Broken French: A widowed, billionaire, single dad romance, Natasha Boyd [e reader books .TXT] 📗

I complied, leaving the door open. My brain had obviously tucked away more French than I’d thought. I didn’t think I could speak it, but I was happy with how much I seemed to be understanding. I’d go ahead and use the language app on my phone every morning and try to get up to speed.

In my cabin, I brushed my teeth and washed my face in the small bathroom and changed into my favorite soft t-shirt and sleep shorts. It seemed like a lifetime away that I was flinging clothes into a bag and rummaging around for swimsuits. Turning off the light, I slipped between the crisp, soft sheet and the cozy duvet. Lights, chatter, and music filtered through my open window. The hall was dark outside my cabin door, which was open because there was no way I could sleep with it closed.

As tired as I was, mentally and physically, the time change was already playing tricks on me. I looked at my watch, making out the dim glow-in-the-dark hands. It was five in the afternoon at home.

For the first time in two days, I dragged in a deep breath and felt my chest loosen. Even stuffed into a cabin just above the waterline on a boat, I felt a sense of freedom I’d never experienced. I turned the feeling over in my mind, trying to understand it. How long had I felt tense, stressed, and boxed into a package? Great school, serious degree, lucrative job prospects. Always making sure I was doing something my father would have been proud of. Something my mother could brag about. As much as I could get upset with my mother at her decision to marry Nicolas, which had turned into a disaster, she had raised me to be able to take care of myself. I’d been doing just that before I’d fallen off track, in her words, by quitting.

But there was beauty in the fall. I didn’t have to be a certain way to please anyone but myself here. No one knew me. No one had any expectations of Josie, the woman. I was not the daughter of a disgraced Charleston socialite, nor the stepdaughter of a dishonest con man. God love Charleston, but the city had a memory like an elephant and a weight of judgment just as heavy. But here, for just a few weeks, I was not an architect desperately trying to carve out my own space in the male-dominated field. And there was a certain freedom in being someone new. Albeit temporarily. A girl with a blemish-free name and no history.

Standing up to Xavier Pascale today, and being true to myself, had been a gamble. But the result was maybe I’d earned a tiny modicum of his respect, and that felt good. I could make the best of the situation here, be the best damned nanny anyone had ever had, and fully embrace the chance I’d been given. That included shutting down my ridiculous attraction to my boss.

I closed my eyes and replayed our evening. Unfortunately, the attraction I’d felt for him was hard to beat back. But he’d made clear in no uncertain terms that it was my problem to deal with. And he seemed like he was the type to respect a power imbalance and never act inappropriately toward someone who worked for him. And I knew there was no way I’d compromise my job of taking care of sweet Dauphine or cast a stain on Tabitha’s agency she’d worked so hard to build.

The boat rocked gently, and before long I was dozing. The deep bass of a disco beat in the port thrummed faintly almost in time with my heart. I wondered what the nightlife was like in France and if I’d get a taste of it. Thinking of that made me miss Tabitha and Meredith.

I awoke sometime later, fully alert. The sounds of the port had subsided. Pale waving lines danced like ghosts along the cabin ceiling from the reflection of the water. I strained my ears, hearing a footfall on the steps and then outside my bedroom. I turned my head, seeing a figure in the hall. Mr. Pascale. He fumbled with the latch holding my door open, and it began to close.

“No, please,” I said quietly.

He started.

“Sorry.” I stifled a chuckle at giving him a fright. “Please leave it open. I can’t breathe with it closed.”

He was quiet as he processed this. “We leave the port early in the morning. You must close your window.”

I sat up.

“Je le ferai.” He waved me off and came fully into the room, his silhouette heading to the porthole. He slid it closed and latched it.

I could smell him. His cologne mixed with the sweet scent of scotch. He’d been up late drinking. I wondered if this was a common occurrence. I swallowed, breathed in deeply, the air now filled with him, and rubbed my chest.

“You are okay?” he asked.

“I—I think so.”

“Is this why you do not like boats?” his voice rumbled in the darkness.

“Part of it.”

“And the other part?”

I only vaguely made out his features in the dark. “The ocean has always scared me a little. It’s so dark. Fathomless. Full of things humans don’t understand.”

“Mystery and miracles too. It all depends on how you choose to see it. And the Mediterranean … well, you will see so many parts that are clear and sparkling and seductive. You will forget your fear. You will want to dive down deep to discover her.”

“You sound certain.”

“I am. Oh. Merde!” he cursed. “Can you swim?”

“Of course.” I huffed out a laugh. “And I love beaches. It’s just the idea of being in the middle of wide open expanses of water that makes me forget how to breathe.”

“And that’s where the air is the most clean and plentiful. Where you can breathe the easiest.”

“I guess so.”

“We will cure you, Dauphine and I.”

I chuckled. “Perhaps. She is wonderful.”

“She is.” He stood still for a long