The Ceo's Contracted Mistress
The Ceo’s Contracted Mistress Chapter 5

Bobbie followed Grady into the hotel lobby and sighed as the day came to a close. Their client, for a man who desperately wanted to sell and retire had been a pain in the a*s, arguing and negotiating for things which to her made absolutely no sense.

They had spent an hour while he argued he wanted to take the board room table from the office building. The lawyer for the company trying to buy their client’s enterprise argued the sale price would need to be adjusted to account for the fact his client would need to refurnish an entire boardroom because the table was one of a kind which mean all the chairs and furnishings would need to be replaced to meet whatever new table was going in. Overall, it was the least productive afternoon she had spent in a long time.

One down, nine to go unless they ironed things out ahead of time.

“Daddy!” Lark’s voice carried across the lobby and both she and Grady turned to face it.

Everly, Nana Hoffman and the three kids were coming through the lobby wrapped in towels evidently coming from the pool area. Lark, Ollie, and Max tore through the lobby in their direction, slamming into her and Grady with force.

Everly grinned at them with little to no warmth in her smile, “you’re back! Great. Your kids, your problems now. I need a drink and a nap!” She immediately walked toward the lounge pulling her mother-in-law with her, who, based on Bobbie’s assessment of Prue’s posture, was not protesting at all.

“Hey!” Grady yelled at her. “Do I not even get a k**s from my wife?”

“Nope. We went to the zoo today and the monkeys had s*x. There were a lot of questions.” Everly glared at them, yelling across the lobby uncaring of anyone listening on or the laughs of other patrons of the hotel. “A lot of questions, Hoffman. A lot of intricate, detailed, horrible questions. You owe me. You both owe me.”

“Oh dear,” Bobbie laughed as she looked at the three kids wrapped around them. “Sounds like we are on the hook for dinner.” She stroked Max’s spiky hair. She looked around the hotel lobby aware their exchange with Everly and Prue had been overheard by multiple people in the lobby. When her eyes connected with a pair of brown eyes seated in an oversized leather chair in the open lounge area, her breath caught painfully in her chest. He was staring as if he had seen his own ghosts of Christmas past. She immediately looked away and disentangled herself from the kids and looked down at the wetness of them.

“Alright you three,” she pushed them towards the elevator desperate to get out of the lobby and to control her erratic heartbeat. She looked at Grady, “why don’t you go join the ladies for a drink and do damage control. I’ll take these three upstairs and get them dressed for dinner. There’s a Chuck-E-Cheese up the road. Walking distance. They can blow off energy in the arcade and fill up on nasty a*s pizza.”

The man didn’t need to be told twice. “Bye,” he made a show of pressing k****s to the top of each kids’ head, passed his briefcase to Bobbie, and made a hasty retreat.

She took the chattering and shivering kids to the elevator and felt her heart thundering. Another family got in ahead of them. She got the kids in and was about to breathe a sigh of relief when a bronzed hand inserted between the closing doors and Olivier Villeneuve stepped into her space and her brain. The desire to curl into a ball and panic was overwhelming.

“Bobbie, can I press the buttons?” Lark asked ignoring the huge man who had stepped to the back of the elevator. “Mom wouldn’t let me do it earlier because she said they’re full of germs.”

“Do it, just wash your hands when we get to my room,” she waved trying to remain as normal as possible. If she behaved in any way other than who she was with the kids on a normal basis, they would react. Her body was instantly on fire. He’d always had a stupid effect on her and she had to remind herself he was a dirty s*x trafficking john.

“I jumped off the tower again,” Ollie grinned up at her. “Max and Lark won’t even come up.”

“Did you? Did you try diving or just jumping?” She stepped sideways when the elevator stopped on the second floor to let the other family off and it put her closer to Olivier. She forced herself not to respond and to focus on the trio in front of her.

“Just jumping.” Ollie shrugged, “I’ll try diving next time. It’s just fun to jump. When I’m a grown-up, I’m going to skydive out of airplanes. Maybe I’ll fly the airplane and then jump out of it.”

“Are we going to Chuck-E-Cheese for supper?” Max asked curiously interrupting his sister. “I want to play the games. I really want a whole pizza to myself.”

“If you behave yourself, then yes. We can.” Bobbie looked at the trio not realizing what she’d just agreed to. “Assuming you all listen to me and get dressed for dinner quickly.” She grinned down and winked at Ollie. “No acting up at the restaurant either or there will be no trip to the aquarium tomorrow. Nana Prue has been looking for a reason to get out of it.”

“I promise no jackassery!” Ollie called out and then looked over her shoulder at the man who chuckled at her comment, grinning broadly at him.

Bobbie refused to acknowledge him, hating Ollie had just had her first look at her biological father and had no idea. With luck, neither did he.

“Do you and Daddy have to work tomorrow?” Lark asked pouting

“It’s why we’re here Lark,” Max rolled his eyes. “They’re here to work. We’re on vacation. Nana Prue explained it to us today.”

“I just want him to come with us to the aquarium.” She pursed her lips and Bobbie ushered them out of the elevator not looking up as Olivier held the doors open for them.

“On the weekend, we’ll all do something special together, I promise.” She felt his gaze watching them all the way to their suite. “If you want tonight, we can watch movies in my big bed.”

“Yay!” the kids jumped up and down with excitement. “Sleepover!”

She let them into her room and leaned against the door, closing her eyes against the weight of emotions. She knew now it hadn’t been the ghost of Christmas past brushing past her earlier in the morning. Olivier Villeneuve was in her hotel. Her best bet was to maintain her space, her distance and pray to God he had not made a connection with two of the three kids jumping on the king-sized bed in her room and herself.

He had not gotten fat. He was not bald. He still wore the same cologne, and it was still in her nostrils. His eyes were just as brown. His hair was just as blonde. He hadn’t grown a hunchback and was still easily his more than six feet tall frame. Why couldn’t he have grown a hunchback? She slammed her heel against the door in frustration and then noted the joyous yelling stopped at her action. She opened her eyes.

“Mom, are you okay?” Max asked seriously.

“Hangry,” she replied knowing the kids would accept the explanation without question.

“Me too!” Ollie said with a grin.

“Me three!” Lark yelled excitedly.

The kids were happy to get dressed, Lark thrilled to wear a pair of Ollie’s shorts and t-shirts. The girls’ closets were often interchangeable. The entire time, she was getting them ready, her stomach was in knots. The twins’ father was in the hotel, and she had pretended the kids were not hers in his presence, had prayed neither of them called her mom and had walked away as if she hadn’t known who he was.

With any luck, he had simply thought she was nothing more than a glorified nanny or employee of the Hoffmans. Was he a guest here or visiting someone? All she needed to do was avoid him.

She was brushing out Lark’s hair when a knock on the door made her jump. Surely to heaven he hadn’t come to her door.

She passed the brush to Lark and stood up nervously moving to the door and looking through the peephole. She pulled the door open and smiled at Nana Prue. “Hello Nana Prue. Are you joining us for dinner at Chuck-E-Cheese?”

“I could go for pepperoni pizza,” she agreed with a wide smile, holding up a pair of sandals for Lark.

“Mom’s hangry,” Max tattled from the bathroom where he combed his hair into a bunch of spikes in his signature style. He grinned, his dimples on full display.

“We should go then.” Nana Prue tossed her head in the direction of the suites at the end of the hall. “They’re going to join us in a few minutes. One drink and she’s feeling amorous.” She made a face at Bobbie and whispered in disgust, “there are things as a mother, I never need to know and them asking for time alone to get freaky is one of them.”

Bobbie pulled her lips back in disgust equalling Nana Prue’s “nasty.”

The kids got into their shoes quickly and then raced through the hall towards the elevator, Max jamming the buttons fiercely.

“Pushing it more than once, doesn’t make the elevator come any faster,” Nana Prue said with shake of her head.

“I know, it’s just fun.” Max’s smile was bright.

Bobbie’s stomach was clenched as the elevator the opened and relief filled her to replace it empty. She got in with the kids and slowly relaxed as they slowly descended to the lobby. The kids ran screaming through the lobby with the typical exuberance of three eight-year-old children. She saw the man leaning against the lobby counter look up at her and she saw his eyes narrow on her deliberate shun of him.

“I swear if you three leave the lobby without me, it’s back to the room.” She called after them and shook her head as they skidded to a halt.

“Nana!” Ollie called out, “will you play the arcade games with me?”

“Yes, but only if you promise not to cry when I kick your butt!” Nana Prue teased her and ruffled her blonde curls playfully.

As they got outside Prue nudged her. “Did you see the tall drink of water staring you down in the lobby?”

“No.” she denied putting her best poker face on. “Who?”

“Are your lady parts dead?” Prue grunted at her. “Tall blonde and handsome standing at the check-in counter eyeballing you like he wanted to see you naked under that pencil skirt just now. Which, by the way, you should have changed.”

“I didn’t even think of getting changed. All I could think of was shitty pizza and cold soda.”

“You should be thinking of shagging that gorgeous man,” she hissed at her as the kids raced up the sidewalk.

“Oh my god Prue!” she gave pointed glances at the kids just outside of earshot. “Can you not say things like this in front of them? They hear everything.”

“You should have heard the questions at the zoo. Ollie and Lark couldn’t stop talking about the tiny p*****s on the monkey. Max had questions about the way the mama breastfed the baby. Then two monkeys started going at it like rabbits. Then they were asking if it was how humans made babies and then they asked Everly if she and Grady mated to make Lark.”

“No!” she put her hands to her cheeks in horror. “They didn’t. No wonder she wanted a drink.”

The kids were waiting impatiently pushing the crosswalk light in turns. It was a beautiful evening and she and Prue each held hands of a child as they crossed the street.

“Mom,” Max asked suddenly, “if the monkeys today were making babies and it took a mommy monkey and a daddy monkey, did we have a daddy to make us?”

She looked to Prue and inhaled deeply. “Do you remember the book we read buddy? Some families have one mom, some families have a mom and a dad, some families have two days, and some have two moms, and some have one dad and no mom and there’s all kinds of different ones all around.”

“I know. We don’t have a dad, but did you need one to make us?” Max was persistent.

“We can talk about the biology of making babies another day. What is important to remember is our family is complete just as it is.”

“But the boy monkey had a p***s and Everly said to make babies it was why he climbed on her to put it into the girl monkey’s v****a. Did you have to do that?” Max pressed.

“Maximillian,” her eyes bugged at his question. She looked to Prue who was holding her sides trying to walk upright while roaring with laughter. “We are not discussing this.”

He made a face at her and then raced to catch up the girls.

“Holy s**t, he’s going to be the death of me.”

“Between his questions and Ollie’s daredevil behaviour, I’m surprised you’re not in weekly therapy.” Prue commented with a smirk as she wiped tears off her cheeks.

“Who says I’m not?” she gave a loud sigh as they reached the restaurant and pulled the doors open. “My therapist’s name is Jack Daniels. He and I have an appointment later this evening.”

Prue slapped her on the back at the joke and nodded appreciatively, “I might join your session. It’s been a hell of a day.”

They both grimaced as the took in the venue with kids running amuck, loud beeping arcade games and the smell of greasy food filling the air.

“It might be a double session,” Bobbie admitted. It was going to be a long evening.