Mend My Heart

Chapter 24

Maya’s P.O.V

I think I’m going to enjoy this little outing. And you know why? Well, because it beats being in the stuffy mansion all the time and…Mr Duke would be there. I was feeling like a teenager going to prom with the guy they liked; let’s face it, I do in all honesty like Mr. Duke. I so desperately wanted to reject this and I had been having a constant inner battle warning me against being involved with this walking red flag but as always, us female protagonists never seem to heed the call of wisdom.

I bet if I had told Lexi this, she would have probably had a conniption. She did not approve of Mr. Duke and how he’d conducted himself before, neither did my conscience. But my thoughtlessness was slowly overpowering my reasoning capacity so damn the consequences to hell. Just this once, I wanted the forbidden fruit that tasted too sinfully bad.

I sat in the back with the twins on their booster seats and me inconveniently in the middle like a hotdog between two hotdog buns. It’s a weird analogy but let’s just go with it for now. Mr. Duke was up front with Leslie behind the wheel. I could tell his was highly uncomfortable sitting beside his boss, and it didn’t help either that Mr. Duke was basically shooting him dirty looks every few seconds. I wanted to laugh at the situation. I knew he was only like that because he thought something was going between me and Leslie. Sure, Leslie was cute and all but I felt zero attraction towards him. I wouldn’t mind having him as a friend perhaps, but my so-called boss didn’t have to know that.

My eyes flew to the view mirror and my eyes caught Leslie’s mischievous orbs on me and I smiled at him. “Keep your eyes on the road, Mr. Rushbrook. Do you want to get us killed?” Mr. Duke pronounced gruffly, making Leslie quickly avert his gaze away from me. Okay, I could stifle the laugh that erupted from my lips fast enough, causing someone’s piercing, not to mention icy, eyes landed on me. His facial expression was impassive, lips quirked downwards in distaste. “Something funny, Miss Knight?” he interrogated, his immaculate brows frowning.

I cleared my throat. “I just thought of a joke I heard a while ago,” I replied coolly and Aiden piped in.

“Really, tell us what it is!” he urged and I inwardly face palmed. Why can’t this boy catch my drift and just play along.

I scratched my head, trying to rack my brain for a joke. “Uh, I-I forgot what it is. I’ll let you know once I remember it,” I breathed nervously, and Mr. Duke smirked knowingly at me. I felt heat creep up my neck at that dumb remark. Damn that smug bastard!

The drive to the amusement park, who’s name I didn’t bother to memorise, was relatively quiet except for the twins chanting about how they were happy to spend time with their dad and of course, getting to ride all of the scariest ones. When we go there, I unbuckled them from their seats and both men jumped out before coming round back to help the kids out. Then there came one of the most awkward situations ever; both doors on either side were open and two hands were stretched out to me so I could have some assistance jumping out.

First off, when I’d entered the car, I’d done it by myself. What made them think that I couldn’t get out on my own? Secondly, was this not some scene pulled out of a badly written novel? Honestly, how the hell did we all end up in this position? Lastly, I felt my ego being boosted by this. On the one hand, Leslie was smiling charmingly at me. He was a douche at first but after that date we had, I disliked him a lot less. He was a safe choice but on the other hand, Mr. Duke’s grin held a lot of daringness, self-assuredness like he knew I’d inevitably let him take my hand. And his zaffre eyes were like two magnets, drawing me to them.

I think the choice I made here was pretty obvious.

He pulled me in close, disregarding and invading my space. “Good choice,” he whispered in my ear before pulling away and holding onto the twins’ hands. “Where to first?” he asked them and moved away from where I stood, paralysed but my heart racing wildly.