Falling For The Politician's Son

CAITLYN I needed this job. Not wanted. Needed. The kind of need that sits in your chest like a stone and doesn't move no matter how many times you swallow. Twenty-three years old, broke, and out of options — that was me. Mom's coffee shop was drowning. Six months behind on rent, and Mr. Holt had already made his feelings about that very clear. He didn't yell. Didn't threaten. He just walked in one afternoon, looked around slowly, and started flipping our tables and chairs like it was nothing. Like we were nothing. I stood there and watched my mother press both hands over her mouth so she wouldn't fall apart in front of him. She fell apart anyway. I did nothing. That moment followed me everywhere after that — into every rejection letter, every interview where they smiled politely and never called back, every morning I put on my best blouse and told myself today would be different. It never was. Until the vacancy for a live-in maid at the Morningstar mansion showed up on my screen. Senator Morningstar's son. Twenty-something. Just returned from four years in London. The people of the state were already whispering his name like a prayer — and the man hadn't done a single thing to earn it yet. Just had the right father, the right last name, the right life. I applied without expecting anything. They called me back in two days. The butler's name was Bert, and he had the kind of face that had never once found anything funny. He walked me through the mansion without slowing down — pointing at rooms, issuing rules, not particularly interested in whether I was keeping up. His voice was low and flat, each word landing like a full stop. "Mr. Morningstar's bedroom." He didn't even turn his head. "You do not enter. Ever. Unless he calls for you." "Yes, sir." "Your room is across the hall. You stay on this floor. Available at all hours." A pause. "Including late at night." Something about the way he said that made me shift my weight. "You stay in your room when you're not working. You don't wander. You don't disturb him." He finally looked at me — just for a second, but it was enough. "Bother him once, and you're done." "Yes, sir." He turned and walked away without another word, footsteps thundering down the staircase like a man who had never second-guessed a single decision in his life. I stood in the hallway alone and let out a breath I didn't know I'd been holding. My room was bigger than I expected. Soft bed, clean sheets, a window that looked out over the garden. I sat on the edge of the mattress and sank into it — actually sank — and for the first time in months something in me went quiet. One month, I thought. One month and I can give Mom something real. I lay back. Just for a second. I woke up to darkness and rain. 7:59 p.m. The workers retired at seven. The house was silent in the way that big empty things are — not peaceful, just hollow. I pulled on my cardigan and went downstairs to find Bert, or the cook, or anyone who could tell me whether I was allowed to eat something. The kitchen was empty. The whole ground floor was empty. I was alone. I told myself that was fine. I'd survived hungrier nights. I turned to go back upstairs — And then I heard it. A crash. Heavy. Close. I froze. It came from the study — the room Bert had mentioned with that lowered voice, the one nobody was supposed to enter. The door was pushed halfway open and pale light spilled out from inside it, cutting across the dark hallway floor. Go back upstairs, Caitlyn. I looked down. Wet footprints. Large, fresh, leading straight through the front corridor and directly to the study door. Someone had come in from the rain. Someone was in there right now. My heart kicked hard against my ribs. The workers were gone. The senator's son wasn't due back for three more days. So who was in that room? I pushed the door open. He was pacing — a man in a soaked black overcoat, water dripping from the hem onto the rug, dark hair plastered flat against his forehead. He held an open book in both hands, turning pages fast, muttering something under his breath with the focus of someone who had completely forgotten the world existed outside of whatever he was looking for. He hadn't heard me come in. Three more books lay open on the floor around him. Scattered. Frantic. A thief. My mind snagged on the word. Someone who knew the house would be empty. I should have backed out quietly. Called someone. Done anything other than what I did. "Hey!" His head snapped up. Gray eyes. Sharp jaw. Water still dripping off the end of his nose. For one horrible second neither of us moved. Then — "s**t," he said, like I was the problem. "Who are you?" My voice came out steadier than I felt. "Who the hell are you?" He took a step toward me. I took one back. "Don't — I'll scream, I swear I will, the neighbors will —" "The nearest neighbor," he said flatly, still walking toward me, "is half a mile away." My back hit the doorframe. He stopped just in front of me. Tall. Dripping. Completely, infuriatingly calm — like a man who had never once in his life felt cornered. His gray eyes moved over my face with an expression I couldn't name. Then something shifted. Not softness exactly. More like recognition. "You're the new maid," he said. It wasn't a question. My mouth opened. "You're —" "Grant Morningstar." His jaw ticked. "I came back early." The silence that followed was the loudest thing I had ever heard. He looked at me — really looked, the way you look at something that has just become a problem you didn't plan for — and then he said, very quietly "Why are you in my study?" And the thing was — the truly awful thing was, I didn't have a single answer that was going to sound good. But that wasn't even the worst part. The worst part was the way he was still looking at me. Like he hadn't decided yet what to do about me.