Page 236 of Nanny and the Beast

Gigi and Olivia wave goodbye and walk with Alaric, but Ophelia stays put. She watches Klaus through narrowed eyes.

“If you ever break her heart again, Iwillcome for you,” she warns him.

Despite everything, I laugh softly.

“That’s not necessary, babe,” I say to her.

She gives him the universal “I’ll be watching you” hand signal before walking away.

“I like your friends,” Klaus says. “They’re very protective of you.”

I glance back inside the house. My friends left in a hurry for a reason. There haven’t been any more gunshots, but I can still hear the muffled screams of a man in agony.

“What is she doing to him?” I ask.

“Revenge,” Klaus says. “She’s been waiting her whole life for this moment.”

“I’m sure he deserves it,” I whisper.

Klaus looks at me, his eyes intense. There’s so much depth to this man. So much turmoil, so much pain.

He cups the back of my neck and leans down to crush his mouth against mine. He kisses me like he needs me for sustenance.

His mouth writes promises against my lips—of loyalty, trust, and everlasting love.

Our paradise is fractured by the scent of vanilla and nutmeg in the air. Every scent has a memory, and this one takes me back to the night when I found the diary. I had a feeling then that someone was in the room with me, hidden among the shadows.

I pull away from Klaus.

I see a figure in my peripheral vision. Black hair, long white nightgown, slender frame. It’s the girl from last night.

Klaus follows my gaze to the balustrade.

“Fuck,” he curses under his breath.

51

KLAUS

On the night of the car accident, there were two people in the car. One of them was my skeevy brother-in-law, Richard. The other was Clara Mason, his mistress.

When the car erupted in flames, Richard escaped in the nick of time and saved his own ass.

He left his mistress behind.

By the time I arrived at the scene of the wreckage, it was almost too late.

Clara had third-degree burns all over her body. She nearly lost her life that night. I saw to it that shereceived medical treatment, but it was still a miracle that she survived.

The girl was a fighter.

She still is.

I kept her alive out of necessity.

I spent tens of thousands of dollars on Clara’s medical expenses and reconstructive surgery. And when she was discharged from the hospital, I let her live under my roof.It wasn’t out of the goodness of my heart, but because the girl might have known something about Sera or Richard.

“Klaus?” Emma asks, clutching my shirt.

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