aside, she did want to spend some time with Shaw; he was Kari’s son, and she adored the blond dynamo. She wanted to make up for all the birthdays and Christmases she’d missed with him, maybe do some fun activities with the little guy. And maybe if he came to care for her as much as she cared for him, Linc would let her spend some time with him when she returned to the Untied States during shooting breaks.
But if she stayed in this house, she would be living with Linc, and the chances of finding herself naked with him were stratospherically high. The guy just had to step into the room, and the urge to jump him was strong. Tate closed her eyes, remembering the feel of his lips on hers, his broad, hard hands on her bare skin. She just had to look at him to turn into a raging inferno. Why Linc? Why now? And why, dear God, did he have to be Kari’s ex? Why was she even attracted to him? She’d never been a fan of the Mr. Traditional type of guy, the type who expected his woman to run the household and take care of the kids, ending the day by cooking a gourmet dinner. She was not that woman.
“Linc, concentrate!” Beck snapped.
Tate jerked her attention back to the present and saw that Linc was staring at her mouth, his fists resting on his thighs, clenching and unclenching.
“Big Brother is rattled,” Beck said, amused.
“What was Jo’s suggestion, Linc?” Sage asked, her eyes darting from Linc’s face to Tate’s and back again.
When Linc spoke, his voice sounded weary. “Well, she suggested that Tate take over as Shaw’s nanny until I find someone else, someone suitable.”
Sage tipped her head to the side. “Why isn’t Tate suitable?”
Linc glared up at his sister. “I don’t know her.”
“You won’t know anyone an agency sends, either,” Beck pointed out, standing up to head for the coffee machine. He pulled cups from the cupboard, took milk from the fridge.
“Yeah, but they would’ve done background checks, have references from other parents,” Linc said, glaring at her. “Tate arrived on my doorstep yesterday!”
“Some would call that fate,” Sage suggested.
“Fate, my ass,” Linc growled.
“You do know that I am sitting here, listening to you talk about me?” Tate interjected, feeling her temper start to bubble.
“You need a nanny, Linc,” Beck told him, ignoring Tate’s protest. “Unless you plan to take some time off.”
“I am not leaving my son with a stranger,” Linc said, his jaw rock hard.
The new nanny would be a stranger, too, but that pertinent fact seemed to have escaped Linc’s steel-trap mind. Tate’s hand gripped her coffee cup, reminding herself that throwing the object would accomplish nothing. Unless the cup hit his head and knocked some sense into him.
“No, what you are really saying is that you won’t leave Shaw with a Harper,” Tate said, pushing herself to her feet.
Their eyes clashed and Linc nodded. “Yeah, I won’t leave him with Kari’s sister. Just like I wouldn’t leave him with your mother.
“Not that she’s ever asked to see him,” Linc added, his voice bitter. To Linc, who obviously valued family so highly, her mother’s lack of interest had to be a knife to his heart. Tate wanted to tell him that her mother was dead, she wanted to put him in his place, but those words died when she opened her mouth to retaliate.
“Stop comparing me to Kari.” It took all her effort to keep her voice calm. “I’m not my sister.”
“If it walks like a duck...” Linc said, his words deliberately careless.
Tate heard Jaeger’s groan. “Dammit, Linc. Stop being an asshat.”
Linc threw up his hands, his handsome face dark with suppressed anger. “It’s not like I’m making assumptions here, Tate. Kari spoke about you. You never went to college, wanting to travel instead. You missed countless family events because you had something better to do. You can’t wrap your head around commitment, and you’d rather have your freedom than stay in one place. You make a habit of quitting jobs and ending relationships on a whim. Knowing all this, how can I trust that you won’t ditch my kid if you have something better to do?” Linc linked his hands behind his head as his chest rose and fell in agitation. “He’s my life. I’d never forgive myself if something happened to him on your watch!”
This was why she’d kept her distance from her family, why she’d worked so very hard to create another identity. All her life comparisons had been drawn between her and Kari. Linc was just another in a long, long line of people who’d assumed she was just like Kari and condemned her for it.
She sighed. She’d lived most of her life feeling trapped between two worlds—her family’s perceptions of who she was and who they thought she should be.
Now, far away from the life she’d left behind, she felt free, like she could finally be who she really was. People either liked her, or didn’t, for who she was without reference to Kari. She made it a point to not worry about what people thought about her, to try to live her life on her own terms according to her own truth.
But, unfortunately, Linc’s assumptions about her hurt, and feeling hurt annoyed her. She’d known him for a few hours; his opinion shouldn’t matter to her.
But, dammit, it did.
Tate, feeling as if she was fighting a riptide, took Ellie from Sage’s arms and dropped a kiss on her silken head. Determined not to let Linc, or his siblings, see how upset she was, she tossed her head and gritted out, “You got all your information about me from Kari, yet here I stand, holding her child, the second one she’s dumped. I think there’s something wrong with that picture.”
Tate walked toward the stairs, feeling the acid burn of tears in the back of her throat. At the door, she made herself turn, to look at Linc once more, probably for the last time. “I’ll call for a cab, and I’ll be gone in an hour. Good luck in your search for a perfect nanny.”
As Ellie played at her feet with plastic toys, Tate looked out her bedroom window to the tree-lined street below. Tate watched as Beck swung Shaw up onto his shoulders, the little boy laughing with delight. Sage was walking alongside Beck, and Jaeger stopped to close the wrought iron gate behind him. They were taking Shaw to his pre-K, Tate surmised. The Ballantyne siblings were a close-knit unit, something she and Kari had never managed to be.
She was, once again, alone. Tate looked down at Ellie’s dark head and smiled. Well, she wasn’t completely alone; for the next few weeks or so she had this precious little girl for company. Tate bit her lip, wondering if she’d ever see Shaw again. She wanted to be part of his life, but whether Linc would allow that was a tenuous possibility at best. However, there was one thing she did know beyond a shadow of a doubt. When she restored Ellie to Kari she’d be a constant and consistent presence throughout Ellie’s life, whether Kari wanted her to be or not.
Well, as constant and consistent as her travels and job allowed. Shaw and Ellie were her nephew and niece, the only family, apart from Kari, she had. She wanted a better, healthier relationship with
