Page 16 of Bully Wolf’s Nanny (Silvermist Wolves #1)

“But when is Nicolas going to come and read me a bedtime story? He said he’d read me another chapter of The Hobbit !” Thea whined, tugging on Daisy’s hand. “Where is he?”

“He’s downstairs,” Daisy replied, not moving even as Thea redoubled her efforts to try and get her mother to leave the room with her to find Nicolas, “talking to…talking to Francesca.”

“Who’s Francesca?” Thea asked, finally giving up and flopping down on the floor.

Daisy swallowed the lump in her throat, her stomach all in knots. “Francesca is Gracie’s mother.”

Thea frowned. “But I thought you told me Gracie didn’t have a mom, and that was why you had to help Nicolas look after her.”

“That’s because I thought her mom…couldn’t look after her. But maybe she can. She’s talking with Nicolas now, I’m sure he’ll explain to us when he’s ready.”

“Does this mean we have to leave?”

“I don’t know.”

“But I don’t want to leave!”

Daisy didn’t reply. She couldn’t. She didn’t have the words. How was she possibly supposed to tell her daughter that she couldn’t bear to leave, either? Not after what had happened between them. Not after they had spent the night together.

It was like the universe was playing some sort of cruel trick on her.

“Maybe she’s lying,” Thea said, her young voice full of hope, “maybe she’s only pretending to be Gracie’s mommy! Maybe she’s actually an imposter and she wants to steal all of Nicolas’s money. Like in Cinderella!”

“I’m not sure that’s quite how that movie went,” Daisy said, pulling Thea into her lap for a cuddle.

“Yeah, it is! Because the evil stepmother married Cinderella’s dad for his money, and then he died and Cinderella had to work for her, and maybe Francesca is the evil stepmother!

” Thea’s little brow creased as she worked through her own logic.

“But then that would mean Gracie is Cinderella, and she’s not Cinderella. You’re Cinderella!”

“I don’t think anyone is Cinderella.”

“No, it’s you,” replied Thea with a confidence only a little girl could have, “because you’ve got the same hair.”

Daisy couldn’t help the smile that pulled at her lips, even as her heart crumpled inside her chest. She hugged her squirming daughter even tighter against her, fighting back the tears that were threatening to fall.

This was so stupid. Why was she so upset? It wasn’t like Nicolas was in love with Francesca. By all accounts, he had never been in love with Francesca. This woman had turned up out of the blue, and for all she knew, Nicolas would turn her out on her ear.

But somehow, deep down, Daisy knew that that wouldn’t happen. Women like Francesca, tall and gorgeous and ice cold, never acted without the complete certainty that their plan would succeed. Whatever she wanted, she was going to get it. And Daisy was willing to bet anything that she wanted Nicolas.

Why wouldn’t she? Why wouldn’t any woman?

And despite what Thea seemed to think, Gracie was Francesca’s biological daughter. Nicolas couldn’t deny that. Who was Daisy to try and get in the way of a mother and her daughter? If anyone tried to take Thea from her, she would do anything to get her back. Anything at all.

Everything was about to change. She knew that with all the certainty of the incoming tide. And she could do nothing to stop it.

That was why her heart was breaking. She had gotten a taste of true happiness. True contentment. Just a tiny bite, but it was enough that she was hooked.

And now, one way or another, it would be taken from her.

After all, how could she hope to compete with a woman like Francesca?

Francesca was everything she wasn’t. Sophisticated. Elegant. Confident.

Beautiful.

Why would Nicolas choose her, when some shining silvery goddess had turned up on his doorstep? And the mother of his beloved daughter, no less.

For one brief, fleeting moment she considered confessing the truth to him. Telling him that Thea was his daughter. That she was mother to one of his children. Perhaps then she would have a fighting chance…

But no. The idea crumbled to ash in her mind as quickly as it had formed.

She couldn’t tell him. Even if he believed her, there was every chance that his fury at her for lying to him would doom any chance of a relationship between them.

Nicolas was a mercurial man at best, and she had experienced the sharp end of his derision first hand.

She wouldn’t be able to handle it if he turned on her. Not after she’d fallen in love with him all over again.

That left only one option. To wipe the slate clean. To do what she came here to do, and wipe away any hope for more.

She was here to be Gracie’s nanny. Nothing more, nothing less.

She would make her peace with that. And forget all about Nicolas.

Even if it meant living with the heartbreak of losing him all over again.

Tears were slipping down her cheeks now, and she hastily wiped them away before Thea could notice. The last thing she wanted to do was upset her daughter. Fortunately, Thea had busied herself trying to braid her hair—" Look, just like Cinderella, Mommy!”— and was making a mess of it.

With deft hands, Daisy took over, combing out her daughter’s messy dark strands before artfully weaving them together into a messy French braid reminiscent of Cinderella’s casual romantic braid in the live action film.

She didn’t turn at the slightly hesitant knock on the door.

Nicolas let himself in. Of course he did. It was his house. She would do well to remember that.

“Nicolas!” Thea cried, twisting her head as far as she could given Daisy was still braiding, “is Francesca gone, can you read me The Hobbit now?”

There was a pause, then a slight rustle of fabric as he shifted on his feet behind her. Daisy was aware of how stiff her shoulders were, how straight her spine was. She fixed her gaze on the back of her daughter’s head and refused to turn. To even acknowledge him. If she did, she would break.

“Later, Thea,” Nicolas said, his voice hard as chipped marble. “Why don’t you go and get ready for bed. I need to talk to your mother.”

Obeying the command, Daisy tied off her daughter’s braid and ushered her out of her bedroom, with a promise to come and see her later. Then she turned, slowly, deliberately, her hands folding neatly in front of her.

“What can I help you with?” she asked softly, her eyes fixed on the soft rug beneath her feet.

Nicolas stepped towards her, the shining leather of his shoes coming into view.

“Daisy,” he said, “look at me, please.”

She tilted her chin up, slamming a mask of professional indifference onto her face.

He was devastatingly handsome. Of course he was. His dark hair was tousled, as if he had been running his hand through it. At some point he had taken off his navy sweater, and his white shirt was open at the collar, sleeves rolled up to reveal toned forearms.

He looked strong. Sophisticated. Effortlessly sexy.

She fought not to tremble under the heavy weight of his irritated gaze.

“I’m sorry she spoke to you like that,” he said, crossing his arms, “I told her not to again. I won’t tolerate you being disrespected.”

“That’s very thoughtful of you,” Daisy said.

His brow furrowed. “What’s wrong?”

“Nothing’s wrong,” she replied quickly.

He looked for a moment like he might reach out to her, take her in his arms perhaps, or just touch her.

She desperately wanted him to.

But instead, he turned on his heel and began pacing, his movements jerky and agitated. She was reminded then of his wolf stalking through the forest, pent up with rage and frustration. It sent a shiver down her spine.

“Francesca is…” he started, his fists clenching and clenching.

He searched for the words, and it struck Daisy that she had never seen him rendered speechless before.

He had always had something to say. Some witty retort, some clever comeback, some bitingly devastating comment. No matter the circumstances.

She remembered one pack bonfire, perhaps seven or eight years ago.

It was soon after he had first kissed her.

What she had thought was some weird one-time fluke never to be repeated had actually been repeated multiple times.

He would ignore her in the corridors and then stalk her down after school and back her into a tree before kissing her senseless, his movements desperate and aggressive. And she had continued to let him.

It hadn’t been love. Though the bullying had stopped, though cracks were forming in his hard shell, she knew it wasn’t love.

Not yet, at least. And then the bonfire had happened.

Her father had forced her along, dragging her along with her mother to ‘show face.’ The alpha wasn’t pleased with him.

That much she knew. She also knew without a shadow of a doubt that a pack event was the last place she wanted to be.

Things had been getting angrier. Heated.

A boiling pot ready to spill over. She didn’t want to be anywhere near it when it did.

Even knowing Nicolas would be there did nothing to calm her nerves.

He was predictably right at the heart of his little group, along with Felix and Dane.

Except, it wasn’t so little anymore. There were perhaps twenty of them, all alphas, all young, sprawling across a park bench on the other side of the bonfire.

Her eyes had met Nicolas’s as he leaned back, leather jacket straining over new muscle, and he had jerked his head once toward the woods.

She understood. She managed to escape her parents and met Nicolas in a hidden corner against some boulder or other, where he had pressed his long, hard body into hers and claimed her lips for his own.

They hadn’t really talked. Nicolas had said something about how beautiful she was, how pure, but she had just chalked that up to lust.

And then his father had found them. His father, tall and imposing and terrifying.

They had leapt apart as if burnt, and Daisy had seen every conceivable emotion pass across Nicolas’s face.

She had made to leave, to run back to her parents, but he had caught her by the wrist and faced down his father.

She had thought he might falter, might struggle to find the words.

Lord knows she was rendered speechless in shock and fright.

But he hadn’t. His father said something or other, some poison about her, about her family, about Nicolas himself. Nicolas had sneered at his father, his hand warm and tight around her wrist, and spat out the words that had remained etched onto her brain ever sense.

“She’s a more worthy shifter than you will ever be, you son of a bitch.”

It had been at that moment that she had started falling in love.

So to see him now, pacing in the bedroom that he had given her, his jaw tight and his eyes shining with some emotion she had no name for…

It unnerved her.

He stopped at last, his back to her, the hard lines of him silhouetted against the window. His breathing was heavy, his shoulders moving up and down with the force of each lungful. His fists were tight at his side.

“Francesca is staying” was all he said.

Daisy’s heart plummeted.

But it was okay. She had prepared for this. She had expected this.

“I understand,” she said, proud of how her voice remained steady. “Will my services still be required?”

He did turn to face her then, his jaw set, his eyes chips of steel. “What are you talking about?”

“My services,” she repeated, her nails biting into her palms, “now that Francesca is here to look after Gracie. Will my services still be required?”

“Daisy, that’s not…of course they still will be. Francesca doesn’t know Gracie, doesn’t know how to look after her. And I’m too busy, I’m right in the deep end at work.”

“So I’ll teach her,” Daisy said with a firm nod, “understood. I’ll make sure she knows everything she needs to know to look after your daughter.”

His throat bobbed. “Daisy, why are you speaking like that?”

“Like what?”

“Like you’re some kind of robot.”

“I’m not speaking like I’m a robot. I’m speaking like your employee.”

“My employee?”

“Yes, Nicolas. Your employee. I am your employee. And now that Francesca is here, I suppose I’m her employee, too. And I want to reassure you that I will do my utmost to deliver a professional and excellent quality of service.”

He let out a harsh breath of air, arms folding across his chest, eyes narrowing. For a while, they didn’t speak, just looked at each other. It was as if his eyes were drilling into her very soul.

Eventually, she lost whatever battle of wills they were engaged in, and shifted on her feet. “Is there anything else?”

“Is there anything else?” he repeated, but not as a question. His voice was incredulous, calling her out, the weight of what had passed between them heavy on the air. Daisy pressed her lips together tight, tears pricking her eyes.

“I’m Gracie’s nanny, Nicolas,” she said, a cold chill running over her skin, “that’s why I’m here. That’s my job. And I want to do it well. That’s it.”

He regarded her for several long, agonizing moments, his muscles clenching, his mind whirring. She could see the battle he was fighting as plain as day on his face.

“Nothing has to change, Daisy,” he said at last. “I don’t want things to change.”

“But they have to,” she replied. “Gracie’s mother is here. That’s a good thing. For Gracie. We can’t lose sight of that.”

He looked away, his eyes slightly glazed, but nodded stiffly once.

“If that’s what you want.”

“It is,” she said.

Even though the only thing she wanted in that moment was for him to take her into his arms and kiss away all the fear. All the pain.

“Understood,” he said, and strode out the room, his arm brushing against hers as he passed. She fought not to lean into his heat.

As soon as the door closed with a soft click, she sank to her knees, unable to stop the tears from falling.

“This is for the best,” she said into the empty room, “this is for the best.”

And it was. She couldn’t fall any further in love with him.

She couldn’t. She’d done it once, and it had nearly destroyed her.

She would not give him that power again.

She would stay, she would teach Francesca about looking after Gracie, and then when the time came, she would leave.

There was no way Nicolas would be able to resist Francesca for long, and Daisy could only hope and pray that she would be long gone by the time Francesca succeeded in seducing him and getting her family back.

Despite her misery, despite the tears falling down her face, she laughed.

Perhaps she was rather like Cinderella after all. Except no handsome prince was coming to save her.

The prince had had her. And now it was back to being a servant.