watched Jess cuddling Ella, and then he looked at his children and he lifted his youngest into his arms and started towards the duck pond. ‘I could work around your Tuesdays and Saturdays.’
Dan told her how much he’d pay her per day. It was generous, even when he added, ‘For that amount, I’d be asking you to remain there until I got home late some nights, but you and your daughter would have all your meals at my home.’
‘It sounds very reasonable. I wouldn’t mind doing that for you.’ It sounded like a good way to save some money on her food bill, and Jess could drive the short distance back to her house at whatever time suited.
‘Come and meet the children. That will be a good start, and…thank you. For approaching me and asking if I needed help.’
‘You’re welcome. It’s nice to be able to help others.’ Jess dropped a kiss onto Ella’s head to hide the hope that wanted to force its way onto her face. Dan hadn’t said he’d employ her yet.
But maybe he would. Maybe Jess would be able to help Dan while the money he paid her would help Jess.
Maybe Jess would be able to stop worrying, just a bit, and have enough money to stave off the wolves until she figured out something better for the longer term. Like tracking down Ella’s father and making him take responsibility for setting her up for this fall?
Jess had tried to find Peter, just after Ella came along. He’d already disappeared by then.
Jess stuck her chin up. She could only try to sort things out, and she’d try with all her might. ‘Righto, Dan. Take me to meet your children!’
CHAPTER TWO
‘KIDS, THERE’S SOMEONE I’d like you all to meet.’ Dan led Jess Baker to the duck pond where his children had been pretending not to watch him talking with Jess after Luke chipped them about their whispers.
The children were quite off the mark with their speculations. Jessica Baker was a great deal younger than him, not to mention those kinds of relationships should be kept out of the workplace.
Dan frowned. He simply wasn’t interested in Jess. He might have noticed she was an attractive young woman, noticed her heart-shaped face, her slim straight nose, her honey-blond hair, those soft grey eyes, but he was not attracted to her.
And what mattered right now was that he needed to tell his brood that they’d be with a carer while he dealt with this business in Sydney. Deserting them when they’d only just arrived was the last thing Dan wanted to do, but he was going to have to do it.
Dan had a good business, but he was still a man with five children. He’d rented a house in Sydney and worked hard to save enough so they could buy their home out here, where things were cheaper and they could all enjoy a quieter lifestyle.
Jess Baker had told him her umbrella had bent bits, but something about the set of her chin suggested she might be a godsend, just the same.
‘Luke, Rob, Daisy, Mary, this is Jess Baker.’ Dan glanced at the child in the young woman’s arms. He couldn’t remember if Jess had said her daughter’s name, yet he had no difficulty at all remembering the soft touch of Jess’s fingers on his arm. He was…curious about her.
No. Dan wasn’t curious. He was a father on his own with five children and eighteen years of memories of the one love of his life, and Jess was a very young woman and potential employee. Dan forced his gaze to Jess’s daughter. ‘And this is—’
‘Ella.’ Jess filled in the blank for him with a smile that transformed her face.
Rather than focus on that transformation, Dan gestured to the child in his arms. ‘This is Annapolly. Her name’s Pollyanna, but we started saying it the other way around and it stuck.’
Dan would simply push the confusing thoughts about Jess Baker away. And how could he think about reacting with awareness to this young woman anyway, when he hadn’t done that about any woman at all for the last four years?
There’d been Rebecca for Dan since they were childhood sweethearts. They’d married, had the first four children. Partway through Rebecca’s pregnancy with Annapolly, the doctors had discovered Rebecca had cancer. Rebecca had died a month after Annapolly’s birth. Dan had just stopped with all that when he lost Rebecca.
‘Hello.’ Jess offered a uniform smile as her gaze shifted from one child to the next.
Rob responded with a curious, ‘Hullo.’
‘We saw you speaking with our father,’ Daisy observed.
Mary asked hopefully, ‘Are you gonna feed the ducks?’
‘Yes.’ Jess nodded. ‘I am.’
Jess Baker was young, and she would come with her baby in tow, but Dan’s instincts said Jess would be committed about the work. Those were the only instincts he needed to consider.
He pushed his thoughts into business mode. ‘We’ll have lunch at our new house. It’s a big farm-style home on a ten-acre allotment on the northern edge of town.’ To his children he added, ‘I’ll explain what’s happened with my work and how Jess has offered to help us on the way back to the house.’
Throw Jess into the middle. Let Dan see how she managed among the stacks of half-unpacked boxes and the children.
‘Straight after the ducks,’ Jess agreed, and handed out pieces of bread.
Dan’s younger children gathered around. Luke and Rob didn’t. They’d fallen into a whispered conversation. No doubt they had questions. Dan would answer them when he had everyone in the van, and hopefully there wouldn’t be too much of an explosion when he told them they’d be in childcare for a fair chunk of their holidays.
Maybe they’d accept Jess’s care easily. Maybe this would be all right. Maybe Dan’s sea change for the children wasn’t about to turn into a premature disaster before they even had a chance to give it a go.
Maybe?
And maybe Dan would be able to shove aside the way he’d reacted to Jess. He certainly wouldn’t let it happen again. Dan failed to notice that, in thinking that, he had admitted to himself there was a reaction in the first place.
‘Jess, I wonder if you’d mind sorting out lunch while I see to things with Roy, here?’
The Internet technician had arrived in his van as Jess Baker drove up in her small, older-model hatchback.
Dan spoke the words as he, the children, Jess, and the Internet technician trooped into the house. Dan had taken his moment to explain the childcare need to his children on the drive back here.
To allow them to moan and groan and then to make it clear there was no choice.
Now all Dan could do was see if Jess could manage. He’d made it clear he expected cooperation from the children with that.
‘Of course, Dan. That’s what I’m here for.’ Jess’s gaze darted this way and that. The kitchen was farther into the house, to the left through the open-plan living room. Jess spotted it and asked, ‘Do any of the children have food allergies?’
