Page 41 of Billionaire Babysitter

“Sophie, come and look at this,” says Dr. Meier. He’s a tall, lanky guy with a receding hairline and a fondness for the color beige. With a thick Dutch accent, he is soft-spoken and prone to going off on tangents about things he forgets he hasn’t explained to me. I like him, though. He’s enthusiastic.

I scamper over to the drawer he’s just opened and peer inside. There are probably a hundred dead moths in there. "This is one of the most exciting collections we have,” he says, grinning.

His passion is infectious, and the kindness he shows when he explains stuff slowly to me is beyond my belief. Lucas always used to work hard too, but he expected me to know everything.

Damn, there he goes, wriggling his way into my brain again.

I was so ready to quit that job and never think about him, ever, ever, ever again. Why is he making that so hard now?

I don’twantto miss him. But then I remember his smile. I remember the way his fingers felt on my skin. He drives me crazy. Even now, he’s still driving me crazy.

“You all right?” asks Dr. Meier.

“Yes, sorry. I'm just a bit distracted,” I say.

“You always look far away,” he says. “You're one of the most dedicated underlings I've ever had. But you always have this look. Has something happened to you lately? Forgive me if that’s a personal question.”

“No, it's—it's okay,” I stammer, staring into the eyes of a moth so I don’t have to look up at him. “I just quit a really intense job. So I guess I'm used to working much harder than this with half the thanks.”

“Ah, I see,” he says, leaving the conversation open-ended enough for me to keep going if I want to. And part of me wants to change the topic, but Dr. Meier has shown me nothing but kindness, and suddenly I find it all flowing out of me in an unstoppable flood.

“My boss… well, he asked a lot of me. And I didn’t think I was going to miss it but…”

“But change always takes time to get used to,” he says sagely.

“Something like that,” I say.

“Forgive me if this sounds callous,” he says, “but could you try smiling every now and again? On the museum floor, I mean. I don’t care what you do in here, but the American public are prone to complaining about anything and everything, especially employees who look human.”

I give him a weak, thin-lipped smile and hate that it reminds me of Lucas again. It’s like I’m turning into him. His thing always used to be that he never smiled. “I’ll try.”

“Good,” he says as he goes to peer back into the drawer. “Now, shall we look at some moths?”

We spend the rest of the day doing just that, and though I present my very best public face to Dr. Meier, I feel distant. Everything that’s happened lately rolls around in my brain like a broken pinball machine, and though I’ve tried to put them out of my mind, I’m worried about the kids. I miss them.

I don’t think I trust Lucas to have been left alone with them.

There’s a subway stop right outside the museum that takes me straight home, which I usually jump on, but today I decide to walk a little further. It’s not like I have anything to rush home to, after all. The sun’s out and it’s warm and I’m starting to feel like a hermit, so I think some fresh air will do me good.

Really, I should go to my mother’s and cry it out, but I don’t feel like getting into all this with her right now, especially because that means admitting that she’s been right for years about me working too hard. I’ll cry on her shoulder when it’s less raw. When I don’t spend every second of the day trying not to think about him and failing.

Damn that man!

I take a deep breath as I walk, closing my eyes for a second as I turn down another street. I’d like to shut them for longer, but the reality of walking in New York for more than two minutes means that’s not at all practical. What are all these people so busydoing? It’s not even that late yet, and still there are people everywhere, hurrying along like they’re late for an appointment.

Usually, that’s me too. Today, I’m soaking it all in, the sun and the traffic and the life. I’m not thinking about Lucas, or the kids, or the park. I’m not thinking about any of it at all.

When I finally get home and sit down with my dinner, I realize I’ve barely thought about anything else.

CHAPTER 26

LUCAS

“Daddy, do wehaveto go?” asks Noah with an enormous sigh. They’re packing up their suitcases, and all the happy chatter from lunch has dissipated into an unsettled kind of quiet. Chloe can barely look at me as she carefully folds her clothes into her suitcase while directing her siblings. Jason and I stand in the doorway, trying not to look too much like we’re lingering but probably failing severely. It’s hard not to watch them and feel the pang of heartbreak.

“What have you done to them?” murmurs Jason in that hushed tone of adults trying to hold a conversation without the kids really paying attention.

“I haven’t done anything,” I say. “The question is, what havetheydone to meand—”

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