up at me, wide-eyed with those big baby-blue eyes of hers and nodded like a chastened child. “You have a big house. You have a couple rooms that you’re only using for storage. I could move my mattress over—or just sleep on an air mattress. You have a big house. You’ll hardly notice me.”
Oh, how very wrong she was about that. I’d notice her constantly. Even when she wasn’t in eye shot. “I’ll even pay you rent!” she added hastily.
And that was probably the funniest part of this entire thing. She had no idea how little I needed the money. And not just from the millions I’d earned in Draco stock, either. But all the money I’d had before that—which I now refused to touch.
Which brought me to the next facet of this entire bullshit mess—
My family. God. With this out in the open, I was now going to have to come clean and tell my family that I’d up and married again. At least this time the wedding hadn’t cost them millions of dollars that they’d hardly noticed spending. And Kat. She had zero idea about the family that she’d married into.
Not that I’d even planned on ever having them meet her. This was all supposed to be long over and behind us before we had to meet any relatives.
“Our families,” I finally said out loud.
She raised a dark red brow. “What? What about them?”
I gave her a look like I thought she was an idiot for even asking the question. “We’re going to have to tell them, Kat. And I’m sure your parents are going to want to meet me.”
She rolled her eyes. “Don’t be so sure. They’ve got too much other crap to worry about.”
Huh. That was weird. It occurred to me then that Kat almost never talked about her family and I knew little about them beyond the necessary facts. And those I only knew so we’d be good to go for the immigration interview. Her dad was a documentary production assistant and her mom was a nurse. They’d been married a little over thirty years and lived just outside of Vancouver, British Columbia in the suburb of Port Coquitlam. Sounded refreshingly honest and middle class to me.
She also had a brother, just under a year older than her. I knew hardly anything about him except that he hadn’t gone to college and did not appear to be gainfully employed, still living at home at the age of twenty-seven.
I frowned. I’d have to investigate all of that later.
For now, I was too busy chastising myself for being so intent and focused on that job promotion that I hadn’t considered all the ramifications. I’d taken drastic steps to keep Kat here because with her very particular talents, she was going to help me hit the deadlines and as a consequence, get this job. Kat was my secret weapon—even if she didn’t know it.
With her talent, we could not have made the deadline without her. I was certain of it. So if it meant I had to mock a certain institution I had no respect for anyway to keep her here, I hadn’t hesitated to do it.
Maybe I should have hesitated a little, because obviously, I hadn’t thought this through as thoroughly as I should have.
I cleared my throat. “Well I’m going to have to tell my family because it will almost certainly get back to them—and soon. Brace yourself because they’ll insist on meeting you immediately.”
She blinked and then shrugged. “Okay. That’s fine. I can do a family meet and greet, no problem, unless… unless they’re serial killers or something.”
Worse. They were rich. As in loaded. As in stinking ridiculously goddamn wealthy.
And until now, and with the exception of Jordan, around here, that fact had been my best-kept secret. Now, who knew what would happen?
“Listen.” She spoke after I hadn’t answered her rhetorical question. She looked down, pushing a strand of glossy flame behind her pale, delicate ear. “I’m sorry this happened. I took every precaution I could. The same precautions that have worked well for the past six months. But I got unlucky. Once we do the immigration interview, and I get the green card, I promise to move out as soon as I can. In fact, I’ve been scrimping and saving. Once we get the closing bonus for the expansion, I’ll have enough for a down payment on a place of my own. It won’t be a big house like yours but it will be