Page 51 of My Forbidden Billionaire

I can’t just give up on Jacob.

But what am I supposed to do?

“Well, Jacob won’t be a father at your school forever. I imagine that his daughter will graduate at some point and then you two would be free to be together, if that’s what you both wanted, of course.” Emmy’s simplistic and ultra-positive view of life actually makes me smile.

“I like this loophole,” Larisa adds.

“His daughter is ten years old. She still has eight more years before she graduates. Do you really think he’s willing to wait that long?”

“Okay, then how about this? What if you just marry the handsome billionaire and then you wouldn’t even have to worry about where you work or how you’ll pay your rent? How about that?”

I shake my head. “Are you suggesting I should just give up my career? You both know how hard I worked to get to where I am—and all the education it took. Are you really suggesting I should throw it all away just because I met a guy who has a lot of money and can pay my rent? Is that who I am? I’d be no better than Tom…” my voice trails off.

Both Larisa and Emmy become silent. The only noise is coming from the street traffic outside, as each of us are lost in thought.

I finally break the silence. “Look … Jameson Juniper Hall is not just any school. It’s the best and most elite private school in America, and one of the best in the whole world. Do you know what that means?”

“That they give the kids an extra slice of pizza for lunch?” Larisa jokes.

“It means that, as far as my career goes, this is it. They don’t give opportunities like this more than once to teachers. I’m extremely lucky to have even been hired at Jameson and I know that. Considering how hard Ms. Abadie came down on me about the color blue, I would most likely get fired if I went against school rules and dated him. Not to mention his daughter is involved. The other parents could absolutely turn against me and against his daughter, accusing me of favoring her, making her life miserable … do I really need to explain myself more?”

“Wow … I never imagined it was that serious,” Emmy says as she sips her hot cocoa. “I guess I thought it would be more of a slap-on-the-wrist kind of punishment.”

“No. Definitely not just a slap on the wrist. And let’s say I did get fired. What other kind of job could I possibly do? I’m not trained for anything else.” I sigh.

“I mean, you could finally write that novel you’ve been dreaming about,” Emmy points out.

“We need to be realistic about this. Life is not a movie. It’s not some fairy tale in which I’m Cinderella, and a handsome billionaire prince comes and sweeps me off my feet on a white horse.”

“But it could be…” Emmy sighs.

She’s not wrong.

A life with Jacob could be a fairy tale.

But it’s simply not in the cards for me if I want to keep my job and the livelihood I’ve worked so hard to rebuild after my breakup with Tom.

I sip my hot cocoa once more and watch the TV screen, but I don’t feel like paying attention anymore.

Chapter Nineteen

Jacob

I stare down at the “ Good Morning” text message that I sent to Josephine over eight hours ago. This is the longest she’s ever taken to respond and I can’t decide if I should be worried or not. Surely, she’s just busy. It’s Monday, I would assume Monday is the busiest day for a teacher, but I don’t know. Something is nagging at me that it’s more than that…

“Hey Jacob, do you have a minute?” Theo pops his head through the door of my office. He’s carrying a stack of folders, as well as his laptop and tablet.

“Of course, come in, Theo.”

“Great, I just wanted to pass along the numbers from our accountant. Our profit margins are up and we should be able to expand our charity outreach program this year.”

“That’s fantastic news. We’ve been talking about expanding that program for months now.”

“Agreed. We’re up fifteen percent from last year, so we should be able to make a significant contribution before the year ends.”

“That’s great, thanks for letting me know.”

“Of course. Oh, and I wanted to ask you, how was your date with Josephine this weekend?”

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