Jo smirked. “You sound surprised.”
“Not surprised. Pleased. Grateful.”
She bit her lip and looked away, pink rising in her cheeks, and suddenly that warmth in his chest was sliding down his spine.
“Daddy,” Annie’s concerned voice snapped him out of his rapid descent into inappropriate thoughts as his daughter appeared in the doorway to the hall. “Where’s Jo going to sleep?”
“In a bed, silly,” Jo said. “Want to show me which room is mine?”
“But there aren’t enough rooms.” Her furrowed brow melted into a delighted smile. “Are we having a sleepover? I’ve never had a sleepover before. The bed in my room is ginormous!”
“What do you mean there aren’t enough rooms?” Derek moved past his daughter and down the hall. He’d specifically instructed his assistant to change his reservation to one of the cottages with three bedrooms. But as he threw open the doors that lined the hall, his stomach sank, gut twisting. There were only two bedrooms. Two very large bedrooms, each with its own king-size bed and luxurious en suite bathroom, but only two bedrooms all the same.
“There’s been a mistake.” He pulled out his phone and thumbed through his text messages with Luke.
“It’s fine,” Jo said. “I can sleep on the couch.”
“My bed is really big,” Annie said again, snagging Jo’s hand and tugging her to see. “We can share. I don’t snore or anything and I’m really good at braiding hair.”
“I’m sure you are,” Jo said. “My hair’s a little short for braiding, though.” She gathered her hair in one fist to demonstrate, tugging on the platinum strands, and suddenly all he could picture was the way he’d done the same thing the night before. How she’d arched her back and whimpered when he’d slid inside her, how she’d begged for her climax.
Stop. She’s the nanny. No fucking the nanny. No thinking about fucking the nanny.
He dialed his assistant and marched back to the living room, putting enough space between himself and Jo to adjust the traitorous bulge in his pants without her noticing. Luke answered on the second ring. “If you’re calling about the video from Paris, don’t worry. I already handled it. The woman who posted it has been served a cease and desist, and the IT team is scrubbing it from the web as we speak.”
“What video?”
“Apparently Jackson and a woman wearing head-to-toe body paint—”
“Never mind. I don’t want to know,” Derek sighed. If he was going to get through the next few days without being a total dick to the most famous member of Midnight Storm, it was better that he not know about whatever fresh scandal the popstar had started. Sometimes being the guy trying to get their careers back on track felt a hell of a lot more like corralling feral cats. “Why does this cottage only have two bedrooms?”
“Didn’t you see my text?” On the other end of the line, Derek could hear the steady clacking of Luke’s keyboard as he typed, no doubt firing off an interoffice memo letting the other assistants know to avoid mentioning the video to their grumpy boss. “Hotel Bellwether is packed because of NostalgiCon. There weren’t any open cottages or villas with three bedrooms. I can get you three separate rooms in one of the towers, but they wouldn’t all be together—different floors, and you’d be on the other side of the property from the band. I figured you’d rather have two rooms in a cottage and stay close to the artists.”
He pinched the bridge of his nose and forced himself to breathe. It wasn’t Luke’s fault that the hotel didn’t have any empty cottages.
Luke continued, “There should be two king beds and a sofa bed in the living room. I can find something off property if you want, but—”
“It’s fine. Thank you. We’ll make it work.”
“Call me if you change your mind,” Luke offered, still typing.
He knew he’d regret asking, but he couldn’t help himself. “How bad is the video?”
Luke hesitated, and Derek could picture the pinched expression he got when he was weighing two equally shitty options. “Not as bad as Ibiza, but worse than Mykonos.”
“Jesus Christ.”
“Daddy, you’re not supposed to say that,” Annie admonished from somewhere behind him.
“Make it disappear,” he said. “And scan for others that might be out there. Where there’s one video—”
“There’s usually more.”
The line disconnected with a click and Derek slid his phone back into his pocket as the pain in his temples surged. Getting Midnight Storm back on tour was going to be the death of him.
Just one more tour.
All he had to do was ensure NostalgiCon went off without a hitch, get his partners at the label to see they were ready to tour again, and see Midnight Storm through one last stadium tour. One last tour to make sure the band he’d been with from the start was alright, that his life’s work wasn’t so easily destroyed by a pop star with a self-destructive streak. One last tour before he could stop spending so much time on the road and be the father Annie deserved.