CHAPTER 3

Nadine knew that voice, it haunted her dreams for the last seven years.

She whipped around and didn't know when the dishes she was holding slipped from hands that went numb. The chattering sound the dishes made on the floor jolted her and made her jump.

What was he doing here? How did he get here? Did he find out about Nichole?

Dozens of questions raced through her mind as she stared at him with eyes as round as saucers but she seemed not to be able to find her voice.

Nicholas was every teenage girl's dream years ago but now, he must be the dream man of every woman and the envy of every man.

His raven black hair was windblown and tousled from him probably running his fingers through his hair tens of times in a day. She had a sudden flash of doing that herself years ago. She also remembered him running his fingers through curls on her body that had no relations to the ones on her head...don't go there Nadine! She scolded herself.

His grey eyes were piercing and at that moment, they looked like they were trying to drill a painful hole through her.

His six feet three inches frame made her feel even smaller than she actually was. His lean frame was now more of bulging muscles in all the right proportions. Standing before her with his legs braced apart, he reminded her of a sculpture of Adonis she saw in a book while in high school, just a lot more better than the sculpture. He made her feel hot and bothered. She remembered their first night together in that house......don't even go there young lady, she chided herself.

God...talk about mouth watering, that was Nicholas.

She resisted the impulse to raise her hands to her mouth to check if she was drooling.

"I think the cat got your tongue Nadine. I asked you WHAT THE HELL YOU ARE DOING IN MY HOUSE," Nicholas asked again, his voice booming dangerously this time around.

His voice jolted her out of her momentary loss of ability to speak. That was when all the old hurts assailed her and she found the voice to question him.

"I should be asking you that question. What are you doing here?," Nadine asked in a voice that shook with so much emotion.

"You have no right asking me that question in my own house."

"This is not your house," she said angrily then added in a low voice when he continued to stare at her with fumes practically coming out of his mouth "it's no longer your house."

"The last time I checked, this house was mine"

"No it isn't. Last I checked, you sold it and it now belongs to a Mr Carlos. Unless you changed your name, the house isn't yours."

Nadine argued but she wasn't so sure anymore. She applied online with a site recruiting people for housekeeping jobs. The representative in town who gave her a call two days earlier to tell her about her recruitment had told her the house belonged to a Mr Carlos. And years ago after Nicholas left the town suddenly, she heard from the grapevine that he had put the place up for sell.

When she was told the place belonged to Mr Carlos, she felt OK taking the job and didn't ask anymore questions. She was beginning to question her own facts.

"Well, sorry to disappoint you Nadine but I never closed the deal with Carlos. The house is still mine," he finished with an air of superiority. The satisfaction dripping from his voice was enough to drown her.

"Oh. Really?," Nadine said in a small voice. Now, she just felt so stupid for arguing with him.

"Yes really. I had no reason to explain anything to you and give you any proof but now I've done that so back to my question. What are you doing in my house?"

"I'm the one your personal assistant recruited on a site to put the place in order. A lot of cleaning needed to be done and washing...," she rambled on. Nicholas seemed to be the one the cat got his tongue this time around.

Apart from running My Inn, which was not a means of livelihood really; as her inflow of guests was sparse all year round, she took any available part-time job she could make time for. Housekeeping was one amongst them.

My Inn didn't get a great deal of patronage at that time of year, if no patronage at all, so she took in more part-time jobs she could lay her hands on at that time of year.

She was a single mom with a growing six year old who needed every penny she could earn. She prided herself in being able to pull her own weight. She was done being dependant on people in any area of her life.

"In short, I'm your housekeeper. I've a contract to do the housekeeping pending the time of your stay," Nadine said, realizing at that moment the situation she just found herself in. This was going to be a nerve racking experience, she thought to herself.

She should have asked more questions but the amount on the contract per week just wasn't reasonable to be true. And it sure turned out to be the opposite. No amount of money was enough to pay for the time she was going to spend having to put up with Nicholas. She wasn't over how he treated her in the past.

"That's total bullshit. Your contract or whatsoever is terminated starting about now. You can get out of here," Nicholas railed angrily.

"Believe me, nothing sounds more pleasing than that at the moment but I got an advance payment of two months which, I've no plans of returning. So to my great displeasure, I'm stuck with you," Nadine said. She felt angry tears prick the back of her eyes. She turned blindly to continue washing and arranging the dishes before he could see them fall.

............

Nicholas stared dazedly at Nadine has she turned her back on him to continue with whatever the hell she was doing. He could not believe she just turned her back on him while he wasn't even done talking. But he was really speechless and didn't know how to make a coherent statement then.

How the hell did the site Emma used end up hiring Nadine to be his housekeeper in the whole of Folks? It wasn't like the town was densely populated but he couldn't just pass it up as a coincidence. He had enough reasons to suspect she could have played games to get the job just to get close to him.

By God, but she was just as beautiful and as feisty as ever. Seeing her did things to him he was never going to admit to himself, bringing back all the old memories, the good and the bad.

His heart and groin craved the Nadine he used to know before everything went south between them, the sweet innocent beauty that opened up her heart and soul for him, the Nadine who loved him for who he was, the one that understood all the pains and hurt that were inflicted by his parents, and still accepted him and helped him nonetheless.

But his brain brought back all the old hurts she herself inflicted, it reminded him of the woman really behind all the superficial layers of her sweet innocence.

She was more of a woman now, no longer the shy girl he left behind. She was more rounded in all the right places and she had aged so well, she didn't look a day older than the nineteen years she was when he left town. He remembered she had never been on the slim side and he had loved that about her body. He loved the way he soft curves used to fit so well with the planes of his own hard body, believing she was the woman made for him.

Like hell she was, he thought to himself and snorted out loud.

He stared at the nice rounded curve of her ass in her tight jeans. It lured him and made him feel the sudden urge to put his arms around her from behind to feel that ass snuggled to his groin. A picture of her well endowed cleavage flashed in his mind's eyes.

He could picture just nuzzling at her breast in bed for a whole day.

And her legs, they weren't the classical ones that went on and on but they were just a bit longer than average and he remembered how perfectly they used to wrap around his waist while he moved inside her.

If Nadine turned around at that point in time and saw the predatory and smouldering look in his eyes, she was pretty likely to forget talks about any advance payment and run for the hills.

If she wasn't the deceitful bitch he knew her to be, he would give all he had in the blink of an eye to see those gorgeous legs wrapped around his waist one more time.

But he did know her and even if his groin was trying to control his brain at that moment, he was never going down that path with her ever again. He had to get her out of his house and out of his life as soon as possible.

He tried to gather his thoughts and cleared his throat loudly."Believe me, it's not my wish to be stuck with you too. You can just forget about the advance payment and get the hell out of my house," Nicholas said in a tone that showed he wasn't going to make any compromise beyond that.

"I didn't know I was now your charity case Nick," she said without turning around, "Thanks but no thanks. I'll be out of your hair in two months and you wouldn't even know I was here the whole time. I can be very good sneaking in here in the mornings to do what needs to be done and be gone before you even know it"

"That I don't doubt. No one in the whole town could best you at sneaking around. I can bet my money on that."

"What do you mean by that?," she demanded and turned to face him with eyes blazing.

" I'm pretty sure you know what I meant by that."

"No, I don't."

"Look Nana darling, I'm not here to waste my time discussing and reminiscing about the past with you," he said like he was trying to explain a complex process to a child "I'm ready to forget any of this happened if you'll just get the hell out right now."

"Don't ever call me that," she said in a small voice.

"Call you what?"

"Nana," she said blushing furiously. They both knew the times he called her that in the past.

"Oh! Sorry to offend you darling," he said with a sick smile on his face.

"Don't call me that either"

"Fine. But you don't really think I meant any of them to be endearing, do you? Because they are not."

She knew he never meant any kind of endearment he ever said to her. She didn't care, look where all the pretend endearments got her.

" I never thought that for a second."

"Good. We are clear on that. Just take your leave now"

"I can't do that. I don't want your charity. I'll work for what I got paid to do."

"Like hell you will," he replied scathingly.

Nicholas guessed she was still as deceitful as ever. He remembered she used to be freakishly independent. But he also remembered it was all a show for his own sake at the end.

"Yes I will."

"Just return the advance payment then."

"I told you I can't do that."

"Why the hell is that?"

"Because I used a huge part of it already. I'm not leaving but I won't get in your way. Just deal with that."

"Bullshit," he said and stormed out of the kitchen. Then she heard him slam the front door.

Nadine's tight rein on her emotions snapped and she let the tears she had been holding back fall freely.