Читать книгу Parents Of Convenience - Jennie Adams - Страница 7

‘DO YOU suppose we could give some consideration to my sons at some point?’ Max glared at the interloper in his kitchen and marvelled that he could want her so badly. His desire to throttle her was as strong as the desire had been earlier to kiss her! The first was perfectly normal. It happened to him all the time. The second was a shock.

This was Phoebe. His sister’s untamed and untameable best friend. Normally, the sight of her simply made him want to grind his teeth. He was, in fact, grinding them right now. Well, just look at her, for heaven’s sake!

Wild, coarse-looking hair in every shade from blonde to middle brown crowned her head like an unruly mop. In the centre of this display of hairdressing disaster rested an enormous pink bow with a pair of black eyes imprinted on it. When Phoebe moved he got the impression of two sets of eyeballs darting this way and that, instead of just one.

She had an elfin face, with a pointy chin that always seemed to be angled to challenge him. Right now, the normally lean cheeks were distended with sandwich and milk coated her upper lip.

‘Mmph.’ Phoebe chewed, then mumbled something around her sandwich that sounded like, ‘We are considering your sons.’

‘Not in my reality, we’re not.’ Max’s gaze moved from her face to her outrageous clothing. Her overalls were such a bright shade of pink they made his eyes ache. The green shirt she wore underneath clashed abominably. And here she was, calmly eating him out of house and home while Jake and Josh stood watching, starving. How was that helping the boys?

‘Calm down, Max.’ Phoebe had finished her mouthful of food and looked ready to take another enormous bite.

She claimed to be here to help. What a joke that was.

‘I need round the clock, competent childcare,’ Max informed her in a tone that would have made icicles sprout in a scorching desert. ‘Not some wraith-like fairy creature with nothing to share but silly monster talk that will probably make my boys cry in the night.’

As if Max needed any more of that. He wasn’t cut out for this parent thing. Just look at the mess he had made of trying to raise Katherine after their parents had died. After a few weeks of Max trying to involve himself in her life, his twelve-year-old sister had begged him to go back to working long hours. Jake and Josh’s advent into his care hadn’t met with any better success.

Max might be great at money but he stank at family. The sooner he got his sons into organised care and returned to his normal way of life, the better it would be for everyone.

First up, he had to get rid of the eating machine, namely Phoebe. Guilt pinched him briefly. Maybe she was eating because she was hungry. She did look thinner than the last time he had seen her—what, six months ago? Did she not have enough money?

That thought simply made him angry all over again, for hadn’t he tried to ensure her financial security in the past, only to have her toss his efforts back into his face in no uncertain terms?

She was Katherine’s friend, Max had plenty of funds and didn’t see the problem, but Phoebe was ever Phoebe—stubborn, cantankerous and totally unwilling to listen, even to the most reasonable of ideas.

Like accepting a permanent loan from him to set herself up in a home and get some formal training. Instead she flitted from one poorly paid assistant’s job to the next as the mood took her.

‘What was Katherine thinking, to encourage you to come here now?’

And why was he still standing here, allowing this farce to go on?

‘She was thinking smart. Something you appear to have lost the ability to do at the moment.’ Phoebe licked a drop of milk from the corner of her mouth and Max’s stomach contracted.

He recognised the feeling. He just didn’t understand why it was happening to him. This was Phoebe. The bane of his life. He did not find her desirable. He simply couldn’t.

Liar, liar, his libido chanted.

‘I’m not scared of monsters.’

‘I’m not, neither.’

Jake and Josh strode towards Phoebe on sturdy small legs, hands fisted on hips, chins stuck out.

‘I eat monster s’wiches.’

‘I eats ’em too.’

Since they’d arrived a week ago, his sons had alternately played up, cried inconsolably, sulked, and mashed and smashed his house to pieces. Max wondered what form the next outbreak would take, and how many seconds of peace remained until it started.

Phoebe may have got his sons to speak, but her methods were unorthodox and bound to lead to trouble. It would be best if he dispatched her now.

He fixed her with a glare and gestured towards the living room. ‘If you’re quite finished demolishing my kitchen, we need to talk.’

‘Not right now.’ She smiled back at him blandly, but with the threat of daggers in her pale blue eyes. Even the spare eyes on her bow seemed to be glaring. ‘A person can’t simply leave a monster sandwich sitting around the place. It might jump up and run away.’

‘Don’t make yourself any more ridiculous than you already are.’ Max had had more than enough of her silly talk. Monster sandwiches, indeed.

But the boys giggled at her suggestion. Actually laughed. Their faces crinkled and they chortled for a full few seconds.

Something tugged at Max, deep down in his gut. How was he going to do this? They were so vulnerable, so completely dependent on him. How could he raise them or, rather, find somebody to raise them, who would come somewhere close to making up for his inadequacies? Someone who would allow them to find joy in their lives, to be happy and cheerful and carefree?

‘Me eat it,’ said Jake.

‘Me, too,’ Josh added.

‘Eat the monster switchwitch.’

‘And drink the milk.’

Phoebe hummed and hawed, but offered to share with a gleam in her eye that revealed a certain satisfaction.

Moments later, his sons were eating with every indication of pleasure. They drank a small cup of milk apiece, while Phoebe scooped up dishes and dumped them into the over-flowing dishwasher and Max stared, stupefied, his feet rooted to the floor.

Phoebe had only been here minutes and she had the boys literally eating out of her hand. This minor miracle. How had it come about? He had no time to consider further, because as fast as his sons had eaten and drank they drooped, and Phoebe swooped.

‘Clean jammies, Max, in the bathroom.’ She scooped a boy on to each hip, as though she did it all the time, and swept them away.

By the time Max joined her, bemused, with two pint-sized pairs of pyjamas in his hands, she had washed faces, supervised teeth and stripped two small bodies to the bare minimum. The boys were slipped into their night attire and herded along to their beds.

‘I’ll be sleeping in the room next door to yours if either of you get scared or decide your beds are too lumpy or anything.’ Phoebe gave each child a quick pat and backed towards the door. ‘I happen to know my bed is the most comfortable in the house, because I’ve slept in it heaps of times before.

‘See you.’ With a wave and a grin she stepped out the door, somehow managing to herd Max with her. As she did so, she brushed against him. Max’s body tensed in reaction to her nearness.

‘They’ll be crying before you can say boo.’ He stood in the corridor, waiting for the yells of rage or screeches of fear, but they didn’t come.

That just left Max, trying to deal with wanting Phoebe and wanting her out of his house in roughly equal measures. Or he told himself the balance was about fifty-fifty.

‘I’m too tired to deal with you tonight.’ He grumbled the words at her gracelessly, a counterpart to his body’s unwelcome reaction to her. She was his sister’s best friend, not to mention all wrong for Max in every way it was possible to imagine.

He did not need to desire her on top of every other thing going on in his life at present. ‘Now that they’re asleep I can’t leave them in order to drive you back into town, either. Brent—my new gardener—was going out for the evening, so I can’t ask him to do it. You’ll have to go tomorrow.’

‘No need to thank me. Yet.’ Phoebe stepped past him into the doorway of the room she always used when she visited, which, thank God, Max thought, hadn’t been often lately.

‘I realise your pride must be tangled around your ankles right now,’ she added. ‘Get some sleep. Maybe tomorrow you’ll be able to accept that I’m the best thing that’s happened to you this week.’

‘You’re not staying.’ The forceful words were a wasted effort because she’d closed the door in his face.

Disgusted, speechless, Max stared at it. Who did she think she was, anyway?

It was more of a splintering sound than an all-out crunch. In fact, as accidents went, this one almost registered as a non-event. Until Phoebe looked over her shoulder and saw the damage.

‘Oh, poop. I’m in trouble now.’ She had her hand on the door latch of Max’s monster four-wheel drive, preparing to get out, before she remembered what she had, for a split second, forgotten. She wasn’t alone.

Her two small charges didn’t hesitate to offer their reminders, gleefully, from the back seat of the Range Rover.

‘Poop, poop, poop,’ Josh crowed, getting louder with each use of the word. ‘Poop, poop, poop!’

‘You crunched it.’ This came from Jake, who had managed to slither himself around enough in his car seat to survey the farmhouse’s wrecked veranda latticing. ‘Max be mad. Mad, mad, mad.’

Phoebe grimaced a smile into the rearview mirror at the identical mirthful faces. Isn’t it great that they feel safe and happy enough to express themselves to me this morning?

‘It’s probably best if you don’t say poop too often, Josh,’ she corrected automatically. ‘Words like that are really best left for the big people. And, Jake, Max is your father, as I’ve already explained several times today. You address him as Dad or Daddy, not Max, and you don’t know if he’ll be mad because he hasn’t seen the damage yet.’

Phoebe knew, but that wasn’t the point. She had been doing so well today, too. She had got the boys up, had dressed them and herded them outside, all the while allowing Max to sleep. Total consideration, that was what she had delivered to him.

She had then forced herself to drive his enormous car to the nearest reasonably sized town, despite her trepidation at getting behind the wheel of something so intimidatingly large. With almost the last of her own dwindling funds, she had bought the boys’ breakfast and stocked up on a few necessities. All of this to help out, but would Max think about that now? She doubted it.

Phoebe didn’t want to admit that she might have wanted, even slightly, to gain Max’s approval for her extra efforts. What would be the point of that?

She kicked the toe of one booted foot against the brake pedal in frustration. ‘It’s his fault anyway, for letting the foodstuffs run out that way. No cereal in the cupboards. Barely any milk, no bread, no fruit. What was he thinking?’

She refused to acknowledge any other feelings. Like dread, anxiety or guilt. Those were for the past, for an uneasy teenager who hadn’t felt at home with herself, let alone with anyone else, and especially not here, under Max’s ever watchful eye.

‘Katherine’s friendship was worth it,’ she muttered. Meanwhile, there was only one thing for it, she decided. She had to get to Max before he got to her.

‘Jake, Josh.’ She fixed the boys with her most practised stern expression. ‘Wait here until I’m ready to get you out. Do not move. Understand?’

Phoebe emerged from the vehicle into the cool morning air and drew a deep, calming breath. A young man was working inside one of the sheds in the distance, but didn’t appear to have noticed her. Brent—the new gardener? At least he hadn’t witnessed the result of her rush of overconfidence.

What had she been thinking about, to try to back the vehicle up to the steps that way? She couldn’t even see over the headrest. ‘Oh, well. Might as well go face the music.’

As she started towards the house Max came charging out. An ominous-looking frown marred his face. Jeans, sturdy boots and a dark T-shirt all appeared to have been pulled on in a hurry, and his hair stood on end. Straight from his bed, Phoebe decided, and told her raging hormones to get over it. Like, for ever!

‘Why am I not surprised to see my car butted up to the veranda, which is now completely smashed to bits?’ Max’s question cut through the space separating them. ‘Oh, that’s right,’ he added. ‘It’s because you’re in residence.’

His gaze moved to his sons, who were still peering, grinning, over the backs of their booster seats. ‘I knew you’d be a bad influence and here’s the proof, not even twenty-four hours later. I don’t suppose you’d care to explain what you were thinking.’

‘I knew you’d react like this. How predictable.’ She may have been slightly in the wrong in this particular skirmish but, even so, Phoebe wasn’t about to admit it.

They met nose to nose at the foot of the veranda.

‘What’s predictable is you taking my car and mangling things with it.’ Max pointed to the four-wheel drive, then at the latticework, which was lying in fragments on the ground. ‘Look what you’ve done. You know you’re not a good driver. You should never have got into it.’

‘If I’m a bad driver, and I’m not saying that I am because I’m not, you can thank yourself for it.’ Did he think having this happen had made her happy, either? It had been a well-intentioned accident. Couldn’t Max at least try to see that? ‘You’re the one who attempted to teach me and proved you weren’t man enough to do a good job. And I took the car to help you, as it happens.’

‘I don’t see how crashing my car could possibly be helping me,’ Max said sarcastically. ‘And, for your information, I faced my mortality on a regular basis for months at a time for your sake so you could learn to drive. These are the thanks I get, apparently.’

Oh, good. Heap the guilt on, why don’t you? She screwed her face up into an aggressive moue. ‘I was stocking up on groceries.’

‘Is that my fault? You ate the entire kitchen for your dinner last night.’

‘I did not.’ She stamped her foot.

Max’s gaze roved over her, from the blue jeans down to the hiking boots and rust-coloured socks, then back up and over the bright orange tie-dyed cheesecloth shirt.

His anger seemed to reach fresh heights. ‘You’re naked underneath those clothes.’

‘And you’re irrational, as ever.’ She paused and blinked. In fact, it had been a very strange thing for him to say.

Suddenly all yesterday’s heated reaction was back in force. Drat Max for reminding her. Phoebe tried not to think about nakedness and Max, but didn’t do very well. She took a shaky breath.

‘If I’m irrational,’ Max said slowly and clearly, ‘it’s because you make a nutcase out of me any time we’re within shouting range of each other.’

Okay, well, maybe that brought things back into perspective a bit. If she could just settle her ruffled pheromones back into place, everything should be fine. Sort of.

‘In range,’ she repeated. ‘Um, yes.’

They were certainly in range now. So close together that she could see right into his eyes, could see the storminess and the sudden darkening as he stared down at her. Her breath caught, and she tried to whip her indignation back around her. I do not want to kiss him!

‘I’ll pay for the damage to your car and the veranda, Max.’ She stepped away from him and waved a hand as though she dealt with this kind of thing every day. And as though she wasn’t in the least disturbed by his nearness.

‘Don’t bother about the cost. I’ll fix it myself.’ Max’s hands came up to rest on his slim hips. ‘How did you get here yesterday, by the way?’

What did he care? She shrugged. ‘I hitched, of course.’

‘That’s dangerous.’ Disapproval radiated from him.

‘Hitching’s not dangerous when you know the driver well enough to trust him or her.’ She glared right back. ‘And don’t try to distract me. I’ll pay for the damage to the car and the veranda. I take responsibility for my actions, unlike some people I could name.’

‘Like newly appointed parents, you mean?’ His tone warned her to back off, fast.

Instead, she nodded and swept him with what she hoped was a shrivelling look. ‘Yes, exactly like that. I wonder what your latest female friend thinks of the two new acquisitions to your home?’

‘There is no…’ He trailed off, shook his head, and pushed out one arm in a wide, dismissive arc. ‘You’re criticising me. Again. Don’t you ever get tired of it?’

‘It’s justified.’ Phoebe poked him in the chest with one finger. This had been coming since she arrived last night. Since before then, actually, when Katherine had first told her that Max had suddenly discovered he was a father. She might as well get it out in the open and be done with it. ‘It’s not like you’ve exactly proved to be the commitment type in the past, is it? One girlfriend after the next, and none of them lasting beyond their first hint that they’d like something more from you than sex and a rapid farewell. It’s no wonder you weren’t told you were a father, even if I am surprised that you were careless about something like that.’ She prodded him with her finger again. ‘Do you even want them, Max? You certainly don’t act like it.’

As the words tumbled out, she realised she had gone too far and wished she could take them back. Max’s face slowly blanked of all expression, until only a stark, hard-edged mask remained.

‘I think it’s time I put a stop to this,’ he said in a voice that was chilling in its calmness. His hand snaked out and wrapped around her arm. ‘Before I lose my temper. As for my sex life, it’s no business of yours.’

‘Am I supposed to be scared?’ She fell back on bravado and hoped it would work.

Max simply glared at her. ‘That might be a good idea.’

‘Well, I’m not scared. Far from it.’ She tugged at her arm and he let it go.

Phoebe couldn’t let the conversation go, though. She ploughed on, well aware that she was in dangerous territory, but she needed to know this. ‘Do you deny that you’re just trying to push your sons off on to a nanny so you can ignore them? You can’t just bury yourself in work, in your old way of life, and pretend everything else doesn’t exist.’

For a moment he didn’t speak. When he did, his words were cold, his eyes hard and unyielding. ‘I will make the choices for my sons that I believe are in their best interests and that, Phoebe, is not something I will justify to you or negotiate about.’

Although he still looked angry, Phoebe also got the impression she had hurt him. Regret unfurled inside her. ‘Max.’ She stretched out a hand.

He ignored it and stepped back, gesturing towards the back of the car. ‘My sons are getting restless. Maybe you should get them out of the car, if you’re quite finished with this little discussion.’

‘What about you?’ She bit her lip. ‘What are you going to do now?’

‘I’m going inside to phone around for a new nanny. What else?’

The dart found its mark, although she tried hard not to show it. She didn’t want to go. Stupid, wasn’t it, to want to hang around here? All that was likely to happen if she did was that she would get too attached to Max’s sons and be upset when she had to leave them.

Phoebe tried, but sometimes her overactive mothering instinct didn’t exactly stay under control as well as she wanted it to. Empty womb syndrome, she thought, trying to be cynical and failing utterly.

She refused to admit that she might not want to leave Max either.

‘Whatever you feel is best, Max.’ She lifted one shoulder and let it drop. ‘The only thing I care about is that your boys are in the best hands.’ A hint of steel crept into her voice. ‘And that is something that I will make absolutely sure of, no matter what.’

He shook his head. ‘Do I really need to remind you that you don’t even have a say in this?’

Indeed, she didn’t have a say. They weren’t her sons. She had no hold on them whatsoever, despite the fact that they had crept into a corner of her heart already, just by being their cute, irascible selves.

Phoebe had no business feeling attached to Max, either, even if it was only physical attraction. And it was only that, she assured herself. Which was bad enough.

‘You can say what you want.’ She returned him stare for stare, determined that he wouldn’t guess he had hit a raw patch with that last question. ‘It won’t change my attitude one iota.’

‘Won’t it? We’ll see about that.’ Max turned on his heel and walked away.