7+Us Makes Nine_A Nanny Single Dad Romance_Baby Makes Three Read online

  Table of Contents

  7+Us Makes Nine

  Married to my Enemy

  Say Yes, Senator

  Mr. Charming

  Hot Pursuit

  Fighting Desires

  Copyright Page

  7+Us Makes Nine

  A Nanny and Single Dad Secret Baby Romance

  By Nicole Elliot

  Hi Kittens!

  This is the final book in the Baby Makes Three series. These can all be read as standalones and in any order you’d like.

  Thanks so much for sticking it out with me. It means more than you’ll ever know.

  Look for a new series beginning in August. Things are about to get WILD.

  xxx

  Nicole

  One

  Catherine

  “We have to let you go.”

  “Excuse me?” I asked.

  “I’m sorry, Catherine. But there are certain circumstances beyond my control that have taken over the situation.”

  “Let me guess. Does it have anything to do with someone by the name of ‘Lola Whitestaff’?”

  “I’m not at liberty to discuss that.”

  “I came to you the second her husband hit on me at that carnival we had last month. Right to you. I told how that man made me feel and you said you would do something about it. Is this your idea of doing something about it?” I asked.

  “The Whitestaffs are massive contributors to the school. He claims he didn’t hit on you.”

  “That isn’t what this is about. His wife is threatened by me. She came into my office last week, you know.”

  “She did? Why didn’t you tell me that?”

  “I did, sir. I filed a formal complaint, like you had me do with her husband. She came into my office ripping me a new one about how her husband didn’t hit on me, but about how I hit on him. She threatened my job, and now she’s getting what she wants.”

  “I’m not aware of any complaint you filed.”

  “If I make this a legal matter-”

  “Miss Catherine, that isn’t-”

  “And I subpoena the financial documents from this institution, am I going to find that they are one of the top five contributors to Lawrence Day?” I asked. “Because a similar situation happened at another school downtown. A teacher was harassed by a father and lost her job because she reported him and he didn’t like it. So they threw money at the situation.”

  “Are you calling my character into question, Miss Catherine?”

  “It depends on how this situation pans out, sir.”

  I was infuriated. I was the one that had been harassed. I was the one being threatened by Mrs. Whitestaff. It wasn’t my fault her husband hit on me at that carnival. It wasn’t my fault her husband was a serial cheater and everyone in the community knew it. But if I was going to lose my job over it because they single-handedly kept this school functioning, then I was going down with a fight. I would make sure my voice was heard, and if necessary I would ride my issue to the highest ranks I could. Because there was no reason in this world why I should lose my job over a man who’s pissed off I didn’t sleep with him and a woman who’s pissed off because I’m prettier than her.

  “The situation is out of my hands, Miss Catherine. Friday will be your last day.”

  “No, sir. Today will be my last day. I’ll pack up my things and you can start preparing for the next woman to come in so she can be harassed by the moneybag parents of this school,” I said.

  Before the principal could get another word in, I stormed out of his office. I was fed up with this. First, I had to talk with him face-to-face about the encounter and exactly what happened to me. What Mr. Whitestaff said and how he made me feel. Then, I had to file a formal complaint that went in my employee folder recounting the events again. Then, Mrs. Whitestaff came marching into my office threatened to expose ‘the slut I am’, so I filed a formal complaint. And less than a week later I’m losing my job at a school I’ve taught at for over three years?

  I wasn’t buying it.

  And if anyone asked me about it, I’d explain it to them exactly like that.

  I didn’t have much at my desk. It was mostly things my students had made for me. I folded up the pictures and shoved them into my purse, then picked up the colorful pad and pens that I purchased in bulk that delivered every month. I plucked the few desk ornaments I had from around the sides of my computer, then I grabbed my snacks from the drawers of my desk. Finding vegetarian snacks that didn’t need to be refrigerated was hard, so I wasn’t about to leave them sitting in a desk for some crackerjack idiot to scarf down in one sitting.

  They were expensive.

  “Miss Catherine!”

  I heard the principal yelling behind me as I made my way out to my car.

  “Miss Catherine! Wait!”

  I knew exactly what he was about to make me do, and I wasn’t sure if I was going to sign it or slap him for it.

  “Yes?” I asked.

  “You forgot this,” he said.

  He jogged up to me with one sheet of paper and a pen.

  “What is this?” I asked.

  “Come on. You know what this is,” he said.

  “No, I don’t. Explain it to me.”

  I was going to make him do this. I was going to make him looking me in the eye and explain exactly what this was so he knew exactly what he was doing.

  Selling out a woman’s harassment claim so the school didn’t attract any bad press.

  “It’s a standard NDA, Miss Catherine. Because of the high-profile students and parents we cater to, it’s procedure that anyone who loses their job or quits signs it. So they can’t start writing books about their time spent around these children.”

  “And also so I don’t talk to the press about my encounter with Mr. Whitestaff,” I said.

  “Catherine-”

  “I want to hear you say it.”

  I watched him grit his teeth but I stood my ground. I leaned against my Prius and crossed my arms over my chest. I looked the man I had called my boss straight in the eyes while he debated on whether or not to say it. It made me sick. That man cornered me at the carnival and tried to shove his hand up my skirt, but I was the one losing my job over it. Part of me wanted to go to the press. To expose him for the sick bastard he was. Part of me wanted to talk about my crass run-in with his wife and how she verbally cornered me and slandered my name to the moon and back.

  But they also had four children that would pay the price if I did. Two of which I taught.

  And I wasn’t sure I could do that to them.

  “This NDA is so you don’t talk about your time at Lawrence Day. Regarding what you’ve done with the kids, or what has happened with the parents,” he said.

  I took the piece of paper and the pen from him and signed on the dotted line.

  “The next time you want to pin something like this on a woman, imagine if it were your daughter, sir,” I said as I handed him the piece of paper back. “Because I’m someone’s daughter, and the only thing you’ve done is perpetuate the idea of rape culture.”

  Then I tossed my shit into my car, ducked in, and sped off.

  I wasn’t going to cry. It wasn’t worth my time or energy. But I did need to get on the ball with finding another job. The last thing I was going to do was call my parents. I was twenty-seven years old. I didn’t need my father’s money to bail me out of this situation. I had a small savings account that would get me a couple of months. I was in good health, so there were no doctor’s trips in my future. My fridge and small deep freezer was stocked to the brim with all sorts o
f foods. I’d be okay until I could find another job.

  I didn’t need my mother and father’s money to get me out of this situation.

  I rode through town, eyeing all of the places that had ‘help wanted’ signs in the windows. I figured my best bet was to go online and start placing applications. I loved teaching. I loved guiding children. But the idea of stepping back into another school made me sick. Lawrence Day had been my home. That job saved me from the horrendous daycare situation I’d dumped myself into after college. And while I figured waitressing jobs would get me by, I didn’t want to give up on the idea that there were children somewhere that needed me.

  That needed someone to help guide them and teach them and talk with them.

  That was what I loved about Lawrence Day. The fluidity of the classroom. The lesson plans were loose, and the standardized testing was nonexistent. Children still took naps in school for an hour and a half all the way up through third grade and recess time was never encroached upon. Children there were healthier and happier and fuller with life.

  I didn’t know where else I was going to get that type of atmosphere.

  I walked into my townhouse and sighed. The neighbors to my left were fighting and the neighbors to my right were trying out their newest sex toy. Screams of anger and pleasure assaulted me from both sides. I rolled my eyes as I banged on my bedroom wall to get everyone to shut the hell up, then I stripped myself of my clothes and went to go take a shower.

  All of my best ideas came to me while I was showering.

  The bathroom filled with steam as the water poured along my skin. Calling my parents wasn’t an option. I hadn’t spoken with them since I graduated college, and even though I knew they’d help me it would come at a cost. I came from money. My great-grandfather built a tech company from the ground-up and passed it down to my grandfather. Then my father. I’d known nothing but affluence growing up. But I was the different one. The odd one out. The daughter my mother shoved away in a room instead of taking out in public for the paparazzi to behold. I didn’t like the tailored dresses and the lavish steak dinners and the sparkling dresses to attend opening nights at the opera and the symphony.

  I didn’t like any of it.

  I’d never eaten meat. The texture of it didn’t sit right with me. Most people were vegetarians by principle, but it had nothing to do with that for me. I didn’t like the slaughtering of animals. It wasn’t a pretty sight. But meat had this odd grainy texture I couldn't get past. So of course, all of the steak dinners were out of the question. I didn’t like dresses. Or heels. Or ruffles or lace. I preferred denim and large sweaters and socks in different colors.

  None of which was appropriate for the opera.

  The only thing I really got from my parents was their love of wine. But not the expensive kind. I drank any kind of wine that wasn’t dry and didn’t suck ass. That was about it, though. I distanced myself from my parents during my teenage years because they didn’t understand me. Always forced me to try and be someone I wasn’t. But when I hit college and they offered to pay for my tuition outright, I figured I had just been a selfish teenager.

  Until the requirements hit.

  I had to take certain classes they approved of and master a foreign language. Preferably Spanish, so it would help me in the business world. My father set off to groom me to take over the family business of technology, something that didn’t appeal to me at all. Hell, I still used a flip phone, for crying out loud. I hated technology. I used email only because I had to and the only time I ever turned on the television was to watch a movie.

  And every time I complained about it, my father would say the same thing.

  “Then get your own money and pay for your own college.”

  So, I did. I took out student loans in my name, switched my major to Early Childhood Education, and left them behind. Their standards and their wishes and their path for my life. I went home on the holidays, where all they did was berate me for my choice in careers.

  “You won’t make good money.”

  “You’ll never pay back those student loans.”

  “You won’t be able to afford living in San Francisco.”

  “What am I going to do about the family business if you won’t take it over?”

  My response?

  “Groom the other child.”

  I just didn’t think they’d take me so seriously.

  So, I stopped going home for the holidays. They never called, so cutting them off wasn’t really a hard thing to do. I didn’t lose anything in the process, either. Except for their bickering and crippling expectations. That was why I wouldn’t ask them for money. Not only would it open a door I was content on having closed, it would bring about requirements for my life that didn’t jive with how I’d carved it out.

  I washed my hair, then ran conditioner through it. I always tore through conditioner faster than shampoo. I bought three bottles to its one whenever I went shopping. My thick head of wild curly hair came down past my shoulder blades and was a hell of a bitch to work with sometimes. I detangled my hair and cleared my mind, waiting for an idea to come to me.

  Children.

  Freedom.

  Fluid schedules.

  Mentorship.

  What type of job in this community would offer me those things?

  Then, it hit me. As I rinsed the conditioner out of my hair, it popped into my head.

  A nanny.

  Being a nanny to someone’s children would give me that.

  I quickly washed myself down and turned off the shower. My neighbors to the left were still fighting, but luckily my kinky neighbors had shut the hell up. I wrapped a towel around me and ran for my laptop. I slipped along the kitchen floor and reached for my purse. I dug out my small laptop and sat at the table, waiting for it to start up.

  I was the perfect candidate for being a nanny.

  So that was where my focus would be.

  Two

  Jace

  “Mr. Logan! Do you have any comments for us on Anya’s current condition?”

  “Mr. Logan! Is it true that Anya’s slipped back into her old ways?”

  “Mr. Logan, will you allow Anya to see her children now that she’s slipped from her sobriety?”

  “Mr. Logan.”

  “Mr. Logan!”

  “Mr. Logan?”

  I bit down onto the inside of my cheek and walked into the theater. The security guard at the door quickly closed it behind me, making sure no one followed me into my place of work. I’d purchased the most prominent theater in all of California a few years back when I made my transition from acting to producing and directing. It cost me almost ten million dollars but was easily netting me twice that every year. When I bought out the theater, it was originally tailoring itself to live performances. But I put a stop to that. The theater wasn’t just about live performances. It was about bringing people together in whatever way possible. Fireside Theater wasn’t just about rich people coming to see boring old performances of the same stuff over and over again any longer. It was a way to reach out into the younger generations and pull them into an atmosphere that might’ve otherwise left them behind.

  “Mr. Logan?”

  “I’m tired of hearing my name already and it’s only ten in the morning,” I said.

  “I can’t imagine. I’m sorry. But the phone downstairs is ringing off the hook. Someone’s fishing for a comment about Anya.”

  “Well, once I figure out what’s going on with my ex-wife, I’ll prepare a comment on behalf of myself and our children,” I said.

  “You mean you don’t know?”

  I panned my gaze up to my secretary. He was a small college kid who needed a part-time job and I had a great deal of work to keep him busy. He was a real asset, and I was going to miss him when he graduated next summer. He came into my office and turned on my television. My eyes panned over to the screen as I leaned back into my chair, and the headline clued me in to all of the reasons why the paparazzi ha
d suddenly descended into my world again.

  Hollywood Harlot Anya Petrov Seen Stumbling Out Of Rehab Clinic

  “Turn it off,” I said.

  “Yes, sir.”

  The woman couldn't keep her damn act together to save her life. I met my ex-wife on the set of the movie that catapulted my career. She was the headlining act that would sell the dark historical romance and I was the fresh new face of leading men. That movie catapulted me to a fame as an actor I could have never dreamt of otherwise, but it also catapulted me into a torrid affair with the most sought-after Hollywood woman in history. Anya was a powerhouse, and a fucking talented woman. I’d fallen in love with her on set, but it wasn’t until we wrapped up our last day and I’d gotten the courage to ask her out on a real date.

  We were married four months later and created a beautiful family together.

  Anya was passionate about adoption. She was adopted, and she’d always wanted to adopt from the Ukraine-- where she was originally from-- instead of having children naturally. Her reasoning was that she got to keep her body for the screen, she got to fulfill her want to be a mother, and she got to get children away from the horrid circumstances they faced in countries like the one she was from. And I admired that. I loved her all the more for it.

  But then, she slipped into the partying scene.

  The drug scene.

  And stuck me at home with three children who wondered where the hell their mother was.

  The divorce was swift. Anya had been caught stumbling out of a ‘high house’ and wandered out into the middle of the street. She was almost hit by an oncoming car and it made headlining news. That was the beginning of our downfall. That was when I finally came to terms with how bad her partying had gotten. Two times I had begged her to get sober. Once before we divorced and once directly after. And until then, I gained custody of all three of our children.

  Two we adopted from the Ukraine, and one surprise child we had naturally.

  Anya didn’t like that at all.

  “Do you want to draft a statement?” my secretary asked.

  “I’ll do it before the end of the day but tell anyone who calls that if they call again, they won’t get my statement,” I said.