She was very kind towards Roger who’d been cold towards her in the beginning, but now I see him even break into a smile or two around her. And then she remained friends with Sebastian, even though I knew that the man still nursed a massive crush on her.
She was a different breed from the women I dated in the past and everything I never knew I needed until now.
But she was hiding something.
I could tell, but because I was afraid to lose her, I did not want to know what it was. She was the first woman to make me scared of finding out the truth, and I was not sure if that was dysfunctional or not.
I was in constant talks with Dan, my friend and contractor, who was currently working on the home I built specifically with her in mind.
Sitting in my office as I stared at the progress reports that Dan sent me weekly, I could only hope that things worked out, and she'll fall in love with this building, just as I’d fallen in love with her.
My phone chimed just then once, I ignored it, but then the noise came again, three times in succession, and I picked it up to check.
It was a notification for a news site. One I was not familiar with. I sometimes got a few notifications from sites like this when they talked about me in the media. I had done nothing media-worthy other than the Greenberg project, so I was confused about the reason my name was being mentioned in the tabloids.
The headline of the first site I opened stopped me in my tracks;
"Billionaire architect, in sordid relationship with almost-killer nurse"
I knew headlines could be misleading, but there was a picture of myself and Vanessa, looking pale, with dark circles and eye bags on her face. Much like she’d looked when she’d first started working here.
I read through the content of the headline and stared in shock at the news. It said that Vanessa had almost killed a child at her last job because she was drunk and had administered the wrong dosage to the patient.
I could not believe what I was reading because the Vanessa I had grown to know over the past seven months had never taken one sip of alcohol in my presence and she took her job way too seriously.
But the next three sites I opened all read the same thing, including a source from her former workplace who came on record to say that Vanessa had a drinking problem, which was why the hospital let her go.
Because of her stellar record, they refused to report her to the Nursing council board and her license had not been probed into.
I was in too much shock to understand exactly how I was feeling about the total news. I decided first to find Vanessa and ask her about it myself.
I could not help but wonder if there was some truth to this. Was this the big secret she had been hiding all this while? Has she restrained herself from taking alcohol because of her past?
These were questions I had no genuine answers to and the only way I knew I would find the answer was to hear it from her.
I was connecting the dots in my head though, the lack of alcohol intake, that she was at the peak of her career at one of the top hospitals in the city and she’d given it all up to come work for me. I thought it was because she wanted to get away from the city after the death of her mother, but I now realize there was more to that story.
She was in the kitchen, alone, when I stumbled into her. Her eyes were focused on her phone and from the horrified expression on her face, I knew exactly that she had seen the headline I just read, but I could not tell if she was horrified because it was the truth or not.
“Vanessa?” Her eyes darted up sharply at the mention of her name, and I could see that they were red-rimmed, like she was on the brink of tears.
“Hey, hey.” She looked like she was about to crumble to the floor, and I hurried over to her, wrapping my hands around her. She clung to me tightly, and she was shivering.
Only when I heard the soft sounds coming from her did I realize she had been crying.
“Hey, please stop crying, baby,” I muttered, pressing a soft kiss to her forehead.
It took a few minutes before she finally settled down.
“It’s true.” She whispered, and I almost did not hear what she’d said, “it’s all true. I’m so sorry.” She continued to mutter how sorry she was while I hushed her.
“I don’t care,” I said, leaning back to stare her in the eyes so she saw in my eyes that I meant every word.
“You should. I was horrible to that kid, and if my co-worker had not come in at just the right time, she would be dead. And I would be in jail now.”
“Hey, it was a mistake. A horrible one, but a mistake all the same. I know you, and you would never intentionally hurt anyone.”
She was shaking her head even as I spoke, and I could see that my words were not changing anything from how she already saw herself.