Page 36 of Daddy's Little Worker
She sucked in a breath. He was asking too many questions.
“Frankie, I have to talk to him about it. He’s our boss,” Trent explained.
“Please,” she whispered, her voice cracking at the end.
“Take some time to cool off and pull yourself together. I’ll give you that time,” was all he said.
Her heart ached, knowing Noah was going to find out she wasn’t doing so well right now. Was he going to come after and check on her? If he did, she was just going to have to make sure she wasn’t anywhere near him.
“We’re all here for you. Everyone in this building cares about you and wants to see you happy and okay,” Trent said. “If you need anything, let me or anyone else know.”
Frankie heard his footsteps leave, and she crumpled onto the bench right next to her. Noah was going to find out, and she wasn’t prepared for that.
“Are you okay?” a feminine voice asked.
Her head shot up, and she saw bright blue hair.
“Wow,” she whispered.
“I get that reaction a lot when people see me for the first time. Or well, recently. I just dyed my hair this color a couple of weeks ago, so people are still a little shocked,” she giggled. “I’m Monty. I’m one of the bartenders here. Or well, juice distributor. Snack dealer. Whatever the other Littles like to call me.”
Frankie chuckled and wiped under her eyes to get the tears away. “I’m Frankie. I clean the club.”
“We’ve technically met before, but you were asleep. Noah took care of you, though, right?” she asked. “I told him you wereasleep and figured you were an employee, but I hadn’t met you yet.”
Frankie’s face fell at the mention of Noah’s name. She didn’t want to think of Noah or that Trent was probably speaking to him right now.
“Oh, I don’t like that face. What has Noah done?” she asked, sitting beside Frankie.
“Nothing,” she whispered. “That’s a lie. He kind of has done something, but I just don’t want to talk about it. I want to push it to the back of my mind and get on. I’ve got a lot to do.”
Monty stood up from the bench. “Well, if you want to talk, I’m always here. I’m not normally here this early, but I’m always here in the afternoon. Unless my younger brother is sick and I have to take care of him… which seems to be a lot more lately, but he is going to get better.”
“Why are you here early?” she asked.
Monty’s face turned bright red. “I was seeing someone. I’ll see you later!” she chirped as she skipped out of the room.
CHAPTER 16
NOAH
“What did you do to Frankie?” Trent burst through the doors.
Noah’s eyebrows pulled together. “I drove her to work this morning. She gave me a little scare when she was at the bus stop and not in front of her apartment, but I was calm and gentle with her.”
“No, you must have said something to her!” he raised his voice. “Poor girl is in the employees’ room with tears in her eyes, and doesn’t want to see anyone. She panicked when she heard I was going to talk to you. What the fuck did you do to her? I thought you wanted to be with her. Do you not anymore?”
Noah stood up and started walking toward the door. “I need to go make sure she’s okay.”
“No.” Trent stood his ground. “You aren’t going to talk to her today. She needs time to wrap her brain around everything and not panic when she hears your name. What did you do?”
Noah thought back to the drive. Nothing seemed different. He talked to her like he usually would—being caring and talkingabout work. What was wrong with that? He paced up and down his office, thinking through everything.
“Can you really not think about what you did?” Trent asked. “What were you guys talking about?”
“I talked to her about being safe, and that she could always text or call me to do it. That I’m always there for her. That I want to be needed by her, and then I talked about work and how she didn’t need to make up for the time today,” Noah explained and stopped in his tracks.
“Frankie is fragile, and you need to remember that,” Trent reminded him. “She probably was confused about why you were talking about wanting to be needed and then going to work.”
