Runaway Mommy: My Boss is the Father novel Chapter 37

The line went dead.

Listening to the dial tone, Eleanor felt a rising sense of panic. She smacked Richard Hayes on the arm as he casually played solitaire on his tablet. “Tell me the truth, is your son abnormal?”

Without waiting for Richard to answer, she frantically started planning blind dates for Jaxson.

For good measure, she also dialed Sebastian's number.

-

Late that night, Phoebe finished washing up.

Her apartment was incredibly cramped. Compared to her old room at the Vance estate, this entire bedroom was about the size of her former walk-in closet.

With a bed, a wardrobe, and a cheap desk she snagged from a thrift store to use as a vanity, the room was completely full.

She checked her phone. There was a message from a client who had recently contacted her for a commission. They accepted her rates and wanted to order a few illustrations.

Phoebe confirmed the art style and requirements, agreed on a timeline for the rough sketches, collected the deposit, and logged off.

The request wasn't too demanding.

In the original illustration community, Phoebe was a highly sought-after artist. She had taken on several major commercial contracts, providing art for top-grossing video games.

When millions of players booted up those games, the first thing they saw was Phoebe's splash art, signed under the pseudonym "Zephyr."

At first, players who didn't know who Zephyr was would be so stunned by the artwork that they'd look her up online, only to realize she was an established top-tier artist in the community.

That led to an endless stream of commission requests.

Later, there was a massive wave of drama when rumors claimed she had charged a sky-high fee of a hundred and fifty grand for a single piece.

Haters swarmed her, insisting her art wasn't worth anywhere near that price, and flooded her inbox with vicious insults.

The game developers had to step in and issue a public statement clarifying that the fee wasn't nearly that high.

However, they explicitly stated that Zephyr's immense talent was absolutely worth every penny.

When Phoebe logged back online, she publicly posted her commission rates and announced a price increase.

People could hire her if they wanted to, but she wasn't going to coddle the people trying to drag her down.

Thanks to that move, Zephyr's reputation skyrocketed, cementing her status as an absolute powerhouse in the illustration world.

“Phoebe, I'm begging you! I really don't swing that way! I panicked and told her I have a girlfriend, and now she's demanding to meet her!”

Sebastian pleaded, “Please, just come meet her with me?”

He never imagined Eleanor's imagination could run that wild.

If he actually let Eleanor believe he was dating her son, the entire Judson family—Seraphina included—would be blacklisted by the Hayes family permanently.

Left with no choice, he agreed to the meeting.

But after racking his brain, the women he usually kept around were either D-list models or influencers—nobody you could bring home to a matriarch, and they'd definitely cling to him afterward.

That's when he thought of Phoebe.

“Sebastian, did you hit your head? Not even a dog would agree to this.”

Sebastian was unbothered. “Ten minutes. Just help me stall her, and I'll transfer a thousand bucks to your account right now.”

Phoebe changed her tune instantly.

“Screw dignity, I'll do it.”