She kept up her monologue as the three of them walked back into the house. Only to be assaulted by the noise and dust. “Phoo!” Annabelle cried and then sneezed three times in a row. “What's going on?”
Al Raymond appeared around the corner, his face stormy. “You're back.” It wasn't a question.
“You see, we live here,” Vane tried to joke.
But the contractor wasn't having it. “I have the crew on double time to make up for the lost weeks. We're plastering the walls today.” Annabelle sneezed again, and Al nodded as if she'd agreed with him somehow. “If you want to continue living here in this super important historic house, run out and pick up some dust masks.”
“How is this place important? I thought it was just, you know, old.” Maggie spread her hands.
Al chuckled. “This was the summer home of the first governor of the state,” he explained. “Lots of important policy work done here and all that.”
“What, really?” She turned to Vane. “Your ancestor was the first governor?”
Vane shrugged. “I didn't know the guy. But that's what they tell me.”
Just like it had when the private car rolled up, the wide gulf between her life and Vane's felt like a slap in the face. She watched Vane out of the corner of her eye as he attempted to have a conversation with Annabelle about her stay with Art. It was a pretty normal scene, but for some reason, she couldn't make him look “normal” at all. It was like seeing a picture of herself after studying her reflection her whole life. She knew she was looking at the man who had spent the last three days making sure she was happy and cared for, but something looked... off. He was the same, but he didn't feel the same to her.
Then Annabelle leaped up with a shriek. “It's too loud in here! I can't think!”
“We could stay at a hotel,” Vane suggested.
Maggie shook her head vehemently. Any hotel Vane chose would be just one more reminder of their differences. She couldn't deal with the idea of spending time in whatever luxury, presidential suite he'd casually suggest.
“How about we camp?” she asked. “On the beach. Do you have a tent?”
Vane scowled. “I doooo,” he drawled. “But I'm not much of a camper.”
“I am!” she butted in breezily. This was good. Camping was back in her comfort zone. Maybe a night spent out in the open, roughing it, would help her feel like she was back on even footing with him. Like they were just normal, regular folks.
Instead of a billionaire, his ward, and the nanny he'd hired for the summer.
* * *
“I have never seen a tent like this,” Maggie complained. She didn't like complaining. But this was ridiculous.
“Would you let me take care of that?” Vane smiled as he took the tent poles gently from her grasp, but she couldn't help but notice the tinge of irritation in his voice. She, who'd spent a lot of her childhood living out of a tent, had insisted on setting it up herself. But rather than the simple setup of her youth, Vane's tent was huge, as well as luxurious and complicated. She'd taken one look at the high-tech tangle of poles and nylon and felt instantly out of her element. This was the private jet of camping gear.
“I can help you.”
“I know. But you don't need to.” Vane gently shut her out, shifting his weight to block her from making a grab for the rest of the poles.
Stung, she took a few steps back. She should have felt impressed at how capable he was in the face of such a complicated task, but instead she felt... small. Small and useless and left out.
“Annabelle? I want to pick some flowers to pretty this place up,” Maggie announced, turning her back on Vane and pointing to a far-off dune. Wildflowers danced in the breeze, an explosion of blues and pinks. “Want to come?”
“Sure!” Annabelle, bored with tracing a stick in swirling patterns through the sand, jumped to her feet. Maggie challenged her to a race, then yielded, laughing, when the girl overtook her.
She didn't look back to check Vane's progress. In fact, she did her level best to keep her back to him. It was childish, she knew, but part of her wanted him to see just how much she didn't need him.
Sure, you're a big, strong, smart billionaire with money to burn and you're paying my salary. But you need me more than I need you.
She reached down and plucked a perfect stem and lifted it to her nose. She hoped Vane was looking at her right now, just so he could see just how fine she was doing without him.
“Hey.”
She yelped and dropped her flowers just as she heard the click of Vane's camera shutter. “Hey!” she snapped.
“Sorry!” Vane chuckled as he lowered his camera and grinned at her. “You looked like you were posing for me. So, I took some pictures.”
She abruptly turned so he couldn't see she was blushing furiously. Yes, she wanted him to see her, but not like this. “Is the tent set up?”
“Has been for a while now.” His smile was so real and genuine. How could he be so charming and so frustrating at the same time? “I came over to tell you ladies, but you looked so pretty picking flowers that I took a few shots first. Smile!” he called and pointed his lens at Annabelle, who immediately planted her feet and struck a superhero pose atop the dune.
“How do I look?” she yelled as he checked his shots.
“Actually, you look pretty awesome.” He beckoned her over, and the two spent a happy moment exclaiming over the shots he'd taken. Annabelle rested her head affectionately on his arm, and he absentmindedly patted her back as they shared the camera screen.
This, Maggie thought with a sigh, was something she could feel good about, at least. The two of them were more connected now than they had been when she'd arrived. Instead of being so freaked out by his role as guardian, Vane seemed to be slipping into it more comfortably. Like a pair of dress shoes that needed to be broken in, he grew more and more confident every day.
They spent the rest of the afternoon there on the dune, with Annabelle chattering a mile a minute about literally everything. Vane smiled and listened and occasionally raised his camera to snap a candid, and Maggie traced complicated mandala patterns in the sand before wiping them away and starting over. She went back to the gutted house and returned with peanut butter and jelly sandwiches for dinner. As the sun slipped lower in the sky, Vane disappeared into the house and returned with all the makings for s'mores.
“I can start the fire,” Maggie insisted.
“You don't need to.”
“I want to.” She turned her body, shutting him out the same way he'd shut her out from setting up the tent, then sat back triumphantly as the spark caught and a small fire flickered to life. “Told you I could.”
“I never doubted you for a second,” he agreed as he leaned in and caught her lips with his.
Maggie stiffened. They hadn't kissed in front of Annabelle before. What was he doing? She glanced at her charge.
Annabelle watched them in frank, open fascination. Maggie braced herself for the questions. But instead of commenting on the kiss the way she commented on literally everything else that ever happened, Annabelle went quiet. She speared her marshmallow on the end of her stick, poked it into the flames, then blew it out. She removed the charred outer layer and popped it into her mouth before repeating the process three more times. By her fifth marshmallow, she was openly yawning.
“Sugar crash,” Vane murmured as Annabelle slumped to the side. He brushed Maggie's hair back from her neck. “I'm going to put her to bed.” He scooped the mumbling, protesting Annabelle into his arms and gently deposited her into her sleeping bag in the tent before returning to Maggie's side. “You want to try something with me?”
“Mm, what?” His hand on her neck felt good after feeling so strangely detached from him all day.
“I was thinking—” He brushed his lips under her ear. She shuddered and sighed. “We could go back up to the dune—”
“Mmhmm?” She shivered as he lightly brushed her jawline. Her body still craved him so much.
Maybe this was what she needed. To feel connected to him again. To feel like they were on equal footing, like he wanted and needed her as much as she knew she wanted and needed him. To stop burying their feelings.
“The nearest neighbor is just down the beach a bit,” Vane growled in her ear. “What do you say we give them a show?”
Maggie turned sharply. “You're in to that?”
Vane smiled boyishly. “Well, I never have been before.” He tugged at her shirt collar. “But then again, I never had a hot teacher to show off before either.”
A lump rose in her throat. “I'm your hot teacher?” she asked, voice quavering. She tilted her head to search his face.
But he was intent on her bra. “How does this thing work?” he complained. “Why are you even wearing one, anyway?”
She stiffened and pulled back.
Vane immediately snatched his hand away. “Did I do something wrong?”
She crossed her arms miserably over her chest. “No,” she sighed.
“Are you okay?” He touched her cheek and finally looked her in the eye. “You seem... I don't know. You've seemed off all day.”
“Have I? Sorry.”
He frowned. “What's wrong?”
She shook her head and looked away. “You know what? I don't even know.” She turned towards the horizon. A thin band of blue still clung to the border between the sky and the sea, and for one moment the only thing she could think of was sprinting towards it. What lay on the other side of that line?
Shouldn't she be trying to find out?
13
A steady rain drummed on the roof. Or rather, Maggie assumed it did. She could look outside and see that it was raining. But she sure couldn't hear it.
“What?” she asked Annabelle for the third time.
“Argh!” the girl shrieked and clapped her hands over her ears. “It's so loud!” The near constant pathwack of a nail gun had been going for at least an hour now. Maggie wouldn't have minded if there was some kind of pattern to the noise. But the randomness and occasional ear-splitting tearing sound were enough to make her eyes water. “I said what about blue!” Annabelle shouted.
Maggie nodded and tried to wrench her thoughts back to the task at hand. She was helping Annabelle pick out the paint colors for her secret room. “I think that would definitely make it feel bigger, yeah.”
Annabelle grinned. “If it was blue, would you not be scared of going in there?”
“I'm not... “ Maggie pressed her lips together. How to explain a phobia to a child? “My mind isn't scared. It's my body. You ever have that? Where nothing is actually frightening, but your heart is pounding anyway?”
“And your scalp gets all tingly?” Annabelle touched her head. “Yeah. I have that a lot.”
Maggie's jaw dropped. “A lot?” she asked.
Annabelle nodded, still touching her head. “I thought it was because maybe my Dad was visiting. That's what happens in the movies anyway. When a ghost comes, your hair gets all prickly.”
Maggie swallowed hard. “Maybe that's what it is, then. I don't have that though. I just get really nervous in small spaces. I feel like I'm trapped.”
“You do?” Vane was standing in the doorway, carrying a box and looking heartbroken. “You feel trapped?”
Why did explaining feel like she was lying to him? “I was talking about my claustrophobia.”
“Oh. Right. Of course.” He didn't look convinced, but further conversation was cut off by another scraping sound outside the window. When it was over, he went on. “I brought you some things you could use to decorate your room.” The fact that he had to shout over the noise made it seem like he was yelling at her, which only made Maggie more uncomfortable.
“What?” Annabelle reached into the box and pulled out a framed picture. “It's me!' she squealed.
Maggie looked over her shoulder. “Oh!” It was a print of his shot of Annabelle on the dune. Her hair whipped in the wind and her face tilted upwards in a heroic pose, her profile highlighted by the sun. “Vane, it's beautiful!”
“There's more,” he said, looking pleased.
Maggie flipped eagerly through the shots of Annabelle. Here she was mid-leap off the porch. Here she was intently dripping sand through her fingers to make a drip castle. Here she was tearing across the sand like an Olympic athlete. Each shot was beautifully lit and carefully composed, capturing her quintessential Annabelle-ness. “You're really good,” she marveled.
He thanked her and stood up. “I have to take a call in a few minutes, but I thought you might want to hang some in the secret room. You pick whichever ones you like, and give me the ones you don't so I can hang them in my office, okay?”
Annabelle beamed at him. “Thanks, Uncle Vane.” She turned excitedly back to the box of photos. “What do you think, Miss Stewart? With the blue, right?” She held up a picture of her that was mostly sky.
The two of them spent the rest of the afternoon organizing and then painting Annabelle's secret room. By the time dinner rolled around, unable to decide on just a few, Annabelle had covered an entire wall in her favorite pictures of herself. She chose a few more for her bedroom, and as she closed her eyes that night, she smiled one last time at the picture of herself on the dunes.
“This feels like mine now,” she said sleepily.
Maggie padded silently to her bedroom with a smile on her face. She was still smiling as she settled onto her bed and undid her hair from its clasp.
“She asleep?” Vane was in her doorway still in his work clothes. His collar was unbuttoned at his throat, and his sleeves were rolled up, exposing his tanned forearms. For the first time that day, Maggie noticed it was finally silent enough that she could hear her heart beating in her ears.
“She is. And she was smiling.” Maggie stood up and went to him. “You made her so happy with those pictures.”
He took her hand readily in his. “I hoped she would like them.”
“She said it made this place feel like hers.” She touched his face and searched his eyes. It was so much easier to feel connected to him when he showed his simple thoughtfulness rather than his immense wealth. She brushed her finger over his lips and then followed it with a kiss. “You are doing right by her.”
“How about you?” he asked with a groan, pulling her into his arms. “I haven't felt like I'm doing right by you these past few days.” He pressed his lips against her ear. “Can you let me try to do right by you now?”
She sagged against him, and as she yielded to his kisses, she deliberately shoved aside the misgivings of the past few days. It wasn't bad to want him. It wasn't bad to crave the way he made her body feel. She didn't need to go rushing off. Not when she had his warm, strong body pressed against hers.
Honestly, where else could she possibly want to be?
“Missed you,” he growled against her throat before spinning her around. She landed on her back on her bed, and opened her arms. He peeled off his shirt and dove for her like a starving man at a buffet.
They made love easily, picking right off where they'd left off. And as she shuddered in his arms and he trembled before groaning out her name, she felt that rightness again. The feeling she'd been searching for was back in her grasp.
Vane kissed her lips then her forehead before pushing back from her. “I didn't mean for that to happen, but it was a nice surprise.”
“Why else would you come to my room at night?” she teased, tugging the blankets up to her chest.
“To bring you this.” He stepped out into the hallway. When he turned back to her, he had another cardboard box in his hands. “These are for you.”
She sat up straighter. “My pictures?”
He grinned. “I hope you like them.”
“I'm sure I will; you captured Annabelle so perfectly I—” She trailed off as she pulled the first one from the stack.
It was a shot of her hand, bent at the wrist. A pink flower trailed casually from her fingers. It was a beautifully composed s
hot. But it was just her hand. She pulled out the next one.
“It's your smile,” Vane explained softly.
She swallowed and nodded. Another of her body parts, this time just the corner of her mouth and the tip of her earlobe.
Every single picture in the box was like this. There was a not a single complete shot of her. It was all parts. “That's my favorite part of you,” Vane explained as he pointed to the picture of the curve of her neck. “I love it when your hair is down, but when it's up I can see your neck like this.”
“Is that how you like me to wear it?”
“It's my favorite part of you,” he reiterated.
Maggie leafed through the photos again. “You took pictures of all your favorite parts, it looks like.” She tried to sound teasing, but her voice sounded unnaturally high in her ears.
“What can I say? I wanted to remember them.” He wouldn't meet her eye.
She turned away too. His favorite parts were only fractured images of the whole person. Was he not interested in her as a whole person, then? Was he only interested in the parts of her that were useful to him? She was good for having sex with and being around to look after his ward. He'd taken pictures of her neck, her hand, her smile. What clearer sign did she need to know that he only saw her this way? As a collection of parts? “Thank you,” she said stiffly, feigning a yawn. “Wow, I'm really beat. You wore me out.”
Vane frowned. But rather than ask what was wrong, he just nodded and left her room.
Maggie fell back on her bed. Her body was still sore from his loving and her lips still bruised from his kisses, but her mind was already far away. Tomorrow was the last day of her initial six-week contract.
She sat upright. If she was only a collection of parts, a convenient person to have around to suit his needs, then why should she stay? Keep moving, her mother's voice in her head, quiet up until now, suddenly shouted.
The Billionaire’s Ward: McClellan Billionaires Book Three Page 9
