by Leslie North
“Hey, kiddo, why don’t you come on over here for a minute, pop a squat?” he said as naturally as he could manage. It was stupid as all get out but he was actually nervous about the conversation. Here he was, a grown man, and nervous about talking to a six-year-old kid. He kept expecting things to get easier without having a woman to act as a translator but somehow, it hadn’t happened yet. Jonah must have heard it in his voice, too, because after shooting a questioning look in Ian’s direction he groaned loudly and threw an arm across his eyes.
“Fine! If I have to but I don’t have to like it, do I?” he moaned, stomping in Ian’s direction. Andy’s eyes grew wide, and then he collapsed into a fit of giggles.
“No, Uncle Jonah,” he laughed, “not you, me! He wants me to squat!”
“I don’t know about that, are you sure?” Jonah asked suspiciously. Jonah could do a fantastic job of pissing Ian off when he set his mind to it, although he had become increasingly serious over the years. Times like these, though, he felt lucky to have the guy for a brother.
“I’m sure,” Andy cackled, hurrying over to Ian and sitting cross-legged on the hay. He looked up into Ian’s face, his good humor tinged with a little doubt now, and for a minute all Ian could do was look at him. He was hit by such an immense wave of love that it was a wonder he could keep standing at all. That was the thing they never told you about children. It wasn’t just when they were born that they took over your heart. They did it over and over again, and each time it happened, it was as surprising as the last.
“Something wrong, Daddy? Did I mess up?”
“What? No! Not even close, bud. You do a great job with your chores. I do want to talk to you about something, though, if that’s all right.”
“Sure, s’okay,” Andy answered, picking up a straw of hay and sticking the tip of it in his mouth. Ian considered telling him to take it right back out and then thought better of it. The boy had enough rules about what could and couldn’t go past his lips. If he didn’t get exposed to a germ or two from time to time, he was never going to make it to old age.
“So,” Ian started in, his stupid heart speeding up with anticipation of Andy’s reaction, “do you remember what we talked about when you were sick? When you were still in the hospital?”
“Yup,” Andy answered instantly, “berries.”
“Right, the Strawberry Fest. That’s right.”
“Am I gonna be in it?” Andy asked anxiously, his eyes jumping up from his hay to Ian’s face, “It’s too late, huh? That’s…that’s okay.”
“Nope, not too late. Not too late for everything, anyway. There was one slot open, and you’re the boy who got it.”
“Which one? What am I gonna do?!” Andy exclaimed, his whole face lighting up. Christ, if only Ian could just stop the conversation right here and get to spend the day a hero. Because he wasn’t at all confident that Andy would be so excited when he learned it was nothing to do with the animals, which was what every kid wanted to do. Ian’s mind went back to the image of Andy on the step stool beside Katie making supper, but he rejected the thought almost as soon as it came. One evening of cooking with the new nanny didn’t mean the boy would want to cook again. More than likely, this was just another failure to keep Ian up at night. Still, stalling wouldn’t change anything. Might as well spit it out.
“You’re going to be in the cooking part, buddy. You’re going to get to cook things. What do you think about that?”
Ian watched Andy’s face anxiously, waiting for it to fall. He could feel Jonah’s eyes on him, too, and he was pretty sure he knew what his brother was thinking. Their eyes met, then Jonah’s cut to Andy.
“Hey, bud—” he started, intending to do some damage control. At the same time, they all heard the sound of the barn door opening again, and Ian just had time to wonder who in the hell that could be when Andy jumped up and crowed with delight.
“Katie! Katie, I’m going to do it!” he shrieked, jumping up and down so violently it made his words sound jumbled. Katie laughed delightedly, and Ian’s eyes were drawn to the source of the sound. It was almost an involuntary thing, looking at her, but once he did, he couldn’t look away. She was wearing jeans today instead of a little dress, and her heels weren’t quite so tall as before, but that was as far as the practicality of her outfit went. Jeans or no, the pants were tight enough that he could see the change in her back pocket and shorter or no, she was still wearing heels in a barn. Her top was a plain black crew neck that made her breasts look unreal. They bounced prettily as she hurried to give Andy a hug, and Ian had to look away. This was his son’s nanny, for Christ’s sake.
“Oh my gosh, Andy! That’s so great! Are you excited?”
“Super excited!” Andy yelled, throwing his arms around Katie’s legs.
“Good,” she laughed, “I’m so glad. Now, tell me what it is you’re going to do.”
“Cook! In the berry thing. I’m going to be in the cooking group.”
“Are you?” She asked, glancing up at Ian for confirmation. When he nodded in the affirmative her smile widened, and when she looked back at Andy it was obvious that she was genuinely excited now, too. “Andy, do you know what this means?”
“Nuh-uh,” he answered, shaking his head back and forth.
“It means that the two of us are going to have so much fun. Cooking is my most favorite thing to do in all the world, and now I have someone to show things to.”
“But I get sick with a lot of foods,” Andy said doubtfully, remembering his allergies for the first time. Katie didn’t even look fazed, though. She just nodded her head and put her hands on his thin shoulders.
“I know, and I don’t want you to worry. I know all kinds of things about cooking special, healthy foods. I’ve totally got this. You wanna go inside and practice?”
Andy looked at Ian, who nodded that yes, chores were done and he could go cook with Katie. The two of them hurried out of the barn, chattering away like two best friends as they went. For his part, Ian was so surprised by the scene you could have knocked him over with a feather. Whether it was just because of Katie’s reaction or some kind of deep-seeded interest Ian hadn’t known about previously, Andy was over the moon about cooking. Ian just hoped Katie could actually deliver on the promises she had just made. Her explanations from the night before made a certain kind of sense, but she had still done something deceitful and the whole “once a cheater, always a cheater” sentiment could easily apply to this scenario. He was going to have to throw a little trust in her direction, and that was far from one of his strong points.
“Holy shit, brother, when were you going to tell me about that situation?” Jonah asked, his voice low and reverential. Ian glanced up, a little surprised to remember that he wasn’t in the barn alone.
“There’s no situation, Jonah. That’s Andy’s new nanny,” he answered, a little more defensively than intended.
“Oh, right. And let me have three guesses as to what her crowning credentials were,” Jonah laughed.
“Come on, man, nothing like that. I didn’t even lay eyes on her before I hired her. She’s the mayor’s niece, okay? He did me a favor giving Andy the last slot in the Strawberry Fest. Shit, he could have just pulled the opening in the cooking group out of his ass for all I know. He asked me to do him a favor in return, and the favor turned out to be letting her work here for a spell. It’s not a permanent thing, so don’t get used to it.”
“Uh huh,” Jonah said, his eyes going back to the still retreating Katie, “whatever you say. I’m going to enjoy watching her walk away anyhow. I’m pretty sure you were enjoying that, too.”
Ian waved Jonah off, and the two of them got back to work. Ian couldn’t help thinking about Katie, though, and not only because of Jonah’s stupid comments. The way her hips moved in those jeans was out of this world, and her ass was pretty killer, too. But it was the way she was with Andy that he couldn’t quite shake. She made his kid happy, and that was a hard thing to ignore.
&nb
sp; 6
“Bye, sweet boy! Have such a good day at school, okay?” Katie beamed at Andy as she walked him up the steps to the front of his school. The two of them had spent every second of the weekend not involving their various chores devoted to the art of cooking. Katie was doing it to help Andy, of course, but the effect it had on her mood was surprising, too.
After the complete disaster of her failed cookbook, Katie felt like she’d lost everything. It wasn’t only a matter of an intended career path that stalled out before it really got started. It was a hell of a lot more than that. It was a loss of her identity, of who she thought of when she thought about herself. If she wasn’t a chef, if she wasn’t cooking, then she didn’t know what she was. Cooking with Andy all weekend had given her a reminder of who she was at the very heart.
“I don’t wanna go to school, though, I wanna do more cooking,” Andy whined, tugging on her hands.
“I know, sweetie, but we have to learn other things, too, right? I promise we’ll get in plenty more practice before the big competition.”
“All righty!” He slapped both of her palms in an epic double high five, then turned and ran into the school. Katie watched until the top of his head was swallowed up by the other kids, almost all of whom were bigger than he was. She hardly knew him, and she got a little pang seeing that. The little man was getting under her skin for sure, and quickly.
“Hey, there! Hey, howdy!”
Katie kept walking for a couple of steps before she realized the greeting was meant for her. She looked up and saw a little gaggle of women; three out of four of them were bottle blondes. They stood in a clump by their cars, all of them waving at her enthusiastically. She stopped, looked over her shoulder to see if they were actually trying to get the attention of somebody else, and then smiled.
“Hello, can I help you with something?” she asked, closing the gap between her and the women. They looked at each other and laughed companionably. It was easy to tell that they knew each other well. They had probably known each other since they were little girls. That was the way things usually went in small towns. So why were they reaching out to her? She was the outsider, and people didn’t always respond well to outsiders.
“Um, we sure hope so,” the one who’d spoken out originally giggled, “we’re itching to ask you a question or twelve.”
“Sure,” Katie laughed nervously, “ask away. I can’t guarantee I’ll know the answers, but I’ll do my best.”
“You’re more likely to know what we’re after than anyone else, so that makes you just about the most exciting thing that’s ever come our way, if you ask me,” she answered, shooting back her answers so rapid fire it was almost hard to keep up. “I’m Janice, by the way. What’s your name?”
“Katie. Katie Rylie.”
“Good to meet you, sugar,” Janice said with an unnaturally large smile, “these bitches are Emily, Brittany, and Clara. And we’re just dying to know.”
“Okay, dying to know what?”
“What it’s like to live with the most tragic hunk of cowboy in the world.”
“The...the what?” Katie asked, totally caught off guard. It wasn’t like she was living under a rock or anything. She knew what Ian looked like. Still, it hadn’t occurred to her that people might be looking to get the scoop on him and it definitely hadn’t crossed her mind to think of Ian as tragic. Sullen and taciturn, maybe, but tragic?
“Honey, you don’t know about him?” Jane asked, shocked, “You really don’t?”
“What, did you just crawl out of a hole or somethin’?” the one called Clara asked under her breath. The other three seemed nice enough, but this one was giving her a look like she’d gladly push Katie in front of a bus if the opportunity presented itself. Considering they were standing in a school parking lot, with yellow buses only a few yards away, the thought was a disturbing one.
“Come on, Clara, don’t be a bitch. She just means you must not have learned much about the guy you’re working for if you don’t know why we think he’s tragic.”
“No,” Katie said awkwardly, “I guess I don’t.”
“Well, don’t you fret, sugar, because we’ve got the scoop. I’ll tell ya all about it if you come with us for coffee.”
Half an hour later, Katie found herself crammed around a too-tiny table that was clearly only meant for three people, tops. Clara was still busy shooting her hostile looks. The other three were talking a mile a minute. Katie felt more out of place with this little foursome than she ever felt on the ranch. She had lost track of all of her high school friends and she and her friends in New York were all so busy, they were lucky to catch up once a month. She squirmed uncomfortably and looked at the clock. The second she found a good excuse, she was out for sure.
“So, Katie, tell me what you know about the handsome cowboy,” Janice asked, leaning forward with a hungry look in her eyes.
“Honestly, nothing much. I just look after his son, mostly. I don’t ask about his personal life.”
“Well, sugar, it’s a good thing because it might have set you off crying right then and there.”
“Okay,” Katie answered uncertainly, picking at her manicure, “maybe you shouldn’t be telling me this.”
“But you’ve gotta know! Listen to this. You know Andy’s mom? Well, she died a couple of years back. It was the saddest thing, sugar. It was so, so awful. Ian and Lonnie, they knew each other since they were practically in diapers. Anyone who knew ‘em knew they’d be together forever. They got married one weekend without telling anybody and came back just as happy as clams.”
“That’s so sweet,” Katie said softly, letting the full impact of what Janice was saying wash over her. It was the kind of story everyone hoped to have as their own someday, but she already knew it was going to end badly.
“You haven’t heard the end yet,” Clara said sourly. Katie glanced at her and got nothing but the stink eye for her trouble.
“Don’t mind her,” Janice said, rolling her eyes dramatically, “she’s just a sourpuss. So anyway. Ian and Lonnie were going to have tons of babies together. But then it took forever to get preggo with Andy, and they ran all of these tests and everything, and in the end, it turned out she had the ‘big C.’ Pretty awful, right?”
“Terrible,” Katie agreed, hiding her trembling hands underneath the table. She thought back to her first impressions of the ranch house, the sheer number of rooms in the place. That size took on a whole new meaning now that she knew those rooms were for children dearly wanted and never born.
“I know it. They fought it as hard as they could, but in the end, she just couldn’t beat it. Can you imagine?”
“The thing that really breaks my heart is his poor little boy,” Emily chimed in, taking advantage of one of the rare breaks in Janice’s monologue, “being left with nannies and the like day in and day out. Can you imagine? It’s like his poor daddy can’t stand being around him for more than five minutes! Poor, poor boy. What’s his name?”
“Andy,” Katie offered grudgingly. She didn’t like the “poor little orphan” vibe they were giving off about Andy. The way they were acting made it sound like Andy was stuck in an awful life he couldn’t get out of. From the experience she’d had with him so far, she knew Ian to be a good, if not always one hundred percent present dad. And what kind of people sat around talking about how hot a guy was in one breath and then questioned his parenting skills with the next?
“Right,” Janice said, “that’s the one. He’s the one who got it the worst. I can’t even imagine how he’s going to turn out.”
“He’s actually pretty great,” Katie piped up, her face hot with a mixture of embarrassment and indignation, “he’s such a smart, capable little boy and their house is a happy home. It’s a pretty nice place to be, actually.”
“Right,” Clara said sarcastically, “and I’m sure that has nothing to do with you being in line to be the next Mrs. Cowboy.”
“What? No way!” Katie exclaimed, complete
ly thrown off guard by Clara’s snarky comment. The worst thing about it was that the second the allusion was made, Katie got a full-color picture of what it would look like to make a bunch more babies with Ian. She could practically feel them filling up that empty house with new family members and happier memories. She thought about running her hands down his broad chest and letting them keep sliding, and her mouth filled with saliva.
“Really?” Janice asked, a little friendlier than Clara but still utterly shameless, “It never crossed your mind that you might be the one to take that man’s story from Lifetime movie to Hallmark?”
“I don’t know what that means,” Katie answered, stuttering a little on the last word.
“Come on, sure you do. One of ‘em leaves you with an empty box of tissue and a Debbie Downer mood for a couple of days and the other makes you think any of us can have our very own fairytale princess story.”
“Okay,” she laughed, “that actually makes sense, but that’s definitely not what I’m doing. I’m not going to be here long enough to be Ian’s anything. I’m just stopping off here while I figure out my next move. I’m sure the two of them will be great when I’m gone. More than great; they’ll be fantastic. Now if you guys will excuse me, I need to go. I’ve got to see what I can find at the store for tonight’s dinner.”
She got up and left the table without waiting for a reply. She knew without a doubt that those women would sit and gossip about her for at least another hour after she was gone. She didn’t care. There was one thing she’d gotten out of the awkward chat, and she was willing to count that as a win. Janice’s idea of Lifetime versus Hallmark was stuck in her head, and now she had a new mission. Before she moved on to whatever her new life was going to be, she was going to do everything she could to help Ian and Andy’s life make the switch into the latter camp. If she could pull that off, everything that had happened would be worth it.