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Riley and Zoey shared what I called a “twin look.”
“Yeah, that’s what I thought. Now, go do your homework,” I said, pointing up the stairs.
They both groaned. I gently tugged on Riley’s ponytail.
“If you do your homework, maybe I’ll make you some brownie sundaes,” I said. Being a nanny for eleven years meant I wasn’t above bribery to get desired results.
The twin’s faces lit up at the same time and they dashed up the stairs as I laughed.
Those girls.
I walked back into the massive kitchen and started cleaning up from dinner. In addition to my nanny duties, I also helped clean and manage the large home. Mark Jewel traveled a lot for his work as a business consultant, so on his weeks with the kids, I was the stability in their life. Their mom, Sadie, also lived in Arrowbridge in another nice home and shared custody with Mark, and I would go back and forth with them to each house. It might be confusing to others, but over the years we’d honed our system.
By the time I finished in the kitchen and walked around the rest of the house to clean things up for the night, I was exhausted. In another week, the girls would be out of school and I’d have them with me full time. I was prepared with activities for both inside the house and outside. When they were little, it was so much easier to throw water wings on them and toss them in the pool all day or set up a sprinkler for them to run through. Now our summers were more labor intensive for me. Mark had given me raises as the girls had gotten older, though, so I wasn’t complaining.
It was almost time for me to be off the clock, and I’d head across the property to the guest house, where I’d lived these past eleven years.
In the not-so-distant future, the girls were going to be old enough that they could watch themselves most of the time, and I was going to be out of a job. I tried not to think about it, because if I did, I’d have a massive fucking breakdown about my complete lack of a career backup plan.
The girls did their homework, which wasn’t much considering it was almost the end of the school year, and then I treated them to brownie sundaes before shooing them into the shower before bed.
I walked down to Mark’s office and knocked on the door. There was no answer, but I pushed it open anyway. If he was on a call, then I would just come back later.
Mark wasn’t in his office, but Honor was, looking very cozy at his desk, sitting in his chair. She had her own freaking desk and chair, but she just had to sit in his. Gross.
I rolled my eyes.
“Where is he?” I asked.
“Bathroom,” she said, without looking up from the computer.
“Can you tell him I’m heading out for the night?” I asked her.
Honor ignored me and squinted just barely at the screen. I had to admit, it was kind of cute seeing someone who looked like her squinting. Maybe she needed glasses. I bet she’d be too vain to wear them, but there were always contacts.
“Hello? Did you hear me?” I asked, waving my arms.
“What?” Honor asked, her voice snapping.
Mark came up behind me, saving me from having to speak any more to Honor.
“Heading out?” he asked, sliding around me and into the office.
“Yeah, the girls are upstairs, homework is done for the night, and they’ve had ice cream,” I said.
Mark rolled his eyes. “Thanks for that.”
“Hey, I wouldn’t be able to feed it to them if you didn’t pay for it,” I pointed out.
Mark smiled. He was in his late-thirties and incredibly handsome. If I had any attraction to men at all, I probably would have fallen in love with him years ago. That man was swoon-worthy in every sense of the word.
“Yes, but if I didn’t buy ice cream for them, I would never hear the end of it,” he said, and we both laughed.
“Good night,” he said, leaning over Honor’s shoulder to look at something on the screen.
“Good night,” I said, waving.
Honor never acknowledged me.
