The Texas Ranger's Nanny

by Rebecca Winters

  You escaped tonight, Claire, but tomorrow it’s going to be a different story.

  * * *

  DR. MARSHALL STUDIED Vic as he walked into his office and sat down for their Monday session.

  “You know what? You look rested. What’s gone on at your house?”

  Vic filled him in on the activities of the weekend. The psychiatrist smiled. “It used to be a boy and his dog.”

  “I know. Daken acts like a dog, but he can’t sleep in the house, which is a good thing.”

  The doctor laughed. When it subsided he said, “Something else has changed.”

  “Yes. It has,” Vic said definitively. “I know what you were getting at during our last session, and you were right. I’ve been upset for a long time by a situation that has been out of my control. Trying to hide it all these months from everyone turned my emotions into a volcano threatening to blow.

  “The kidnapping was the catalyst that caused the eruption. When I confronted Leroy, who sat there knowing where my son was without saying anything, all my anger and frustration came together, and I exploded.”

  The older man smiled. “Good.”

  “I’m in love with my nanny, but all these months I’ve been afraid to do anything about it because I hired her to help me with my son, not to pursue her. I was afraid to reach out to her because she never gave me any sign that she might be interested in me that way.

  “After the kidnapping happened, she helped me look for Jeremy. I loved her and my son so much, yet I couldn’t do anything about either problem. What if I ended up losing both of them? The more Leroy sat there with his head bowed not saying a word, the angrier I got, until I couldn’t take it another second.”

  “What do you think you’ve learned from this experience?”

  “That there will always be times when certain situations are out of my control. That’s when I need to identify them early enough to take a step back.”

  He nodded. “Are you planning to do something about your nanny?”

  “Absolutely. When I leave here, I’m going to have it out with her.”

  “And if she doesn’t give you the answer you want?”

  “I’ll have to deal with it, just like Jeremy. But I don’t feel angry anymore.”

  “What do you feel?”

  “Surprised that it took coming to you before I could see what I was doing by not admitting my feelings about her to myself. I was afraid that by owning up to them, I might lose her, so I kept putting it off, obviously to my own detriment.”

  “You’ve learned a lot. I thought we’d have to do more sessions for you to reach this point. Tell you what I’m going to do. I’ll fax your boss a letter stating that you’re ready to get back on the job with the proviso that you meet with me once a week for the next month. I want to see you next Monday and we’ll talk some more.”

  Vic let out the breath he was holding. “Thank you, Dr. Marshall.”

  “Feel like you’ve been let out of jail?”

  “You know it.”

  “Your boss will be happy to have you back.”

  They shook hands and he left with renewed excitement. He could get back to work, but right now all he could think about was Claire.

  It was just ten o’clock. The session hadn’t taken long. On the drive home he called Nate’s mom. She informed him Claire had brought Jeremy over to play. She’d drop him off at one.

  Vic thanked her and hung up before calling Kit to tell him the good news. His friend was out on a case, so he left the message on his voice mail. He’d probably hear from TJ before the day was out. He phoned Clint and had to leave the same message with him on his voice mail.

  After that he left messages with his friends Cy and Luckey. No one was available, but it didn’t matter. At the moment he was on his way home to Claire and couldn’t think about anything else.

  The cleaning service van was leaving just as Vic pulled into the driveway. He waved to them. After parking, he hurried into the house. “Claire?”

  “In Jeremy’s room!”

  He headed in that direction. “What are you doing? I just saw the cleaners leave.”

  “They do a great job, but Jeremy left his spy stuff on the bed. I want the room to look tidy when you show the women around.”

  She’d dressed in an attractive, short-sleeved khaki dress with a rope belt. He could hardly take his eyes off her while she put Jeremy’s stuff in the backpack.

  “There. It’s done.” She lifted her eyes to him. “Are you hungry? I can fix you something.”

  “No, thanks. We need to talk.”

  “How was your session with Dr. Marshall?”

  “First things first. Shall we go in the family room?”

  His comment seemed to take her back. “Sure.” She preceded him into the other room and sat down in one of the leather chairs.

  Vic perched on the arm of the couch opposite her. “Jeremy told me he spent part of the night in your bed. Do you want to go first and tell me the thrust of the conversation? If not, I’ll tell you what we talked about when he got in my bed.”

  Color seeped into her face. There was no mistaking the pinkish tinge. He waited. There was no response.

  “According to Jeremy, you love me.”

  He heard a sharp intake of breath before she said, “My conversation with him was in the reverse of yours. He told me you loved me.”

  “During the night it appears my son decided to take the matter of your leaving into his own hands and fix everything.”

  “He’s nothing if not straightforward,” she muttered.

  “Unlike his father when it comes to matters of the heart,” Vic admitted.

  “You lost your heart to your wife. Jeremy isn’t old enough to understand the kind of pain you went through.”

  “I’ve been telling myself the same thing for quite a while, until he told me you took a picture of me the night Jeremy was missing. That’s when I realized I’ve underestimated him. He gets everything.”

  She stirred restlessly. “What do you mean?”

  “He figured out there was a reason why you took that picture when I didn’t know about it.”

  “I took it so that when he saw it, he would know how exhausted you were while you were out trying to find him,” she defended. “It proved your love for him.”

  “In his mind it proved something else, too.”

  “That I love you?” she fired. “I have learned to love you in my own way, Vic. You’re a remarkable man and father, loved by your friends and family. What’s there not to love about you?”

  “I could say the same thing to you. I’ve loved you for a long time. After the way you helped me find Jeremy, I can’t find the words.”

  She got up from the chair. “We made a good team.”

  He shook his head. “I despise that term. It doesn’t begin t—”

  “Claire?” a familiar voice cried out, interrupting what he was going to say. “Dad?”

  Vic frowned. “In the family room, sport.”

  He came running into Vic’s arm. They hugged hard. “How come you came home so soon?”

  “I have a stomachache and told Nate’s mom I didn’t want to stay there.”

  Vic’s glance met Claire’s over Jeremy’s dark head. “Then I’m glad you’re here. Do you want to lie down in your room?”

  “No. I want to stay in here with you and Claire.” He curled up on the couch just as Vic’s cell rang.

  He pulled the phone from his pocket. It was Nate’s mom. He clicked On. She started to apologize, but he cut her off. “No explanation is necessary. Thank you for letting him play there as long as you did and driving him home. He’s fine now and will talk to Nate later.” He clicked Off.

  Jeremy lay there looking at both of them with his w
arm brown eyes. “Is everything okay?”

  “Of course,” Claire assured him. “Why wouldn’t it be?”

  He sat up. “Are you two going to get married?”

  In an instant, Claire lost color. “You know what? While you two talk, I’m going in the kitchen to fix us some lunch. Maybe by the time it’s ready, your tummy won’t hurt so much.”

  His son’s timing to come home couldn’t have been worse. After she disappeared, Vic walked over and sat in the chair she’d vacated. Jeremy swung his legs to the floor. “Is Claire mad at me?”

  “I don’t think so.”

  “I bet she is.”

  “Why?”

  “Because she wouldn’t answer me.”

  “That’s because she couldn’t.”

  “How come?”

  “A lady waits for the man to ask her to marry him.”

  “Oh. So you haven’t asked her?”

  “No.”

  “But you said you loved her, and she said she loved you.”

  Vic had to weigh what he was about to say with the greatest care. “Is that what you want? For us to get married?”

  A smile broke out on his face. “Yeah. I wanted you to get married a long time ago.”

  Good grief. “Just because two people love each other, it doesn’t always mean that they get married.”

  Jeremy slid off the couch. “Don’t you want to marry her?”

  “Maybe she doesn’t want to marry me. Some women wouldn’t like to be married to a lawman. You know Nate’s dad?”

  “Yeah.”

  “He works in hospital administration. He goes to work at eight in the morning and comes home at five every night. Nate’s mom doesn’t have to wonder where he is or how long he’ll be gone.”

  “But Claire doesn’t worry about you when you’re gone on cases. She knows you have a job to do.”

  “That’s true because she’s your nanny. I hired her to watch out for you. But if I asked her to marry me, she might say that she doesn’t want to be married to a Texas Ranger. Some women would be too afraid.”

  His son moved closer to him. “She wasn’t afraid when I got kidnapped. She helped you find me. She’s awesome!”

  Vic had no answer to counter Jeremy’s faultless logic. “You’re right.”

  “Why don’t you ask her and find out?”

  “I can’t do it right now. We need to eat lunch first, and then those ladies who would like to be a nanny are coming over here to meet you.”

  His face scrunched up in a frown. “I don’t want to meet them.”

  “We have to, but if you don’t like any of them, we’ll talk about it after they leave.”

  “Do you promise to ask Claire to marry you?”

  “Tell you what. I promise to talk to her about everything tonight after you’re in bed. Do we have a deal?”

  It took him a minute to say yes. Then they walked to the kitchen together. Claire looked up at them. “Lunch is ready. Come and sit. Grilled cheese sandwiches and tomato soup.”

  “Yum.”

  She smiled at Jeremy. “Sounds like your tummy is feeling better.”

  “The pain’s not so bad now.”

  “That’s good.”

  * * *

  ALL FOUR OF the women who showed up at the house were in their twenties. Claire found each one physically attractive in her own way. All four couldn’t take their eyes off Vic. No doubt Claire had reacted the same way when she’d met him. Jaw-dropping gorgeous was a term Kaye had used in referring to Claire’s employer.

  After unloading the marriage bomb, Jeremy turned out to be a model of decorum during the interviews. His deed was done. That child...

  Whatever he and his father had talked about before lunch had helped Jeremy to behave like the sweet boy he was. He took each nanny wannabe on a tour of the house and showed her his bedroom.

  At the end of each interview, Vic and Jeremy would take the applicant out to the barn to show her the horses. Claire asked each of them a few questions and answered theirs. When Vic accompanied the last applicant to the front door, Claire and Jeremy waited for him in the family room so they could talk.

  He walked in, but didn’t sit. “They were all very nice. I know what I think, and I’m pretty sure Claire knows what she thinks. However the most important person here is you, Jeremy. We want to hear your impressions.”

  “They were okay I guess, but none of them wanted to pet Daken. The first one wore too much perfume. She asked me how come you weren’t married, Dad.”

  His dark brows lifted. “Nothing about your favorite foods or what you liked to do after school?”

  “Nope.”

  “Oh, yeah. She told me she’s afraid of horses.”

  “Did you tell her she had to water and feed the horses sometimes?” Claire wanted to know.

  “Yes, but she didn’t say anything. Oh, and you know that one with the long black ponytail?”

  Vic nodded. Claire thought she looked very exotic.

  “She kept asking me how many girlfriends you had. I showed her my picture album, but all she did was stare at your pictures.”

  By now Vic was looking frustrated.

  “The one in those high heels stumbled in my room.”

  “Oh, no—” Claire exclaimed, trying to hold back a laugh.

  “She fell on the bed. When I asked her if she was okay, she got mad and told me it was nothing. I didn’t like her ’cause she wasn’t nice. Oh yeah, and she’s never heard of Wolverine, but she asked me a lot of questions about Mom.”

  “Dare I ask about the last applicant?” came the voice of ice. Claire couldn’t look at Vic or she’d burst her seams.

  “Well, she asked if I had an extra picture of you in your Ranger uniform she could have.”

  “What?”

  “I told her the Rangers don’t wear uniforms, but when you have to be in a parade you put on your white hat.”

  There was no holding back now. Claire burst into laughter that reverberated throughout the family room. Vic was clearly upset, but that didn’t stop her from enjoying this moment.

  “Jeremy Malone. You made all of that up.”

  “No, I didn’t. Honest. They all asked me something else, too, but I’m not going to tell you what.”

  “How come? Why stop now?”

  “It’s a secret. Now that they’re gone, can I go out to the barn and make sure Daken is all right?”

  “Go on,” Vic muttered. He was clearly in a foul mood.

  Claire studied the face of the man she loved. “Honest, he wasn’t lying, Vic. You are attractive and your picture has been in the paper and on TV several times in the past year. You’re a Texas Ranger, a phenomenon, to these young women who’d love to take care of your son. They aren’t shallow, they were just awestruck.”

  He took a deep breath. “You didn’t act like that.”

  “You had no idea what I was thinking. I wanted to ask Jeremy dozens of questions about you, but I knew he’d tell you everything I said so I kept my mouth shut.”

  Amusement lurked in the depths of his gorgeous black eyes. “That’s because you’re too smart for your own good.”

  “I know a good thing when it comes along, and I wanted that job. My sisters were older and I always wished I’d had a brother, but it didn’t happen. The minute I met Jeremy I thought he was exactly the kind of little brother I would have wanted. The perfect age. He’s funny and creative and kind. After meeting you I thought, throw in the father, too, since his son is a chip off the old block.”

  He moved toward her. “So you thought of me as an old block?”

  “Well, there are all kinds of blocks in all kinds of sizes and shapes, some more interesting than others. When Jeremy told me you could eat a whol
e box of Lucky Charms and a quart of milk out of the mixing bowl without stopping, I knew I wanted to be your son’s nanny.”

  A heartbreaking smile broke out on his Vic’s face. “You mean that’s what it took to get you to come to work for me?”

  “That and the way the two of you walk. It’s amazing, really. The way you hold yourselves, the set of your bodies, they’re identical. It’s fun to watch you when you’re together side by side.”

  “I like to watch you, too, the way you walk, run, smile, laugh, the way your hair attracts the sunlight and turns the strands to gold, how good you always smell.”

  The words she’d only dreamed of him saying to her caused her heart to thud, but the moment was ruined when they heard the front doorbell. She couldn’t believe the horrible timing. “Maybe one of the nanny applicants has come back for some reason. Do you want me to get it?”

  “No, thanks. I’ll do it and get rid of her quick.” He charged out of the room while she stood there trembling.

  A minute later she heard male voices, and before she knew it, Kit walked into the family room with Vic. The other Ranger wore an excited expression.

  “It’s nice to see you, Claire. What a difference from a few nights ago.”

  “I don’t even want to think about it. How are you?”

  “Great, now that Vic has been put back on the job. TJ has taken Rodriguez off the case and reassigned me to help Vic, since I was in on it from the start. I came straight here from headquarters. I’ve looked at the file and found something we ought to check out.”

  Claire knew what that kind of news meant to Vic. “That’s great that you’re back on the job, Vic!” She looked at Jeremy’s father. “Did you know when you came home from your session this morning?”

  “Dr. Marshall told me he was going to fax TJ and tell him I was ready to get back to work.”

  “Your boss works fast.”

  Vic nodded. “Now I need to tell Jeremy, but I’ll wait until I put him to bed.”

  “I think that’s a good idea. I’ll start dinner for you. After we eat, you’ll have to go out to the barn, Kit. Jeremy has acquired a new horse.”

  “You’re kidding.”

  “I know how much you love horses. He’ll want to show you himself.”