Page 46 of Mr. Wolfe's Nanny

“The dead tree… Theo, answer my question before you turn ecologist on me, please.”

She gazes at me with the same blue eyes I inherited from her. She also looks ready to break into a jig. I know she likes Quinn. I wasn’t sure she liked Quinn as a possibility for her son until now.Good to know, I guess.

Meanwhile, I’m ready to break out in a cold sweat.Casual, separate and monogamous don’t amount to wedding bells. Whatever might happen between Quinn and me isn’t something my mother needs to be in the middle of.

“Mom, you know what that event is like. Going alone would’ve been beyond tedious. I just thought having an escort would make it less so.” Tedious is the last word I’d use to describe last night.

Of course now, she’s got Oliver and Grayson’s full attention. Gray even abandons his napalmed pancakes as they flank her, scouring over the photograph and caption with glee. “Who is the Mystery Beauty then?” Gray asks. “Was she who you-”

He opens his mouth, no doubt to say something inappropriate, when our mother answers for me. “It’s Ms. Quinn who I hired to be the children’s nanny, Grayson! You both know how much the children adore her.”

I see Oliver’s eyes narrowing as he keeps studying the paper. Fuck, he’s going to remember her from Sapphire any second.

“Going alone would’ve been horribly tedious,” Mom babbles on. “I hope she had a good time, Theo. You didn’t let Elliot Barker leer at her too much, did you? For his age, he’s quite a shameless rake.”

“No, Mom. I didn’t let him leer at her too much or…”

My rambling trails off as my mother waxes on about how lovely Quinn looks in her dress while my brothers’ eyebrows are shooting skyward.

Amazing Mom Senses to one side, Margaret Wolfe has developed a bit of an intentional blind spot when it comes to her sons’ sex lives - hear no evil, see no evil - which my brothers don’t share. They know I got laid last night and they know who I was with now. Theyknow. Fuck!

“It’s really important to me and to Quinn that you don’t say anything about last night to the kids.”

I’m begging her.

I’m threatening them.

“The kids might not understand and making a thing of us going together might upset them. It was just…” I pause, wondering why this feels like a lie. “It was just a one-night thing, a favor. She was my companion for the event, nothing more.”

My mother nods sagely, patting my cheek like I’m still four and saying it’s probably wisest to go slow before she bustles into the kitchen to take over Gray’s pancake disaster.

Meanwhile, my brothers are both giving me that ‘oh shit-what have you done, man?’ look. It’s quite a look and conveys a good deal, okay?

Look, I never doubt that my brothers love me, would go to war for me but I’m the oldest. They jokingly call me the Golden Son, Dad’s favorite, a role I’ve never sought exactly. I can’t explain why duty and responsibility were hardwired into me at a tender age but they were. All three of them, even Gray, have some of those traits in them but they tease me mercilessly about being the ‘most adult’ of us.

But now? Well, it’s like Christmas came early for them. Theo did something salacious, something unexpected. Theo’s keeping a dirty secret. They’ll probably fill Jonathan in by this afternoon and the fact I fucked the nanny will be common knowledge next time we get together.

Something unpleasant twists in my stomach at the thought. I don’t want them thinking less of Quinn in any regard. “I’m going out to see the kids,” I say, no longer feeling very pleased with myself.

Oliver’s hand on my shoulder halts my escape. He leans in with Gray close by while Mom’s distracted looking for more pancake mix. “Theo, whatever’s going on, man… whatever happened last night, you know we’ve always got your back, right? We just want you to be happy.”

“It’s true,” Gray adds, seeing my suspicious look. “If anyone deserves some happiness, it’s you.”

“Thanks,” I manage to say before rushing outdoors to my children.

They really are good brothers even if I’m unsure how to feel about any of this at the moment. And really not sure how Quinn will feel about them knowing.

24- Quinn

Acouple of weeks have passed since the night Theo first came to my bed and he’s returned most nights since then after the children are asleep and the house is quiet. I’ve never had sex this regularly in my life nor have I enjoyed it half so much with anyone else. He’s an amazing lover, giving and attentive in the bedroom. Our one-night stand was no fluke and I fear I’ll be hard-pressed to find a future partner who can, pardon the phrase, measure up.

God, his face when I admitted that to him.

Smug and pleased and sexy as hell. You’d think he’d won the lottery but we’re both winners here. All those endorphins have put me in a permanently sunny frame of mind, I think.

“Just be careful, Quinn,”Isa has warned me. I know she’s right but part of me doesn’t want to hear it.

Maybe this thing between us is casual and could be labeled as purely sexual but that doesn’t mean it’s unimportant. While the kids come first, this is a corner of our lives that we’re carving out just for us and we’re making the most of it. We deserve a happy sex life, don’t we?

---