Читать книгу A Man Worth Loving - Kimberly Meter Van - Страница 9

SAMMY WINCED AGAINST THE PAIN in his head and, ignoring his son’s outstretched hands as he passed the swing, went straight for the kitchen for some aspirin. Ian fussed when it was apparent Sammy wasn’t going to liberate him from the swing but Sammy couldn’t possibly deal with the kid when his head was about to explode. He washed down three extra-strength pain relievers with a generous swallow of a fresh beer and then leaned against the counter, closing his eyes against Ian’s gathering howl. Sammy rubbed at his eyes and then drained the can so he could crush it and leave it behind in the kitchen. So what if it was only 10:00 a.m.? A little hair of the dog was what he was going to need to deal with the screamer in the other room.

Ian’s face was red and scrunched from crying, his big, round eyes staring at Sammy reproachfully as he lifted his chubby arms again, whimpering until Sammy pulled him free to put him on the floor. But that’s not what Ian wanted, either, apparently because he wiggled and kicked and screamed until Sammy was quite sure the kid was going to have a heart attack or something. Alarmed, he picked him up and gently but awkwardly jostled him the way he’d seen Annabelle do with Ian and her daughter Jasmine when they fussed. It seemed to work for a minute but before Sammy could enjoy the reprieve, the kid yowled loud enough to bring the house down.

“Damn, kid, what’s your problem?” he muttered, jostling him a little less gently, which only made it worse. “Are you hungry or something?” he asked. He tilted his son upside down so he could sniff his drawers. He drew back quickly. “Oh, gross. Dude? Seriously! We’re going to have to work on that. That’s disgusting.”

His alcohol-soaked brain wasn’t functioning on higher levels, and for a second he couldn’t remember how to change a diaper. His gaze sought and found the diaper bag Annabelle had dropped off, and he grabbed it. With one hand holding Ian in a football pose, which the kid didn’t like one bit, Sammy wrestled with the bag until the contents spilled out, including several bottles, which rolled out and went everywhere. He picked a diaper and the wipes from the pile and proceeded to the sofa.

Ian, near hysterical, waved his hands and kicked his feet so hard Sammy had a hard time grabbing the flailing little suckers so he could take the offending diaper off. “Will you cut it out already? Do you want this thing off or not?” he demanded and Ian squeezed more tears down his cheeks, which made Sammy feel ten times worse for being so rough with him. “Sorry, kid….” he muttered, but he was too busy trying to wipe the crap—holy hell, how’d a kid so small make such a mess?—from Ian’s little bare butt to waste time on apologies that the baby wouldn’t understand anyway. His brother Dean had tried to tell him that the tone of his voice was important when dealing with kids, especially when they’re young, but honestly, Sammy hadn’t been interested in taking parenting classes with his wife fresh in the grave.

Finally, he got Ian clean and into a fresh outfit, because the one he’d been in now had baby poop all over it, but Ian was still puckering his face, getting ready to wail. “C’mon, help a guy out. What’s wrong?” he moaned, collapsing against the back of the sofa and staring at the ceiling in misery. Suddenly, Ian slid from the sofa, startling Sammy, to land on the floor with an oof that knocked the wind out of the little guy so it took a moment for the real screaming to start.

“Oh, God, are you okay?” he exclaimed, rushing to pick up his son, scared that the kid was truly hurt. When Ian didn’t stop screaming, he did the only thing he knew how to do in this kind of situation. He called Annabelle.

AUBREY WAS IN THE QUILTING shop, perusing new fabrics, when she overheard Mary talking with her daughter-in-law Annabelle. Aubrey didn’t mean to eavesdrop but her ears perked when she heard they were talking about Ian.

“He’s fine,” Annabelle assured Mary, who wore a concerned frown on her face. “He just got the wind knocked out of him, but I told Sammy he should never leave Ian on the sofa without watching him. He’s just learning to roll over on his own. The sofa’s not that high off the ground but if it’d been the bed…he might’ve been really hurt.”

Mary scowled. “That boy ought to be horsewhipped for the idiot he’s being. I don’t know what’s gotten into him. He was raised better than that, I can tell you that right now. His father and I are beside ourselves….” Mary stopped as Aubrey approached, her tirade momentarily halted. A bright smile followed. “Why, Aubrey, hello, I didn’t see you there. You remember my daughter-in-law Annabelle?”

“Nice to see you again,” Aubrey murmured, taking in the beautiful, curvy redhead and the little blond girl skipping around her feet. She smiled at the girl, who had stopped to stare at her with wide, inquisitive blue eyes. “Is this your daughter?” she asked Annabelle.

“One of them. This is Honey. My baby, Jasmine, is home with her dad. I just needed to talk with Mary about Ian. I knew she’d be here at the shop so I made a quick stop. You’re going to be Ian’s nanny, I hear?”

“Yes. I start this afternoon. What happened to Ian? I couldn’t help but overhear.”

“Oh, it was nothing really but it shook Ian up a little. He took a tumble off the sofa and it knocked the wind out of him. He was totally fine when he got some love and affection. And a bottle. Poor guy was starving. I told Sammy I left him some preprepared bottles in the diaper bag but I found them under the sofa.”

“What kind of formula does he use?” Aubrey asked, getting a notepad ready to jot down the brand. Mary and Annabelle exchanged a look and Aubrey wondered what she’d inadvertently said wrong.

“He doesn’t drink formula much,” Annabelle said, pausing. “Depending on your philosophies, this may sound really strange, but I express breast milk for Ian.”

“Excuse me?” Aubrey started, not quite sure she heard that correctly. “Did you say you’re breast-feeding your nephew?”

“No, I said I’m expressing breast milk for my nephew.”

Mary intervened, speaking warmly of her daughter-in-law as she explained. “You see, Dana died in childbirth. A rarity in this day and age but it still happens. Annabelle had only just given birth to Jasmine a month earlier and because Dana had planned to breast-feed for as long as possible, Annabelle started expressing milk for Ian before he even left the hospital because she knew it was what Dana would’ve wanted.”

Aubrey didn’t know how to respond. The concept was so foreign to her. Her own mother hadn’t breast-fed, saying it wasn’t seemly to be seen with two babies hanging off her chest as if she was some kind of baboon in the jungle. Annabelle mistook Aubrey’s silence for reproach and stiffened. “It’s perfectly natural. Back in the medieval days, royalty often used a wet nurse. It’s healthier than formula and helps with their immune system.”

Aubrey wasn’t judging, though it was certainly a shock. Aubrey tried to imagine what her mother would have to say about that and nearly giggled at how appalled Barbie would be. Her twin sister, Arianna, would likely mirror that horror. They’d both arch perfectly waxed eyebrows in distaste and remark on how white trash it all was. “I think it’s beautiful that you loved your friend so much you would do that for her son,” Aubrey said.

Annabelle’s eyes watered for a brief moment. “Thank you. I just want the best for him. She wanted a baby so badly. When she got pregnant we cried together. I think she told me before she told Sammy. It was the happiest moment of her life.”

“How’d Samuel react to the news?” Aubrey inquired, not quite comfortable using her employer’s more familiar nickname.

“He was happy but I think he would’ve given Dana the moon if she asked for it even if he preferred sunlight. Dana was the one who really wanted to start a family right away and it took a while to get pregnant. Dana called Ian her miracle baby.”

Aubrey’s eyes threatened to water, wishing there’d been such a miracle in her own life. Don’t go there. She forced a bright smile. “It was nice to meet you. I suppose I’ll see you two a lot while I’m Ian’s nanny. I hope to become good friends.”

And then, before either could say anything further, she left the shop.

It wasn’t until she was halfway to her rented house that she realized she’d forgotten all about the quilting fabric she’d wanted to check out. She sighed heavily and put it out of her head. She needed to get ready for her first day of work.

SAMMY SLAPPED A LITTLE aftershave on his cheeks and winced when tiny nicks from the quick shave job screamed at the alcohol splash. He sucked in a breath and then grinned in the mirror, his best roguish charmer that usually worked pretty well on the ladies, and then, remembering that his jeans were still in the dryer, he stepped out of his bedroom to find Aubrey in the hallway. She seemed frozen to the spot, a look of chagrin and embarrassment on her face.

She turned quickly and stammered an apology. “The door was open…. I didn’t realize…I thought you said to be here…Oh, I’m a few minutes early, though, not because I’m one of those people who are ridiculously punctual, well, actually, I am one of those people because I hate to be late—”

“It’s okay,” he said gruffly to her rambling. If he hadn’t been embarrassed himself, he might’ve found the humor in the situation, but at the moment he wasn’t feeling anything but intense mortification at being caught with nothing but a towel around his ass on his nanny’s first day on the job. Nice going. If she didn’t quit right then and there it’d be a miracle. He wrapped the towel a bit tighter to ensure there weren’t any wardrobe malfunctions and said to her back, “Kid’s asleep in his swing. Why don’t you go wait in there while I get dressed.” She bobbed her head in agreement before skittering away.

He detoured to the dryer and jerked the jeans up over his hips quickly. When he was decent, he sent a prayer to heaven that she was still willing to take the job and tried that charming smile on again to up the odds of her staying.

She rose from the sofa where she’d been fidgeting with the strap of her purse when he entered the living room. He waved away her attempts to apologize again. “It’s my fault. I’m not quite used to having someone else in the house and I forgot to grab my clothes before I hit the shower,” he said, cringing at the red blush staining her cheeks. “It’s okay. Really. No big deal. No harm no foul as they say.”

“I’m assuming there will be no more of these types of incidents while I’m in your employ?” she said, her tone implying that perhaps he’d engineered the whole situation.

“Of course not,” he said, slightly insulted that the sight of his toweled body had offended her so much. There was no reason to make a federal case out of it. “It was an accident. The last thing I need is my kid’s nanny to be thinking about me naked,” he muttered.

“Not a problem,” she retorted, a bit sharply. “I’ve already put the incident out of my mind.”

If it weren’t for the high color in her cheeks he might’ve believed her. But she was holding to it so that was fine with him. He wasn’t lying when he said he didn’t want the nanny to think of him in any way that wasn’t completely professional.

“Good. Now that that’s settled…” He rubbed his hands together, ready to move on. He had a date with a longneck bottle, which would hopefully end with a date with a redhead or a blonde…whichever was ready and available. “So, I probably won’t be home until late…well, depending on how well things go tonight…”

“How late?” she asked, her brow furrowing a little.

“Uh, well, not sure. Is that a problem? I thought I told you that you might need to be available for overnighters.”

“Yes. You did mention the possibility but I didn’t realize it would start with my first day. I didn’t bring the proper supplies.”

He frowned. That certainly put a crimp in his plans. Suddenly he felt as if he had a curfew. He glanced around and his gaze alighted on the kid’s car seat in the corner where Annabelle had left it the last time she’d dropped him off. “Here…how about this…if it gets too late you can just take the kid to your place and I’ll pick him up later.”

Problem solved. Except the disapproving stare coming from his new nanny told him what she thought of that idea. “Oh, never mind. I’ll be home before eleven. That work for you?” he bit out, hating that he was giving in. He could tell right now this arrangement wasn’t going to work out. He didn’t care if his mom picked her out or not. She didn’t have to deal with her.

“Thank you,” she said, her eyes registering cool victory. “I appreciate your consideration. I don’t know the roads around here quite yet and don’t feel comfortable driving too late at night.”

Yeah, yeah…he wanted to grumble but he didn’t. He was just itching to get out of there. He was headed out of town tonight and now his prowl-time just got cut in half. Not even he could close the deal with this short of a window. But he could try. “You have my cell. If there’s an emergency…just leave me a voice mail I guess and then call Annabelle. She’s real good with stuff like that. She’s my brother’s wife.”

“I’ve met Annabelle,” she interjected.

“Oh? When?” he asked, to be polite. He couldn’t really care less and time was ticking. He pocketed his wallet in his back pocket and grabbed his keys.

“Well, don’t you remember, she was the one who dropped off Ian yesterday. We met officially this morning in the quilting shop. She was telling me how Ian rolled off the sofa yesterday,” she said, although her tone was professional, he sensed her disapproval and he stiffened.

“He was fine,” he said.

“Yes, Annabelle told me. I’m glad. Falls can be very serious for a baby Ian’s age.”

Sammy shifted, annoyed at her prim censure. “Yeah, well, he’s fine,” he said, moving to the door. “Later.”

“Goodbye, Mr. Halvorsen.”

He stopped. “Call me Sammy,” he said but she shook her head.

“I’d prefer not. You’re my employer.”

“Oh. Yeah, okay. I guess you’re right. But it’s just that when you call me Mr. Halvorsen I feel like I should be looking for my dad or something. Plus, it makes me feel old.”

She smiled at that but held firm. He felt a scowl coming on but really what did he care what she called him? If she wanted to be all stiff and proper who was he to say she couldn’t be? He shrugged. “Suit yourself. Good night, Ms. Rose.”

AUBREY WATCHED AS SAMMY WALKED out the door, her temper building as she replayed the last five minutes of their conversation through her head. What a self-absorbed jerk. She tried to be understanding because he was a widower and all but he had some nerve to try and come on to her like that. Who wandered around their house in just a towel? Especially when their nanny was supposed to arrive within minutes? And then to try and make her feel as if she was overreacting to his display? Her fists clenched as another wave of anger rolled over her. How did she get herself into this one?

Egad. The ego on that guy. Unfortunately, he probably had plenty of women who were happy to feed that monstrous ego. If she were the brainless type, she could totally see how the man likely charmed his way into countless beds. A smile here, a little flattery, and boom, panties dropped. Her lip curled in open disgust. It was likely he had good qualities somewhere deep—very deep—down, but at the moment, Aubrey couldn’t imagine what they could be.

Well, if she were held under a hot bulb in a torture chamber with someone threatening to pull her fingernails off she might be forced to admit that he had one helluva physique. He looked damn near carved from stone, like the marble statues at Versailles, except he didn’t sport a Roman nose nor was he missing a limb. She inhaled sharply at the traitorous musings and shut them down immediately. Jerk. He hadn’t even said goodbye to his baby. What kind of father was he?

A terrible one.

She felt a twinge for judging him so quickly, but really, he hadn’t made much of a case for himself with that attitude of his. And what kind of person tells a virtual stranger that she can just pack up his child like luggage and take the baby home because it inconveniences his party time? Argggh! She cored an apple with particular vehemence and nearly sliced through to her hand. She took a deep breath and steadied herself. No point in getting so worked up over one silly, self-absorbed idiot who didn’t know how lucky he was.

She looked sorrowfully at the sleeping boy and her heart melted a bit more for the sad circumstances then she went to prepare some food for the little guy. She’d brought her food processor so she could make homemade baby food. He was old enough to start with a few solids but she wanted to start slow so that she didn’t inadvertently spark a food allergy in the boy.

Without Sammy in the way, bothering her with his smarmy smiles and perfect body, she started to feel more at ease. The house was small and rustic but there was a coziness to it that appealed to her. It didn’t take a rocket scientist to figure that one out. Her mother had ridiculously bourgeois taste that ran toward the faux gold furnishings and lavish tapestries that carpeted the cavernous hallways of the homes she decorated and Aubrey had always found them embarrassingly ostentatious. Yep, Sammy’s house was so far from anything Aubrey had ever called home that it was immediately wonderful in Aubrey’s opinion.

Humming a wordless tune, she went to work mashing some bananas she’d brought with her and set to boiling water for the apples. Nikki and Violet had loved her homemade applesauce. She frowned slightly as the thought of them still hit a sore spot and started coring more apples. Apparently eight months wasn’t enough time to lessen the pain of not having them in her life but she’d loved them so deeply. Her gaze drifted to Ian, who was starting to awaken and sighed heavily. She couldn’t let her heart get attached to this one. One corner of her mouth twisted ruefully. At least she didn’t have to worry about falling for her employer with this job. Sammy Halvorsen was the last person she’d ever be attracted to.

Thank goodness for small favors.