-CELINE~
‘Because I’m falling in love with you.‘
The words echoed in my head like a death sentence as I paced the small living <i>room </i>of our quarters. What had I been thinking? Why had I said that?
I pressed my palms against my eyes, trying to block out the memory of Hunter’s face when the words slipped out.
The shock, the something that might have been hope, the way his mouth had opened like he wanted to say something back before Sally’s knock interrupted us.
God, what was wrong with me?
I nced toward Caesar’s bedroom, where he was sleeping peacefully,pletely unaware at his mother was having aplete breakdown.
He’d been so happy at dinner, chattering about wanting to learn chess from “Uncle Hunter,” and I’d smiled and nodded while my heart was breaking.
This had to stop. Whatever was happening between Hunter and me, had to end before it destroyed us both.
I pulled our suitcases from the closet, my hands shaking as I opened them on the bed. We’d done this before…..packed everything we owned in the middle of the night and disappeared.
I could do it again. I had to do it again.
Caesar’s clothes first. His little shirts and pants, the expensive outfits Hunter’s mother had bought him that
he loved so much.
Then his toys….the cars, the stuffed animals, the books Hunter read to him before bedtime.
My chest tightened with each item I folded. How could I exin to a three–year–old that we were leaving the only peace he had ever known? How could I tell him he would never see Uncle Hunter again?
“Because you’re being stupid,” I whispered to myself, shoving my clothes into the second suitcase. “Because you let yourself believe in fairy tales.”
Rich men didn’t fall in love with their housekeepers. They didn’t build families with women like me.
They had their fun, scratched their itch, then married women like Mia ckwood while the help found new jobs and pretended it never happened.
I had learned that lesson from my own family, hadn’t I? My parents had taught me exactly what happened
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when women like me forgot their ce….when we dared to dream beyond our circumstances.
But even as I packed, I couldn’t stop thinking about the way Hunter had looked at me in his study. The desperation in his touch, the tenderness afterward.
The way he’d said my name like it was something precious.
‘Stop it,‘ Imanded myself. ‘Stop reading into things that aren’t there?
I was almost finished when I heard the soft knock at the door.
My heart stuttered. I knew that knock.
“Celine?” Hunter’s voice was muffled through the wood. “Can we talk?”
I froze, a pair of Caesar’s pajamas clutched in my hands. Maybe if I stayed quiet, he’d thi
as asleep.
“I know you’re awake,” he said gently. “I can see the light under the door.”
Damn it.
I shoved the pajamas into the suitcase and zipped it closed, then moved the cases to the floor beside the
bed where they wouldn’t be immediately visible.
“Just a minute,” I called, trying to make my voice sound normal.
I checked myself in the small mirror beside the door…hair was slightly mussed, cheeks still flushed from
packing and panic, but otherwise presentable.
Taking a deep breath, I unlocked the door and opened it just wide enough to see his face.
He was still wearing the same shirt from this afternoon, though it was wrinkled now. His hair looked like he
had been running his hands through it, and there were shadows under his eyes.
“Hi,” he said softly.
“Hi.”
We stood there for a moment, neither of us sure how to begin.
“Can Ie in?” he asked finally.
Every instinct I had screamed at me to say no, to keep the door between us, to protect what little was left of my heart.
But I stepped aside anyway because I was weak and stupid and still half in love with a man who could never be mine.
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He stepped into the room, and I immediately regretted letting him in. The space felt impossibly small with him in it, his presence filling every corner until I could barely breathe.
“How’s Caesar?” he asked, ncing toward the bedroom.
“Asleep. He had a good day.”
“Good. That’s…” He trailed off, his eyes scanning the room.
I followed his gaze and realized with horror that he could see the corner of my suitcase sticking out from
behind the bed.
His face went very still.
“Going somewhere?” His voice was carefully neutral, but I heard the edge underneath.
I lifted my chin, forcing myself to meet his eyes. “Maybe.”
“Maybe?”
“Probably.”
He was quiet for a long moment, and I could practically see him thinking, calcting, trying to figure out
how to handle this.
“Because of what happened this afternoon?” he asked finally.
“Because of everything.” I wrapped my arms around myself, suddenly cold. “This whole situation is getting out of hand, Hunter. We both know it.”
“Do we?”
“Yes.” The word came out sharper than I intended. “You’re my employer. I’m your employee. What we’re doing….it’s inappropriate. It’s…”
“It’s what?” He stepped closer, and I had to fight the urge to back away. “Wrong? Inappropriate? Or are you just scared?”
The usation hit too close to home. “Don’t.”
“Don’t what? Tell the truth? Point out that you’re running away instead of dealing with what’s happening between us?”
“There’s nothing happening between us!” The lie tasted bitter on my tongue. “We had sex, Hunter. Twice. That doesn’t mean anything.”
His eyes shed. “That’s bullshit, and you know it.”
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“Is it? Because from where I’m standing, it looks like you got what you wanted, and now you’re trying to turn it into something it’s not to make yourself feel better about screwing the help.”
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The words were designed to hurt, to push him away, to make him angry enough to let me go. But instead of retreating, he moved closer.
“The help?” His voice was dangerously quiet. “Is that really what you think this is about?”
“What else could it be about?”
“Maybe the fact that I’m in love with you?” <fndd30> The rightful source is Find[F]ovel</fndd30>
The words hit me like a physical blow. I actually stumbled backward, my hand flying to my chest.
“Don’t,” I whispered. “Don’t say that.”
“Why not? It’s true.”
“No, it’s not. You don’t know me, Hunter. You don’t know anything about me.”
“I know you take your coffee with too much sugar and not enough cream. I know you hum when you cook, and you always check on Caesar three times before you go to bed. I know you haven’t bought yourself anything new since you got here because every penny goes to paying off debts you shouldn’t have had to
take on alone.”
Each word was like a knife, cutting through the walls I’d built around my heart.
“I know you’re terrified of letting anyone get close because someone hurt you badly once. And I know you love Caesar more than your own life, which is exactly what a mother should do.”
“Stop.” Tears were burning behind my eyes. “Just stop.”
“I know you, Celine. Better than you think. And I love every damn thing about you.”
“<i>You </i>love the idea of me,” I shot back, desperation making me cruel. “The fantasy. The broken single mother you think you can save. But that’s not love, Hunter. That’s a pity.”
His face went white. “That’s not….”
“Isn’t it? Isn’t that what this is really about? You feel sorry for me and Caesar, so you thought you would y house for a while, make yourself feel good about helping the poor unfortunates.”
“That’s not true.”
“Then why?” The question exploded out of me, with years of hurt fear, and anger behind it.
“Why us, Hunter? Why Caesar? You barely knew us when you hired me, but you brought us into your home,
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into your life. You allow your mother to buy him clothes and toys and read him stories like you’re his…”
I stopped, the words dying in my throat as something shifted in Hunter’s expression. Something that looked like guilt fear and desperate resolve all rolled into one.
“Like I’m his what, Celine?”
The room went dead silent except for the sound of my heart pounding in my ears.
“Nothing,” I whispered. “I didn’t mean anything.”
“Yes, you did.” He was looking at me with an intensity that made my skin crawl. “Say it.”
“Hunter, please….”
“Say it, Celine. Like I’m his what?”
“His father,” I breathed, the words barely audible.
AD
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