Chapter 13

chapter 13

brYCE

Watching Emmaline squirm has to be my favorite activity. It’s better than any hockey game I’ve played. We both know the attraction between us boils just under the surface and even though I want to kiss the fuck out of her every day, she’s my daughter’s nanny, and I can’t. But that doesn’t stop me from flirting and pushing her boundaries.

Emmaline Rustavelli is mine whether she knows it or not. We continue to play cat and mouse games and my relentless flirting and intimating that there’s more between us is breaking her resolve.

Do I respect that she’s putting my daughter’s needs first? Hell, yes.

What she hasn’t quite figured out yet is how good we are together. How we work as a unit to make Jolie’s life interesting, and fun while making sure she knows discipline and restraint. Like last week when we went trick or treating in the park across the street. Businesses were giving out full- size candy bars, and Emmaline said, “Pick out one candy bar or pick out three little candies for tonight.”

Jolie’s in her room playing on her tablet, so I flop onto the couch, dragging Emmaline with me. She needs to understand that we’re good together, and this attraction between us hasn’t filtered off or waned. If anything, it’s increased tenfold.

“You can’t do that,” she huffs as I flip her over onto the rug, using one of her Jujitsu moves she taught Jolie and me.

“Flipping you over is my favorite pastime,” I whisper over the shell of her ear. Her hair splays across the floor, and her laughter dies down. The moment is here. The time when she succumbs to the life she could have. My head drifts toward hers. Those magical lips call my name.

When our lips are about to touch, I say, “I’m crossing the line. I’ve waited weeks to feel your lips and taste your…”

“Uhhhhhhhhhhhh!” Jolie screams.

Cockblocked again, but in a split second, I’m taking the stairs three at a time and am in her room. “Are you okay, sweetheart?”

She points to her tablet, and her screen time has been reached for the day. “Don’t scream. When you reach your limit, that means it’s time to do something fun with Emmaline and me.”

Jolie jumps off her bed and gets out a new game I bought her. She played Operation at Cannon’s a few days ago.

“Okay, let’s see if we can perform an operation before my game tonight.”

She squeals as I throw her over my shoulder, and we pounce down the stairs. We prepare the operating room. Emmaline puts out a white tablecloth over the coffee table, gives us all sanitary gloves because as she says, in her doctor voice, “Surgeons must have clean hands in the operating room.”

A month ago, I never imagined this life—playing board games with my daughter and wrestling with the completely off-limits nanny, who just happens to be my teammate’s younger sister.

But now I can’t imagine a life without them in it.