Chapter 11 The stain and the savior
RORY POV
It was eight o’clock when the elevator dinged.
First day at my new job.
I'd made sure my hearing aids were in and functioning perfectly. I let my blonde hair down, the waves acting as a curtain to hide the devices. I didn't want pity stares today, I just wanted to keep my head down and not mess this up. I needed this job.
I was very much looking forward to seeing Liam.
His father? I was hoping he wouldn’t be around.
shit!
The elevator doors opened and I immediately took that hope and buried it.
Alexander Miller was standing right there. Those cold blue eyes landing on me the moment I stepped out, looking at me the way he had looked at me yesterday, like I was a ghost he couldn’t quite get used to seeing. He probably wasn’t used to seeing eye bags like mine either. I had barely slept. Not when I spent the entire night trying to figure out who I could possibly dress up as a convincing millionaire boyfriend before next week.
And not when Lia had texted me twice saying she couldn’t wait to see me.
He wasn't alone. Dozens of staff members were lined up in the foyer, looking like they were awaiting a public execution. I didn't blame them, the air around Alexander felt like a storm.
He had clearly been mid address when I arrived.
I bowed my head slightly. "Good morning, sir," I whispered, trying to slip past.
"Come here."
I froze. I turned, about to join the line of staff, but his voice sliced through the room again.
"Beside me, Aurora."
I walked slowly, feeling the weight of a hundred eyes on me, and stood at his side. The silence was suffocating. I could feel his gaze burning holes into the side of my face.
"This is Aurora Hale," he announced to the room, his voice a low, lethal baritone. "She is Liam's nanny. While she is in this house, you are to abort any and all forms of conversation with her. Unless it involves my direct permission, she does not exist to you. Am I clear?"
"Yes, sir!" they answered in unison.
"Dismissed."
The crowd scattered. Taking that as my cue, I started toward Liam's room.
"I didn't dismiss you, Aurora."
I halted. I turned back, keeping a safe distance between us.
"Look at me," he ordered.
Eye contact with this man should come with a warning. Something about the way he looked at you made you feel like you were standing at the edge of something and couldn’t see the bottom. I felt it immediately, that strange weightless sensation of looking at him directly that I had no business feeling at eight in the morning on my first day of work.
“You let your hair down,” he said.
He noticed.
"Yes, sir." | looked at his tie, his shoulder— anywhere but those eyes.
"Dye it. Brunette," he said flatly.
My heart skipped. I looked up in shock. "W-hy?"
The moment the question left my lips, I wanted to swallow it back. He looked like he wanted to snap my neck for the audacity of asking.
“You don’t question your lord and savior,” he said. “Unless you want me to take everything back and fire you before you’ve spent a single hour here.”
I think my boss is a controlling narcissist. A controlling narcissist who had absolutely no business being this disgustingly handsome. He could have had a pot belly. Bad teeth. Something. He didn’t deserve that face and he certainly didn’t deserve to be this tall while also having that jaw while also being this insufferable.
“I’m v — very sorry sir,” I said. “I’ll change it.”
“Good girl.”
He reached out and ruffled my hair with his fingers like I was five years old.
I was so stunned by the gesture that I stood there blinking at the space he had already vacated because I hadn’t even noticed him leave.
I practically ran to Liam's room to escape the tension, but the moment I stepped inside, my heart broke.
He was in bed. But he wasn’t sleeping. His small body was shaking, trembling from head to foot, small broken gasps leaving his mouth, his hands clutching the sheets beside him. His face was twisted with something that made my chest hurt to look at.
Nightmare. A bad one.
Is this what he went through every night?
I crossed the room quickly and sat beside him, pressing my hand gently to his forehead. He was burning up despite the room being cool, sweat coating his skin, his breathing fast and shallow.
“Liam,” I said softly.
Nothing.
“Liam baby, it’s me.”
Still shaking.
I tapped him gently. “Your friend Rory is here.”
His eyes snapped open.
“Mummy!”
He launched himself at me with the full force of a five year old who had been terrified and was grabbing the nearest safe thing. His arms went around my neck, his whole body still trembling, holding on like letting go wasn’t an option he was willing to consider.
Nobody had ever held me like that.
“It’s Rory baby,” I said softly, my hand moving in slow circles on his back. “It’s just Rory.”
He didn’t let go immediately. But slowly, very slowly, the shaking eased. His breathing evened out. His grip loosened just enough for me to feel him coming back from wherever the nightmare had taken him.
After a while he pulled back and looked at me. His father’s eyes in a softer face.
“Were you dreaming?” I asked.
He nodded against my shoulder. “It was so bad.”
“I’m sorry Liam. I really am.”
“You’re here now,” he said simply. “I’m fine.”
He pulled back further and looked at me properly.
Then his eyes found my hair and his entire face changed.
“I like your hair Rory,” he said, beaming. “It’s shining.”
I felt something warm move through my chest.
I was used to people looking at my hair and finding something to say about it. Something that wasn’t that. Liam looked at it like it was genuinely the best thing he had seen today and meant every word.
“Thank you darling,” I said. “Now up. Bath time. We have a lot of catching up to do.”