MoanaWhen I opened my door, all I could smell was alcohol.Edrick was standing in the hallway. He was swaying slightly back and forth, his steely eyes unfocused in front of me. Even though it seemed he only just got home, he already had a glass of whiskey in his hand -- he must have filled it as soon as he came in the door.“Why aren’t you in my room?” he grumbled, his breath reeking of whiskey.I took a step back, scrunching up my nose from the smell. “I waited for you for two hours, but you never came,” I replied. “I assumed you wouldn’t be home tonight.”Edrick was silent for several moments before speaking: “Well, I’ll sleep in here, then.” Before I could stop him, he pushed past me and into my room.“How much have you had to drink?” I asked, closing the door quietly.Edrick chuckled sardonically and turned around to face me with a shrug. “What does it matter to you?” he asked. As he stared at me, I wondered to myself if he even knew or if he had lost count of how many times he’d
MoanaEdrick and I quickly pulled away from each other, rushing to fix ourselves. I pulled my nightgown back down around my legs and tied my robe around myself, fixing my hair while Edrick quickly buckled his belt once more.“Hello?” Ella called again.“It’s okay, Princess,” Edrick called, steadying his heavy breathing. “You can come in.”Ella cracked the door open and poked her head in. Her hair was a mess and her eyelids drooped sleepily as she rubbed them and yawned, but there was also a hint of fear and sadness on her teary-eyed face. She looked as though she had been crying -- I couldn’t quite tell if it was from the sound of Edrick and I fighting or from a bad dream. Maybe both. “I had a bad dream, Moana,” she said quietly and tearfully. “I came to look for you, but it sounds like you’re fighting…” Her tiny voice was quivering so much that it made my heart ache.“What? No,” I said, rushing over to her and crouching to her level. “Your daddy and I were just talking.”“Oh. I thou
EdrickBeing around Moana, especially while I was as drunk as I was that night, made it almost impossible to resist her. Why did I feel so attracted to this ordinary human nanny? It was as if there was a spell on me that night, and for the briefest of moments as our tongues explored each other’s mouths and our bodies became pressed up against one another, I swore I was able to pick up the faintest scent… The same scent that I picked up on the night that we played the maze game.Just as quickly as it began, however, it was over. There was a knock on the door, followed by my daughter’s frightened, shaky voice. When Moana opened the door, there were tears streaked down Ella’s little face. Seeing those tears sobered me and made me realize that I was putting my daughter at risk by being so foolish and getting so emotionally involved with the nanny.As I stood in the middle of Moana’s dark room and watched her disappear with Ella, I started to realize that I had to do what was right.I hard
MoanaI hadn’t expected that my sleeping arrangement with Edrick would have made such an impact on my body and mind, but as the days ticked on and I found myself tossing and turning each night and waking up from strange dreams, I began to realize that I wasn’t the only one in the arrangement who needed the other. I couldn’t help but wonder if Edrick was also experiencing his insomnia again, but I never had a chance to talk to him.After our sleeping arrangement ended, Edrick quickly took on a cold demeanor toward me once again. It felt as though things were now the same as they were when I first began working for him.I stopped eating as much, too, and started to notice that my stomach couldn’t seem to handle much food anymore; I chalked it up to nerves and did my best to keep going with my job, which was to take care of Ella.One Sunday morning, I felt as though I needed to get out of the penthouse and was about to take some personal time to go to the orphanage when Ella begged me to
Moana“I’m sure he’ll visit soon,” I said, quickly blinking away the tears that came to my eyes when Clara asked so innocently about Edrick coming to visit the orphanage.Neither Clara nor Ella seemed to notice my emotional demeanor, and Clara burst out into cheers. I watched with a smile as they ran off to continue playing. Sophia chuckled behind me.“The children really do like him,” she said, taking a sip of her tea. “I honestly thought that he was just another emotionless drone, focused solely on business, but he’s really much more than that. It seems that our cookie baking session might have softened him a bit.”I nodded thoughtfully, thinking back to the day that we all baked cookies in this very kitchen. Edrick had begun that day so coldly and had been so distant from the children, but he eventually warmed up to them as we spent the day together. I realized that day that the Alpha billionaire actually did like children, although I wasn’t certain if he would ever admit it. Secre
MoanaWhen I went to bed that night, I made sure to set my alarm a little earlier than normal. I was so intrigued by Edrick’s strange behavior that I wanted to test him a little, so I woke up as soon as my alarm went off and made an effort to run into him first thing in the morning, when he would often sit in the dining room or in his study with the door open to look over financial reports.I left my room quietly and noticed that there was a soft light emanating from the dining room already, which meant that Edrick was there. Smirking to myself, I walked over to the kitchen.“Good morning,” I said as I passed him. “Coffee?”He was silent for a moment before slowly raising his eyes to me from his paperwork, then shook his head. “No, thanks. I’ve already made my own.”I narrowed my eyes as I studied him. There was no coffee on the table in front of him.“Drank it all already?” I asked, gesturing to the empty table.Edrick was silent again for another few moments before nodding once agai
MoanaI stood outside Edrick’s study for a few moments, my hand raised to knock, as I bit my lip and wondered if this was the best idea. Would attempting to talk to Edrick even accomplish anything?I almost turned around and left, but as I thought of Ella’s sad face when her father wouldn’t play with her after work simply because of my presence, I mustered up my courage and knocked.“Come in,” Edrick’s muffled voice called after a few moments. I took a deep breath and entered, standing in the doorway. Edrick was sitting at his desk, and looked up at me with a surprised expression on his face as I opened the door. “Oh, Moana. Did you need something?”“I want to talk to you,” I said, doing my best to keep my shoulders back and my chin held high for fear of breaking down right in front of him over such a small thing. I really had been so much more emotional than usual lately, but I didn’t want to let Edrick see me break down over something like this.“Come in, then,” he said, clearing hi
MoanaI woke up the next morning with a strange feeling in my stomach. My head hurt after being kept up all night from having too many dreams, but as I tried to get out of bed and suddenly felt a wave of unmistakable nausea come over me, I knew that that feeling couldn’t have just been from the nightmares.Groaning and holding my tender stomach, I scrambled out of bed and over to the bathroom just before vomiting.When I was finished, I took a deep breath and grabbed the edge of the sink, pulling myself up from where I had been kneeling on the floor in front of the toilet. My face looked pale and I had dark circles under my eyes.“Are you okay, Moana?” a tiny voice suddenly said from the doorway, making me jump. I looked over to see Ella standing there, still in her pajamas.“Yes, love,” I said gently as I squeezed some toothpaste onto my toothbrush so I could scrub away the sour taste of vomit in my mouth. “I think I just ate something bad yesterday.”Ella stayed there while I brushe