They’re dancing.
Knowing my father, the countless times I’d heard about him dancing with my mother, the nights I’d held him as he cried thinking he’d never be able to do it again ... she was giving that back to him. Zeppelin, the bratty, flirty, annoying tornado that had invaded my life and ground my social life to a halt with a single bat of her eyelashes, was dancing with my father.
I nearly closed the feed before that scene could overwhelm me, but I barely had my cursor halfway up the screen before something else caught my eye.
No, not something else. Someone else.
Who the fuck is that?
I leaned in closer, urging the feed to zoom in on the man getting up from the couch and walking toward her to cut in. Fucking seriously? Jake? I get rid of Caffrey Brannigan just for the fucking neighbor to come in and steal her?
The vague sound of one of my senior bankers asking me a question pulled me back enough to answer him quickly. I didn’t know if he recognized the look on my face or could hear the blood rushing through my veins like a fucking tsunami, but I also didn’t care. When I satisfied his request and glanced back down to the screen, my father was clapping on the couch while Jake danced with my Zeppelin.
My Zeppelin.
Well, someone’s got a death wish.
I stood abruptly, feigning a family emergency and gathering my things quickly. This was one of the many perks of being the boss — there was no one above me to question me or slap my hand for bolting, and I wouldn’t have cared if there was, anyway. Zeppelin and I had been doing our own little dance for months now, and I’d be damned if I let my mousy, insignificant neighbor steal her away from me.
Not when I was finally starting to trust her enough to open up.
Driving home was a blur, as was parking my car in the garage and hearing the first sounds of their fucking dance party. I pep-talked myself outside the door, trying to remember that what she was doing for my father was amazing and deserved to be celebrated, not punished — but fuck me if I didn’t want to bend her over and spank her raw for including another man in this instead of me.
Some rational part of me won out as I opened the door and walked in through the laundry room and set my things down in the kitchen. I knew they wouldn’t have heard me come in thanks to the malt shop oldies playing through every speaker in the house, and suddenly, all the fight left me.
What the fuck was I doing?
Panic and regret set in when I realized I was about to ruin the best day my father had had in a while, so instead of leading with anger and jealousy, I loosened my tie and rounded the corner to the living room with a soft, nearly-genuine smile on my face and walked straight over to Jake. “Mind if I cut in?”
He looked startled to see me, but shook his head quickly and raised his grubby, stupid hands in defense like I’d caught him touching something he shouldn’t.
Which I had.
I winked at him and turned to Zeppelin, curling one arm behind my back as I bowed slightly and held a hand out for hers. “May I?”
“Of course.” She took my hand and stepped in, her eyes dancing with lust and anticipation, nothing like how she looked at Jake. “Thought you’d never ask, Silver.”
I didn’t pay much attention to the song that was playing or the other people in the room with us — all I could see, hear, smell, feel was Zeppelin, her laughter, graceful movements and that bun that was getting messier by the second. She fit so well with me swaying and twirling to that mystery tune that for a moment, I forgot all of my reservations. All the reasons that it was a terrible idea to get involved with her like this, all the arguments I kept at the forefront of my mind at all times.
It was just us, just this, just months of longing and tension finally stretched so thin they were about to snap.
I was heartbeats away from kissing her right there when the music ended and I heard my father coughing. My attention immediately shifted, breaking whatever spell I’d just been under and rooting me firmly back in reality.
The reality where my father had to come first.
“I’m o-okay,” he said, holding a hand up to stop Zeppelin from giving him CPR right there.
“Dad, it’s getting worse. You shouldn’t even be here.” I hated myself for saying it, but I meant it. He belonged somewhere with trained nurses and proper equipment, not here. “Dance party over,” I muttered. “Jake, I think you should go. Thanks for stopping by, though.”
I wish I wouldn’t have pushed him toward the door and then out of it the way I did, but as worried as I was about my father, I also couldn’t help but wonder why he was there and how many times he’d touched her before I looked at the nanny cam. It wasn’t fair of me in the slightest, but he wasn’t allowed to have her. Not until whatever was going on between us was resolved.
“Sterling, I—”
“Yeah, great,” I interrupted. “Maybe call first next time. Bye.”
I shut the door behind him and tipped my head back against it, wondering what the fuck I was doing... and how long it would take to figure it out.