Babysitter for the Single Dad Read online

  “Stay with me tonight,” I say.

  “I’m not going anywhere.”

  “You know what I mean.”

  She nods, and I lift her from the table and lead her into my room.

  CHAPTER 19

  Jenna

  I’ve never gone from kissing a guy straight to bed like that. I hope he can’t tell how little experience I have—one boyfriend at school who was not much to write home about, but then neither was I. A guy I dated last year for a few months, but that petered out too. I don’t have a clue how to keep a guy like Elliott interested. I should be scared, but as soon as he took me in his arms it felt right. I stopped worrying so much, but I’m still on edge.

  When we reach his room, he kisses me again and unzips my dress, pulling it off my shoulders so the fabric falls down and pools at my feet, still in my heels. I swallow, my heart pounding.

  “I don’t think you know how beautiful you are, standing there like that,” he says, his eyes drinking in the sight of me, his obvious lust sending a message to my core. My insides melt.

  He opens a couple of buttons on his shirt, and too impatient to undo the rest, he pulls it over his head. I can’t resist reaching out my hand to run my fingers down the center of his broad chest, with its smattering of hair, down to his abs.

  “Back at you,” I say, and he grins as he throws off his shirt. I know that movie stars have to be fit and look good, but I never touched one. Reality is so much better than on the screen.

  It could have been awkward then, but somehow, it’s not. He kisses me, soft tender kisses, as he undoes my bra, and before it hits the floor, he bends to take my nipple into his hot mouth. My breath hitches, and a shiver ripples down my spine as he feasts first on one breast and then the other.

  A heavy ache settles in my belly. I want this. I want him. My hands graze through his thick hair, holding him against me as he sucks and pulls and teases the hard peaks, and I cry out with the sensation.

  He looks up at me, and there’s a glint in his eye as he licks again at one nipple, guiding me back onto the bed. His bed. I can’t believe I’m doing this, but I am. He plants a row of kisses down my stomach and on top of my panties, and the butterflies in my stomach do somersaults.

  “These have to come off,” he says, running his finger slowly under the lace top, “for what I have in mind.”

  “What do you have in mind?” I ask. “Something bad?”

  “No, something good,” he says, and he eases my panties down and pulls them off my feet, flinging them to the floor along with my heels.

  He breathes in my scent, and I squirm with a mixture of embarrassment and anticipation, but he’s not letting me go. He holds me tight at the hips, and lowers his head.

  At that moment I forget everything but the heat of his mouth on me, the sensation of his face against my thighs, the warmth of his breath, and more than anything, his tongue.

  He teases me incessantly, flicking, probing, swirling, keeping me on the cusp of pleasure. I moan with desperate need. I want to come so badly. And then he takes my hard, engorged nub between his lips and sucks. I climax so hard I don’t think I’ll ever be the same again.

  But he doesn’t stop there. He doesn’t stop until he’s made me cry out and arch against him again and again. I don’t think I can move after that. My bones have melted into the bedcovers.

  “I loved hearing you come like that,” he says, kissing his way up my stomach.

  “I don’t think I can do it again. You exhausted my capacity for orgasms.”

  “Sounds like a challenge I want to accept.” He laughs, and makes as if to go down on me again, but I pull him up.

  “It’s definitely your turn now. I think I might even be able to move again if you give me a moment.”

  He smiles. “Your pleasure is mine.”

  “You’re such a charmer, but you’re overdressed for the occasion.”

  “That’s easy to fix.” He divests himself of jeans, socks and shoes in record time, and I’m treated to the sight of him hard and magnificent in white cotton boxer briefs. I slip my hands into the waistband and release him from the fabric prison.

  “It seems cruel to coop him up in there.”

  “Yes, barbaric, but it saves frightening old ladies in the street, or on the screen.”

  He grabs a condom from the nightstand.

  “It’s a shame to cover him up again,” I say. “Have you had one of those tests?”

  “Yes, all good. You, too? What about protection? Are you on the pill? Much as I love Sophie, I can’t make a habit of fathering children.”

  “You’re safe with me.” I smile at him. I want to feel him flesh on flesh more than anything. And I’m sure it’s all okay. I trust him for some reason more than I ever have any other guy, which is strange, given he could make all kinds of lies seem like the truth as an actor.

  “I feel anything but safe with you,” he says, and then he sees my face fall. “That didn’t come out right. I don’t mean wearing a condom, I mean how I can’t get you out of my head, and I’ve only known you for a day.”

  I like that, given what we’re about to do. But I don’t have time to think about what it means, what any of this means, because he’s between my legs, leaning over me and sliding in with one slow, perfect movement until I’m full of him. It feels like he’s everywhere deep inside me.

  I take a deep breath, and he looks down at me, his eyes never leaving mine, and for a moment I think this is how it’s meant to be, this is how joined up we should be, him and me. We belong like this.

  But I don’t have long to think, because my lungs and head are filled with him as he plunges into me over and over, each thrust deeper than the last, and I gasp at the intensity of the sensation of opening up to him, receiving him, being his with every movement of his body.

  “Come for me again,” he says. And I was wrong earlier, because it feels like my body is capable of anything with him, and in two more strokes I cry out once more with pleasure.

  Before I come down from that high, he flips me over. “I want to see your beautiful ass,” he says, and he plunges back in, taking me relentlessly. I’m greedy for more of this, more of him. I raise my hips to meet him time after time. I want him to fill me with everything he has, to come for me, as I have for him. He speeds up, and then pauses and clutches me tight, groaning as he explodes deep inside me and calls out my name.

  CHAPTER 20

  Elliott

  Sleeping with the nanny is such a cliché. But this is nothing like that. How can something I know I shouldn’t be doing feel so right? It just does.

  Jenna doesn’t feel like she’s only my babysitter. She’s someone special. I thought that from the moment she grabbed my arm on the plane. But that’s ridiculous. Who believes in that stuff these days? It’s nothing but lust. It has to be, to feel like that so soon. But it’s funny how protective I feel towards her already, as if I want to keep her safe in my bed and not let her go.

  Suddenly I shudder, because I can imagine what the paparazzi would do with this, if it ever got out that I slept with my nanny the day after she arrived in my house, and I can’t have them getting to her. She lies so sweetly against me, her curves nestling into my body. I want to keep her safe from all that.

  She shuffles a little in her sleep, and I kiss her hair, her sweet apple-blossom scented hair, and like that ad for shampoo where the man can’t resist, I go in for another kiss.

  She wakes then and turns to me. “Is it morning?”

  “Nearly. No need for alarm clocks in this house with Sophie around.” I hear her babbling in her bed.

  “I’ll go and see to her.” Jenna makes to get up.

  “No, I’ll do it. You lie there, and I’ll bring you some breakfast.”

  “This is the wrong way around.”

  “Not what you said last night.” I grin at her, and she laughs.

  “I wouldn’t say no to coffee and some of that fresh Spanish bread if there is any.”

&n
bsp; “Coming up.”

  Sophie is happily playing in her crib with her little pink bunny, so I take Jenna her breakfast first.

  “Two happy ladies today. I think we should go for a drive and see a bit of the island. Would you like that?”

  “Will you be spotted?”

  “Not if I wear my sunglasses, usually. There are some beautiful places I’d like you to see.”

  “Then I’m all yours.”

  “I wouldn’t want you being anyone else’s.”

  “I’m not.”

  CHAPTER 21

  Jenna

  I want to ask Elliott if he’s anyone else’s, if this means we’re exclusive, but I don’t dare. It feels too presumptuous on my part. He’s a movie star. There must be any number of willing women, and suddenly, it doesn’t seem like such a clever idea to be in his bed.

  Not that it ever was a good idea. It just felt so natural last night, and waking up with him this morning was… nice. I just have to be careful not to get carried away, not to be stupid and fall in love with him, but from the way I’m feeling it might be too late for that, no matter how little time I’ve known him.

  They say sometimes you just know. And I just know I’ve fallen hard for a guy who is fun to be with, a good daddy, a good brother, and it doesn’t hurt that he looks like the movie star he is.

  I have to stop thinking he’s perfect. He has got to have a lot of faults I haven’t even seen yet. Other girlfriends would be a biggie that could change my mind in an instant. Unrequited love is not going to be in my future, thanks very much.

  But whatever, we have today to enjoy. Elliott gets Ben to rent a jeep and after he brings it home, Elliott gives him the day off. We set off with Sophie on our island discovery trip, all the kid paraphernalia along with a picnic in the back.

  The island is beautiful, the air fresh and the sun warm. It doesn’t feel like I’m working at all. I’m miles from the cold grey drizzle of a typical London October. He shows me his favorite cove, craggy peaks, forest roads.

  “We’ll go farther afield another day, but there is so much to visit. I love it here. Are you hungry? That picnic is calling my name.”

  “You’re lucky to have Mrs. Martinez.”

  “Yes, she’s an angel. I hope she never retires.”

  We stop and haul everything out of the back of the jeep. Sophie claps her hands. She hasn’t been admiring the scenery much, just talking to her pink bunny in the back, keeping up a one-sided chat that makes us laugh.

  Elliott spreads a picnic rug out under a tree. We’re in some forest somewhere. It feels like we are far from civilization, but we passed a village just ten minutes ago. We open up the basket and take out all the things the housekeeper has stashed away for our lunch. So much food you’d think she was feeding an army, not just two adults and a baby.

  But we seem to get through a lot of it. It’s the kind of food where you can’t resist just one more taste of this dish or that.

  “I’m glad it was you who took the job as my nanny. I didn’t know how I was going to get to see the girl on the flight again, otherwise.”

  “You could have just asked me out.”

  “I could, but you might have said no, and then I would have been mortally wounded. We stars have big egos, you know.”

  “I wouldn’t have said no.”

  “I’d have had to wait until you had a day off if I wasn’t your boss. This way, I get to see you every day.”

  I feel all warm inside when he says that, although part of me is saying don’t read too much into this. He has a natural, easy-going charm. But when he looks at me again and kisses me, deeply and thoroughly, his eyes never leaving mine, all doubts vanish like the snow in July.

  After lunch, Sophie has a nap under the tree. She looks so peaceful in the shade, and I lie, equally at ease, in Elliott’s arms. He teases me with kisses and caresses, but nothing more can happen there, even though I’d like it to. Not when Sophie could wake up any moment. Not when some curious hiker could come by and catch us.

  “When Sophie goes to bed tonight, I’m going to peel off every stitch and kiss you all over,” he whispers, his breath tickling my ear, “and then I’m going to eat you up.”

  “Like the big, bad wolf.” I giggle.

  “Maybe not going as far as that. Can’t fuck you if you’re all eaten up.”

  “Shhh. Sophie will hear. We can’t have her learning words like that at eighteen months.”

  “I guess not. Eaten up is very, very bad, but it depends on the context. Eaten up and fucked together is bad.”

  I glance over at Sophie. She’s fast asleep. “Fucked is very bad.”

  “Very bad indeed. I’ll have to spank you for repeating such things where my daughter might hear.”

  My breath hitches. “You wouldn’t.”

  “Only if you want me to.” And I can’t help but laugh. I have no idea where he’s going with this. Or maybe I do.

  CHAPTER 22

  Elliott

  After Sophie wakes up, Jenna changes her, and we do a little tour of one of my favorite villages on the island, but we don’t go as far afield as I thought we might today. Somehow, I just want to get back to the beach house. Call me selfish or mesmerized or something, but I want to make sure Sophie is not disturbed in her routine so she will go to sleep at her usual time, and I can be alone with Jenna.

  It was just an off-the-cuff remark about spanking, but I saw how she reacted, and thinking about her bottom in that bikini on the sand, I can’t wait to test out my theory that she wouldn’t mind playing that kind of game.

  So we arrive back mid-afternoon, a little tired but happy. We can go touring again another day and maybe stay over on the north of the island or something, or I can charter a boat, whatever Jenna wants.

  Sophie has other plans than relaxing at the house, however. She grabs her little bucket as soon as she spots it and pulls my hand.

  “I think she wants to go to the beach,” Jenna says, laughing. “No rest for the wicked. I’ll get her ready.”

  I really don’t mind at all. I have all the time in the world right now for the two ladies in my life. When we get to our usual place on the sand, we both help Sophie build the biggest sand castle yet.

  “We should put some water in that moat,” I say to Jenna.

  She yawns, hiding her mouth with her hand.

  “I think I kept you awake last night.”

  “I wasn’t complaining. You were as awake as me.” She laughs.

  “Have a break, sleep now if you like. Because I might be keeping you up past your bedtime tonight, too. That’s if you want me to.”

  “I want,” she says, looking at me and I have to change the subject entirely before I embarrass myself with a huge erection in my shorts on a public beach.

  “Come on, let’s get some water.” I lift up Sophie and take her down to paddle at the edge of the water. We fill her little bucket. She insists on carrying it herself as she waddles back up the beach. I don’t think there will be much water left in the bucket by the time it gets to the castle.

  “Jen-na,” she says, when we get back. “Look!” and she holds up the bucket, but then she topples over and falls on Jenna, the bit of cold water left goes everywhere, and Jenna leaps up leaving her bikini top behind. She must have loosened it to avoid strap marks when she was lying on her front. She grabs it quickly.

  “Little imp,” she says, giving Sophie a hug. Jenna looks at me. “If it had been you I’d have thought you did that deliberately to make me leave my top behind.”

  “Not guilty!” I say. “Not this time. Though it’s a good trick. I’ll bear it in mind. Feel free to leave your top off, anyway. This is the beach in Palma, not the Vatican City.”

  “I don’t think so, thanks.”

  Maybe she’s right. There are not many people on our part of the beach, but it’s not private. Anyone could come by. And I don’t want to share a view of her body with anyone. I’ll bide my time until tonight.

  I
hand her a towel, made warm by the sun, and take Sophie off to refill her bucket.

  CHAPTER 23

  Jenna

  Elliott doesn’t even ask me to have dinner with him again. It’s just assumed, which is nice. Mrs. Martinez has gone off to see her mother who has broken her leg, but she’s left food that Elliott prepares while I settle Sophie into bed.

  It’s weird, I’ve only been here a couple of days, and I already feel at home. There’s no awkwardness or ceremony here, just like being in a family. A bit like Katie’s. I haven’t had that for a while. A family of my own.

  It’s a pity that movie stars are not great at the family thing in the long term. But there’s me getting carried away with myself again.

  When I come into the kitchen, Elliott feeds me a taste of the chicken from the pot. “Mmmh, that’s nice.”

  “Hungry?” he asks.

  I thought I was but when I look at him, all thought of food goes right out of my head. “I could wait,” I say, “if you could.”

  His eyes light up, and he smiles and switches off the stove. I hold out my hand, and he takes it and kisses it, and then leads me out of the kitchen.

  “First, there’s the little matter of your punishment,” he says, when we get to his room.

  “My punishment… oh, you mean…” My heart is doing flips at the thought. Do I want this? I forgot all about it.

  “You know what I mean. Your potty mouth earlier. Do you think that warrants punishment?” There’s merriment in his eyes. I can go with this. It’s a game, not a serious attempt at control.

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Sir? I like it. Call me sir, until I tell you to stop.”

  I giggle.

  “This is no laughing matter.”

  “No, sir.” I pretend to look contrite.

  “Right then, over my lap, quickly now.”

  I bend over his legs, and he pulls up my skirt. “I like you in skirts and dresses. They suit you, and I can pull down your panties and fuck you whenever I want.”