“That won’t be necessary, I’m sure.”
Her father’s intent gaze was fixed on Slade. “You work close by?”
“Actually, I work at home. I’m a computer software designer.”
“He’s the best,” Timmy said with unmistakable pride. “You should see some of the stuff he’s created. It’s awesome. I’ve only beat one of his games once. Kevin can’t beat them at all. And everybody says we’re computer whizzes.”
“I just do those games for you guys,” Slade reminded them. “I get paid for designing business and investment programs.”
“Fancy that,” Trent said.
He looked a little too fascinated for Dani’s liking. She jumped in. “Well, I’m sure Mr. Watkins would like to get to work, Daddy. We should let him go.”
Amusement lit her father’s eyes. “Don’t rush the man off, Dani. We were just getting acquainted.” He turned back to Slade. “I can’t say that I know too much about computers, but I’d be mighty interested in seeing what you do sometime.”
Before Slade could reply, he added, “Maybe now, if it’s not too much of an imposition.”
The very thought of her father going off with Slade Watkins made Dani’s blood run cold. “You can’t,” she blurted at once.
Both men stared at her.
“Why the devil not?” her father demanded.
Heaven help her, Dani thought, as she said, “Because I need you here.”
Her father seemed intrigued by that, especially since she’d been declaring her independence from him for the past decade. She hadn’t accepted so much as advice on snow shoveling in all that time. Not that that had kept him from offering unsolicited advice on every subject imaginable.
“Really?” he said. “To do what?”
“You can supervise while the boys scrub the porch.”
Her father’s eyes sparkled with merriment. “That would be the porch stained with blueberries?”
“That’s the one.”
He turned back to Slade and shrugged. “I guess we’ll have to do it another time.”
Dani noticed that Slade appeared almost as relieved as she was. Apparently he’d detected all those fatherly undercurrents, too.
“You’re welcome anytime,” he assured her father politely before his gaze settled on Dani again. “Are you sure…?”
“If you ask me that one more time, I’m going to be insulted,” Dani told him. “Go on to work and don’t worry about a thing. Anything I can’t handle, I’m sure Daddy can.” She shot a pointed look at her father. “He’s always wanted a houseful of little boys to mold in his own image.”
“I’ll be back by five,” Slade promised. “Unless you need me before then.”
“Five will be just fine,” she said, wondering how she’d live through the hours until she caught the next glimpse of him. Lordy, but just the sight of the man was addictive. What would happen if they turned out to be compatible, too? Her body would probably go up in flames from internal combustion.
When Slade had finally departed with obvious reluctance, her father gazed at her. “Interesting man, wouldn’t you say?”
“Yes,” Dani said, then briskly turned her attention to the boys. “Let’s get busy with the porch, shall we?” She beamed at her father. “Daddy, I was serious. You can supervise.”
“I figured you made that up just to keep me from chasing after your young man.”
Dani shot a worried look at the boys. Fortunately they weren’t paying any attention. They were trying to coax Pirate into chasing a Frisbee.
“Slade is not my young man.”
“Whatever,” her father said. “At any rate, I thought I’d run on over to visit Ashley for a bit. See how things are coming with that fool business she’s started up. Whoever heard of making money by teaching women how to fix their faces?”
If Dani had ever suffered from sibling rivalry or a desire for revenge, she would have let him go, but she figured her sister deserved a break just this once. Besides, keeping him here might break the gossip chain, at least until suppertime when he went back to the ranch.
“I need you here,” she insisted.
“In a pig’s eye,” he retorted. “But I’ll stay.” He grinned at the boys, who’d given up on getting Pirate’s attention. “Can’t have a woman getting herself all mussed up doing men’s work, can we?”
Timmy and Kevin seemed intrigued by the notion that the scrubbing they were about to do qualified as “men’s work.” Dani left the three of them with buckets of sudsy water, stiff brushes and the hose. Pirate finally roused himself from his spot in the sun and began racing through the showers of water, barking his fool head off. The noise was deafening…and wonderful.
When Dani came back to check on them an hour later with milk and fresh-baked cinnamon rolls, she found all of them soaking wet from head to toe. Her father looked more bedraggled than she could ever recall seeing him. He usually prided himself on his dapper appearance. As for the porch, the supposed object of all their energy, it looked only marginally better.
“It’s going to take some paint,” Timmy told her excitedly. “Uncle Trent says we can pick any color we want.”
“Uncle Trent said that, did he?” She regarded her father sweetly. “Did he stop to consider what kind of taste you two boys might have?”
Her father winced at that. “We won’t do anything too outlandish, will we, boys? Maybe a nice bright yellow.”
“Yeah,” Kevin said. “Yellow’s a really happy color.”
Her father squeezed Kevin’s shoulder. “Then yellow it is.” He beamed at Dani. “Haven’t had this much fun in a long time. Come on, boys. Let’s get on over to the hardware store.”
“Before we have cinnamon rolls?” Timmy asked plaintively, eyeing the tray that was still in Dani’s hand.
“Well, of course not,” her father told him. “I can’t imagine what I was thinking of. Grab a few and we’ll eat ‘em as we walk over there. That’ll keep our energy up for sure.”
Dani watched the three of them head off down the street. The six-foot-two rancher and his two pint-size companions made quite a picture. They hadn’t gone far when Dani realized something about herself she’d never known before. She was capable of deep, gut-wrenching jealousy. She wanted those boys to be chattering excitedly to her, not her father.
She reminded herself sternly that it was just one day. And there was a good reason for putting them into her father’s capable hands. It was to keep him, not the boys, out of mischief.
She stood back and stared at the porch and tried to envision it being bright yellow. It would be…colorful, she concluded.
And happy, just as Kevin said. She was smiling by the time she went back inside.
* * *
“It’s awfully quiet in here,” Slade observed suspiciously when he returned promptly at five that evening. He looked as if he’d expected to find the house burned down or, at the very least, in ruins. “Where are the boys? Did you tie them up and gag them?”
“They’re taking a nap,” Dani told him. “They were completely tuckered out from painting the porch. Or maybe it was from the fumes of all the turpentine it took to get the yellow paint off them afterward.”
Slade’s blue eyes widened. “You actually let them paint the porch?”
“Daddy supervised–in a manner of speaking, anyway. He has some surprisingly lax ideas about supervision. He sure wasn’t that way when we were growing up. He told me he was encouraging their creativity.”
“Oh, God,” Slade moaned. “What did they paint?”
“Aside from the porch?”
“Exactly.”
“I believe the petunias are now yellow. And you might want to check Pirate for any lingering traces of the flower they tried to paint on his back. I curbed their little imaginations before they could touch up my hubcaps.”
“Dear heaven. No wonder you convinced them to take naps. I’m surprised you didn’t knock them out.”
“I didn’t convince them, exactly,”
she admitted. “They sat down to look at a video and the next thing I knew, they were out on the sofa. Should I wake them?”
“Heavens, no,” Slade said.
He said it with such heartfelt fervor that Dani chuckled. “They don’t give you much of a break, do they?”
“They’re just young and energetic, I know,” Slade said. “But sometimes I swear they were put on this earth just to exhaust me.”
“Well, take a break now. I baked cookies earlier. Have some.” She put the plate on the kitchen table. “Milk or iced tea?”
“Iced tea would be terrific.”
She poured him a glass, then sat across from him. “I’m sure most worn-out parents feel that way about their kids at one time or another,” Dani said.
“But every day?” Slade asked.
“Maybe you should explain the concept of quiet time,” she suggested.
“I did. That’s why I bought them each a computer. I thought they’d sit there quietly and play the games I created. I made them practically impossible to beat, so they would be totally absorbed.”
“Did it work?”
“They yell at the computer,” he said wearily. “Then they race back and forth between their rooms to see if the other one is winning.”
“Sibling rivalry,” Dani suggested. “It’s natural. They’re also very protective of each other. You saw how they united to stand up for each other yesterday. That kind of loyalty at their age is terrific.”
He gazed across the kitchen table at her. “Is that the way it is for you and your sisters?”
“Most of the time,” she admitted with a grin. “You haven’t met Sara or Ashley yet, have you?”
“No, but the tales are legendary. I’m sure I even heard a few when I visited here as a kid. A few people have gone so far as to suggest that the three of you were every bit as bad as my kids.”
“Ashley and Sara, maybe,” Dani said with a grin. “Not me. I was an angel.”
He surveyed her intently, then said softly, “I can believe it.”
Dani shivered all the way to her toes. Swallowing hard, she asked, “Do you have brothers or sisters?”
“No. Maybe that’s why I’m constantly amazed by the mischief the boys get into. I was a quiet, only child.”
“A computer nerd,” Dani said, regarding him with skepticism.
“Yep.”
“You don’t look like any computer nerd I ever met,” she said before she realized exactly what she was saying. Embarrassment flooded her cheeks with color.
Slade laughed. “Have you known many?”
“Now that I think about it, you’re actually the first I’ve seen. In person, anyway. Computers have been slow coming to Riverton. People around here believe in doing things the old-fashioned way.”
“Still adding and subtracting with an abacus?” he teased.
“Not exactly,” she quipped right back. “We discovered the calculator recently. It’s improved the quality of life quite a bit.”
He winked at her. “Just wait until I teach you all the tricks a computer can do.”
Dani seriously doubted that learning computer skills would be half as instructional as an hour or two in private with Slade Watkins. Her imagination went into overdrive considering what she could discover with his lips on hers and her hands exploring that fascinating expanse of chest. She flushed just thinking about it.
Unfortunately, her straying thoughts caused her to miss whatever it was Slade had said.
“Hmm?” she murmured.
“I asked if you’d like to have dinner with us tonight,” he repeated. “I could give you a crash course.”
“A crash course?” she repeated blankly.
“In computers. I suspect sooner or later the boys are going to want to drag their laptops over here. You’d better have some idea what they’re up to.”
“Oh.” She tried to keep the disappointment out of her voice.
“Is Dani coming to dinner tonight?” Kevin inquired sleepily, coming over to stand beside his father.
“I’ve asked,” Slade told him. “She hasn’t answered.”
“Please,” Kevin said, regarding her hopefully.
With two pairs of blue eyes focused on her, Dani couldn’t have refused if her life depended on it. Not that she wanted to in the first place.
“Well, of course I’ll come for dinner,” she said.
“Will you bring dessert?” Kevin pleaded. “Daddy can’t cook worth a lick.”
“You haven’t starved yet,” Slade retorted indignantly.
“Almost,” Timmy said from the doorway. “If we’re having Dani over, maybe we should order pizza.”
Slade looked at Dani sheepishly. “Exactly what I had in mind. Is that okay?”
She laughed. “Given the reputation of your cooking, I’d say pizza would be perfect.”
Chapter Three
Slade wasn’t at all sure what had possessed him to invite Danielle Wilde over for dinner. The house, which had fallen into disrepair after the deaths of his grandparents, was still in a state of chaos. His cooking skills were nonexistent. And he hadn’t spent an evening with a woman other than his wife in over a decade. Idle chitchat had never been his specialty in the first place, which was why he and Amanda had gotten along so well.
Amanda had chattered enough for ten people, which had foolishly led him to believe she found him to be a good listener. Only later had he discovered that she simply liked the sound of her own voice. She hadn’t wanted or needed any response from him. The distance between them had widened and widened until by the time she had been in the terrible accident that ultimately took her life, they were merely coexisting. The boys had been the glue that held them together. For their sakes, he and Amanda had kept up a sad front until her tragic death.
Oddly, now that she was gone, he missed her in unexpected ways. He realized that despite their differences, despite her wandering attention and frequent affairs, Amanda had provided something he needed and had no idea how to create for himself–a home.
He glanced around the old Victorian house he’d visited only a few times as a child and tried to put a finger on exactly where he’d fallen short. The rooms were bright and airy. The furniture was exactly the same as it had been in the Denver home he and Amanda had shared, albeit a little dustier. There were even a few remnants of his grandparents’ belongings, genuine family heirlooms.
Goodness knew, the house looked lived in, he thought as he snatched up a handful of recently laundered underwear that had never made it past the sofa. And it was as charming as he’d remembered, a fact which had lured him back when Denver had begun to feel claustrophobic after Amanda’s death.
Even with the evening sun splashed across the polished wood floors and a soft breeze filtering through the sheer curtains, it lacked something. Maybe Danielle Wilde, whose house practically radiated a friendly, inviting, homey atmosphere, could help him pin it down.
Despite that hopeful thought, he wished he hadn’t impulsively uttered the invitation for tonight. Now he was stuck with it, an endless evening of trying to make conversation with a woman he barely knew.
His only consolation was that the boys were ecstatic. They had even eagerly agreed to help him straighten the place up before her arrival. Of course, their idea of tidying up consisted of tossing everything into the nearest closet, a habit they’d no doubt learned from him. Thank goodness it was summer and there would be no need to hang up their guest’s coat and risk a tumbling of hidden clutter.
He took another quick survey of the downstairs and nodded. “I guess that does it.” He called the boys, who came clattering down the stairs the very first time, for a change. “Did you both wash up and change your shirts?”
Even as he asked, he realized he should have been able to tell without asking, at least about the shirts. Unfortunately, Kevin and Timmy’s taste ran to multiples of the exact same T-shirt. Each of them had at least a half dozen, all in red, except for those that had accidentally fallen
into a load of laundry with bleach. Having declared them dorky, they refused to wear the resulting pink shirts anyway.
A close inspection indicated that the clothes they had on now were indeed freshly laundered. Their faces were scrubbed. Even their hair had been plastered down with enough gel to hold it in place through a hurricane. He found their desire to impress Dani Wilde touching. That she had endeared herself to them so quickly was a surprise. For all of their high-spirited mischief, his sons were innately shy, just as he had been at their age.
He thought back to his own childhood. He’d had exactly the wrong sort of personality for the son of a blustery Texas rancher. It had been a bone of contention between them for years, until his father had required a little computer help to organize his growing business interests. Since then a grudging sort of respect had sprung up between them. Even so, it was easier on both of them if they simply avoided each other. He hadn’t been back to Texas in years now. He missed his mother, but not much else.
He grinned at Timmy and Kevin. “You look very handsome,” he assured them.
Relief spread across their faces. “You’re sure?” Timmy asked.
“Very sure.”
“She’s coming,” Kevin announced, racing toward the front door and slamming it open. Pirate dashed out, barking and leaping into the air, convincing Slade that he’d been a circus dog in some previous life or perhaps even before they’d picked him up from an animal shelter.
“Right here, Dani,” Kevin shouted as if she weren’t already parked in their driveway and being besieged by their dog.
Slade watched as both of his boys practically tumbled down the front steps as they ran to greet her. Before he could wonder how she had conquered their hearts so easily, he saw her hunker down to their level and admire their slicked-back hair, their red shirts and their brand-new sneakers. She did it so naturally, so sincerely it made Slade’s heart ache. That was it, of course. The boys craved a woman’s praise, a woman’s warmth and tenderness. They would have gravitated to any woman who offered it so freely.
He sighed as he watched the three of them. That was the one thing he could never give them, no matter how hard he tried. After he had failed so miserably to make Amanda happy, he had vowed never again to move into a relationship in which he would be so completely out of his depth. He understood the complexities of computers far more readily than he did those of women. There would never be another marriage. Never.
The Bridal Path: Danielle Page 3