Page 3 of The Oscar Escape
Aunt Harper: Our nanny love match family is overjoyed.
Nanny love match family.
The words were a salve to Aria’s frazzled nerves.
That’s how she’d met her best friends, Phoebe Gale, Sebastian Cress, and Oscar Elliott.
A famed matchmaker with a rolling Eastern European accent and a tumble of dark hair with a lone silver streak had come into their lives and changed everything. Always clad in a trademark scarlet-colored scarf and a near-permanent cat-who-ate-the-canary twist to her lips, Madelyn Malone specialized in matching affluent single male caregivers with nannies—nannies who, in Aria’s extended nanny love match families’ cases—had ended up married to their bosses.
Phoebe’s tech mogul uncle Rowen had married her nanny, Penny Fennimore. Sebastian’s dad Erasmus had married his nanny, Libby Lamb. Oscar’s dad, Mitch, had married his nanny, Charlotte Ames. The final match was with her uncle, Landon Paige. That’s how Harper Presley became Aunt Harper. The former nannies had been best friends since elementary school. Thanks to that bond and Madelyn’s matchmaker magic, the four families were inseparable, and Aria had grown up surrounded by joy and adventure with her extended nanny love match friends and family by her side on birthdays, holidays, summer getaways, and winter breaks. You name it, they were together.
But that wasn’t all Madelyn had set in motion.
The matchmaker had dropped a love match legacy showstopper of a revelation. Years ago, when Aria and her friends were in second grade, the woman had waved them in and whispered a secret—no, more of a proclamation. The air positively pulsed with anticipation when she’d spoken these words:Your matches have already been made.
Aria recalled the moment with unwavering clarity. She could still feel Oscar’s shoulder rub against hers as he squeezed her hand. Even at the tender age of seven, she and her friends understood the weight of Madelyn’s words.
Their true love, their one perfect match, was out there . . . somewhere . . . waiting.
Aria exhaled a sharp breath and tucked the memory away. The last thing she had time for was love. She had an aggressive sales goal to hit.
Ping!Another text flashed on the screen.
Aunt Harper: Are you taking care of yourself? And you do realize that means eating plenty of bonbons.
Her aunt’s love of bonbons was legendary. Aria chuckled at the mention of the sweet treat and felt a bit more like herself. But her short-lived giddiness evaporated when another text from her uncle appeared.
Uncle Landy: We need to know you’re not pushing yourself too hard. You’ve got nothing to prove. Your talent is undeniable.
“Dammit,” Aria whispered and blinked back tears. Maybe she didn’t have anything to prove to her aunt and uncle, but she had plenty to prove to the world—to those who saw her last name and assumed she hadn’t earned her success.
She swallowed again and grimaced as the searing pain in her throat returned. She took another sip of whiskey and chased it down with a mouthful of cold medicine. She stared at her cell phone. She couldn’t let Uncle Landon and Aunt Harper know she was hanging on by a thread.
Aria: I’m great. Loving life on the road. The news about Phoebe and Sebastian is amazing. Send them my love and tell them we’ll talk soon. I better go. Gotta get to the next engagement.
Yeah, like guzzling more alcohol and cough syrup. She grabbed the whiskey and took another sip.
In for a penny, in for a pound.
Dots rippled across the screen.
Uncle Landy: One last thing—have you talked to Oscar lately? Mitch and Charlotte mentioned they hadn’t heard much from him in a couple of weeks.
Oscar Abrams Elliott.
At the mention of the man, every muscle in her body tensed.
She pictured his piercing blue eyes, a chiseled jawline, and a tangled mess of dark hair. The broody artist and indie documentarian of their friendship foursome, the man was never without his camera and recording gear. She bit her lip as a wave of emotion threatened to swallow her whole. Perhaps it was the medicinal cocktail, but she couldn’t stop the memory of her first day of second grade from resurfacing.
A memory she’d titled, The Second-Grade Switcheroo.
A bully had taken a trinket of hers—an eraser in the shape of a piano. She’d gone to kick the boy—the asshat deserved it. But before she could land the blow, Oscar stepped in front of her and stopped her from striking the bully. He’d pulled a switcheroo that kept her out of trouble.
Hence, how it garnered the title of The Second-Grade Switcheroo.
A switcheroo that had given Oscar one hell of a bruise.
But he hadn’t seemed to care.
