Page 21 of Beau Pair
Protective over my daughter.
If that isn’t fucking hot, then I don’t know what hot is.
After some more polite conversation, Zoe and Beau leave the house, and I’m left alone to put Elsie to sleep and wonder if Beau is going out to hook up with someone.
I have no idea what kind of hold this man has on me, but it’s scary to be so possessive over someone I don’t even know that well, and who I can’t get to know better because of how inappropriate and unprofessional it would be.
Despite those facts, I spend the night tossing and turning because I want to know what he’s up to and if he’s spending the night in someone else’s bed instead of his own.
For a few moments, before I manage to close my eyes, I allow myself to dream how perfect he would look in my bed, how warm his body would be against mine. How delicate his hands would be holding me close. How breathtaking his whisper in my ear.
* * *
Saturday comesbefore I know it, and Beau and Elsie have definitely become a team. I’ve never seen her grow this close to anyone other than Dolly or me, so I have no idea how she’ll take it when Dolly takes her home for the next two weeks. Would having Beau as her nanny cause problems for us? Are they growing closer than necessary? Should I cut the umbilical cord while it’s still early enough?
“It’s good that she likes him. Don’t be stupid, Gordon,” Dolly tells me, and I realize I’ve been thinking out loud.
I stop the car at the traffic light and turn to her in the passenger seat.
“Yeah, but what happens when he’s ready to move on? She’ll be devastated,” I reason with her.
Dolly bites her lower lip and smirks at me.
“Are you concerned about Elsie or yourself?”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Oh come on, Gordon. You like him. I saw how you were looking at him when we had dinner together. And he’s all you ever talk about. I mean, I should be offended for our daughter, but it’s so damn cute, I can’t.”
I’m about to tell her how wrong she is, but the cars behind me start honking, and when I look back at the traffic light I realize it’s green, so I step on the gas pedal.
Once the angry drivers have vented and fucked off from behind me, I manage to talk again.
“I don’t like him.”
Dolly gives me the side-eye.
“And I’m one hundred percentnota lesbo,” she says.
“God. Fine. I like him. But he’s off-limits.”
“I would ask why, but I know you so well, I already know what you’re going to say,” she says, then puts on a fake voice that I think is supposed to mimic me, judging from the lower tone. “He’s my employee, I can’t do anything with him. He’s my daughter’s nanny. I can’t fuck him without fucking it all up.”
“And my student,” I tell her.
“And my student. What if the college finds out I’m screwing my nanny slash student? It doesn’t matter if he’s my student for one semester only, I can’t do this. Even if there’s nothing in my contract that strictly forbids relationships with students.”
She’s still putting on the fake voice, and it starts to grate on me. That’s not what I sound like.
Yeah, even though it may be what I’m thinking.
Okay, that’s exactly what I’m thinking.
“As a matter of fact, the contract advises against relationships with students,” I correct her.
“Advise is not the same as forbid,” she says. “I should know. I have a Ph.D. in the English language, sweetie.”
“Be that as it may,” I tell her as we get on the final stretch home, “it’s still wrong. Not only would I be taking advantage of my position of power both as his boss and teacher, it’s also bound to end in catastrophe.”
