Page 45 of Nanny for the SEALs

“So, do you keep in touch with Maite?”

He blinked, as if he was trying to focus, then put down his fork. “No. I should have been honest with you from the start. Maite was a girl who worked at the club. Well, she was a little more than that…”

I rested my cutlery on the table as his eyes flashed and he continued to talk with no hesitation about the past. “Not this club, but the other one we were managing before we bit the bullet and decided to open our own.”

“Okay.”

I didn’t know what more to say.

“Anyway, we got close. I’d just finished my service, or more like got dismissed.”

His eyes turned dark and he cleared his throat as if to not elaborate on that part of the story.

“And she was there. She was nice. Friendly. Exactly what I needed at the time. We got on well, and well… I don’t have to paint you a picture, but we were close.”

His eyes met mine. I expected him to say more, but his mouth was firmly shut.

“Is that it?”

He shook his head. “No. It’s just that darkness seems to showing its ugly head. She asked where we were going, what was going on? She clearly wanted more, a lot more. We were having fun and apart from what needed to be done on a monthly basis, I’d never had a girlfriend. Never wanted one. Never felt the need.”

“So, how come you spent so much time with her?”

“Mom died. Or rather, Mom killed herself. Stan and Pete were grieving, the only ones I could really turn to, and I needed someone. Fuck! I sound like a right jerk, but Maite was there at the right time to take away the pain.”

“Then what happened?”

He took in a deep breath, no more avoiding my stare, but looking directly at me. “Rachel and Steven happened next.”

I shook my head, thinking he wasn’t going to get away that lightly with just saying that the twins came along and that was it. There must have been more to the story.

“She wanted love, and I just couldn’t give it to her. Then, the twins were left with a note, saying she couldn’t do it alone. I knew why she’d forced my hand that day.”

“Oh.”

He nodded. “Yeah, there are some things in life I’m not proud of, and Maite is one of them. She wanted more, a relationship. She told me she loved me, and I said some shit to her. Don’t bother asking what, I was drunk most of the time I was with her. Fuck, probably all of the time. I knew she was illegal, it wasn’t a secret, and she didn’t try to hide it. And let’s be frank, I didn’t need to ask the question. The club was the kind of place that most of the girls there were either hiding or running away from something. No one says when they ask at school, what do you want to be when you grow up? And a kid replies, a stripper. There’s a reason you’re in that line of business, and the reason isn’t pretty.”

I didn’t know if I liked or hated his frankness. I realized the difference between him and his brothers. Rick was the type where there was no holding back. He’d naturally taken on the role as the dad because he was the one who kept it all together. As he talked about his past, I could feel the remorse, but I couldn’t figure out if it was remorse because of what had happened or the way he’d treated Maite, or because he discovered in the midst of it all, he did truly love her.

“It was all fucked-up. I started drinking, getting jealous of guys groping and wanting to touch her. I hooked up with her as a stripper, and I was sending her the wrong signals. I was a jerk. So, when she left the twins, I still took the DNA test, just to get Stan off my back. But I knew from the moment I cast eyes on them that they were mine. There was no denying it.”

“And Maite… you tried to find her?”

He nodded. “I did a couple of times. But then I just wished she was okay. Clearly, she wasn’t when she dropped the twins, but I hope somewhere along the line she has managed to find peace.”

“Do you still love her?”

He choked, “That’s the problem. I never did love her; I just used her. But I know in my heart of hearts that she loved me. As I said, I was in a dark place, one in which I have no intention of going back to.”

He didn’t need to say anything more than that. It was weird when he said he didn’t love Maite; I felt relieved, as if he’d said he did, then I would have been jealous. It was crazy… she was the twin’s mom after all, and I was just nothing but the nanny.

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