Page 87 of The Bossy One

I wanted to say that this mess had been inevitable the moment I started falling for him. I wanted to say that a “break” wouldn’t fix what was wrong with us. Either we trusted each other, or we didn’t. Either we wanted the same things, or we didn’t.

If I were braver, more honest, I would have told him that even with the tangled emotional mess between us, and all the pain we’d caused each other, he was still the best thing I’d ever had. I would tell him to walk with me, not away from me.

If I were kinder, I would have told him we should just end it now. There was no future for us here. Even if we managed to patch things up between us for the time being, we would just be delaying the inevitable. We were just too different…I wanted to look forward, to shine a light on what might lie ahead, but Declan was too guarded, too consumed by the shadows of his past. In the end, we would just hurt each other.

As hard as it was to accept, even if this felt right, it wasn’t necessarily right. For God’s sake, this was the second time Catie had caught us arguing, and that wasn’t something I wanted to happen for a third time. Better to make a clean break now—or as clean of a break as we could make, with my heart beating raw on the floor between us.

Instead, I was selfish enough to want more time with him, and cowardly enough to want to protect my heart. So I made myself say, “Sure. Maybe a step back is for the best.”

Was it my imagination, or did he look disappointed?

If he did, he covered it up quickly. “It’s my fault,” he said. “I let it get too intense, too quickly. For both of us.”

My heart leapt. It had been intense for him too?

Declan looked away. “I should go talk to my mum and Catie.” He turned and left.

Hope, I decided, was a painful, foolish thing.

28

OLIVIA

An unexpected benefit of Declan’s mom coming for dinner was that she invited Catie to spend the next day with her. She also kept the conversation afloat, while Declan brooded into his whiskey, and I radiated false cheer and ate too much ice cream.

Honestly, bless Marie.

The next morning, I decided to do the responsible thing and use my unexpected free time to start sending in my resume for upcoming nannying jobs on the Sunny Days Childcare site. After Declan told them I’d passed my trial period with flying colors and he wanted to keep me on through the end of his contract, Sunny Days HR had green lit me to begin applying for future jobs again.

I’d put off actually logging on and looking for other jobs partly because I’d been busy, and partly because I didn’t want to think about my time with Catie and Declan coming to an end. But yesterday had reminded me that I couldn’t afford to be too sentimental. As much as I might feel like I was part of the family for the time being, at the end of the day, this was a job, and I was just passing through their lives. Staying wasn’t an option, not after all that had happened, so I needed to start figuring out where I was going to go next.

I made myself a cup of tea. Then I returned to my bedroom, where I pulled on Declan’s sweatshirt to ward off the early morning chill, then popped open my laptop.

I scrolled through the job openings. There was a Chicago family whose nanny requirements screamed “high maintenance.” A scatterbrained Hollywood actress who lived on a Montana ranch in between films, and needed a nanny for her new stepchildren. That sounded promising, until I checked the ages, and realized the stepchildren were seventeen and eighteen.

No thank you, I thought. I’d nannied younger teens before, but at that age, they’d resent the insult to their independence. And they’d be right.

I kept scrolling. There was a fairly normal sounding family that would be vacationing in Faribault-Northfield for a few weeks in late August and wanted a nanny so the parents could enjoy a little alone time while they were there. Normally, I avoided jobs that short, but the idea of getting to stay close to home for a few weeks enjoying a low-stakes job sounded like just what the doctor ordered.

I polished up my profile and started to type up an in introductory message to the couple.

A knock sounded on the door.

I jumped, nearly spilling my tea.

It was Declan. It had to be. My stomach twisted.

“Come in,” I called.

He did, slouching against the doorframe. His dark T-shirt pulled tight across his chest. I knew from experience that those shirts were incredibly soft, almost as pleasing to the touch as the skin beneath it. A small, weak part of me wanted to go to him and bury my face in his chest.

How messed up was it that he was the one who’d hurt me, and he was also the only person I wanted to go to for comfort?

Maybe that’s not messed up, an old voice whispered.Maybe that’s how it’s supposed to be.

The voice sounded a lot like my mom’s, I realized.

I brushed off the thought, unsettled.

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