by Alicia Banks
Antonio knew that it was just ridiculous, and more than once he told himself to pull his mind out of the gutter. No part of him and Josselin were ever supposed to coexist. She was human and generally that was enough. She didn't even know who he was or more importantly, what he was. If she did, Antonio figured she wouldn’t want anything to do with him. How could she agree to something that she didn't even know existed?
It actually left him in a foul mood and when he got to work, he didn't tell anyone good morning like he usually did. Instead, he just shot out a few dirty looks and went about his business. Everybody was just looking back and forth amongst themselves, trying to figure out what his problem was. Nobody really knew.
Before he could really think straight, he ran into Tommy, and Tommy got a lot of the aggravation that he was presently feeling.
“Why did you send her to me?”
Tommy was a little taken aback by Antonio's mood. Antonio was not known to be especially even keeled, but Antonio couldn't remember a time when he was so unable to control his response. He had no reason to be upset, maybe that's what made him more upset than anything else. It was crazy really. He didn't even know this girl, so why was she already getting into his head? Antonio was convinced that something was being kept from him, something vital for him to understand why he felt the way he did about her. There had to be some kind of explanation.
“What is going on with you, Antonio? Is something the matter?”
Antonio agreed that something was definitely the matter.
“You set me up somehow, Tommy, and I want to know why. I don't want you to tell me that you have done it for my best interest or anything like that. Cut the crap. Who is this woman, and why did you tell me that she was the one for the job?”
Antonio was rather impatient for his second to give him an answer. He trusted Tommy with many things, and he had never questioned that trust. For the first time, he didn't understand what was going on. It was obvious that Tommy was holding something back from him. He wanted to know what it was.
“Why don’t you tell me what's going on first and maybe I can help?”
“You seem to think that you are the boss, and you are not. You are going to tell me what I want to know. Who the hell is she and why did you send her into my life?”
Tommy looked confused for a little bit, and then he finally sighed out loud. It was a tired sound, like he had been holding on to it for too long.
“Like I told you before, she is someone that I just happened upon. She put in an application for the ad about the nanny and when I met her, I don't know how, but I just had a feeling that she was the one for the job. Haven't you ever just gone with your gut before?”
Antonio did not say a word to any of that. He, of course, ran by intuition. Shifters in general tended to listen to their bodies and what their surroundings were telling them. Right now, his intuition was telling him that Tommy was still not being completely honest with him. That pained him to even imagine and it still didn’t answer the question of why. He wanted the real answer.
“You didn't answer why, though. Why is she so perfect?”
Tommy got this slow smile on his face and it really unnerved Antonio. Once again there was obviously information being left out. He didn't believe for one second that everything that was being told to him at the moment was true. There was something else going on. He wasn't going to let Tommy off so easily. He waited several moments for Tommy to finally give another answer.
“I thought that she would be perfect for you. Not just as your nanny, but in general. Tell me that you don't feel the same way. I would imagine that you do, or you wouldn't be so worked up right now. I have to say, I didn't think she would get underneath your skin quite so quickly.”
It was worse than he had feared. He had worried that Tommy had done the exact same thing that he was admitting to now. He was trying to set him up and it bothered Antonio. He didn’t want to be set up and not by Tommy. He was the only one that had stayed out of it. Now, though, Antonio was going to have to come face to face with what was really going on. Tommy was right, she really had gotten under his skin and it had happened in record time.
“You are messing with things that you shouldn’t be, Tommy. I needed a nanny.”
“And you have one. Is it really that bad if you like her as something more?”
“Yes.”
Tommy chuckled. “Nah, it will be fine.”
“She’s human.”
“We’ve already gone down this route already, remember?”
Antonio didn’t know how to respond. “Well, shit, Tommy, why did you have to make my life more complicated than it already was?”
“Because you need it. You spend all of your energy on business. You need to have a life as well.”
Antonio scoffed. He had a life, a full one. He was busy at work, busy at home with his daughter. What more could he do in the time allotted? Not getting with other women since the death of his mate made sense. He just didn’t have time for anything else, let alone the time and energy that women required. They wanted to be coddled and all of this affection pushed on them. He didn’t have it in him, and it had always seemed wiser to understand that it wasn’t his place and to move on.
“Ophelia is my life now, Tommy. You know that.”
Tommy put his hands up like he gave up. “Fine, Antonio. Look here. You go on and say what you want. She is your nanny. You don’t have to do anything. If you do, it’d be your own choice. It doesn’t have to be a bad thing, though. That’s all I’m saying. Have an open mind and see what happens.”
“Shut up, Tommy, now you just sound like a damn fortune cookie.”
Tommy laughed and Antonio scowled. He did feel some kind of connection to her. It was instantaneous as well. The more he had gotten to know her, the more concrete it had felt. Antonio didn’t know what to think of it all. He was stunned that Tommy was so right, and he wondered why he hadn’t seen it before. What was it about Josselin that pulled him in?
Tommy got his orders of what needed to be done and he was gone, just as seamlessly as he came. Antonio watched after him for a minute, filled with anxiety and this feeling like something was going to come of it all. He couldn’t see into the future, though, to see if it was going to be good or not. Antonio liked to think that he’d finally found someone that Ophelia liked.
All of those emotions were running through him, paired with thoughts of what tomorrow would bring. All of it was wrapped up and for once, he looked forward to what it might bring with it. Antonio was happy for the moment, everything looking up, but then he got a phone call that ruined his illusion. He had to realize that was all it was.
“Antonio?”
“Yeah?”
“I need you to get back here right now!”
Josselin’s voice was strained and obviously there was something going on, something that freaked her out. He asked her first if his daughter was okay. She said that she was, but he didn’t believe her.
“Tell me what’s going on.”
“I don’t know. She has a fever of like 106. I didn’t even think that was possible.”
Antonio cursed under his breath and asked Josselin a strange question. “Did you give her the smoothie in the fridge?”
Josselin paused and then asked him why that had anything to do with what she called for. “I don’t know if you know this, Antonio, but that is deadly high. You need to come get her. I couldn’t get the front door open and I don’t know the address to call the ambulance. Please call them and get here.”
Antonio started to settle down. He wasn’t near as worried now and he calmly told her to give her the smoothie.
“My daughter has certain minerals that she needs in her body. If you give her the smoothie and give her a few minutes, she will be fine. There is no need to worry.”
Josselin was incredulous, but he was firm. “Does she seem in distress or anything like that?”
Josselin agreed that she didn’t. “Then maybe the thermome
ter is wrong.”
“I don’t think it’s that at all. She is hot to the touch. She shouldn’t be okay, Antonio.”
“Just do it and call me back. I have a meeting I’m about to enter. Call me back in ten minutes and if it isn’t better, I’ll come home, okay?”
Josselin agreed but said again that she thought it was a bad idea to wait. Antonio assured her that it wasn’t and hung up. He smiled at the phone and realized that they had forgotten some important information to pass along.
He knew that he should have said something, but he’d been sidetracked. There were tells that even his daughter at her young age was exhibiting. Her temperature was going to have to be regulated with the herbs that were crushed up into her smoothie. This was done when a shifter was raised in a more human environment. She needed to appear as normal as possible. He hadn’t considered what would happen if she didn’t drink her smoothie. She’d been drinking it since about two when she had accidently shifted and burned her playhouse down. It had freaked out her witch-nanny. He couldn’t even imagine what the human one would have done in the same scenario. He didn’t think that it would work out well.
Antonio waited for her to call back and when she didn’t, he called her back. She answered after a couple of rings and she sounded like she wasn’t as freaked out about it now.
“How is she?”
“She’s fine, fever is down. What is in that smoothie?”
“Just a few herbs to keep her healthy. She needs to have that every morning. I am sorry that I forgot to tell you. It was one of the things that we were supposed to go over yesterday.”
Josselin wanted to know what else there was that she hadn’t been told.
“I am pretty sure that is all of it, but if you have any questions, just call me first. I will never be too busy to take your call.”
She thanked him and said that she was in the middle of breakfast. He got off the phone and mused how it was all going to turn out. He wanted to be positive, but it was Day 1, and they were already running into problems.
Chapter 9
Josselin didn’t know what to think. The girl was burning up, close to death with a temperature, and now she was sitting at the table, legs swinging, eating a banana like nothing was wrong in the world. Josselin had felt such panic when she’d dressed her, feeling her skin so hot. She’d thought it was a fluke or something, but the thermometer had said otherwise. It was just a mess, but now she was fine, cool to the touch. It didn’t make sense and Josselin knew that something was off. It wasn’t possible. And what in the world was in that smoothie to do such a thing to begin with?
Ophelia seemed to be fine and wanted to know if they could play in the atrium. She seemed to know the rules of no going outside and Josselin went with it. She didn’t understand it, but Josselin knew that people were strange and lived very differently from each other. Her life back home had never been good, so even if the little girl didn’t get to play outside that much, Josselin would have traded lives. Ophelia was obviously loved and well taken care of. The burning question was of the mother and where she was. How could a mother leave a child?
They went to the atrium and there were several cases of toys all over the place. Josselin could see that Ophelia was there quite a bit. The little girl went around showing off all of her favorite toys. When she got to a couple of dragons, she held them up and said that they were her favorites.
“You like dragons, huh?”
She agreed. “Looks like daddy.”
Josselin agreed, because that’s what you did with small kids and asked her who the other dragon was.
“That’s me one day.”
Josselin didn’t know what to think of the little girl that wanted to grow up to be a dragon. She was sure that the more traditional answer would be a princess. Didn’t all little girls want to be that?
“Well, I bet you will be a great dragon, Ophelia, if that’s what you want to do.”
That made the little girl smile and her blonde hair bobbed up and down while she ran around the room, acting like she was already one. Josselin laughed at her antics and they played for hours. It was Ophelia that said she was hungry and that made Josselin realize it was well past noon. The time was flying by, and she couldn’t imagine how good her day was. It was so much better than what she was used to.
They made lunch and the two sat on a balcony. Josselin was looking around the castle, trying to see anything, but the clouds were all around them like a fog. She’d never seen anything like it. She couldn’t see the ground and it was a bit disturbing to her. She didn’t say anything out loud, not wanting to scare the child, knowing that it was just her mind playing tricks on her. Of course, the ground was down there somewhere. It was just so foggy. Yet, why was it sunny as well?
Ophelia took a nap, and Josselin knew that she should do anything other than what she wanted to do. She knew that there was something off about the castle, Antonio, the smoothie, all of it. There was something just out of her reach and she wanted to know what it was. All of it was bothering her and Josselin had to get some answers. She remembered all the rules well and told herself that she was going to make sure that she stuck to them, but bend whichever ones she could to get the results she was after. She wanted answers and it was quickly becoming an all-consuming affair.
***
The house was too big to be considered a house. It was a castle for all intent and purposes. It was huge and it was confusing. She had gotten a walk through, but she didn’t know what was going on, not really. She got lost several times and the only reason she found her way back finally was because she was right next to the wing she was supposed to stay away from. Josselin considered it in her mind the Forbidden Wing, which made her desperately want to go explore.
Josselin peered down the hallway that didn’t look much different than the rest of it. How bad would it be if she just opened a few doors to see what was in there and what she was supposed to stay away from?
Josselin was tempted, but since the rules were so clear, she didn’t want to make Antonio mad and lose her place. All she could do was turn around and get away from there before she was caught and there was no way that she could go back.
Josselin wanted to see what was in those rooms. They practically called to her, but her mind went to her old home, and the desire to never go back was no stronger than it had ever been. It didn’t matter what was in those rooms. All that mattered was that she kept her job and did what she was supposed to do. Josselin really liked Ophelia and Antonio was curt, but decent. He was also nice to look at, which was a blessing in and of itself. Josselin was just going to have to push that curiosity to the side and hope that she was going to be able to deal with it.
She walked away from the Forbidden Wing with reluctance, but she knew that it was the right thing to do. Josselin didn’t want to mess up what was going on. It was working and she was ready for things to move to the next part of her life. She wanted her uncles and cousins, brother, to all be a distant memory.
Instead of poking around like she really wanted to, Josselin decided that the next best thing was to go back to the library where she’d found herself when she first woke up the day before. She was enamored with books, old ones especially, and he seemed to have quite a collection. There were many things that she’d found out about Antonio from her walk around the house, but his love of the written word was probably one of her favorite little tidbits of information. It made him seem more down to earth and a little less intimidating. It also gave them a commonality that made her more comfortable as well.
Josselin grabbed a book that was on the table next to where Antonio had been. She liked the idea of reading the same thing as him, and she went to the hallway and the bench by Ophelia’s room to read. The house was so vast, and she wanted to make sure that she could hear her when she woke up. It was going to take time to get used to the place, but the bench was comfortable and Josselin settled in for a good book.
***
September 5th,
1939
The castle is finally finished. I don’t know what kind of spells those witches put on it, but it’s in the sky now. Better yet, there is no way that humans will find it. It’s been cloaked and the witches assure me that it will work for the next hundred years before it will need a booster spell to keep it up. I have to wonder, what would happen if they got mad and messed it up? How bad would a five-thousand-foot fall really be? Could I fly out in time?
Josselin didn’t know what to think of the writing in the book. She’d read books before that were formatted like journal entries but nothing like that. The pages look old and worn. She flipped through it. The whole leather-bound book was full of dates, and she went to a more recent entry.
December 23rd, 2017
The baby is coming early. The doctor said he would be here, but Tommy can’t find him. He has vanished and we didn’t know who else to call. I’m going to deliver this baby, as soon as it comes…
Wish me luck! I’m scared shitless and Katarina isn’t looking so good.
December 24th, 2017
The doctor never came. Ophelia was born and is healthy. Katarina didn’t make it. She died about twenty minutes before the doctor got here. How I wished I could have saved her. I won’t be able to go on without her. Ophelia is so little. She has her mother’s eyes. Every time I look at her, I’m going to see what I lost, and what I will never get back.
Josselin was so engrossed in the book that she didn’t hear the front door open, but she heard it close loudly. She heard Antonio’s voice calling to her and Ophelia. She didn’t know what to do. None of the book made sense, not the first part, but the second part, that was clear. This was Antonio’s journal or something and she’d read a short entry of his wife’s passing.
She felt like she knew more than she was supposed to and was afraid that he would learn she’d read it. It wasn’t on the rules list, but it seemed like a no-brainer. Of course, she wasn’t supposed to read a person’s most private thoughts. In her defense, she hadn’t known that’s what it was, but now that she did, she needed to put it back. Then, he would never know what she knew and hopefully, he wouldn’t ever know. It would be strange if he did.
