Runaway Mommy: My Boss is the Father novel Chapter 38

Sebastian's demands were incredibly simple.

“This weekend, we'll pick a mall, meet up, let her take one look at us, and then we scatter.”

Phoebe gave him the address of the mall where she had already planned to meet Lucas Lennox.

“Let's do it there. I'm taking my daughter there to play this weekend anyway.”

Phoebe only agreed after Sebastian swore she wouldn't have to actually interact with Eleanor.

After hanging up, Phoebe had no motivation to draw. She lay flat on her back, staring at the ceiling.

The rain tapped rhythmically against the windowpane.

Her mind wandered.

She had only met Eleanor once, back when she and Jaxson were dating.

Phoebe hated living in the dorms, but her family's house was in the same district as the university—only a ten-minute drive away—and Edward strictly forbade her from renting an apartment off-campus.

One day, knowing her parents were out, Phoebe sneaked Jaxson into her house.

After fooling around in her room, Eleanor had video-called Jaxson, immediately demanding to know where he was and why the walls behind him were entirely pink.

Jaxson deadpanned that he was at a pink-themed internet cafe.

Phoebe had peeked at the screen from the corner of her eye.

Eleanor looked incredibly pampered.

She had clearly lived a life shielded from any real hardship. She retained a naive innocence, half-believing Jaxson's obvious lie, though she muttered under her breath.

“You're a boy, why do you like pink? Is there something wrong with you?”

Jaxson hung up on her right there.

Looking back at it now, Eleanor's sudden suspicion that Jaxson and Sebastian were dating wasn't totally out of nowhere.

Who knows, maybe she had been harboring those doubts for years.

Phoebe couldn't hold it back and let out a soft laugh.

The sound echoed slightly in the cramped room, and she froze, suddenly realizing it had been a very long time since she had genuinely laughed.

Since Edward passed away, the only time she ever smiled was for Lily.

They dated for years, yet Phoebe never met a single member of his family.

The only reason his friends even knew they were together was because Phoebe was so relentlessly aggressive. Her stubborn pursuit of him was infamous across campus, and when they finally got together, it made massive waves.

She looked down at Phoebe and gave a sickeningly fake smile. “Where should I sit, Phoebe?”

Phoebe didn't even look up from her screen, casually pointing toward the intern desks in the back. “Grab any open desk. Let me know if you need anything.”

Her tone was completely neutral.

There was nothing Seraphina could pick a fight over.

Seraphina found an empty desk and dramatically slammed her Birkin bag down, the heavy thud echoing across the room.

Autumn couldn't help but turn around, clicking her tongue. “That's a thirty-thousand-dollar bag, and I wouldn't even dare toss it like that. What kind of insane background does this girl have?”

“They just dumped a literal princess on you. Your life is about to be hell.”

Phoebe gave a wry smile, raising an eyebrow at Autumn. “Wanna cheer me up and do this expense report for me, Autumn?”

Autumn immediately rolled her desk chair back to her own cubicle.

“Never mind, I see you're handling it just fine.”

It wasn't that Phoebe was unbothered.

She just couldn't figure out the angle. Jaxson absolutely knew Seraphina had been transferred to Marketing.