word that had been choking in his chest all afternoon. “Thanks.”
She glanced up at him with a smile. “You’re welcome.”
But her smile quickly faded. So did his. Those male feelings swept over him again. She was so pretty. And the babies were so quiet, he felt like himself again. A man. Not just a daddy. She was attracted to him. He knew she was attracted to him. Her face told the story. It would be perfectly natural to start flirting right now …
He stopped his thoughts. Stepped back.
He’d already thought all this out. He didn’t want a relationship. He absolutely wasn’t going let another woman get close enough to hurt him—or the twins. And if he had no intention of getting close, then the only thing flirting would lead to was a fling.
That was just wrong.
He rubbed his hand along the back of his neck. “Your supper never did come down from the main house.”
She took a pace back too. “I know.” She cleared her throat. “Think you’ll be okay while I go up and check on that?”
He nodded. “Yeah. We’re good. In fact, if you want to stay up there and eat, you go ahead.”
“Okay.” She pivoted and all but ran to the front door.
He scrubbed his hand down his face. If he really wanted to keep himself in line around the nanny, he didn’t need to formulate a plan for the place of women in his life. All he had to do was remember how badly his last relationship had turned out. The pain of realizing he’d been used. The pain of discovering Liliah wanted nothing to do with his babies. She had been a boatload of trouble and drama.
He frowned. Liliah had been a boatload of drama and trouble. And that was probably why Tory was so attractive to him. She was Liliah’s polar opposite. Nice, sweet and kind to his babies, Tory didn’t bring an ounce of drama to his life.
But, after Liliah, even if Tory were his soul mate, a relationship wasn’t worth risking his trouble-free, drama-free household. And being involved with the nanny would certainly bring drama.
He’d had his share of drama with Liliah.
He didn’t want any more. No matter what form it took.
The next morning, Tory carried both babies into the kitchen. She slid them into their highchairs and began mixing cereal. “So, I take it everybody slept well.”
Cindy giggled and Sam yelped.
“Hey, hey, Sammy! I get it. You’re hungry. And I’m hurrying. But there’s only one of me. So you have to be patient.”
She took the two bowls of cereal to the table, pulled out a chair and arranged it between both highchairs. “Okay. It’s just us now. So everybody has to be on best behavior.”
Sam squealed, slapping his hands on the highchair tray.
“Did you not hear the part about best behavior? Your dad is exhausted and we’re letting him sleep in.”
She spooned a helping of cereal into Sam’s mouth. He smacked his lips in innocent enjoyment.
She laughed, wanting to pinch his chubby little cheek. Instead, she fed Cindy a spoon of cereal. “But I’m also sort of trying to butter him up. We never talked about days off and we have to because—”
She paused, cleared her throat, not sure why she couldn’t quite bring herself to talk about Jason with two babies who probably wouldn’t understand a word she said.
Except that the situation with Jason was sad and they were happy. Sam was a chubby, giggly little guy and Cindy was petite, demure. Probably someday she’d be exactly like Gwen. It seemed wrong to tell them about something so tragic when they were so cheerful.
So she wouldn’t tell them, but she had to tell Chance. She had to ask for days off.
Chance stretched lazily when he woke. His back didn’t hurt. His head was clear. And his muscles felt great. He was almost energetic.
He bounced up in bed and his gaze flew to the clock. It was almost nine!
The kids!
Why weren’t they screaming?
He rolled to get out from under the thin sheet that covered him and saw the blue drapes on the big window.
Not his house. His mom’s guesthouse.
And he hadn’t gotten up with the kids in the middle of the night because they now had a nanny.
A godsend nanny.
Well, the woman who would be a godsend if she weren’t so damned good-looking.
He passed his hand down his face, reminded himself that Tory was a drama-free employee whom he wanted to keep and headed for the bathroom. He didn’t hear any crying and he also had a meeting that morning, so he stepped into the shower in his private bathroom and scrubbed himself off.
Alone.
No kids sitting in front of the glass shower door, in the little basket-like seats Liliah had dropped them off in, crying as he took one of the shortest showers in recorded history.
For this and this alone, he could keep his hormones under control around the nanny. Because the other thing he’d figured out—before he drifted off to sleep the night before—was that she wasn’t the problem. She hadn’t done anything wrong. In fact, she’d more or less told him she wasn’t interested in him by her behavior at the discount department store. Which meant anything he’d taken to be attraction on her part, he’d misinterpreted.
So he was the one who had to get in line. And that should be a piece of cake. He’d been ignoring women for fifteen months now.
He dressed in trousers and a white shirt and tie and walked through the great room into the kitchen area. Tory had the babies in the two highchairs, and was alternating feeding them. Her auburn hair had been caught up in a long ponytail that made her look about twenty, but she wore baggy jeans and a blousy top that hid all of her curves.
Still, when he saw her, his stomach jumped. Nerve endings he didn’t even know he had bounced to attention.
She smiled at him. “Hey, good morning.” Her gaze tumbled from his head to his toes and her smile grew. “Well, look at you.”
His mouth went dry. He tried to say good morning, but when the words came out they were more like a jumble of mush.
“I have coffee.”
“Great.” He walked to the pot, scolding himself for being ridiculous. Yes, she was pretty. And, yes, it had been a long time since he’d really looked at a woman—and since one had looked at him. But she was dressed in clothes obviously not meant to attract him. So the once-over she’d given him was nothing more than a friendly acknowledgment that he looked better in a shirt and tie than blue jeans.
He had to stop reacting to her. He needed her.
As a nanny.
He
