Читать книгу Dating a Single Dad - Kris Fletcher - Страница 11
ОглавлениеCHAPTER THREE
ON THE WEDNESDAY MORNING after her arrival, Brynn took a deep breath and walked into Taylor’s office in preparation for her first meeting with the entire North clan. She had been in and out of the office over the past couple of days and been introduced to all the players, but this would be her first real test. Her stomach danced a slow jig of anticipation. She’d gone over all the materials given to her by Taylor and had pulled together some ideas that she knew were solid. The hard part would be convincing the family members that she wasn’t trying to get rid of their plans, but rather wanted to focus on the best ones.
The really hard part would be to get through this meeting without being a total bitch to Carter. Logically, she knew that none of this was his fault, and that he was unaware of Taylor’s dilemma. But logic didn’t keep her from thinking that everything would be fine if he would just get lost. Or maybe meet someone and run off to Vegas. Or do something so devoid of morals that Taylor would never again look at him with anything other than disgust.
That was Brynn’s personal favorite scenario. After all, it had taken just one act of supremely selfish moral cowardice to shred her love for her father. Imagine what such an act could do to a mere crush?
Taylor was alone. She sat behind her desk with a faraway look on her face, barely stirring when Brynn walked in.
“Morning,” she said softly. Taylor merely blinked.
“Hello? Taylor?” Brynn waved her hand in front of her cousin’s face, grinning at the way Taylor startled. “Welcome back to the land of the living.”
“Sorry. I was...”
“Long, long ago, in a galaxy far, far away?”
“Something like that.”
The words were light. The misery in Taylor’s eyes was not.
“Hey.” Brynn glanced into the hall, but seeing no one approaching, she took the chance of slipping around the desk and giving Taylor a light squeeze around the shoulders. “We’ll get through this. I won’t leave you, I promise.”
Taylor smiled faintly and poked at the papers in front of her. “I know. I’m so glad you’re here.”
“Me, too.” Even though she hated the circumstances, she wanted—needed—to be here. Wait and see were not words she could live by, at least not when it came to her family. She had to help.
Her father used to tell her that the world would keep spinning if she sat down, but she never quite believed him. Maybe because he usually followed it up with, Get out of here, Brynn. You’re not needed. And a laugh that never quite struck her as funny.
She shook away the memory and pulled a flash drive from her pocket. “Here you go. The next step in Operation Sleeping Beauty.”
Taylor shook her head but smiled as she took it. “What is it, a how-to manual?”
“Music. The songs you associate with him, plus some from when we were silly romantic teens for good measure.”
“Thanks.” But there was little enthusiasm in Taylor’s voice as she dropped the device into her purse.
This wasn’t good. Brynn knew her efforts wouldn’t be an overnight success, but she had hoped for a slightly more encouraging reaction.
“While we have a minute, I need some more info. Tell me about food.”
“Brynn, I really don’t think this is going to—”
“Taylor, you promised to give this your all. So all up, kid. What foods?”
“Well...he’s a pretty typical guy. Steak. Shrimp. Pasta.”
Brynn shook her head. “Deeper. What foods did you prepare for him? Where did you go to eat? Did he ever feed you cotton candy or kiss chocolate off your mouth or anything like that?”
“Isn’t this just a little bit kinky?”
“Oh, yeah. I really get off on hearing the details of my cousin’s sex life, you betcha.” When Taylor blushed, Brynn hurried on. “Look, I know this isn’t comfortable for either of us. But food is highly associated with romance, so if I’m going to do my job, I need to know what kinds of things you—”
“Hot chocolate.”
“Sorry?”
“Hot chocolate. I’m always cold in the winter and he made it for me.”
Brynn stole a piece of paper from Taylor’s desk and began scribbling notes. “Homemade or from a mix?”
“Homemade, mostly. With a little almond syrup in it. Half and half.” She sighed. “He really does make it better than anyone else.”
“Did you have a special mug?”
“Mmm, no. Just whatever was handy.”
“Marshmallows or whipped cream?”
“Whipped—” she began, then broke off in another blush. Brynn assessed her over the rims of her half-glasses.
“Seriously?”
Taylor’s shrug was as fluid and graceful as everything else she did. “What can I say? He would make a big bowl of whipped cream, and there was always tons left over, and, you know, waste not, want not.”
“I think I get the picture.” And now she would never be able to get it out of her mind, unfortunately.
“Um...Baileys Irish Cream has some pretty potent associations, too.”
“Okay, I think that gives me plenty of material.” But Taylor was in her own world again.
“Kung pao chicken. And doughnuts. How did I forget those? Oh, yeah. Ian has a real fondness for doughnuts. But only ones with a hole in the middle, if you get my—”
She stopped abruptly. Brynn looked up from her notes, ready to give thanks to whatever deity had brought this rush of Too Much Information to a halt, but stopped when she saw the look of utter horror on Taylor’s face as she stared at the door.
Say it isn’t so.
When she turned to follow Taylor’s gaze, Brynn saw exactly what she had feared most: the doorway was filled with Norths, covering the whole spectrum of emotions. Moxie sported a sly smile, Carter had his eyes closed as if in agony, and Hank—Hank wasn’t looking at Taylor but at Brynn. His face was carefully blank, but there was a glint of intense curiosity in his eyes. It was almost as if he had been waiting for her to chime in with stories of her own creative uses for food.
A small sound from the other side of the desk brought Brynn’s attention back to where it was supposed to be: Taylor, the job, making a professional impression on these people who had entrusted her with their celebration.
Silence hung over them. No one seemed capable of speech. Brynn realized that if anyone was going to get them through this, it had to be her.
Long months of caring for her two younger brothers while their mother was sick had taught her that a bright smile and brisk attitude conveyed confidence that usually reassured others, if not herself. She shoved the paper in her pocket and turned to the door. Big smile. Breezy confidence. Play the part.
“Mrs. North. Good to see you again. You, too, Carter, Hank. Taylor has told me about your thoughts for the festival, and they sound fabulous. I’m looking forward to bringing them to life. Now, I know you were thinking of horse-and-buggy rides, but did you have any specific...”
She continued chattering while guiding them into the conference room where the rest of the family waited. By the time everyone was seated, Taylor’s face was only slightly pink instead of horror-movie white, and Moxie had stopped breaking out in unnerving snickers. Carter still wouldn’t look up, but Hank—Hank was watching her again.
Quickly, so fast that she almost thought she imagined it, he winked at her from across the table.
Forget keeping herself from being a bitch to Carter. The real challenge here would be making it through the meeting without sinking through the floor.
* * *
WEDNESDAYS WERE HANK’S night off. When he’d bought the cabins and moved himself and Millie out of the home he had shared with his folks and Moxie, his mother had made him swear on her future grave that he would bring Millie back at least once a week. Usually they grabbed a quick bite together, then he was pushed out the door with orders to see a movie or “be social.” Ma said that it was so they could spoil Millie silly without him protesting. He suspected it was really part of her ongoing quest to see him remarried, or at least going out on a regular basis. Subtlety had never been one of her strengths.
As he walked to the sprawling old Victorian and yelled to Millie to slow down before she slipped on the ice, he braced himself for what he was sure was going to be another round of lectures. Tonight’s installment, however, was strictly his own fault. He knew he’d made a mistake the moment he let himself wink at Brynn during the meeting.
It wasn’t the gesture itself that he regretted. She deserved something after getting them through Awkward Central without anyone wanting to bleach their brains. She’d put on some cute little librarian half-glasses, talking about nothing like her life depended on it, and he saw why Taylor had said she was all about family. She’d been willing to make an idiot of herself if necessary to help her cousin.
Yeah, she had definitely earned a wink. If only he’d been smooth enough to wait until Ma was looking the other way....
Sure enough, no sooner had he and Millie walked into the house and hung their coats in the hall closet than his mother took him by the arm.
“Moxie, can you amuse Millie for a while, please? Henry and I are going to the laundry room for a little chat.”
Ah, hell. She’d called him Henry and invoked the laundry room. That was the spot Janice North reserved for the worst transgressions, the ones usually punished by a serious dressing-down and manual labor.
“Moxie, no. Save me. You know what she’s like when she gets talking.”
Moxie grinned and tugged on the collar of Millie’s lab coat. “Come on, sprite. Let’s get out of your grandma’s way while she knocks some sense into your daddy’s head.”
“Can I watch?”
Great. Even his kid was abandoning him.
Resigned to his fate, he preceded his mother into the room and boosted himself up to sit on the dryer—an instinct from childhood. It was harder to be spanked if his mother couldn’t reach his bottom. “Okay. Let’s hear it.”
“Henry William North. Before you and Millie moved out, you and I had a little talk, remember?”
“And here it is, your once-a-week dinner as promised.”
“There was more to it than that, and you know it. You agreed with me that you were well and truly over the divorce and ready to move on. Start dating. Start having a life again.”
Very true. ’Course, he’d had his fingers crossed when he said it, but come on. That was self-preservation.
“You know, Ma, most folks your age are starting to have trouble remembering things. Why is it that your memory is just getting sharper? Are you part of some secret government experiment to steal memory cells from one person and transfer them to another?”
“Be serious for a minute, will you? I know it took a while to get over Heather, and I understand. You had a lot thrown at you very fast, and you needed time. But it’s been long enough. You bought the cabins, you and Millie are settled there, you’re building the life you wanted all those years ago, back before things got knocked off track.”
Hank snorted. Knocked off track? More like knocked up.
“In any case, I’m getting worried about you. You haven’t shown much interest in a woman in heaven knows how long.”
“Hey, hey, hey.” He raised his hand. A man could only listen to so much before he had to defend himself. “Not true. In fact, the only reason I saw the last Batman movie was because it had—”
“Anne Hathaway in a catsuit. I know.”
“You do?”
“Honestly, Hank. You think your brothers never tell me anything?”
Ian was lucky he was out of the country. Carter and Cash, on the other hand, were dead meat.
“Be that as it may,” she said with a pat on his arm, “it’s time for you to stop fixating on Catwoman and start looking at the flesh-and-blood women around you.”
Wait for it...
“That Brynn... She certainly seems nice.”
Could he call them or what? “Drop it, Ma.”
“Why? She’s smart and funny, and Millie certainly seems to like her.”
“Plus, she’s living in my backyard, which would make things kind of awkward if it didn’t work out, don’t you think? Not to mention that she’s working for us. Did you even listen to that sexual-harassment training we had to sit through?”
“You’re not at the dairy anymore.”
And this conversation was a great reminder of another reason why he had left: to be his own boss. To not have his family telling him what to do, in one form or another, 24/7.
“No, Mom. Just...no.”
She narrowed her eyes at him before smacking his feet. “Move your legs.”
He did it on autopilot, realized how easily he’d slipped, and groaned. Lucky for him there was no punishment on the horizon. Just the squeak of the dryer door as she pulled it open and pulled out a clean undershirt.
“Hank...” She folded the shirt in half, her actions automatic after decades of male laundry. “I know you’re reluctant to think about trying again, but life is hard enough as it is, especially when you’re a parent. Millie is going to take more from you than you realize. Things are easier when you don’t have to go through everything by yourself. And no, I’m not talking about the chores, okay? I’m talking about having someone in your corner. Someone to hold you up. Everyone deserves that, Hank. Even people who had a lousy marriage the first time around. Maybe even more so.”
Hell and damnation, how was he supposed to respond to that? Janice North didn’t put her heart on the line very often. For her to talk to him so openly, so honestly...she really must be worried.
“Okay, Ma. Total truth here. I wouldn’t mind finding someone someday, maybe even get married again. But it has to be on my terms. And my terms include not chasing someone who’s only here for a few months.”
She tossed the shirt into the hamper and grabbed a fresh one. “You can’t let that stop you. I saw the way you looked at her during the meeting today.”
Someday, he would learn. “Yes. I like Brynn. The whole, oh, thirty minutes of interaction I’ve had with her over the past three days have all been pleasant. But as you said yourself, Millie likes her.”
“And that’s bad?”
“Yeah, it is. Mills already asked me when she could get her ears pierced just like Brynn. She’s going to have a hard enough time saying goodbye when the time comes. Can you imagine if she saw me going out with Brynn? Hell, she had me married off to her friend Tish’s mom a dozen times before they moved. One dinner with Brynn, and Millie would be planning the wedding. I’m not gonna do that to her.”
There. She couldn’t argue with that one.
For a moment, it looked like he had won. She folded the shirt silently, let it drop into the hamper, grabbed a handful of socks and spread them across the top of the washer. With expert speed, she began matching them.
“All right, then,” she said at last. “Forget Brynn. But you need to make an effort, Hank. It’s past time.” She swept the paired socks into the hamper and picked up two singletons, one pink and one brown, dangling them in his face. “Because if you don’t wake up and get moving, my boy, this is how you and Millie are going to end up.”
* * *
ON FRIDAY NIGHT, Hank pulled into the driveway leading to the cabins, killed the engine and tried to muster up the energy to get out of the truck and walk into the house. When he picked Millie up from after-school care she had announced that her backpack wouldn’t zip anymore, her shoes were too tight and she needed a white T-shirt for tie-dye day on Monday. His choice had been to try to cram the store run into an already packed weekend, or get it out of the way immediately. He’d opted for door number two. Not a bad choice, but now it was dinnertime, they were both tired and grumpy and he’d forgotten to pull something out of the freezer that morning.
Great. Another Friday night of Kraft Dinner and ketchup with a side of guilt.
Compounding his frustration was the fact that, while Millie was more than happy to tell him about the items she needed, she had spent the entire shopping trip tap-dancing around any discussion of school itself. He knew better than to ask a simple What did you do today? He drew instead on his mother’s ancient lines: Did you read any good books? Who did you play with at recess? What did you draw in art?
Nothing.
Well, not a total nothing. She gave an animated reenactment of Curious George’s antics. But all other questions were met with shrugs, silence or sudden declarations that she wanted a telescope.
His mother said that Millie had too many other interests to think about school when she wasn’t there. Her report cards said she was attentive and contributed to classroom discussions. But his gut told him something was wrong.
“Hey, Mills. I was thinking—do you want to have a friend over this weekend?” Maybe she was just lonely, what with her best friend moving away. Maybe he could juggle the jobs, let Millie have an hour or two, maybe do some eavesdropping in case she let something slip with a classmate. “We could get a pizza and you could invite—I don’t know. Who do you like to play—”
“Daddy! Is there another car at Brynn’s place?”
He peered through the dying bits of daylight, unsure if this was a true question or an attempt at distraction. But sure enough, there was a second shape in front of the Wolfe cabin.
“Guess she has company. But about this week—”
“Oh! Maybe it’s Casey! She told me Casey was coming!”
“Who is Casey, and when were you talking to Brynn about him? Her? Whatever.” More important, might this Casey be a potential playmate?
“You know. Casey is her little boy. Not her little boy, but her... What’s that word? Not like uncle, or cousin, but...”
“Nephew?”
“Yes! That’s it! He’s her nephew. And he lives at a camp but he likes to play with her, and she was going to see him a whole lot while she’s living here, because the camp is... I don’t remember. Somewhere close.”
“And when did you get all this information?”
But his words were lost in a burst of movement as Millie opened her door, scrambled out of the truck and took off.
“Brynn!” She raced down the path between the trees. “Hey, Brynn! Can I come see Casey, please?”
“Millie,” he called helplessly. So much for that attempt at conversation. With a curse he slammed his way out of the truck and followed his daughter.
Millie barely avoided smacking into the man walking away from the cabin. “Whoa, kiddo.” The man laughed and stepped off the path. “Careful. You don’t want to slip.”
Millie nodded and scooted around him, aiming for Brynn, who was standing in the doorway with a kid in her arms. Millie crashed into her legs, causing Brynn to stoop and hug Millie to her. Hank groaned. He was never going to get her home now.
The man who had almost been Millie’s punching bag caught Hank’s eye. “Let me guess. That’s Millie, and you’re Hank.” He extended his hand. “Sam Catalano, Brynn’s brother. Good to meet you.”
Hank nodded and stuck out his hand, wishing he’d thought to pull on his gloves. His hands were probably like ice. Of course, if this guy was the hockey player, he was probably used to that. “Sorry about my daughter’s manners. She’s on a quest to set a new speed record from my place to here.”
“She’s off to a great start.” He grinned. “So, has my sister made your life a living hell yet?”
“Yeah, I’ve had to call the cops three times for her wild parties.”
“Excuse me?” Brynn said. “Hank, it was only one party. And Sam, remember, your night out with your wife depends on me babysitting, so you should watch your mouth, mister.”
“Oh, hell, she’s right. I’d better get out of here before I say something wrong and piss her off. Nice meeting you, Hank.”
“You, too,” Hank said, but his attention was already on the scene in front of him. Brynn’s nephew was squealing on her hip and Millie was chattering at top volume, yet Brynn still radiated calm while smiling at him. Nothing extraordinary. Just two adults sharing a moment in the midst of some kiddie insanity. But something about it felt so warm, so welcoming, that he was hit by the most ridiculous sense of longing he’d had in ages. It was almost like he was seeing the Ghost of Should-Have-Beens.
But that was ridiculous. And probably due to the amazing smells tickling his nose as he drew near.
“Hi, there.” He pointed toward Millie, but spoke to Brynn. “Sorry. She saw the car out front and figured that was her own personal invitation.”
“Well, of course it is. I told Millie to pop in anytime, and I meant it. That is, assuming it’s okay with you,” she added quickly.
“Please, Daddy? Please? Can I have a visit, oh, please, oh, please, oh, please?”
He wanted to say yes. Millie needed friends, true. But they should be her age, and local. Permanent. He couldn’t let her start thinking that everyone who stayed in the cabins was there purely for her enjoyment. She had to learn—they both had to learn—how to be friendly and helpful while maintaining the boundaries they needed to make this work for everyone involved.
“Mills,” he said gently. “We have to have dinner.”
“Why don’t you join us?” Brynn nodded at the toddler clinging to her like a monkey. “It’s just me and Casey, and I’m sure he would rather play with another kid than with his decrepit old auntie.”
She didn’t look decrepit, not that he could say that to her face. In a Leafs jersey that hung midthigh and something that looked like the leggings Millie wore beneath her lab coat, Brynn looked casual and relaxed and limber.
Dangerously limber.
“That’s a great offer, but—”
“Oh, Daddy, please!”
“Mills, come on. You have homework, and I’m in the middle of some things, and we have—um—plans.”
Brynn shook her head. “But you have to eat anyway, right? And seriously, you’d be doing me a favor. I learned how to cook by feeding hungry males, and I still don’t know how to make anything less than army quantities. If you don’t stay I’ll be eating spaghetti and meatballs for the next two weeks.”
Ah, hell. They did have to eat. If he didn’t have to spend time cooking, he might be able to work ahead a bit, freeing up that hour or so he wanted to give to Millie and a playmate. And since he would be helping Brynn...
“Okay.” He raised a hand to stifle Millie’s squeals. “But I wasn’t kidding—we have to be rude and scoot fairly quickly. Duty calls, and all that crap.”
Brynn gave him the kind of assessing look that made him feel distinctly uneasy, as if she had other plans that couldn’t be revealed yet, but she nodded quickly and stepped back to allow him entry. “You’re right. That’s horrifically rude. You’ll have to apologize by coming again another time when you can stay longer.”
Millie clapped her hands. “Oh, yes! We can do that. Right, Daddy?”
“We’ll talk,” was all he said as he stepped inside and shrugged free of his jacket, hanging it from the wall pegs already sporting a bright red parka and a tiny blue snowsuit. He looked from the suit to Millie and shook his head.
“Hard to believe she was ever that small.”
“And Casey’s a big guy. Right, squirt?”
Casey nodded slowly. Big blue eyes checked Hank out from head to toe. Apparently satisfied, he patted Brynn’s cheek.
“Casey blocks. Pease.”
“Good manners, bud. Millie, there’s a bunch of toys in the bedroom. Could you take Casey in there and show him around?”
The smile on Millie’s face was bright enough to ease his worries, at least for the moment. “Oh, yes! Come on, Casey!” She held out her hand. Miracle of miracles, Casey grabbed hold and followed her down the hall while Millie talked about the rooms, the work and whether they might be able to make something explode that night.
As her voice faded, Hank realized that, thanks to his own weakness, he was now alone with Brynn and would have to make conversation. Dammit. Ian could talk about anything, Carter and Cash put Millie to shame, but the small-talk gene had skipped him.
Still, he needed to say something.
“This, uh, really is nice of you,” Hank said as Brynn headed back to the kitchen area.
“My pleasure. And, like I said, army quantities.” She lifted the lid of a slow cooker and gave a stir. He caught sight of deep red sauce, inhaled the warmth and felt like he’d walked into a sixties sitcom. “Without help, I’d be eating this three meals a day for a week. No hardship, but my jeans wouldn’t be too happy about it.”
He couldn’t help it. That was a comment that begged a man to check out the curve of her hips. She might not be wearing jeans at the moment, but he remembered the way they’d fit her on move-in day, the way they had hugged as she lifted and hauled, and he had to agree that any action that spoiled that view would indeed be a sin.
“So are you settling in okay? Have everything you need?” He glanced around the space, which already felt cozier. “You’re kind of our test case for this cabin-rental thing, so if I messed up anything, let me know. Don’t be shy.”
Oh, that was rich—him telling her to not be shy. Pot, meet kettle.
She laughed as she opened the refrigerator. “My brothers would tell you that shyness is the least of my issues. Everything is great so far. This place really is adorable—not just my cabin, but all of it. How long have you been here?”
“A few months. My sort-of uncle Lou finally admitted he couldn’t keep up with things anymore and let me buy it off him.”
“So it’s been in the family a while.”
“Yeah.”
“That’s so cool. We moved a lot when I was little, and my brothers were more into taking things apart and destroying them than preserving them.” She pulled grated cheese and salad ingredients from the shelves and handed them to him. He took them automatically. “It’s nice to see things being passed down through a family. Traditions, heirlooms. Things that last.”
He couldn’t hold back the snort. “The only things that were lasting around here were the river, the rocks and the foundations. Lou should have admitted defeat years ago. I still don’t know if I’ll have everything up and running by May.”
“Given what I’ve seen of your work thus far, I have no doubt that you’ll do just fine.”
“Thanks.”
“Total truth.” She held out a bottle. “I need a beer. Care to join me?”
He meant to say no—after all, he still had a full night ahead—but what kind of host would he be to refuse? Or, for that matter, what kind of guest?
The bottle was halfway to his lips when she made a small sound.
“Crap! I always forget. Would you like a glass?”
“No, thanks. This is fine.”
“You’re sure? I’m a horrible hostess—sorry. I never remember the gracious touches when I’m off-duty.”
It was so unexpected—the organizational queen forgetting something—that he felt himself relaxing. Maybe even grinning. “You’re feeding me and you made my kid happy. I can’t think of anything more gracious than that.”
A slight hint of pink rose in her cheeks, spreading down her neck to the creamy bit of skin visible in the vee of her jersey. It was an intriguing sight, for sure. He could swear there was a little freckle at the point of the vee. Or maybe it was a fleck of sauce. He couldn’t tell. Neither could he pull his gaze away. Because even though he couldn’t see it, he was suddenly very aware that the opening of the jersey was a few tiny millimeters above the sweet line of cleavage, a part of the female anatomy he had always found highly alluring.
She turned slightly to grab a bubbling pot from the stove, breaking his concentration and making him realize, with embarrassment, that he’d been staring a bit too intently for a little too long at a particularly dangerous zone.
And he’d been worried about Millie overstepping her bounds.
“Did your brother play for the Leafs?” Okay, lame line, but it sort of excused his blatant perusal.
The slight quirk to her eyebrows told him how much she bought it. But instead of giving him the lecture he deserved, she simply dumped pasta into the colander in the sink.
“No,” she said. “He was all over the place for a while, but didn’t really hit his stride until he landed in Detroit.”
“So you wear that to harass him?”
She turned back, her face twisted in a mix of humor and chagrin. “I wear it for me. Because try as I might, I can’t stop rooting for them.”
A feeling he knew well. “A sucker for the underdog, huh?”
“It’s pathetic. If they’re playing lousy and I try to cheer for another team, I feel like a traitor, but if they actually do a good job, I can’t walk away because this might be the year they turn it around.”
“I’m sorry.”
She laughed and gave the colander a shake before swishing her hands at him, a motion he recognized as a request to step back. “Sometimes I think about forming a support group—Diehard Leafs Fans Anonymous—but then I wonder if anyone would be willing to admit to it.”
“Well, winters can get pretty long around here. Time it right and it could be the biggest excitement to hit town in years.”
She laughed again, dumped the drained pasta back into the pot and added a heaping ladle of the sauce. The smell of all that beef and garlic was getting to him. It was the only way to account for the slight light-headedness that was taking him over. It had to be the food. Maybe the beer on a mostly empty stomach.
God help him if it was the woman.
