Remarrying My Billionaire Ex

OLIVIA'S POV 

"Mrs. Ross, the nanny quit."

I looked up from the medication chart I was reviewing to find Victoria Ross standing in the doorway of Ethan's room, her Chanel suit perfectly pressed even at nine in the evening. After eighteen months of marriage to her son, I still wasn't used to being called "Mrs. Ross."

"Which one?" I asked, setting down my pen. It was the third nanny in two months.

"Does it matter?" Victoria's lips thinned. "Ethan locked her in the pantry. She's threatening to sue."

I sighed and glanced at the small boy curled up in his bed, pretending to be asleep. At six years old, Ethan Ross had perfected the art of psychological warfare against anyone his father hired to care for him. Anyone except me.

"I'll handle it," I said, standing. "How much does she want to keep quiet?"

Victoria named a figure that made me wince. It would come out of the household budget I managed, which meant Damien would see it. Which meant another reminder that I was failing at the one job that actually mattered in this contract marriage.

After Victoria left, I sat on the edge of Ethan's bed. "I know you're awake."

His eyes opened immediately, dark like his father's. "Is she gone?"

"The nanny? Yes. Why did you lock her in the pantry?"

"She called my mom's picture 'that dead lady.'" His voice was matter-of-fact, but his hands clutched the blanket. "I told her to leave. She wouldn't."

My heart cracked a little more. "Ethan, you can't keep doing this."

"Why not? You're here. I don't need anyone else." He sat up, his small face fierce. "You don't leave."

*Not yet*, I thought, but didn't say. The contract ended in six months. I'd already started preparing for him, little by little, though he refused to accept it.

"Your dad will be upset," I said instead.

Ethan shrugged. "Dad's always upset."

He wasn't wrong. Damien Ross had two modes: coldly professional or completely absent. Tonight would be the former, since he was actually home for once.

As if summoned by my thoughts, I heard the front door open downstairs. Heavy footsteps crossed the marble foyer, heading toward the study. Not the master bedroom. Never the master bedroom when I was still awake.

"Sleep," I told Ethan, tucking the blanket around him. "I'll talk to your dad."

"Olivia?" His voice was small now, the fierce warrior gone. "You won't let him send me away, will you? To boarding school?"

"Never," I promised, pressing a kiss to his forehead. It was the one promise I wasn't sure I could keep.

I found Damien in his study, jacket discarded, tie loosened, staring at the laptop screen with the intensity he brought to everything. He didn't look up when I entered.

"The nanny quit," I said.

"I heard." His fingers continued typing. "My mother already wired her the settlement."

"Damien, we need to talk about Ethan."

"Then talk." Still typing.

I moved closer, forcing myself into his line of sight. "He's getting worse. The therapist said—"

"The therapist said a stable maternal figure would help. That's why you're here." His eyes finally met mine, cold and distant. "Are you saying you can't handle him?"

The words stung, as they were meant to. "I'm saying he needs his father."

"He has his father. I provide everything he needs."

"Except your presence."

Damien's jaw tightened. "I have a company to run. Shareholders. Employees. Responsibilities that don't disappear because my son has behavioral issues."

"He locked someone in a pantry because she disrespected his mother's memory. That's not a behavioral issue, that's grief."

"Then do your job and help him process it." He closed the laptop with a sharp click. "That's what I'm paying you for, isn't it?"

There it was. The reminder that hung between us like a guillotine blade. I wasn't his wife, not really. I was an employee with a ring and a legal document.

"Yes," I said quietly. "That's what you're paying me for."

Something flickered in his eyes, might have been regret, but it vanished before I could name it. "I have an early meeting. I'm sleeping in the guest room."

He always slept in the guest room. The master bedroom might as well have been a shrine to the perfect, irreplaceable Catherine Ross.

I turned to leave, then paused. "It's October thirteenth."

His whole body went rigid. "I know what date it is."

"I just thought you should know. In case you wanted to—"

"Goodnight, Olivia."

Dismissed. I left before the sting behind my eyes could become actual tears.

Back in the master bedroom that had never felt like mine, I changed into my nightgown and tried to sleep. But my mind kept circling back to the calendar. October thirteenth. Three years since Catherine died. Tomorrow will be harder.

Around midnight, I heard footsteps in the hallway. Then my door opened.

Damien stood in the doorway, still in his dress shirt and slacks, but the careful control was gone. His eyes were red-rimmed, his hair disheveled like he'd been running his hands through it.

"I went to her grave," he said, his voice rough. "I sat there for two hours and I couldn't... I can't..."

I sat up, pulling the blanket around me. "Damien—"

"She was perfect. Do you understand that? Perfect. And she's gone and I'm here in this house with a son who won't speak and a wife who isn't..." He stopped, swaying slightly.

He was drunk. Damien Ross, who never drank, never lost control, was drunk on his dead wife's anniversary.

"You should sleep," I said gently.

"I don't want to sleep. I don't want to think. I don't want to—" He crossed the room in three strides and kissed me.

It wasn't gentle. It wasn't romantic. It was desperate and raw and tasted like expensive whiskey and grief. And I, God help me, I kissed him back.

Because I'd been in love with him for six months. Because I knew this was the only time he'd ever touch me like this. Because tomorrow he'd regret it and we'd go back to our careful distance and I wanted one night to pretend this was real.

His hands fumbled with the buttons of his shirt. "Tell me to stop."

I should have. I should have led him to the guest room, given him water, let him sleep it off. Instead, I pulled him down onto the bed.

"Don't stop," I whispered.

********************

I woke up alone, as expected. The sun was barely up, but Damien's side of the bed was already cold. On the pillow where his head had been, there was a note in his sharp handwriting:

“This didn't happen. We won't speak of it again.”

I crumpled the note in my fist, fighting the urge to cry. Of course. Of course it meant nothing to him.

I got up, showered away the evidence of our night together, and went to check on Ethan. He was still asleep, peaceful in a way he never was awake.

My phone buzzed. A text from Damien: *Family dinner tonight. 7 PM. Emma is coming.*

Emma. Catherine's sister. The one who looked enough like her that sometimes Damien would stare.

I was putting my phone away when the nausea hit. I barely made it to the bathroom before I was sick, retching until there was nothing left.

When I finally looked up, Victoria was standing in the doorway.

"How far along are you?”