“Who are you texting?” I reach for her phone, but she keeps it out of my grasp. I swear if she’s planning on telling a reporter that she’s nannying for me, I’ll fire her faster than she can jump out of a moving vehicle. Because that’s what she’s going to want to do if she betrays me.
Run.
Hide.
Try to escape my wrath.
“Your brother fired my best friend and made inappropriate sexual comments to her.”
I stare at Clare. This is the first I’m hearing about it. “She didn’t file a report with HR,” I say. If the woman had, any kind of details involving sexual harassment would have been investigated and discussed among the higher-ups, myself included.
“How was she supposed to when he fired her? Told her he’d let her keep her job if she gave him a blow job.”
“What’s a blow job?” Amelia asks.
“Fuck,” I growl at Clare and Amelia.
“It’s not a nice word,” Clare says, offering a weak smile, perhaps realizing her mistake and trying to rectify it before the damage gets any worse.
I don’t correct Clare that it can be a really nice word, when used correctly between consenting adults.
But she’s right. I don’t need my kid using that word when she attends kindergarten. Day one, suspended. Yeah, that will go over really well when she’s called into the headmaster’s office.
“I’ll kill him,” I mutter a little too loudly. “Give me the name of the girl making the allegations.”
“No way,” Clare says, and shoves her phone into her purse.
“Let me talk to her,” I snap. Why is it that Clare can so easily frustrate and irritate me? I’m trying to do a good thing. I’d like to hear this woman’s side of the story and help her. If she was fired unjustly, then I could offer her a different role, another position away from my scum-sucking brother.
Connor will still be a problem, though, any way you dice it. But I can’t fire him. The man has no ability to work anywhere else. And he’s family.
Even if I think his work ethic and morals are shit. Every time I’ve shown up at the hotel, the staff informs me that he’s never around. It seems like he doesn’t spend more than a couple of hours a week at work. He shows up for the paycheck.
Letting him remain in management for the hotel, though, if what Clare says is true and her friend was sexually harassed, I can’t just let it go. If he’s done it with this one girl, how many others has he intimidated, or worse, forced himself on?
My stomach roils at the awful scenarios running through my head.
“Give me her number.” It’s not a question. I will get the information out of Clare, one way or another.
“No.” She folds her arms across her chest. Her phone is out of my reach, and unless I can get ahold of it, unlock it, and determine who the contact is, I’m not going to have much luck.
“Why not? Why won’t you help her?” I ask. “I thought you were her friend.”
Douglas pulls up out front of the house and punches in the code to enter the property. He’s been silent this whole time. Smart man.
The moment he stops the car, I open the door. I don’t wait for him to come around and open it for me.
I open Clare’s door while she helps Amelia out of her car seat.
“I’m not giving you her name, but I’ll tell her that you’d like to talk. If she agrees, then I’ll arrange a meeting.”
“If?” I squawk at her suggestion. “You’re not her lawyer, Clare. You don’t have to protect her. She’s a grown woman.”
“A grown woman who probably wants privacy. Besides, do you remember that day I told you I could stay on my friend’s couch, the one who lived with the bratva?”
I clear my throat, getting uncomfortable with where this conversation is going. I open the front door, letting Amelia into the house. She doesn’t need to hear this, but I can’t exactly send her to the playroom to occupy her. The room isn’t set up yet. It’s not ready for her.
Hell, I’m still not ready for a kid, but she’s here, and this is real.