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I shook my head. It still threw me for a loop, too. “I don’t know.”
“You know my mom called last night?”
I drew my eyebrows together, facing her. “She did?”
Maya nodded happily. “She said she moved into a new house with her boyfriend.”
I tried to keep a smile as I replied, “That sounds nice.”
“She said it has a bedroom for me.”
My stomach squirmed because I knew Maya hadn’t stayed the night with her mom since Regina left. I didn’t like Regina getting Maya’s hopes up like that. But I tried to remind myself that I wasn’t Maya’s mom. She had a mom, who had every right to see her daughter.
“What are your favorite things to do in the city?” I asked her, trying to distract myself.
She began counting off everything under the sun, from her favorite trampoline park to bowling with her dad, getting ice cream with her mom, visiting playgrounds, or seeing the botanical gardens.
She looked around the room. “Is it okay if I draw a picture for your walls?”
“I’d love that,” I replied. “Remember where all the colored pencils and markers are?”
She nodded, carefully getting off the bed so as not to disturb Graham. As the mattress shifted, he let out a sleepy huff, rolling to his back and stretching his front paws in the air. It was so stinking adorable.
While Maya worked on her art, I continued moving my stuff over from the guesthouse. I didn’t have all that much, but I was surprised how empty the cottage felt without my things in it.
In the short time I’d been here, I’d already come to think of this place as home, and that was a hard thing to accept. Because Maya was already eight. In a couple years, she’d hardly need a nanny, and I doubted Fletcher would want to continue paying me as much as he did.
And then what would we be?
I’d be there for Maya, always.
But Fletcher? In the next two years I worked for him, he could date, fall in love, marry, even have another child with someone else.
That thought ate at me all day until he came home from work.
I had supper ready early and carried some to my room so I could hide out and lick my emotional wounds.
While I ate my food, I could hear him and Maya talking. The low rumbling of his voice and her chirped replies were soothing in a way I didn’t want to admit. This place really was home, and I didn’t know if I could find another without them.
* * *
Three soft knockssounded on my door after Fletcher finished putting Maya to bed.
I knew because I’d heard him quietly sing the song his mom always sang to them and us Griffen kids on the nights we’d stay over. His voice singing those words in memory of her all these years later did strange things to my heart. I was falling for him. And I didn’t know how to stop.
But I couldn’t ignore him either, so I climbed out from under my covers and walked to the door, cracking it open.
In the dim hallway night-light, his sharp features fell into relief, dark eyes studying me.
“Everything okay?” I asked.
His nod was jerky. “Can we talk?”
I opened the door, stepping back and sitting on the edge of my bed. He glanced around my room for a moment before joining me.
“I see Maya put her touch on your room.” He nodded toward the drawing thumbtacked over my bed.
I smiled at the drawing. “She sure did.” She’d taped nine pieces of paper together to make a poster of her, me, Fletcher and Graham playing with one of his many new toys. There were hearts instead of clouds, and the image made my chest swell with love.