Page 86 of Nanny and the Beast

“I know you did,” he replies. “But the thought of a box of chocolates made me feel better.”

I sit across from him. He’s still glancing out of the window.

“Do you still keep tabs on her?” I ask.

“I want to say no,” he replies.

“So that’s a yes.”

“I don’t understand it, man,” he says. “I thought I would be able to move on by now. People always say that you heal with time, right? But if anything, my obsession has only gotten worse. Sometimes, I feel like I can’t even breathe.”

He blinks rapidly, like he’s trying hard to pull himself together.

“She really left her mark on you, huh?” I ask.

“I hate her with every fiber of my being,” he says. “She’s the most self-absorbed woman I ever had the displeasure of meeting.”

There’s pure malice in his eyes now as he talks about her.

That’s something I can relate to.

It feels better to focus on the anger than the pain. Anger feels like something you have control over. It feels like something you can wield. But pain is something that a man is powerless against.

“Do you want to talk about it?” I ask.

“She’s dead to me,” he says. “There’s nothing to talk about.”

There’s conflict on his face, like his mind and his heart are at war.

I’ve never been good with words. I never know the right thing to say. So I just sit across from him. We stare out of the window together until the private jet lands.

There’s a black Range Rover waiting for us on the tarmac.

Alaric gets into the driver’s seat and enters the location in the GPS.

“Have you been to this location before?” I ask him.

“A couple of times,” he says. “The meetings are mostly held in New York City or LA, though.”

As one of the brothers of the Resistance, Alaric attends the international meetings as well. The organization prefers to discuss things in person because of the confidential nature of the information.

“Do we know what this meeting is going to be about?” I ask him.

“I know about as much as you do,” he says.

“I just like to be prepared,” I say, glancing out of the window as we pass through the streets of New Orleans.

“You’re nervous, aren’t you?” he asks, looking over at me.

“Why do you think I’m nervous?”

“Because I know you,” he says. “And I know you don’t enjoy being among large groups of people, especially when it’s not work related.”

I can’t even lie to this man. He knows me too well.

“Maybe I’m a little nervous,” I say.

“If it makes you feel any better, nothing’s expected of you in the meeting,” he says. “There’s just going to be a briefing about the cases, both old and new.”

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