazed by your resourcefulness,” I tell her. I saw her getting the stroller ready, multi-tasking like she had eight arms. I’m amazed by that and so muchmore.

She looks at me funny. I guess I’d look at me funny too if I suddenly started paying her compliments. “Thanks.”

We come upon the play area, and I start dreading who I’m going to run into. Right away, I see a few mothers, and it’s a sad day when I can’t remember which ones I’ve slept with and which ones I haven’t. Not proud of it, mindyou.

They all stare at us as we walk past. Somebody mutters, “Well, I’ll be damned. He can be tamed.” I bite my lip pretty hard. We keep walking, heads held high. I don’t think Penelope heard it, but I got it loud and clear. Is that what they think of me? That I’m a wild stallion being domesticated by this young girl? She’s my nanny, for fuck’s sake. Anybody can seethat.

Nobody controls me, not even Penelope.

If that’s what they think is happening, if that’s the reality of our situation, then I’m fucked. I can’t go down that road. It’s a recipe for disaster. I’ve made a mistake coming out here with her. “We should go back. It’s getting late,” Isay

“But we just got here. And this is the most gorgeous time of day.” She closes her eyes, sticking her nose up in the air. “Feel that breeze.”

Fuck, she’s right. It’s an amazing evening. And if it means Lilly Belle feeling better, so she and I can both get a good night’s sleep, I’ll stick it out. I have to get over this. I have to get over my fear of closeness. Behind closed doors is one thing, but when you take it publicly, it’s a whole different ball game. It means it’s serious.

I fight the urge to give the bitchy moms my middle finger.

Luckily, we don’t encounter anyone else who knows me. We venture through a more quiet park of the park where we pass an old couple sitting on a bench together. Penelope nods in greeting, and the couple lean their heads into each other as if sharing a secret.

“We were just saying,” the old fella says, pointing at Lilly Belle with his cane. “That the three of you remind us of us when we were yourage.”

“When we’d just had our first born,” his wife agrees, finishing off applying her lipstick and putting the case away. “Such a happy family.”

A happy family. Is that what theysee?

The ache emerges out of nowhere. It rises right out of my gut and heads straight into my chest where it begins to suffocate me. We’re not a happy family. I don’t have happy family material in me, and this woman by my side is my employee. This child is my sister’s, and all of this was forced on me without my consent.

The magnitude of just how much my life has changed in such little time smacks me hard upside the head, and I find myself fighting for breath. I even separate myself from Penelope and the baby a bit, walking ahead. I’m not part ofthem.

“Ethan, are you okay?” Penelope’s concerned voice reminds me that I need to play it cool, or she’ll start asking questions, making it all worse. When we get back to the house, I can let loose at the gym like a madman, take a long shower, work on financials—anything to erase the significance of this evening’s outing.

A happy family. The potential is evident but still as impossible as it everwas.

It can’t happen. Not with me in the picture as the father or guardian. I won’t subject any children to the pain of life’s cruel reality the way it was subjected on me. Lilly Belle’s been through enough. And she deserves better than what she’sgot.

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