fax machine continued to spout his contract.
“Uncle Sean!”
Because apparently he wasn’t overwhelmed enough, the doorbell rang.
He needed a clone.
Or a wife.
Just two years ago, he’d come close to that with Tina. He’d never regretted not walking down the aisle, not once.
Until now.
Sam kept talking.
“Wipe me!” yelled Melissa, loud enough for the entire county to hear.
“I’ll wipe you in a sec!”
Sam sputtered, then said, “Excuse me?”
Sean dropped his head and thunked it on the counter, but even a near concussion didn’t change facts. He was failing, pathetically. And failing was the one thing he couldn’t handle. Slowly, he counted to ten, but yep, his life was still in the throes of hell.
He politely hung up on his very wealthy client. Then, mourning the loss of that income, he headed into the bathroom and handled Melissa’s paperwork.
Together they headed toward the front door. “I hope it’s my mommy,” Melissa said, bounding in front of him like an eager puppy, her blond curls wild and neglected. She hadn’t let Sean near her with a brush since she’d arrived.
He had, however, made her brush her teeth. That must count for something.
“I really want my mommy.”
“I know.” Sean missed her mommy too. Big time. “But she’s not coming home for two weeks. The person at the door wants to be your nanny during the day.” Please, God.
Melissa stopped short. “How long is two weeks?”
“Fourteen days.”
She tilted her head at him, piercing him with huge, baleful eyes. “That’s too long.”
No kidding. “It’ll be over before you know it, kiddo. Do you want to open the door?”
She brightened at that. “I hope it’s Mary Poppins. She sings pretty.”
Sean didn’t care about singing, pretty or otherwise. He needed help on this daddy gig, and he needed it now.
He hoped for an older nanny, a grandmotherly type who had lots of hugs and kisses and stories, all the stuff he didn’t have time for. Then he could get back to work without guilt.
Together they opened the door.
“Hello,” said the woman who stood there, who was neither old nor Mary Poppins-like.
Sean’s first thought was she had the most unusually bright blue eyes he’d ever seen, magnified as they were behind glasses as thick as the bottom of a soda bottle. They sparkled when she smiled, which she was doing right now. And it wasn’t a forced, I-need-a-job smile, either, it was the sweetest, most open smile he’d ever seen. Helplessly, he responded to it with one of his own, though his was definitely more from profound relief than anything else.
“I’m Carly Fortune, prospective nanny,” she said, tossing her long dark hair over her shoulder as she held out her hand.
“I’m Sean O’Mara, nanny seeker.” She wasn’t what he’d imagined, not at all, he thought, shaking her warm, soft hand. For one thing, she was young. Her dark hair had fallen in her face again, but mid-twenties was his guess. She wore a long sweater over a wide skirt that fell to her ankles, exposing a pair of chunky boots.
Not an inch of her below her neck showed, so he couldn’t tell if she was small, large or somewhere in between. And because he was a man, and mostly a very weak man, at that, he usually noticed a woman for her appearance. Not that he felt particularly proud of that fact, but it was the truth. A beautiful woman turned his head.
Not that this woman wasn’t beautiful. More like Sandra Bullock in Miss Congeniality before the makeover.
But compassion and joy shimmered from her every pore, and he figured both those personality traits were important when it came to taking care of a child, which was the point to her standing there smiling at him.
And yet the feeling that she was hiding behind her slightly oversize clothing made him uncomfortable. Tina, he thought with a flash of bitterness. Two years since the woman who couldn’t tell the truth to save her life, and he was still second-guessing every woman he came into contact with.
Even so, when she continued to look at him, smiling that infectious, open smile, something very odd happened. From the region of his deadened heart came a pitter-patter, one he nearly failed to recognize.
Then she bent for a large canvas bag at her side, pushing at her glasses when they nearly slipped off her nose, and through the slit in her too full skirt he saw a flash of long, toned, smooth pale thigh.
Beneath that awful bulk of clothing, one would expect to find more clothing, not…bare lovely skin.
And without warning, the pitter-patter in his heart moved southward.
“But…you’re not Mary Poppins.” Melissa’s lower lip came out, trembled. Her eyes filled, and she ducked behind Sean, clutching the backs of his legs. “I really wanted Mary Poppins.” Her voice was muffled as she pressed her face against him, her fingers biting into his skin.
Sean reached back and tried to pry her off, but her fingers only dug in deeper. He wrapped an arm around her small shoulders, thinking that for such a tyrant, she seemed so tiny, so defenseless. No matter. This had to be done. He needed help.
He needed escape.
“Oh, sweetie.” Carly glanced at Sean, then kneeled to Melissa’s level. “I’m so sorry. You’re right, I’m not Mary Poppins. But I do have a really cool carryall like she did, with fun stuff in it, see?” She lifted the canvas bag and shook it enticingly. Something tinkled, something rattled.
Melissa sniffed, then peered around Sean’s legs. “Is my mommy in there?”
“Well…no.” Her voice was low and husky. Another contradiction. A voice dripping with sensuality in a body dressed for nunhood. “But I’ve got some dress-up clothes. What do you think?”
Melissa blinked slowly, then nodded. “Okay.”
Okay. She’d said okay. Sean found himself grinning stupidly at the woman who was going to save his life.
Or at least the next two weeks of it.
2
FOR THE FIRST TIME in her twenty-six years, she hesitated. But this had been what she wanted, a break from her crazy, whirlwind life. A chance to see how the other half lived.
An opportunity to go slumming.
So Princess Carlyne Fortier stepped into Sean O’Mara’s house. Only she didn’t do it as an elegant, sophisticated, classy princess. No,
