by Nancy Warren
Melissa would never see her tenth wedding anniversary, but she didn’t let that stop her from being happy for her friend. “Hey, that’s great. You know, Greg almost deserves you.”
“He thinks I’m crazy to diet, too.”
“I’m so glad I know you two. Greg reminds me that there really are good men out there. And you remind me that some women do have good judgment.”
“Stephen was a charmer, Melissa. He fooled everyone.”
She nodded, poured the coffee and sat down across from her neighbor. “He certainly fooled me.” She proceeded to tell Pam about the bank’s letter. For a long while during her marriage and even for the early part of the separation and divorce, when she’d been so shocked and had tried to convince herself that this was some crazy phase Stephen was going through and that it would pass, through all that she’d kept her troubles to herself. But one day Pam had come across her crying and she’d sobbed it all out. From that day, she’d realized the value of a friend who stood by her, let her say really awful things about Stephen that she needed to get off her chest, let her rant and rail and whimper.
In the year since the divorce, they’d become closer than sisters.
“Oh, my God,” Pam said when she finished her story. “That bastard. We knew he was a bad man, but even I didn’t think he’d turn out to be a deadbeat dad.”
Melissa blinked. Her friend was right. Deadbeat dad. It was a phrase you read in tabloids. Not something that applied to a man you’d loved and had children with. Except in her case, it did.
“What are you going to do?”
“I’m not letting go of this house,” she said fiercely. “The bank president turned out to be a pretty good guy. He’s working out something so I pay a lower monthly mortgage payment. Of course, I’ll pay it forever, but if I can just hang on until the kids are out of school…”
“If you need a loan, to get you through the next few months…”
Her eyes filled with tears. “I’m fine. But thank you from the bottom of my heart for offering.”
“Hey,” Pam said, her own eyes filling. “It’s what friends do. The offer stays open. I still have a nest egg from when I worked. Greg doesn’t have to know anything about it.”
“I thought I had time, you know? With Stephen paying the mortgage and child support, we were okay. I had time to build my landscape design business.” She shook her head. “Now I’ve got sixty days to figure out how to do it all myself. I’ll have to find a job.”
There was half a cookie left on the plate, and Pam popped it into her mouth almost as though she didn’t realize she was doing it. She stopped midchew and moaned. “Oh, honey. You are the only woman I know who bakes better than my mom. Hell, who even bakes anymore? You cook healthy food, you raise gorgeous kids.” She swallowed and said, “I know what you should do, you should run a school for moms.”
Melissa laughed. “Better still, I should be a stand-in mom for kids who don’t have one.” And she told her neighbor about the banker’s unsupervised daughters and their little baking experiment.
“Oh, my God. They could have killed themselves. Why weren’t they at school?”
“I get the feeling that their dad is having a rough time controlling two high-spirited, motherless girls.”
“Of course,” Pam said, slapping her forehead. “That’s what you should do.”
“What?”
“Run a private day-care center from your home.” She leaned forward, her eyes widening as she got excited by her idea. “You’re a trained pediatric nurse, you bake everything from scratch and your house is so child-friendly it’s ridiculous. A friend of mine has been complaining about trying to find decent child care. You’d be perfect.”
Melissa stared at her friend for a long moment and then nodded slowly. “You’re right. That’s the perfect solution. And I know a couple of kids who could sure use my help.” She bit her lip. “Will you watch my kids for an hour or two after dinner?”
“Sure.”
“I’ve got to pick up my car and then I’ve got some marketing and promotions to take care of.”
“I’ll drive you to your car,” Pam offered.
“I owe you.”
“Hah. Don’t worry. I plan to use your day-care services.”
“Anytime. But for you there will be no charge. We’re friends.”
CHAPTER FOUR
SETH GLANCED IN THE rearview mirror at the two children’s bodies sprawled in sleep, red curls mingling. They were going to be fine. His heart squeezed with a painful feeling of relief. And guilt.
He wasn’t good enough.
If only Claire were still here, none of this would have happened. She’d have made them a pan of goddamn brownies if they wanted them. And she’d for damned sure have made certain that his kids weren’t sneaking home at lunch hour to an empty house.
Claire.
He tried not to think of her. It hurt too much. Going to the hospital had brought it all back. St. Vincent’s was where she’d given birth to the twins.
And where she’d died.
And where, that last day, he’d promised to be mother and father to the girls.
He was failing miserably, and the torture chamber that used to be his stomach punished him for his failings on a regular basis.
This time he’d been lucky. The doctor hadn’t even pumped their stomachs, merely put them both on IV drips for a few hours with some antinausea meds and something to rehydrate them. His daughters were going to be fine. But he felt his reprieve like a warning; his current child care arrangement wasn’t only unsatisfactory, it was downright dangerous.
The car headlights guided him into the driveway. When he cut the engine everything went black, and Seth cursed himself for not flipping on some lights earlier.
The house appeared dark, cold and uninviting. He wished with all his heart and soul that Claire were here waiting for him. Claire with her good-natured laugh and generous loving. “Aw, baby, I miss you,” he whispered under his breath as he dragged his exhausted body from the car.
And froze.
His heart jerked painfully against his ribs when a female figure rose gracefully from the front steps and glided toward him.
The hair stood up on the back of his neck and he felt his flesh break out in goose bumps as the apparition moved closer. “Claire?” his voice croaked.
Even as he whispered the name, he knew it wasn’t his wife. The woman coming toward him was too tall and too slim.
“It’s Melissa Theisen,” she answered softly, her voice floating smoothly through the night air.
Disappointment crushed him. He wanted his wife, even if just for a brief ghostly visitation. He was tired, lonely and worried about his children. The last thing he needed was this woman with her mountain of problems.
He could hardly shoulder his own burdens, never mind hers.
She hadn’t been so all-fired-up wonderful as a nurse, either, now he thought about it. He sighed. That wasn’t fair. She’d been perfectly professional, but the twins needed their mother, not a nurse. He hadn’t thought the evening could possibly get worse. Looked like he was wrong.
“This is a surprise,” he managed to get out.
“How are the girls?” He could just make out the pale blur of her face as she stopped in front of him.
“You were right. They spent a few hours on an IV drip and they’ve been sent home to sleep it off.” He opened the back car door and unbelted Laura.
“If you hand me your house keys I’ll open the door for you,” that calm voice suggested. He hesitated, then handed her the keys. By the time he had Laura hoisted in his arms, the outside lights were on and the front door wide open.
Trudging into the house and up the stairs with his sleeping burden, he felt suddenly grateful for the woman snapping lights on upstairs and pulling the bedsheets down so he could slip Laura into bed. She’d guessed wrong, but he didn’t think the girls were in any shape to notice until morning they were in the opposite beds.
“Would you like me to put her nightclothes on while you get her sister?”
“Thanks. Her pajamas are…ah…” He glanced around the cluttered piles of clothing all over the floor until he recognized a cotton nightshirt with a picture of one of those nauseating boy singers on it. “Here.”
He bolted back downstairs and by the time he returned with Jessie, Laura was tucked in and sleeping peacefully.
Within a couple of minutes, Melissa Theisen had Jessie settled in efficiently, and she’d done something to the beds so they appeared smooth and freshly made.
She nodded and quietly left the room.
He kissed them each on the forehead, promising silently to do better for them in the future. He crept out of the room—or tried to. A stray fashion doll, naked as the day she was molded, tripped him up and sent him crashing against the door jamb.
One of the girls muttered in her sleep, then sighed.
He cursed softly. The entire house was a pigsty. He’d let it go because the current housekeeper was a trained teacher who couldn’t find a job. She’d seemed like a responsible young woman, and knowing that she wanted to be a teacher, Seth figured she’d be fantastic with kids.
Now that he saw just how irresponsible she was, he hoped she never got a teaching job. In his opinion, the education system was in enough trouble.
When he returned downstairs, Mrs. Theisen stood at the bottom with a brown paper bag from which wafted a mouth-watering aroma. “I brought you some vegetable soup,” she said. “If the girls wake up hungry, this would be good for them. Easily digestible and very nutritious. I brought enough for you, too.”
“You didn’t have to do that,” he said, feeling awkward and embarrassed.
“Well, I wasn’t merely being neighborly. I do have an ulterior motive.”
He tried to keep his face neutral even though he wanted to kick something. This was not the first “casserole” he’d received that had come with thick strings attached. “I see.” He knew her financial situation, possibly a little better than she did herself. If she asked him out, on this very day when she’d discovered she was in a financial jam, he wouldn’t know how to turn her down without embarrassing the pair of them.
God, why had he put himself in this situation? If he hadn’t panicked when he’d got that call and thought he might need her training…
He took the bag she offered and, since he couldn’t put it on the floor, he walked through to the kitchen, suggesting she follow.
“What a mess,” he said when he saw the baking disaster in the kitchen. He’d forgotten all about it.
“Would you like me to help you clean it up?” she asked.
“No,” he said, more forcefully than he meant to. He blew out a breath. “Sorry. I’m pretty beat. Why don’t you tell me what’s on your mind.” He motioned to the kitchen chairs. She pulled one out and sat.
He put the bag on the counter. “Thanks for your help today.” Pushing a stack of newspapers to the floor, he sank into a matching chair and leaned back, exhausted. He was almost relieved that Mrs. Theisen was here. She’d shared part of the crisis with him, and even if she did have a not very well-hidden agenda, he was touched that she cared enough to check on the children and bring them soup.
He felt like he’d aged ten years in one day, rushing the twins to the hospital then soothing them through the examinations, rubbing their backs each time a new spasm of retching shook their slight bodies and, finally, watching them sleep as the drugs took effect.
The only time he’d left them was when he’d phoned that useless housekeeper and fired her.
“You’re welcome.” She smiled at him faintly and he thought again what an attractive woman she was. Gorgeous, he imagined, when her eyes weren’t etched with worry and she put some effort into hair and makeup.
There was silence for a moment. He couldn’t summon up small talk so he left it to her. Finally she asked, “Who’s Claire?”
“What?”
“You called me Claire.”
“Claire was my wife.” He let his tone resonate with finality.
“What happened to her?” She asked the question as normally as if she were asking what he liked for breakfast. He felt as though something was smothering him. His chest labored to draw breath.
“Cancer. She got breast cancer and they did the old poison, slash and burn treatment. But it spread, first to her spine, until she couldn’t walk.” He let all the anger and viciousness he harbored spill out as though it were this woman’s fault Claire had died. He knew it wasn’t, but she should at least have the decency to leave the woman dead and buried, not question him for all the gory details. Well, if she wanted details he could give her enough to make her sick to her stomach. “Then it spread to her brain and some days she didn’t know who she was, didn’t recognize her own children. Didn’t understand why she was in so much pain.” He gasped at the anguish he was feeling.
“You must have loved her very much,” she said softly, and he realized it was hopeless to try to intimidate a former nurse with illness horror stories. She’d probably seen it all.
“Yeah.”
“She was lucky.”
Something exploded in his brain. “Lucky? What’s so lucky about having your flesh and bones, even your brain, eaten away by disease? What’s so lucky about dying at thirty-five?” His voice was raw and hoarse.
“I meant she was lucky to be able to leave this world knowing she was loved, and that there was someone to care for her children when she was gone.”
“Huh. And a piss-poor job I’m doing at that. The twins are only ten years old. They could have set the house on fire while they were making brownies, or cooked up something even more poisonous.”
“You said you had a child-care provider?”
“She was supposed to be here all day. Instead, she snuck off—to her boyfriend’s, probably.”
“From the state of the house, I’d say she was doing a piss-poor job, too.”
Even though she was repeating his own words, the sound of a vulgarity coming from Mrs. Theisen’s mouth shocked the hell out of him.
“Yeah. I fired her.”
She nodded. “Good.” She glanced at him, then at the brown paper bag on the counter. “Would you like me to warm that soup for you?”
“I’ll shower and change before I eat.” He was pretty sure he smelled like vomit.
“Look. I thought of a way we could help each other out.”
She appeared mildly embarrassed. He never knew how to handle these awkward situations. Not that he’d been in many of them, but in the past three years he’d had some offers, usually from nice women he didn’t want to hurt. Like this one.
“I really don’t think so,” he said as firmly as he could, hoping to cut her off at the pass.
Her eyebrows rose. “You don’t even know what I’m going to suggest.”
Like hell. But he waited anyway. If she wanted to make this more difficult for both of them, he was too tired to stop her.
She licked her lips. That was a mouth made for kissing, he thought, surprised at himself for thinking it.
What if she did ask him out?
What if he went?
This was the first time he’d seriously thought he might, but then he remembered it wasn’t as if she was after his killer bod and winning personality. It was her house she wanted.
So he squelched the tiny spurt of male interest and waited.
“You remember when we were talking in your office today, about my situation?”
“Of course.”
“Well, obviously I’m going to have to do something to earn enough money to pay for the mortgage and bills.”
“Right. We already talked about this.”
“I think I’ve found a way to do that.”
“Already?”
“I’m going to start a day care in my home. I’m an excellent cook, a trained pediatric nurse, as you know, and I renew my first-aid certification every year. My home is clean and child-pro
ofed, I have a fenced-in yard and I live within walking distance of the school.”
“That’s a good plan,” he said, stifling a yawn. “Do you have any kids lined up?”
“That’s why I’m here, Mr. O’Reilly. I’m going to suggest you and your daughters might benefit from the arrangement.”
He stared at her blankly for a second, then almost laughed. On the good side, she hadn’t asked him out, although his ego was oddly stung.
“I’m not sure that’s a good idea, Mrs. Theisen.”
She looked as taken aback as he must have when he found out it was his girls she wanted instead of him. “Oh.”
There was an implied question mark at the end of her, “Oh,” so he went on. “I think it might be unethical for me to use one of my bank customers as a day-care provider.”
She stared at him with her eyebrows slightly raised, and he could see she didn’t believe him for a second. Well, why would she? His doctor and dentist both banked with him, as did his grocer and any number of other people whose services he used. He couldn’t explain why he felt uncomfortable about her proposition. He simply did.
“Well,” she said, rising, “I’ll let you get on with your evening then. I’m sorry to have disturbed you.”
He got to his feet, too. “You didn’t disturb me. You were a big help today. I appreciate it.” He held out his hand and she shook it. Odd to be so formal with a woman standing in his kitchen at seven-thirty at night.
She walked toward the front door and he followed her. In her jeans and sweater she was sexy as hell, which wasn’t something he wanted to notice right now.
At the door, when she turned again to say goodbye, he blurted something he’d been thinking about while he sat beside his sleeping girls in the hospital. “Why did you let your ex-husband go so long without paying anything?” If she’d called the guy on it earlier, she might have at least been able to keep his payments current before he vanished to the other side of the world.
As he contemplated her in exasperated silence, her head dropped and color flooded her pale cheeks. How did she do this? One minute she was the cool, capable nurse, the next she was this vulnerable helpless woman.