“Okay. Thanks again.”
He turned at the door as he opened it. “You’re the one helping me out of a jam.”
Regan gave him another dimpled smile. “We’re helping each other.”
“Right, right. The key and fob I gave you will let you into the house via the side entrance. Just swipe the fob over the white box on your right as you enter, and it will deactivate the night alarm.”
“Great. Will do.”
“Okay. Night, then.”
“Night,” she called softly as he followed the paving stones back to the house. “See you in the morning.”
He lifted an arm in a good-night gesture without looking back, and a strange uneasiness fell over him as he let himself into the main house. Perhaps it was just the action of trusting another human being, one he didn’t know all that well, with the care of his children. Letting her into his home. Lachlan had called him as he was driving back from work to tell him Regan had hashed everything out with Robyn, and the sisters were in a good place again. That had made him feel better about offering Regan the job, and Lachlan, who had grown even more mistrustful of people since Lucy’s betrayal, seemed to warm to his soon-to-be sister-in-law.
There had also been a hint of envy in Lachlan’s voice as he spoke of Robyn’s reunion with her sister. Thane knew his brother well. He was thinking of Arran and Brodan. He worried they were losing their younger brothers.
Walking around the house, Thane switched off lights, checked the doors and windows, grabbed a glass of water, and set the night alarm before making his way upstairs.
He quietly peeked into Eilidh’s room to find her spread across her bed like a sea star, already deep in dreamland. Love ached fiercely in his chest. She’d been so excited to hear Regan was their new nanny, he’d wondered if she would even fall asleep. But he shouldn’t have worried. Eils could fall asleep just about anywhere.
Moving onto Lewis’s room down the hall, he found his son curled on his side, his cheek cradled in his hand, and the ache grew stronger. Even Lew seemed content that Regan would look after them. His son, for such a wee boy, didn’t welcome new people into his life. And he was strange with those who appeared and disappeared out of it. Thane could only assume it was the effect of losing his mum so young. Something he’d never wanted to have in common with his son.
While Lachlan worried about Brodan and Arran, Thane did, too, but he was also angry with them. He never used to be. He was always the one tempering Lachlan’s irritation, reminding him their brothers wanted to find themselves outside the boundaries of the Adair family. Now, not so much.
He had nothing against them going out into the world and living their lives, but where was their love and consideration for family? Their youngest brother, Arran, had been terrible at communicating with them for years. They never knew where he was or what he was up to until he turned up at Christmas or maybe for a month during the summer. He barely knew his niece and nephew.
Brodan, the second-youngest brother, never used to be so bad. When he first moved to LA to work as an actor, he kept in touch every week. He came home whenever he could.
But something had changed over the last year.
Brodan had pushed them all away and was often in the tabloids, earning a reputation as the bad boy of Hollywood. It made no sense. Brodan had never been the wild, partying kind, even at an age when that was expected. He was smarter than all the siblings put together, always had his head stuck in a book, and had openly admitted he didn’t understand the fascination with drugs and alcohol.
Thane, like Lachlan, was most definitely concerned about their middle brother. But even through the frustration of his younger brothers making them worry and missing out on his children’s lives, Thane had hope that one day, they’d come home.
It was something he and Lachlan spoke of often, but as he walked into the large master suite he’d designed for him and Fran, Thane missed getting into bed beside her warmth and unloading all his worries. Fran was ever practical and sensible and always made him feel better.
Sitting on the bed, he stared at the framed photograph on his bedside table of him and Fran at uni.
They’d been together a year at that point. She sat on his knee in the student union, laughing up into the camera with him as he held her close. For a long time, he couldn’t look at pictures of her. Couldn’t bear the god-awful black hole of pain that opened inside him.
Time didn’t heal all, but it dulled the grief until he could look at photos, could talk to Eilidh and Lewis about how they’d inherited their mother’s beautiful dark hair, could fill them in on all the things they’d missed about the mother they never got to know.
To his shame, there were even days he didn’t think of his wife. The first time he realized he hadn’t thought of her for days, the guilt really fucked with him. For weeks after, he snapped and growled at everyone until Lachlan finally got it out of him what was wrong.
As always, his brother reassured him. Reminded him it had happened when they lost their mum and their dad. That it was normal.
Life moved on.
But then there were days when the grief hit again.
Not like it was in that first year. Everything ached back then. His chest, his gut, even his jaw and gums ached with the tension of his grief.
Now it came back as a deep pang of longing.
Like tonight.
Tonight was the first in a very long time he wished he were rolling into bed beside Fran. The Fran from university. The girl who’d loved him and adored him and never dreamed of being disloyal to him. But that wasn’t fair, was it?
Thane laid back on the empty bed, the one he’d replaced when he couldn’t get back into the one he’d shared with Fran. He turned to look at the pillows next to his.
In the end, it didn’t matter whether she was the Fran from university or the Fran who upended his entire world before she fell pregnant with Eilidh. She was Fran. The mother of his children. And it would have been a beautiful miracle to go to bed at her side that night.
The sudden emptiness was strange.
Almost as if it had come out of the blue.
Or brought on by the redhead living in his annex.
Her smile popped into his mind, and his gut twisted.
Sighing, Thane pushed up off the bed and set about changing into his pjs. No more of this maudlin rubbish. So he was wary of people after Lucy—that was only natural. But Regan was Robyn’s sister. And Robyn was one of the most trustworthy people he knew, so he had to trust in Robyn’s judgment. There was no need to be uneasy about Regan’s presence in their lives.
Eilidh and Lewis were thrilled. Especially Eilidh. She’d fallen in love with the American already.
But Regan was leaving in six months.
Aye, there was the rub.
He’d have to make sure Eilidh and Lewis knew Regan’s stay was temporary. And he’d have to do it in a much better way than how he’d communicated about Lucy’s betrayal.
His head nipping with too many concerns, Thane was glad to fall into bed so he could read for a bit. He should be in his office working on the extensive project his firm had just taken on—a commercial revamp of Aberdeen’s shopping district—but Thane had already decided not to work himself into an early grave for someone else’s company. He’d work the hours he was being paid to work. End of.
Opening the crime thriller he was halfway through, Thane tried to fall back into the story … but the words weren’t penetrating. His gaze drifted to his bedroom window, his thoughts returning to Regan in the annex.
He hoped she remembered how to set the alarm properly.
Not that there was a significant chance of anything happening to her on the edge of Caelmore, but Thane was more security conscious after their old family friend and Ardnoch Estate’s mechanic, Fergus, and Lucy terrorized Ardnoch.
“She’s fine,” he muttered to himself, turning back to his book.
Fifteen minutes later, he gave up with a muttered curse under his breath, threw th
e book on the floor, and switched off the light, hoping sleep would come. It didn’t. On nights his brain was overactive, he used to fuck Fran until they were both exhausted. That was early on in their marriage. After Lewis, their sex life changed.
A lot of things changed between them.
8
Regan
The sound of the lapping sea filtered through my consciousness, waking me before my alarm. As late as night had fallen, day broke early, sunlight filtering through the cracks between the automatic blinds. Blinking against the light, I smiled at the sound of seagulls crying.
I’d left a window open last night because it was a little stuffy in my small apartment, and I decided I’d do it again tonight. The sounds of nature as a wake-up call was pretty fantastic.
“Turn on lights,” I said loudly, and all the lights came on in the guest house. I could get used to this. “Turn on coffee.”
A whirring sound from my left drew my attention, and I saw the red light blinking on the coffee machine. I grinned. “Oh, yeah, I could really get used to this.”
Since I was up earlier than I needed to be by half an hour, I dallied while making coffee. I took my phone off charge with the adapter plug from Robyn. “Open blinds,” I commanded and then snuggled into the sofa to watch the large blinds on the sliding doors open. From here, I had a partial view of the sea beyond.
Sipping my coffee, I unlocked my phone and checked my emails.
Nothing. Just spam.
Without social media, there was no one to expect emails or texts from. The only meaningful friendships—or friendships I’d thought were meaningful—had been with my high school best friends, Xavier and Riko. Riko had gone on to art school on the West Coast, and we’d lost touch by the end of her freshman year. Xavier had gone to New York to intern with a CFDA designer, and we’d stayed close—until I went backpacking and started keeping secrets from him. I tried to call him when I returned to Boston, but his boyfriend answered and told me “to stop calling, bitch, Xave doesn’t want to hear from you.”
I cried a lot, but I stopped calling.
And the “friends” I’d made on my backpacking trip weren’t people I could count on for any real support.
I literally had no one.
Except Robyn. And my mom and dad.
Deciding quality over quantity was way better, anyway, I pushed away melancholy thoughts, finished my coffee, and got ready for the day.
An hour later, coffee consumed, shower experienced in my amazing luxury walk-in (that was just as good as the one in Lachlan’s guest suite), hair blown dry, and outfit chosen for my first day on the job, I was ready to go. Deciding comfort was a factor, a shopping spree was in my future to supplement my wardrobe. I wore one of only two pairs of skinny jeans I’d packed, along with a T-shirt tucked in the front but loose at the back, and too-big sneakers I’d borrowed from Robyn.
I let myself into the main house and deactivated the alarm, strolling quietly into the laundry room first where I separated colors from whites. Putting a bunch of colors in first, I finished up in there (for now) and wandered into the kitchen. It was only six o’clock, and no one else seemed to be up yet.
Deciding to get coffee ready for Thane, I fiddled around with his fancy coffee machine until I figured it out. After making myself a cup, I decided no other coffee would ever do again. His was amazing. Then the photos on the wall again caught my attention. After Thane got icy and nonresponsive to my question about his wife, I hadn’t wanted to look at the photos too closely in front of him. Alone now, I took my time studying the gallery wall of beautifully framed black-and-white shots.
There were tons of cute photos of the kids and a few of Thane and Fran, some from when they were very young until right up to near her death, I assumed. Again, I wondered how she’d died. Fran was a very pretty brunette, and although I couldn’t tell their color from the black-and-white photos, her light eyes were striking against her dark hair.
It was Thane who surprised me, though.
In the photos of him, younger and beardless, he was shockingly hot.
Not that I couldn’t already tell he was good-looking. But that massive beard hid a very sexy guy who looked a lot like his brother. Staring hard at him in the pics, I realized Thane’s eyes differed from Lachlan’s and were his most attractive feature. They were piercing and intense and soulful and … hot.
Disturbed by how sexy my new boss was, I stumbled away from the photos and told myself it was just the photographs. I didn’t think that about him in real life. The beard totally wasn’t my thing.
At the sound of floorboards creaking above, I set about unloading the dishwasher.
Knowing I’d be too busy later preparing the kids for school, I decided to do their lunches now. I searched the pantry and guessed at what they’d like. Sandwiches made, I then went in search of their lunch boxes. After scouring the kitchen, I finally found cute lunch bags discarded in the mudroom. Eilidh’s was pink with a unicorn riding a rainbow and an attached pocket for her juice bottle; Lewis’s had Pac-Man printed all over his.
I strolled through the hall and stopped at the sight of Thane standing in the kitchen, sipping his coffee. He wore a white shirt and dark gray suit pants, again so incongruous to his unkempt hair and beard. Without turning, his striking eyes slid to the side to look at me over his cup as he drank.
Strange flutters burst to life in my belly.
First-day jitters, I told myself.
“Morning.” I pushed through the weirdness and gave him a small smile. “I was just making the kids’ lunches.” Moving past him, I returned to my spot at the island.
“Good morning. What did you make?” Suddenly I felt the heat of him at my back as he looked over my shoulder.
He smelled good. Not spicy or musky or “cologney.” He smelled fresh and citrusy. So he was a body wash over cologne kinda guy, huh?
Regan, stop thinking about how good he smells.
“Uh … peanut butter and jelly sandwiches.” I half glanced over my shoulder. “Is that okay?”
“They’ve never tried them together like that. It’s an American thing. So we’ll see.” He thankfully moved away, but only to open the fridge and return with two different yogurts. I finally looked up at him and found myself caught in those amazing eyes.
Why had I not noticed how truly spectacular those eyes were?
I really wish you’d stop noticing now!
“Strawberry for Eilidh.” He handed me a yogurt. “Or raspberry or anything with berry in it. No peach, no banana, no vanilla or chocolate … and nothing with bits in them.” His eyes danced with humor. “Eilidh has an issue with food textures.”
I grinned, putting the strawberry yogurt in her lunch bag. “Noted.”
“Lewis will eat anything, but right now he’s on a chocolate pudding kick.” Thane gave me the little pudding cup. “If he doesn’t stop eating them soon, though, we’ll need to force switch him back to a healthier option.”
“Okay. I can do that. What else should go in?”
He reached for his coffee, and my gaze followed the movement. His large hands looked strong, his skin naturally olive-toned, long fingers but big knuckles, veins popping across the top. I wondered if his forearms were veined and strong too.
More flutters in my belly. I guiltily looked away.
Stupid, stupid, stupid.
I had a thing about nice hands on a guy. Nice hands turned me on. And Thane’s were just about the nicest, most masculine pair of hands I’d come across.
They’re just hands.
And he’s your boss.
And stop thinking the word hands!
What. The. Actual. Fuck.
“You okay?” Thane asked.
“Huh? Yeah. Of course, why?”
He studied me with narrowed eyes. “Because you didn’t respond to my answering your question.”
Oh my God.
That’s right, Regan, zone out on the first day on the job. “I’m sorry. What was your answ
er?”
Thane frowned. “You’re sure you’re okay? Did you sleep well in the annex?”
“Like a dream,” I assured him. At his continued frowning, I didn’t want him thinking I was a flake, so I blurted out, “I was staring at your hands.”
His lips parted in surprise. “What?”
Oh, Jesus. Well, you’ve said it now! “The reason I didn’t hear your answer was that I noticed you have … hands.”
Amusement lit up his blue eyes, and I could tell he was struggling not to laugh. “That’s right. I do have hands.”
Flushing with embarrassment, I rolled my eyes at myself. “Right. You have hands. I meant you have nice hands.”
“I have nice hands?” he repeated, still scrutinizing me with a sexy smirk on his beard-surrounded lips. I really wanted to take a trimmer to that thing.
Realizing I was staring at his mouth, I flushed harder and looked down at the kids’ lunches. With a blasé shrug, I replied, “I notice nice hands on people. Probably comes from my god-awful attempt to draw them for about a year of art class in high school. Hands are hard.”
“Hands are hard.” I didn’t have to look at him to know he was laughing at me.
“Anyway, you were saying about the kids’ lunches?”
“Well, hang on a minute.” He stepped closer and held out his left hand before us, his fingers splayed. “Are they nice enough to do some modeling, do you think?”
I gave him a pretend dark look at his drollness.
His eyes sparkled down at me. “Do you think I should start wearing gloves? Are my hands a danger to people’s libidos? Am I causing unwitting chaos every time I bring these puppies out? I mean, if people start daydreaming about them, like you just did, while they’re in a car with me, it could—”
I shoved him playfully. “Shut up!”
Thane gave a bark of attractive laughter, winked, and set his coffee cup down in the sink. “There are snack packs of fruit in the fridge. Grapes for Lewis, raspberries for Eilidh. Stick those in. Fruit juice packs are in the pantry. I’m going up to wake them before I leave.”
There With You Page 10