Page 7 of Love and Other Champagne Problems

“He has been made aware of anincidenttonight.”

Which meant she downplayed it with my potential suitor as much as possible. Of course. “Why do you trustmenot to do anything else?”

“Because your shock factor has been used up.” My mother gave me a challenging look. “There’s nothing elseto prove. It isn’t as if you kissed him because you’retryingto sabotage your chances with Aaron. You were trying to prove a point to Ms. Jennings. You just don’t think things through.”

To this, I said nothing.

“Besides, Mr. Pennington has seen youreccentricitiesfirsthand and took them in stride,” my father said, his nerves melting into a pleased excitement. “He has proved to be unflappable.”

“So far,” I murmured, staring him down. We’d only had one interaction, to be fair. Sure, it had flare, but it was only the tip of the iceberg. I was sure I could make him flap if I tried hard enough.

Mr. Pennington shifted uncomfortably in his seat, as if he could see the thought in my eyes.

“Whenever you leave the hotel, you are to take Mr. Pennington with you,” my mother said, now diving into the rules. “That means going to Nancy’s, any trips to town, he’s to go with you. We’ll speak with his shift manager so that Mr. Pennington has a free pass if you request him. And please—listen to us, Margot.”

It was ironic to me how they treated me as a rebellious teenager now, when I was well past those years. I wondered if they ever regretted how things had unfolded, if only because they realized they’d wasted my prime manipulation years. If they’d paid more attention to me when I was younger, perhaps I would’ve been more desperate to please them now, and they wouldn’t have to go to such lengths as to hire me a babysitter. Perhaps they would’ve effectively brainwashed me into marrying Aaron Astor willingly and not had toextort me into it.

Instead, they’d set me to boarding school during those younger years.

But even though they hadn’t sunk their teeth into me fully, they’d bitten in enough. I might not have been the happy robot they wanted me to be, but in the end, I still did what they wanted.

“Not to Nancy’s.” I leaned my elbow on to the table’s surface. There was another fuzz on this sleeve, and when my eye caught it, something like panic fluttered behind my ribs. I laid my arm flat to obscure it. “It isn’t as if I’d do anything impulsive there. And no one would even be around to see. Not…” I hated the way slight desperation leaked into my voice. “Not to Nancy’s.”

I could tell my mother wanted to refuse. Of course she did. But as my one and only condition, how could she? “Not to Nancy’s,” she allowed. “But you’re to go straight there and back. We’ll be checking your car’s GPS, if need be.”

I let out a small breath at the victory, pulling myself back together. “I’ll drag around a babysitter to keep me in check. I would hate to do anything to unintentionally ruin my chances withtheAaron Astor.”

My parents exchanged a brief look. The derision in my tone was not missed.

“Mr. Pennington, if you ever need a break, or a sick day, please let us know.”

Again, he nodded to my mother. His wordlessness was beginning to irk me, but it was clear they’d met before this. They’d probably already talked about the requirements, the concerns, the expectations. Everyone in thisroom knew of the predicament except for me. It made me resent the situation so much more.

“I suppose we’ll start now,” my mother said, and gestured her palms at us. “Margot, don’t antagonize him or run him ragged. Do I make myself clear?”

I raised my eyebrows once. “Very.” With the politest tone I could muster, I said to my parents, “Thank you for hiring a friend for me. It’s very touching. I’ll try my absolute hardest to not disappoint you.”

My father’s reaction came by way of a furrowed brow, and my mother was not appeased by my words. “You may head back to your room for the night.” She sounded like a mother, putting a child in time out. I suppose that was the case, though. The only difference was that once she sent me to my room, she never came back to let me out. I always saw to that myself.

Without another word, I departed from their office, not surprised to find Mr. Pennington already on my heels. So, it began now.

The hallway, strangely enough, felt stuffier the moment we stepped into it, as if the office air had been lighter and clearer. Perhaps it was because the hallway was more closed off, with no windows to let light in. All we had was the ugly florescent glow to shine down on us, illuminating our new relationship—baby and babysitter.

Mr. Pennington pulled the door shut behind us, his teeth grazing along his bottom lip as he did so. “I thought I liked you,” I said to him.

“And you don’t anymore?”

“If my parents like you, it means I most likely will not.” I looked him over slowly, from his eyes to thetoes of his shoes. I was once more confronted with the disappointing revelation that the shiny new toy that piqued my interest turned out to be nothing more than another cog in my parents’ machine. It figured—the one person who’d caught the slightest bit of my intrigue had been ensnared by my parents first. “How did you win them over so fast? No, better question—how much are they paying you to babysit their problem child?”

“They may be paying me,” he began. Weirdly enough, he looked almosthappyas he regarded me, like an eager student on their first day of school. The lightheartedness about him practically seeped from those blue eyes, exuding an energy that felt near impossible to remain frustrated with. “But I hope that doesn’t change your mind about me too much. I hope we can still get to know each other… pleasantly.”

Pleasantly. It was an interesting word choice; a word rarely ever used to describe me.

And before I could reply, the happiness had indeed leached from his gaze to the rest of his face, and Mr. Pennington smiled. With over a decade of watching facial expressions under my belt, I’d quickly learned how to detect a genuine smile from a fake one. Mr. Pennington’s smile, in all its glory, was real. The first real smile I’d received in a long, long time.

I wasn’t sure I liked it.

I started down the corridor from my parents’ office, back toward the common space of the hotel lobby. Mr. Pennington’s footsteps in his generic loafers continued after me faithfully, all the way through the lobby and into the elevators.

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