He Made Me Schedule Meetings, Then Failed to Book Me Chapter 09

He Made Me Schedule Meetings, Then Failed to Book Me Chapter 09

“Mason, Claire doesn’t want you anymore. She’s going to spend all her time with me now!”

Sophie turned around and pointed at him.

“Don’t ever call Claire a horrible woman again!”

I didn’t look at Mason’s face.

I took Sophie’s hand and turned toward the car.

The next day, when I went to pick up Sophie again, Ethan was waiting outside the preschool too.

When he saw me, he frowned with concern.

“Claire, did you really take a job as a nanny?”

“Mason told me all about it when he came home yesterday.”

“The things I sent you all came back too. Stop putting on a brave front and come home with me, okay?”

I laughed in disbelief.

“Does picking up a child automatically make someone a nanny?”

“Even if I were a nanny, so what? I was the nanny in your house for five years, and you never once felt sorry

for me.”

“At least when I work for someone else, they acknowledge my value.”

Ethan fell silent.

Sophie soon ran out and stood protectively in front of me.

“Claire is amazing!”

“She plays with me and even helps my mom with her paperwork!”

“Mason, you’re so silly for not wanting a mom this great!”

That evening, Maya heard about what happened at the preschool from Sophie.

She started looking for a new preschool for her.

I felt uneasy. “This is my fault. You don’t need to put your daughter through all that.”

She reassured me. “I was already planning to transfer Sophie.”

“Don’t feel guilty.”

Until Sophie transferred, Maya didn’t ask me to pick her up again.

A month later, I was settled into my job.

Maya never asked me to watch Sophie again either.

One evening, I went to Maya’s house to drop off some documents, and Sophie was still awake.

The moment she saw me, she ran over and hugged my legs again.

“Claire, I’ve actually known you for a long time.”

“You picked Mason up from preschool before. That’s when I started liking you.”

She leaned close and whispered in my ear.

“You speak so gently, and you’re so pretty. I was so jealous of Mason.”

“He was mean to you too, so I disliked him even more.”

“But!”

Sophie clutched the hem of my shirt, her face turning secretive.

“After you picked me up a few times, Mason cried because he was mad.”

“The last time I went to preschool, I saw Mason’s dad pick him up.”

“Mason was still crying. He asked his dad if you really didn’t want him anymore and whether you were going

to be my Aunt Claire from then on.”

She kissed my cheek.

“Claire, I won’t wait until I lose someone to realize how much I value them.”

“I’ve always liked you!”

I smiled and kissed her cheek too.

“I like you too, Sophie.”

Two years later, Maya stopped having me work as her assistant.

“Your work has been excellent, and you’ve learned every part of the business as my assistant.”

“I picked a project for you to try. Don’t put any pressure on yourself.”

I went still when I took the file.

Ethan’s company worked in the same field.

Maya raised an eyebrow.

“Your ex-husband works in this field too, right?”

“I know him. You may run into him when you go to the client company.”

“Will that be a problem?”

I shook my head.

“No.”

I used to organize Ethan’s study for him.

To sort his files, I had read through everything in the room.

One evening, when he came home from work, I even offered a few ideas about a recent proposal.

That evening, he rubbed his temples in irritation and cut me off:

“Claire Morgan, did I ever tell you not to touch anything in my study?”

Chloe followed him in, laughing.

“Claire, you should watch fewer workplace dramas.”

“Everything you mentioned was empty, high-sounding nonsense.”

When he saw me freeze, he tried to soothe me.

“Just be a rich man’s wife. You don’t need to worry about work.”

I never entered his study again.

But once, after he came home drunk from a business dinner, he tossed some documents onto the

living-room floor.

When I picked them up, I saw that my ideas from before had been organized into a formal proposal.

The name in the upper-right corner was Chloe Hayes.

Remembering that, I opened my computer and started writing my report.

A week later, at the client company, Ethan and I ran into each other exactly as Maya had predicted.

His new secretary was a young man in his early twenties.

He had never met me.

Ethan stood frozen.

“Claire, what are you doing here?”

His new secretary spoke up. “Mr. Carter, she’s the representative from our partner company.”

I lifted my chin in his direction in acknowledgment.

During the meeting, Ethan kept his eyes fixed on my face while I presented.

When it was his turn, the moderator called on him twice before he came back to himself.

In the end, I won the project.

I called Maya, thrilled, to tell her the news.

Ethan waited for me at the exit.

“Claire, you’ve changed so much.”

I didn’t slow down.

“I’ve always been this way.”

“I just lost myself for a while.”

“Thank you for letting me go. That’s how I found myself again.”

He followed me.

“Claire, can we talk?”

I waved him off. “No personal business. If you want to discuss work, make an appointment through my

company.”