by Sadie Grubor
We walked out of the Market Grill hand in hand and browsed the market a little longer. I found the Oriental Mart and went crazy getting things to make Chinese for Victoria and me. There was fresh ginger, homemade noodles, and almost too much for me to fit into my bag. I tried to carry the bag, since I was the one who had packed it full. Collin wouldn't have any of that and held on tight to it as we continued to walk.
"Let's stop here." A childlike persona seemed to emerge as we continued through the market. I started to see a side of him that reminded me of Victoria.
Entering the Market Cellar Winery, Collin immediately looked at the bottles critically. He lifted a couple and then replaced them with a wrinkled nose. Swiftly and smoothly, he walked toward the person at the counter.
"Excuse me do you have anything better than what is out front?"
I scanned the different colored bottles stacked along the walls in the massive wine racks. On the opposite wall there were shelves of different bottles. I could hear Collin and the sales person having a discussion about wine in the background, but my mind drifted to thoughts of things that had passed.
Shopping with him was new and having lunch together was interesting. We had talked some, but nothing too serious. I had to admit I was having an amazing time with him. He had really thought about where we should go, and the fact was, he had planned well. Collin's hand on my lower back brought me out of my thoughts.
"You ready?"
"They didn't have what you wanted?" We exited the store, his hand still on my lower back.
"Oh, yes, I found a couple of bottles." He raised a new reusable bag so I could see the tops of two bottles.
We walked a little further until I saw the restroom sign.
"I'll be right back." I smiled and pointed to the restroom sign before I hurried off.
I stood in a small line for a minute before a stall was available. Once finished, I washed my hands and stepped out of the bathroom. I stopped short. Collin was leaning against the wall opposite the bathroom door.
"Hey." I smiled and slightly tilted my head at him.
"Hello." He pushed up off the wall and stepped toward me, his hand behind his back.
"What are you hiding?" I craned my neck to see behind him, but he moved so I couldn't see. "What is it?" I laughed out.
Soon we were doing this crazy circle dance in front of the public restrooms, our laughter filling the space around us and people smiling at us as they passed by.
"Are you always this nosy?" He chuckled at me. "Maybe it's a surprise."
"I don't like surprises." I faked a pout. His face went suddenly serious.
"If you keep sticking your lip out like that I am going to suck it off of your face." He moved in closer and spoke to me in a breathy whisper.
I sucked my lip back in and my breathing hitched. He smirked. Our faces were getting extremely close. I was enraptured in his eyes. The giggles of a small child snapped me out of the trance. I stepped back from him and grabbed his arm.
"We should get moving," I mumbled with a little bit of embarrassment.
"These are for you."
In his extended hand were a bunch of wildflowers. I looked at the flowers and then to him. I kissed his cheek.
"Thank you." I took the flowers and brought them toward me.
"Thank you," he smiled.
"For what?" I looked up at him as we were walking back toward the parking garage.
"For saying yes." He released my hand and wrapped his arm around my waist, holding me tightly to him.
I allowed him to open my door to get in the car, and even to get out when we arrived back to the house. He walked me up to the door and stopped.
"What's wrong?" I was confused.
"Thank you for a lovely afternoon," he leaned forward and kissed me. I kissed him back. Too soon he pulled back and started walking toward the car.
"Where are you going?" The words just blurted out. He looked at me with a grin.
"I need to pick up Victoria."
I could feel the warmth spread on my face and chest, smiling in excitement and relief. The excitement was that Victoria was coming home, and the relief was that he wasn't just walking away from me.
Victoria returned in a pleasant mood and I was just happy everything seemed to go well with her visit. We went through her normal nightly routine and made plans for our last day before she returned to school on Monday. I could tell she was tired, but I didn't think she would fall asleep so quickly. She didn't even make it through the whole bedtime story.
I placed the book back on her bookshelf and slowly walked back to her bed. I leaned down and tucked her in. With a kiss to her head, I turned to leave her room. My hand flew up over my mouth to stifle my gasp. Once I was finally calmed, I removed my hand.
"Damn it, don't do that!" I hissed quietly.
His smile was so big it almost lit up the room.
"I didn't mean to scare you." He whispered and walked toward Victoria.
In one fluid motion, he bent over her and kissed her head. Following him out of her room I noticed he was in his pajamas and grinned.
Dr. Bishop paused just outside of her door. I walked around him.
"Goodnight," I said, trying not to laugh. He didn't say anything. I composed myself and turned around. "Oh, did you want to sleep in my room?" I batted my eyelashes and laid the innocence on thickly.
"Don't tease me, Miss Ashwood," he growled and stalked toward me.
I burst into laughter, but then squealed when he wrapped his arms around my waist and lifted me up. He carried me into my room, closing the doors behind us.
"Put me down," I laughed quietly.
"Once we reach the bed," he retorted with actual humor in his voice.
"So, you think I'm the type of girl that puts out on the first date?" I scoffed teasingly. As soon as the words left my mouth, I was tossed to the bed with a grinning Collin crawling toward me.
Just when I thought he was going to get straight to clothing removal, his fingers dug into my side and tickled me.
"STOP, OH GOD, STOP!" I begged.
"Are you going to tease me again?" he chuckled.
"NO!" I screamed and gasped for air when he stopped.
"Good." He moved from hovering over me, rolling to the side that was quickly becoming 'his side'.
"Jerk," I quipped. With a smack to his arm, I got out of bed.
That night I climbed into bed with Collin, not Dr. Bishop. Once I was under the covers, he moved closer to me and wrapped his arms around me.
"Am I truly a jerk?" His voice was quiet.
"Sometimes," I answered, running my fingers through his hair.
I felt his arms tighten around me. Just when I was about to ask him what he was thinking his voice stopped me.
"Goodnight."
No more words were said. I fell asleep wondering what was going through his head.
Chapter Twenty
Getting Victoria back into her school routine wasn't nearly as difficult as I thought it would be. The first week was pretty simple, and she was excited to see her friends. The second week was looking to be more difficult.
"Come on, you are already running behind schedule." I pulled the covers off of her head.
"I don't wanna," she groaned and pulled her pillow over her head.
"Get up," I laughed and smacked her butt lightly.
"Hey!" She sat up quickly, her hair a wild nest of frizz.
"Well, get up or I will do it again." I raised my hand teasingly. She covered her butt and got out of bed.
"I'm up, I'm up," she giggled on her way to the bathroom.
What usually took us fifteen minutes was accomplished in seven minutes this morning. As we hurried into the kitchen, we ran into Connor.
"In a hurry this morning?" he chuckled.
"Just a little," I said hurriedly and grabbed for cereal, milk, and juice.
Victoria hopped up to the breakfast bar. She rushed to eat her cereal and we practically sprinted to the
car. We just made it in time. The moment she stepped through St. John's doors I slouched back against the car.
"Rough morning?"
My head snapped over to Amber smiling at me.
"Hey you," I wrapped my arms around her. We pulled apart. "How are you?"
She shrugged. "Good, I guess."
"You guess?" I raised one eyebrow at her.
She sighed heavily. "Well, it's just…oh, it's nothing. I'm sure you have things to get done today." She gave me a warm smile. "Plus, I should get MJ home."
"No way," I shook my head, "meet me at the coffee shop around the corner.
"Sophia—"
"I won't take no for an answer." With a quick wink I hopped into my car and drove to the coffee shop. Amber pulled up behind me.
"So, what's going on?" I asked after we had gotten our coffee and settled with MJ.
"You know William and I have kind of started to see each other." I nodded and sipped my coffee. "Well, now he's so far away and it's just so hard to be apart. I didn't realize how much I really cared about him until he was gone."
I furrowed my brow. "Gone? Gone where?"
Amber's eyes widened. "Oh shit!"
"What?"
She clapped herself on the forehead. "I wasn't supposed to say anything," she groaned.
"Okay, I'm confused." I shook my head lightly, taking another sip of my coffee.
Amber leaned over the table a little bit and her tone dropped to a whisper. "Allison is staying with Juliet."
I almost sprayed Amber with coffee. "What?" I choked out and quickly wiped my mouth.
"I know right?" Her eyes grew large and she nodded. "So William and the boys are with her."
"Wait, wait, back-the-truck-up. When did Allison go to Juliet?" I had my hands up, palms facing Amber.
"I guess she was staying with Mrs. Bishop, but something happened and she went to the vacation house." Amber shrugged. "From there she ended up with Juliet. It's weird isn't it?"
I nodded. I was still in shock. "Crap, I'm sorry, so William has been gone for awhile then?" quickly redirecting the conversation back to the original topic.
"Yeah," she sighed out. "I just really miss him."
"I'm sorry."
Amber smiled at me.
"So, how are things with that guy you were seeing?"
I furrowed my brow in confusion again. "What guy?"
"You know the one from the beach. Didn't you go out with him a couple of times?" She pulled her paper cup to her lips.
Dominic.
"Oh, yeah," I shook my head, "that was better left as friends. I haven't seen or talked to him for a while."
"Will he be at the wedding?" She smirked.
I shook my head. "No. I'm guessing you got your invitation to the wedding?"
She nodded.
"Good, you're coming right?"
"Oh, I wouldn't miss it. William is even coming in." Her smile grew and it was infectious. I smiled with her.
"That's cool."
We finished our coffee and talked about a couple more things before we separated ways. I had a few errands to run: grocery store, dress shop, for a follow-up fitting, and then I needed to pick up a wedding shower gift for Miranda.
I decided the dress shop should be the first stop. It was a quick visit. The dress fit perfectly and I was back into my street clothes with my and Victoria's garment bags over my shoulder. I promised to have her try the dress on tonight and if there were problems I would bring it back in.
My next stop was to Target, where Miranda was registered. Quickly grabbing a red cart I pulled out the registry I printed out this morning. Since Miranda lived in the Bishop home for a few years and Benji had been a bachelor, I decided getting bath towels and the bedding set she had chosen would be helpful.
Once I located all of the gift items, I figured that Target was as good as any place to grab the few grocery items that I needed. So I pulled out my small list and started going through the food aisles. After checking off all the items I moved to the checkout. For a Tuesday afternoon, it was unusually busy. I thumbed through the magazines stacked at the register until I could unload my items.
The bedding and towel bags were awkward to load into the car, but I finally got it all in there and back to the house. Carrying them into the house was even more awkward. I dropped garment bags over the banister, the bedding and towels at the bottom of the stairs, and then headed back out for the grocery bags. Entering the house with my hands full of grocery bags I kicked the door shut behind me.
Once the groceries and the dresses were put away, I placed Miranda's gifts in my room. I decided to wrap them later. I had some laundry to do. First, I stripped down my bedding, grabbed all of my towels and clothes, and took them to the laundry room. I put the first load into the washer and ran back upstairs to sweep my room.
I put my ear buds in my ears and turned on one of my favorite playlists as I swept the floor. Before putting the vacuum away I decided I would go over Victoria's room quickly, too. On my way out of her room, I ran into Mrs. Baker, who had an arm full of Victoria's clothes. I pulled the ear buds from my ears with a tug of the wires.
"Good afternoon." I smiled.
"Look at you, doing my job for me." She winked with a smile.
"I just figured I can clean up after myself and I might as well go over her room too."
"Oh, I'm not complaining." She chuckled and entered Victoria's room.
I put the vacuum back in the hall closet and went back to the laundry room. Putting my ear buds back in, I was happily met with the crooning of Frank Sinatra smoothly singing 'Luck Be a Lady'. There was no way to stop myself from bopping along to the song.
Being completely lost in the song, I leaned into the washing machine and brought the wet clothing to the open dryer. Frank was singing about 'letting a gentleman see how nice a dame she could be' when I felt someone grab my hips.
I screamed and jumped, my head smacked off of something behind me. Spinning around and yanking the ear buds out of my ears, I found that something was Dr. Bishop.
"Oh my god, are you okay?"
Dr. Bishop was holding onto his chin and nodding.
"Are you really or do I need to get ice or something?" I bit my lip nervously.
He removed his hand. "I'm fine."
"Well then I should hit you for scaring the crap out of me…again." I narrowed my eyes on him.
His laugh was deep, but not playful. I watched his tongue roll along his bottom lip and fought the urge to attack him. One glance to his eyes told me he knew what I was thinking. He moved slowly, but determinedly toward my lips.
The laundry room door swung open and I jump, again, this time bumping into the half empty washing machine. Dr. Bishop quickly took a step back.
"Oh, I didn't realize that—" Mrs. Baker's statement trailed off. She had no idea what to say. Heat rose into my face turning me bright red.
"No, it's fine. How are you this afternoon?" Dr. Bishop's voice was smooth and cool.
"I'm well, Collin, how are you?" Mrs. Baker responded pleasantly.
I finished transferring my wet clothing to the dryer and started another load before quickly excusing myself from the room. When I got back to my room, I realized it was getting close to pick up time for Victoria. I hurried to make my bed with clean sheets and blanket before grabbing my keys and bag. I was halfway down the stairs when I saw Dr. Bishop standing at the bottom waiting for me.
"You're leaving?" He looked at his watch. "Victoria?" His eyes came back up to my face.
I nodded.
"Before you go," he leaned forward and kissed me. "Drive safely." He smiled crookedly and went up the stairs. My eyes may have followed his backside as he ascended, maybe.
The entire drive to pick up Victoria, I thought about Dr. Bishop and me. If Grace found out about our relationship she would definitely use it to her advantage. Then there was Victoria. I believed she would be happy about it, but what if for some reason she wasn't or what if it d
idn't work out and then she would have to deal with our break up. Honestly how did I think this was going to play out? I mean what nanny have I known who had a wealthy doctor in her bed every night and ended up with him for good? I groaned and pulled into a parking space, waiting for the school to unleash the children to the world.
Her bouncing red ponytail wasn't hard to spot. A smile instantly spread on my face from her happy face. I climbed out of the car and she ran up to me.
"Oh my gosh, we did the coolest science experiment ever today!"
She was full of excitement as she discussed how her teacher made a test tube overflow with baking soda and vinegar. Then they each got a turn to do the experiment. Her excitement was hard not to smile at. Once she took a breath, she looked at me and asked what I did all day.
"I got your dress," I sang out to her.
"Yessss!" She bounced in her seat. "Can I put it on?"
"You can try it on, but you can't wear it around." She pouted a little. "You have to wait till the wedding."
"Okay," she grumbled out.
Victoria's 'activities' schedule was back in effect; however, I had made some variations to the schedule. Monday was her piano lesson at home, Tuesday was dance class, and Wednesday was split between horseback riding and karate—horseback riding classes while the weather was warm and karate when the weather changed over to cooler. I could easily recall the conversation with Dr. Bishop, because I had been a little worried about bringing it up.
Having gone over what I wanted to say about a thousand times, so he didn't think I was overstepping my boundaries because of our relationship. I was lounging on my couch with my laptop trying to read over more of completed book. I thought I was prepared to talk to him, until he entered my room that night.
"Good evening, Miss Ashwood."
I turned my head around and peeked around the armrest of the couch. There he was in his pajamas, walking toward me.
"Good evening, Dr. Bishop." I turned back to my laptop.
He quickly sat down on the couch and lifted my feet to his lap.
"What are you doing?"
Before I could stop him he reached over and took my laptop from me.
