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Emilia
Emilia paced her room, a volcano of fury threatening to melt her from the inside out.
Tomorrow, she would have to be calm for the children, but tonight, she could embrace her anger. And there was so much to embrace.
First of all, that harebrained archery instructor should not be working with children. Emilia herself had only ever read the manual, but even she knew that positive reinforcement was the way to work with a truculent pre-teen like Dyrk.
And any human being would know that Mimi needed reassurance after accidentally loosing that arrow.
The instructor might be a good archer, but he was a terrible teacher, and it was painfully clear that Ra’as had never attended one of those lessons. If he had, she was certain they wouldn’t be run that way.
What was he thinking anyway, arranging archery lessons at his own home and then not bothering to show up for them?
And then he made the cook prepare those horrible meals for his family. This one family appeared to have more credits than entire towns back home, so why would he want them to eat that way? And what kind of cook would tolerate it?
And to top it all off, he didn’t even sit down to eat with them?
A gentle tap on the door distracted her from her train of thought and she went to it immediately.
It would be Mimi, of course, still worrying that her father was mad. It had taken Emilia lots of hugs and stories to get Mimi calm enough to doze off. She was fully expecting a visit from the little one at some point.
“Here I am,” she said softly as she opened the door. “It’s okay.”
But instead of looking into Mimi’s bright blue eyes, she found herself staring at Ra’as Drayven’s muscular chest.
“Mr. Drayven,” she said, stepping back in surprise.
She would have been willing to bet even money that he normally banged on doors like the Intergalactic Bureau about to begin a search.
He had tricked her with that soft knock, and it made her even more angry than before.
She opened her mouth to yell at him, but all her accusations were suddenly log-jammed in her mind, and she couldn’t decide where to begin.
“I’m sorry,” he said in a deep, serious tone.
The words banged around in her head without meaning for a moment. And when their meaning landed, she was too stunned to get her thoughts in order for a response.
“I saw the recipe,” he went on, either not seeing or not caring that she was flabbergasted. “I jumped to conclusions, but I was wrong. Thank you for doing something special to make Dyrk and Mimi feel happy. I hope my outburst didn’t make you decide to leave us.”
Leave them?
The children were wonderful, Emilia would have never considered leaving them just because their selfish father had thrown a tantrum.
“They’ve already lost two nannies this year,” Ra’as said gruffly, appearing to take her silence as a bad sign.
“I was just getting ready to come down and clean up,” she said stiffly. “I’m not going anywhere.”
“Good,” he said, his shoulders visibly relaxing in relief and a warm smile suddenly transforming his cold expression into something almost beautiful. “Good. I already cleaned up, though. So please enjoy the rest of your evening.”
He cleaned up?
“Thank you,” she said sincerely. “That was… really nice of you.”
“No,” he said softly. “Thank you.”
He reached out to her, and she felt a funny little shiver of anticipation dance down her spine.
Slowly, Ra’as stroked her cheek once with the calloused pad of his thumb.
