Max's grin widened. "There's big bucks riding on this, Cat: did you actually forget the cranberry sauce or were you making a neo-classicist culinary statement?"
"Come on, Cat!" Her next-door neighbor John chimed in. "I've got five dollars riding on it."
"Five dollars?" Kate Lawson, town librarian, laughed. "This is a sure thing. I'll up the ante to ten."
"Not even Cat could forget cranberry sauce on Thanksgiving Day," said Cindy in her sweetest voice. "Cat, I wouldn't insult you by making a bet."
She glanced toward McKendrick who watched her with wide, innocent eyes. If he'd said one word to Cindy about the cranberries, then murder by drumstick would be too good for him.
"How much are you in for?" she challenged him. "Ten dollars? Fifty? Don't be shy, Mr. McKendrick. Speak right up. Everyone else is."
McKendrick aimed those green eyes right at her but said nothing.
"Your reputation precedes you, Cat," called out another of the guests. "Most of us were here last year when you showed up dressed as Princess Jasmine for the town's centennial bash."
"It was late October," Cat protested. "I thought it was a Halloween party."
"Come on, Riley," said Mary McGregor. "Are you on Cat's side or the side of the missing cranberries?"
Jenny picked that moment to stroll into the room. "I can't believe you told them about the cranberries," she said to Cat. "I figured once we made it to dessert, we'd be safe."
Everyone present broke into laughter and Cat watched, infuriated, as McKendrick and Max exchanged high fives.
"Very funny, all of you. I hope you had a good laugh at my expense."
"Admit it," said Max, getting that look in his eye that she knew too well. "You and Jenny are hanging on by a thread."
"Don't drag me into this, Maxwell Bernstein!" Jenny's tone was the same one she used on the kids when they wouldn't turn out the lights. "I'm just an employee here."
"Jenny!" Cat was appalled by her friend's treachery.
"You know what I'm talking about," Jenny said, meeting Cat's eyes. "It's your house, Cat. I just follow orders."
"Jenny's right." Riley McKendrick's voice cut through the laughter and bickering. "You own the house. You set the rules. The buck stops with you."
"I don't know what's happening here," Cat said. "We're talking cranberries, not war crimes."
"The cranberries are just a symptom," Max said solemnly.
"Oh for God's sake," Jenny muttered. "Why don't you stick a sock in it, Max?"
"My thoughts exactly. Why is it the people with the least experience are the ones most eager to offer advice?" Cat glanced toward McKendrick who was watching her with undisguised interest. "Are you married, Mr. McKendrick?"
His thick dark brows slid toward the bridge of his nose in a scowl. "No."
"Do you have any kids?"
"No, but--"
"I rest my case." She folded her arms across her chest and smiled. "How would you know what it takes to run a home? This isn't a corporation. Real people live here, or haven't you noticed?"
Scooter chose that moment to bound through the dining room with Sara's favorite Barbie doll clamped between his slobbery jaws and Sara in close pursuit.
"I noticed," said McKendrick as everyone in the room once again erupted into laughter.
"Six kids, Mr. McKendrick. Six cats, four kittens, three dogs, and a litter of puppies. We have enough variables to throw IBM's finest computer into a terminal tailspin. Who has the time to work out a new routine? We barely have time to breathe."
McKendrick leaned back in his chair, a dangerous glint in his eyes. "You creative types--all you do is complain about how busy you are. If you'd apply some sound business techniques to the house, you'd"
"I'll tell you what you can do with your sound business techniques." Her son Jack appeared in the doorway and she took a deep breath and struggled to rein in her temper. "We both know you'd rather be anywhere than here. Why did you accept my invitation?
"Why did you invite me when you didn't want to?" he countered.
"Max said you were going to be alone for Thanksgiving."
"And you have this thing about taking in strays."
She glanced down at the kittens nipping at her ankles. "You could say that."
"I'm not big on family celebrations." The glint in his eyes turned to ice. "And I don't put a lot of store in holidays."
"Which is probably why you were going to be by yourself on Thanksgiving." There it was again, that look of loneliness she'd noticed yesterday, the same look that had tugged at her heartstrings. She wasn't going to fall for that a second time. He could look lonelier than the Maytag repairman for all she cared. She wasn't buying it. "If you think dinner was a prelude to a business contract, you're dead wrong. You have nothing I need. Absolutely nothing."
He shoved back his chair and stood up, all six feet plus of rippling, ticked-off male pulchritude towering over the assembled group. "You're a coward, Zaslow. You don't have the guts to change your ways."
"And you're a blowhard, McKendrick. All talk and no action."
"You want action?" He strode off with Cat right behind him. "You need a demolition crew in here, not a housekeeper."
"The foyer?" she said, skidding to a stop behind him. "What's wrong with the foyer?" She'd never paid much attention to the foyer before except to race through it on her way out the door.
Okay, so it wasn't House Beautiful. Two card tables were pushed together with folding chairs arranged around them. Chunks of turkey and stuffing littered the floor. Big deal. It was Thanksgiving. You had to expect chaos on family holidays.
"It was the only place we could put the kids," she said by way of explanation not apology. "What should I do, have them eat outside?" Then she noticed the pile of galoshes stacked near the front door, right beside a tangle of tube socks and a pink ballet slipper. A basketball was balanced on the bottom step and enough Disney figurines to populate a condo were strewn across the desk. Red and yellow plastic blocks, a skateboard, and a vintage bright purple Barney doll were scattered like breadcrumbs across the tile floor that had been shiny and pristine just hours before.
As if that wasn't bad enough, she watched in horror as he reached for the door to the coat closet. Adrenaline flooded her body as he closed his hand around the knob.
"Open that door," Cat warned, "and it'll be the last thing you ever do." She wondered what would happen if she leaped for his throat and tried to wrestle him to the ground.
"What the hell do you have in there, dead bodies?"
"Dead time management experts and there's room for one more."
"I'll bet there isn't room for a dead gnat in this closet, Zaslow."
"I suppose you think I should be thankful you'd even consider whipping my humble abode into shape. I can just imagine the sob story Max laid on you." She brushed her hair off her face with a quick, angry gesture. "Frazzled widow with five kids, living on the ragged edge of disaster, waiting for Mr. Wonderful to ride in on a white horse and save them all."
"Sorry to disappoint you, Zaslow, but the only reason I said yes was because Max called in a marker. I usually don't waste my time on small domestic jobs."
"Small domestic jobs?" She almost crowed with delight. "There are no small domestic jobs, McKendrick. Only small experts who can't stand the heat."
"I whipped the White House staff into shape in two weeks, Zaslow. There's nothing you can throw at me that could be any worse."
You haven't seen the inside of that closet yet, cowboy. "You're a typical man, McKendrick. Real life sends you running for cover."
"I'm not running."
"You want to," she said. "You know you've met your match and it's scaring you to death."
He moved toward her, all menace and male indignation. "Forty-eight hours," he said, his voice as close to a growl as a human being's could be. "That's all I need."
"You'd never last that long."
"Try me."
The breath left her body
in a loud whoosh as a vivid series of erotic vignettes danced before her eyes, all of which featured McKendrick in various stages of undress. She must be losing her mind. Good grief, she didn't even like him.
Did she?
"Max told me what you charge," she said, struggling to regain her composure. "If you ask me, you're overpaid."
"No charge," he shot back. "All I want is forty-eight hours."
"What's in it for you?"
"Satisfaction." He grinned. "I want to see you eat your words."
"Then you're going to have a long wait, because I'd rather eat ground worms." She poked him in the stomach with her forefinger. Or tried to. The man had abs like steel beams. "You can have your forty-eight hours, McKendrick, but when they're over I expect an apology."
He glanced at his watch. "The forty-eight hours begin now?"
"They begin now." Smiling, she reached for the closet doorknob. Victory would be swift.
And very, very sweet.
Chapter Four
Around eight o'clock the guests began to say goodnight. Riley shook hands with a lot of friendly people who laughed even as they wished him luck.
"Fortitude, old man," said one of Cat's neighbors by way of goodbye. "It's always darkest before the dawn."
"What the hell does that mean?" Riley turned toward Max as the man hurried out the front door. "Isn't that what they say before you go off to war?"
At eight o'clock he didn't know what that meant, but by nine-thirty he understood.
Riley might have whipped the White House staff into shape but he'd never been faced with six kids all under the age of twelve, a housekeeper whose idea of organization involved empty cereal boxes and lots of new Tupperware, and a woman who made her living murdering people for fun and profit.
It was enough to make a man yearn for political egos and governmental interference.
"Problems?" Cat asked sweetly as she passed through the living room en route to the kitchen with a tray of dirty glasses.
He gave her his best you've-got-to-be-kidding look. "Everything's under control. I'm surveying the scene."
"Sure you are," she said, then laughed her way into the kitchen.
She didn't know how funny it was. When it came to home and family, Riley hadn't a clue. He understood productivity and the bottom line; he understood efficiency and economy of motion, two concepts that hadn't found their way to Cat Zaslow's Connecticut farmhouse. What was it about some people that made them buck like an unbroken mare at the thought of organization?
Take the traffic pattern. It had taken him all of thirty seconds to see how bad it was but Cat and company seemed oblivious to the drawbacks. You couldn't get from point A to point B without side trips to X, Y, and Z. Hell, they probably wasted two work days a year just walking around the dog bed parked in the entrance to the living room.
Cat had said you couldn't organize kids but it seemed to Riley you could at least organize their belongings into something resembling order. Give him five minutes and he could draw up a diagram of an efficient way to handle kids' toys, rubber boots, and sleepy cats without so much as breaking a sweat.
And the coat closet. You didn't need a degree in industrial design to know what was going on in there. Some people claimed Jimmy Hoffa was buried beneath the goal post at the old Giants Stadium. Riley wouldn't be surprised to find that the Teamsters boss was buried in Cat's closet somewhere behind the winter coats.
There wasn't much in this world that fazed him, but when she'd opened the closet door and a huge orange tom cat exploded into the foyer, dragging a pair of panty hose and a red-and-white woolen scarf behind him, he'd considered cutting his losses and admitting defeat. The last time he'd seen anything like that closet it had had a sign marked "Bomb Site" posted in front of it.
But what really scared him was the fact that he was the only one who seemed to notice. These people acted as if pandemonium was business as usual. Kittens slept on the steps like scruffy bedroom slippers. A pair of puppies played tug-of-war under the dining room table. And there were more geriatric dogs and cats scattered through the house than you could shake a bag of kibble at. Factor a half-dozen kids and two artsy women into the equation and it was no wonder the house resembled a land-locked Titanic.
Yet despite everything they all seemed happy. Sure, he'd heard the usual squabbling among the kids but he'd also sensed something deeper, a connection from which they drew strength. Family bonds were a mystery to Riley. He'd lost his parents before his second birthday and his grandmother before his third. Eighteen different foster families in a dozen years had taught him how to adapt to situations. He learned quickly how to control what could be controlled in life and he overcame the rest by sheer will power.
Blood ties were the only unbreakable bonds left in the world. You didn't walk away from your own flesh and blood. Biology wouldn't let you. Cat Zaslow's kids had no idea how lucky they were. They'd lost their father but they still had the woman who'd given birth to them and that was what made the difference.
He'd noticed the way she looked at her children, her blue eyes aglow with love, and he'd wondered if anyone had ever looked at him that way...or if anyone ever would.
He moved through the living room to the family room. Two of Cat's sons were sprawled on the overstuffed brown couch, watching Spiderman. They didn't pay him any mind but that didn't surprise Riley. At their age most adults were pretty much invisible. A litter of popcorn, candy wrappers, and crayons lay scattered on the floor around them. The end table groaned beneath a tower of schoolbooks while the piano near the window played host to three house plants struggling for life.
Hadn't these people ever heard of desks? Bookshelves? Shovels?
He avoided the kitchen for the time being, mainly because Cat and Jenny were in there, and made his way through the hall to her office at the rear of the house. At least this room had shelves and a desk. It also boasted filing cabinets, mountains of paper, and more electronic equipment than you'd find in FBI headquarters.
A boy of seven or eight years of age peered up at Riley from behind a stack of bright red corduroy cushions piled up under the window.
"My mom doesn't like anyone in her office."
Riley crouched down next to him. "You're Jack, aren't you?"
The boy took a good look at him then threw back his head and yelled, "Moo-ooo-ooom!"
Riley winced. The kid made up in volume what he lacked in size. "What's that all about?"
The kid also shared Cat's talent for dirty looks. "This is my mom's office. You can't come in."
"You're in here."
"That's different. I'm allowed."
Cat appeared in the doorway. "What are you doing in here?" she demanded.
To Riley's amazement she was looking directly at him. "What do you think I'm doing?"
"Trespassing."
The little boy looked up at her. "What's trespassing, mom?"
Riley'd never seen her smile like that before, kind of warm and womanly and very appealing. "Trespassing means going where you don't belong, Jack."
"Don't look at me," Riley said. "A hundred dollar bet gives me the right."
"You're pushing your luck, cowboy," she said in a pleasant tone of voice. "This office is off-limits to you."
"I told you," said Jack, looking as smug as his mother. "My mom only lets me sit in here. Sarah's a girl and she can't even come in here."
"That's right," said Cat, ruffling the child's glossy black hair. "Jack's going to be a writer when he grows up. He likes to sit at my desk."
"Not if he can't find it."
The look she shot him would have qualified as a deadly weapon in at least seventeen states.
"Why don't you get ready for bed," she suggested to the child, "and I'll come tuck you in when you're done."
"But, mom, I--"
"Go ahead." She pressed a kiss to the top of his head. "I want to talk to Mr. McKendrick."
"Better scatter breadcrumbs," Riley called after the boy. He'd need
them.
***
It was bad enough having the cowboy in her house.
Seeing him in her office was more than she could take.
"Out." She pointed toward the door. "Right now. This is private property."
"This is an office."
"It's my office and I want you out of here."
He bent down and inspected the row of sunbleached Smurfs lined up across the windowsill. "I've got to start somewhere."
"Not here, cowboy. This room is off-limits." She tried her best to ignore the cobwebs dancing inches above his head.
He gestured toward the piles of paper, books, and magazines stacked up on every available surface. "When was the last time you actually saw your desk?"
She refused to answer.
"You need help, Zaslow." He'd said the same words to her before but this time the sound of his voice sent a ripple of pleasure up her spine. Apparently male pulchritude could make a fool of even the most unlikely of women.
"Can't wait to get your hands on my filing system, can you, McKendrick?"
His grin was wondrously wicked. "Among other things."
She opened her mouth to say something but the words didn't come. Quick-witted Cat Zaslow, the woman who made a living with words, was speechless.
Too bad Riley wasn't. "The bedrooms are on the second floor, aren't they?"
"Yes, but--" He turned and strode from the room. "McKendrick!" She started after him. "Just where do you think you're going?"
"Upstairs." He didn't break stride.
"Oh no, you're not." She threw herself in front of him, a perfect imitation of a human roadblock.
"That's where the bedrooms are, isn't it?"
"My bedroom, the kids' bedrooms, Jenny's bedroom, but not--and I repeat, not--your bedroom."
"You said stay out of your office. You didn't mention the bedroom. I'm six-four, Zaslow. I haven't slept on a couch since I was seventeen."
"I don't care if you sleep on the floor as long as you don't do it here." Damn the man. Damn the effect he had on her equilibrium. "I'm not running a hotel here, McKendrick. You can find your own accomodations."
The Marrying Man Page 4