A Nanny for the Reclusive Billionaire Read online

  He might be only four, but she couldn’t argue with his logic. It had been raining on and off for three days, and they’d almost exhausted her mental catalog of indoor activities.

  “Do you need anything in town?” Collins asked, striding into the kitchen and grabbing a banana from a basket on the counter. “I have to deliver some documents for Mr. Dalton.”

  Mallory’s stupid heart skipped a beat at Rhys’s name. He was closing some big deal, and she hadn’t seen much of him in the past few days except for the odd meal with Oliver and their clandestine late-night rendezvous. Which explained why she hadn’t told him about her cancer. She couldn’t say anything in front of Oliver. And it wasn’t exactly pillow talk.

  She shook off the feeling of unease that rose inside her every time she thought about her looming conversation with Rhys and turned her attention back to his assistant, who was peeling the banana. “Is it safe to take the boat out?”

  Collins shrugged. “The rain’s stopped. Surf’s a little choppy, but nothing I can’t handle.”

  “Does that mean we can go to the beach now?” Oliver asked, snatching another cookie from the plate in front of him and shoving the whole thing into his mouth.

  “Not if the surf is rough.” Mallory tapped a finger against her chin, an idea forming. She eyed Collins. “How long are you planning on staying ashore?”

  “Why?”

  “There’s a movie theater in Key West, isn’t there?”

  “No.” He bit off the top of the banana.

  “Is too,” Oliver piped up, a spray of cookie crumbs following each word. “Mrs. Flannigan saw the last Avengers movie there. She likes Captain America best, like me. She brought me a poster and a box of Mike and Ikes.”

  “There is,” Collins admitted. “But if you’re asking me to take you there, the answer is no.”

  Mallory pulled the plate of cookies toward her, took one, and bit into it. Still warm. Chocolate chip, the Worthington Hotel’s special, super-secret recipe. They gave one to all their guests when they checked in.

  She licked a smear of melted chocolate from her lower lip and pinned Collins with her most intimidating stare. At least she hoped it was intimidating. Intimidation was so not her forte. Where was Brooke when she needed her? Probably off shagging her sexy new husband somewhere.

  As if Mallory could complain. It wasn’t like she hadn’t been getting her fair share of shagging lately.

  Focus. Stop thinking about Rhys’s talented hands. Or his magic mouth. Or his…

  “Why not?” she asked, stopping her thoughts in their naughty tracks and getting back to the matter at hand. “We’re going a little stir-crazy. As beautiful as it is here, it would be nice to get off the island for a change.”

  Collins frowned and chewed his banana thoughtfully. “Mr. Dalton wouldn’t approve.”

  “I’d like to hear that from him.” She stood.

  “He’s on a conference call with the New York office,” Collins explained. “He can’t be interrupted.”

  “Then I’ll leave him a note. It’ll be fine.” She polished off the cookie and wiped her hands on her jeans.

  “I doubt that.”

  “I’ll take full responsibility.”

  “That’s what I’m afraid of.”

  “Please.” Oliver looked up at them with wide, pleading eyes and a desperate, vulnerable look on his flushed face no doubt calculated for maximum pathetic effect. Kid was a fast learner. “I wanna go. I’ve never been to a movie theater.”

  “Never?” Mallory had to practically pick her jaw up off the floor. He must be exaggerating. What preschooler had never been to the movies?

  Oliver shook his head, his blond bangs flopping on his forehead. “Nope.”

  This one, apparently. And she thought she’d been sheltered.

  “That settles it.” She pointed toward the door. “Go upstairs and get your raincoat. We’re going to the movies.”

  He jumped out of his seat so fast his chair almost toppled over. “What are we going to see?”

  “We’ll use my phone to figure that out on the way over.” They always had at least one G-rated movie playing, didn’t they?

  “Can we get popcorn with lots of butter?”

  “You bet.”

  “And candy and soda?”

  She tousled his hair. “The works.”

  With a gap-toothed grin as wide as if it were Christmas morning and he’d discovered a pile of presents beneath the tree, Oliver sprinted out of the kitchen.

  Collins grimaced. “I’ve got a bad feeling about this.”

  “You worry too much.” Mallory fished her wallet out of her purse and leafed through the bills inside. Twenty, forty, sixty, and a handful of ones and fives. More than enough for an afternoon at the movies. She dropped the wallet back into her pocketbook and scanned the counter for a pen and something to write on. She settled for one of the muffin-tin crayons and the back of an envelope. “Get the boat ready. We’ll meet you at the dock in a few minutes.”

  “You’re the boss.” Collins tossed his banana peel in the trash can under the sink. “But don’t say I didn’t warn you.”

  Mallory scrawled a quick note to Rhys and stuck it on the refrigerator, figuring he was bound to get hungry and come searching for food at some point. Then she collected her purse and poncho, met Oliver at the bottom of the stairs, and together they headed to the dock.

  Within minutes, they were safely in the back of the launch, zipping across the choppy, gray-green Atlantic with Collins at the helm. They huddled together against the wind as she called up the site for the movie theater on her cell phone browser, Oliver bouncing excitedly and chattering in her ear all the way.

  “Sit still,” she warned with a hand on his shoulder, her laugh taking away some of the sting of her words. “You’ll never make it to the movies if you fall overboard and wind up as fish food.”

  “Fish food?” he asked, his eyes big as saucers. “You mean if I fell in the fish would eat me?”

  “No, silly.” She’d forgotten how literal kids could be. “It’s only an expression.”

  She pointed to a picture on her phone’s screen, eager for a distraction. “How about this one? It has a talking robot and a time machine.”

  By the time they reached Key West, they’d agreed on the new Pixar film and arranged to meet Collins at the marina when the movie was over. She called for an Uber, and they made it to the theater in time to stock up on snacks at the concession stand and catch the last preview.

  “That. Was. Awesome,” Oliver exclaimed as the credits rolled ninety minutes later. “Can we come back and see it again tomorrow?”

  “Not tomorrow.” Mallory held up his rain slicker by the collar. “But sometime soon.”

  “Can Dad come too?” He poked his sticklike arms through the sleeves of his jacket. “He loves robots.”

  “I hope so.” She felt a pang of guilt at not including Rhys in today’s adventure. Not her choice, really. But still, he was Oliver’s father. It would have been nice if he could have been there to see his son’s face light up when the opening credits flashed bigger than life across the twenty-foot-tall screen. Maybe that was what Collins was talking about when he said Rhys wouldn’t approve. Why hadn’t she thought of that earlier?

  No use beating herself up now. She’d explain it to Rhys when they returned home. Hopefully over dinner, if he could make time to join them. She’d asked Collins to pick up some fresh mahi-mahi she could grill and serve with her signature mango-lime salsa. That should tempt Rhys out of his cave.

  She slipped her poncho over her head and bent to retrieve her purse from under her seat. “We’d better get moving. We don’t want to keep Collins waiting.”

  The ride back to Flamingo Key was quiet. Oliver’s eyelids started drooping the second his life jacket was fastened. Before they hit open water, his eyes had closed, and his head lolled against her shoulder. When they reached the island and the boat was secured, Mallory handed the still-sleeping
Oliver over to Collins, who carried him to the house. She grabbed her purse and the insulated bag with the mahi-mahi and scrambled out after them, hurrying to catch up.

  “Can you take him to his room?” she asked, keeping her voice low so she wouldn’t wake Oliver as she opened the sliding glass door leading from the patio into the house. “He’s exhausted. He can nap before dinner.”

  “Yes, Collins,” Rhys drawled from an overstuffed chair in the corner. His words may have been directed at his assistant, but his eyes never left Mallory. The note she’d tacked to the refrigerator was crumpled in one hand, a drink in the other. “That’s an excellent suggestion. Take Oliver to his room. Miss Worthington and I need to talk.”

  …

  “What the hell were you thinking?” Rhys barked once his assistant and son had left the room. Mallory winced, and for a moment he regretted his outburst. Then he remembered the panic that had gripped him when he’d read the note clutched in his hand. He crushed it into a ball and threw it down onto the hardwood floor.

  “Strike that.” He rose, pacing from one side of the room to the other like a caged tiger. “You weren’t thinking if for one second you thought I’d let you take Oliver off the island.”

  “Let me?” She dropped her bags on the floor behind the couch and folded her arms across her chest. “Last time I checked, entertaining your son was part of my job description. I didn’t realize I needed your blessing for every item on our daily agenda.”

  “When it involves Oliver’s safety, you do.”

  “His safety?” She gaped at him like he was speaking a foreign language. “We went to the movies. He never left my sight. And don’t worry, it was rated G.”

  “You took him off the island,” he repeated, stressing each word so there was no way she could fail to understand what had upset him.

  If Mallory was gaping at him before, now she was gawking like a fish, her mouth opening and closing wordlessly. It took her a minute to speak. “Are you telling me Oliver’s never left Flamingo Key?”

  “Not since we came here after his mother died.” Rhys stopped pacing and tossed back what remained of his scotch. His second—or was it third?—since discovering his son was missing. Okay, missing was an overstatement. More like AWOL. Which, in Rhys’s opinion, was just as bad.

  “And you?”

  “Only when necessary.”

  Mallory shook her head incredulously. “He said he’d never been to the movies, but I didn’t realize he was a prisoner here.”

  “He’s not a prisoner.” Rhys waved a hand at their surroundings. “Look around. This isn’t exactly Sing Sing.”

  “A gilded cage is still a cage.” Mallory’s expression softened, an almost wistful look crossing her face. “It can’t compare with freedom. And you can’t keep him here forever.”

  “I know that. But he’s only a child. It’s my job to keep him safe.”

  He pinched the bridge of his nose and rolled his shoulders. Christ, this was exhausting. It didn’t help that he’d been working day and night trying to lock down a contract with the Department of Defense. But if he sealed this deal, he could take it easy for a while. Spend more time with Oliver and Mallory. Family time, doing family things. Things he couldn’t imagine taking pleasure in again before Mallory came along and shook up his world with her mealtime ultimatums and picnic abductions and late-night visits to the previously impenetrable fortress of his bedroom.

  Rhys was so lost in thought he didn’t notice she’d moved next to him until she laid a hand on his forearm, making him flinch. The hand tightened its grip, not letting him shake it off. When she spoke, her voice was gentle but firm. “Like you couldn’t do for Beth?”

  Her words, her touch, took some of the fight out of him. As usual, she’d seen right through him. It amazed him how this woman he’d known for a matter of months could read him so easily.

  Yes, he’d wanted to punch walls when he read her note. But he didn’t want to argue with her now. He wanted her to understand what he was doing and why.

  He sank into the nearest seat, which turned out to be the sectional, and stared into his empty glass. “She wasn’t supposed to be downtown that morning.”

  Mallory sat next to him, close but not touching, listening but not speaking.

  “I left some paperwork at home,” he continued, still staring at the bottom of his glass. “She was bringing it to me at the office.”

  Mallory turned toward him. “Life’s strange that way.”

  “It was sheer dumb luck she didn’t have Oliver with her. He had a cold, so she left him with a neighbor.”

  “None of that makes her death your fault.”

  “Doesn’t it?” He slammed his glass down on the coffee table. “She wanted to leave New York. Begged me to move here full time. But I said no. Told her Argos needed me in the city. I put my damn job before my family.”

  “You did what you thought was right. You had no way of knowing what was going to happen.”

  “I did what I thought was right for me. What was easiest for me.” He shoved a hand through his already-disheveled hair. “I should have listened to her. She’d still be here if I had.”

  “Again, you don’t know that. None of us know how much time we have on this planet. But that’s no reason to hold Oliver hostage.”

  “You don’t get it. I promised to protect him. I’m doing that the best way I know how.”

  “I get more than you think.” Mallory cleared her throat and fiddled with her necklace. “There’s something I need to tell you.”

  “Nothing good ever starts with those words.” Rhys picked up his empty glass and went to the minibar for a refill. Whatever was coming next, he had a feeling it would go down better with a stiff drink.

  She crossed and uncrossed her legs nervously. “I know how Oliver feels because I was like him growing up.”

  He stopped mid-pour. “Your mother died?”

  “No.” She shook her head. “But from the time I was twelve I felt like a prisoner in my own home.”

  “Why twelve?”

  “That’s when I was diagnosed with cancer.”

  Cancer. The word hit him like a sharp right hook to the gut, bringing back memories of his mother, her once-healthy frame thin and pale in a hospital bed.

  “Non-Hodgkin lymphoma,” she explained. “My parents reacted a lot like you. They thought the best way to make sure I got and stayed healthy was to keep me as close as possible. For a long time, I went along with it. I’d caused them enough pain. Why make them worry any more than they already did? Then one day I woke up and realized the life I was living wasn’t my own. So I left. And came here. I guess the rest is history.”

  Her eyes met his, the uncertainty in them another punch to his midsection. “I’ve wanted to tell you for a while, but I didn’t know how you’d react. “

  “Are you—? Is it—?”

  He couldn’t complete the thought, but she understood and answered anyway.

  “I’ve been in remission for years, but I get follow-up care every six months. There’s always the risk it will come back, or I’ll develop another kind of cancer.”

  He set down the bottle and downed what little he’d managed to get into his glass before her shocking revelation. Shocking, but the more he thought about it not surprising. Her veiled comment about survivor’s guilt made complete sense now. How many of her fellow patients had she watched lose their battles with cancer? “I don’t know what to say.”

  “Say you won’t put Oliver through what I went through. Say you won’t suffocate him. Say you’ll let him be a regular kid.”

  “He is a regular kid.”

  “Regular kids go to the movies. And playgrounds, parties, and playdates. They socialize with other kids.” Mallory’s voice rose with each new example. “Please. Don’t do to him what my parents did to me. It took me years to work up enough courage to break free. I won’t live like that again, and I won’t stand by and watch Oliver live that way, either. I care for him—a
nd you—too much to let that happen.”

  Rhys ditched the glass and returned to the sofa. More alcohol wasn’t going to solve this problem.

  “I know I’ll have to lighten up eventually.” His stomach knotted at the admission. “But I feel like I’m making real progress with him. I can’t let him go now.”

  “You’re not letting him go,” Mallory insisted. “You’re letting him live.”

  “I can’t. Not yet.” Rhys rested his elbows on his knees and buried his head in his hands.

  “If not now, then when?”

  “I don’t know,” he answered honestly, his voice muffled by his hands. “I’m sorry. I wish I could give you a better answer.”

  Silence hung heavy in the air between them for a long moment.

  “I’m sorry, too,” she said finally, her voice catching on the last word.

  He lifted his head. His insides twisted at the tears swimming in her eyes. “What are you saying?”

  She looked down at her lap. “I’m saying there’s only one thing left for me to do.”

  “What’s that?”

  His heart stopped in his chest as he waited an agonizing minute that seemed like hours for her response. When she raised her head, the tears that had been brimming in her eyes spilled down her beautiful, serene face.

  “Pack.”

  Chapter Fourteen

  “Thanks for letting me crash with you guys. I promise I won’t stay long.”

  Mallory dropped her weekender tote at the foot of the bed in the larger of her sister’s two spare bedrooms. Funny, she thought, staring at the familiar bag. She’d left Florida the same way she’d come. Just the one piece of luggage, the rest of her belongings on a truck somewhere along the I-95 corridor.

  No. That wasn’t entirely true. She’d left with a lot more baggage than she brought. She just carried it on the inside.

  “Stay as long as you like,” Brooke said, crossing to the window and opening the blinds to let in some late-afternoon sunlight. “We’ve got plenty of room. And Brooklyn’s way more hip than Huntington.”

  “Anywhere Mom and Dad aren’t is more hip.” Mallory shuddered at the thought of moving back to her parents’ Long Island estate. She owed her sister big-time for sparing her from that humiliation. Which was why overstaying her welcome wasn’t an option. “But I don’t want to cramp your newlywed style.”