by Sara Daniel
A minute later, Olivia herself came down the stairs, holding Liam in her arms. “I heard him crying in his crib. No tantrum, just a few tears of loneliness. He might be hungry, but I didn’t want to feed him right away since I didn’t know what schedule you have him on right now.”
Liam whimpered and buried his face in her shirt for a moment but then went willingly into Caleb’s arms.
He studied her clear skin and wholesome features. Her husband had cheated on her. She hadn’t told Caleb. Not when she mocked his friends-versus-sex theory. Not when she’d explained what went wrong with her Forever marriage. The incident made a stronger case for her arguments. Yet, she’d deliberately omitted it. He intended to get an explanation from her about why.
He’d done his part in Penelope’s world today. Now it was her turn to step into his. “Penelope, can you watch Liam for a minute? I need to fix a bottle for him.”
She looked horrified. She held her hands behind her back, refusing to take the baby from him. “God, no. I don’t know anything about kids. I’ll drop him and break him or something awful.”
“You have a nephew. You must have held him at some point. He survived. I’m coming right back.”
Penelope looked at his sleepy son like he was an alien. “I need to clean the lab table. Olivia’s good with kids. She can watch him.”
“The excuses you two come up with,” Olivia said in disgust. She snatched Liam from Caleb’s arms. “Come on, sweetie. You can watch Austin run his new remote control truck while I put dinner on the table.”
The baby went with her, happy as could be swaddled in her arms. Caleb watched them disappear up the stairs. Olivia had things to do too, but she didn’t act like caring for a child was an inconvenience. She behaved like the perfect mother Liam needed. Too bad she’d screwed up her own life and made it impossible for him to consider her for the position.
“I’m setting up a press conference for the middle of next week for Caleb to introduce the world to his son and put an end to the rumors that have been swirling since The Brighid Show last week,” Ethan said, as everyone settled around the dining room table for dinner. “We would love to have all three of you — Olivia, Penelope, and Austin — come to Manhattan and stand behind Caleb to show that Liam has been well cared for and is well loved.”
“Of course he’s been well cared for.” Olivia was insulted that anyone would think anything less. “I have an inn to run. I won’t be able to get away.” She had no desire to be part of a press conference. Jetting to New York on a whim was something she could never seriously entertain. She resented the inn for many reasons, but not for tying her down. She just wanted the responsibilities keeping her here to be of the human variety and not the obligations of a business that had been thrust upon her.
“Penelope?” Ethan asked.
“I’m busy,” she said without looking up.
“We could tie it in with some sort of perfume promotion. Who do you market your perfumes to? Do you have a website?”
“Word gets around.” Penelope shoveled in her food without looking at him.
“A website should be your top priority. Do you market your perfumes to the tourists or the locals?”
“I customize.” She stabbed her peas. “I have to do it for people I know.”
“You can do it for anyone,” Ethan reasoned, “as long as they tell you exactly what they want.”
She snorted. “They don’t know what they want. Take Caleb for example. He wants to make a perfume for his mother. He can’t even fill out a basic questionnaire on her.”
Ethan’s eyes rounded as he turned to his brother. “You commissioned Penelope to make a perfume for Mom?”
Panic filled his gaze for a brief moment before his eyes turned blank. He didn’t even feel comfortable talking about her with Ethan. Maybe Olivia had been too hard on him by pushing for information the other night. “I want to learn about the perfume process. The recipient of the product is inconsequential.”
Austin dropped his napkin on the floor and bent to pick it up.
“Your mother is inconsequential?” Olivia asked. Surely, he must realize how absurd that sounded.
“You’re twisting my words. She’s not important in my life.”
Olivia glanced at Ethan. He was concentrating on his food as if he had no intention of disputing the statement. Caleb didn’t need more people going easy on him. He needed people in his life willing to force him to confront his issues. Right now, someone needed to point out the obvious.
“Your entire life is devoted to your mother and correcting her mistakes,” Olivia said.
“That’s ridiculous.” His eyes narrowed on her. Clearly, the messenger was about to be eviscerated. “My life is devoted to kids. By keeping mothers from making lousy decisions with men, I make better lives for their children.”
A furious red heat crept up Olivia’s neck. How dare he? “You have a lot of nerve to pass judgment on the choices women make. You’ve never been forced to make them. You don’t know what it’s like in my position.”
“I know which decisions are best for the kids. I lived that part.”
And he’d already decided she’d made too many wrong ones and her son was damaged for life. “Exactly what should have I done differently, oh Great One?”
“There’s no need to be sarcastic.”
Sarcasm didn’t come close to describing her need. She rose to her feet and grabbed the empty roll basket as an excuse to go into the kitchen and compose herself. “Austin, did you find your napkin yet?”
“Just a minute.” His muffled reply came from under the table.
“Open your eyes, Olivia,” Caleb said in his grating therapist voice. “Your child has issues.”
She braced her hands on the table, leaning toward him. “You will keep your concerns to yourself in the presence of my son. Is that clear?”
“Found it.” Austin popped above the table, waving his napkin like a flag.
Olivia fought the urge to throw the roll basket in Caleb’s face. She’d never come so close to resorting to violence against a guest. But she would not allow him to air his grievances in front of Austin and then attempt to diagnose him. She knew her son. He wasn’t perfect. Neither was she, but she was determined to give the two of them the best life she could.
To that end, she needed to take him out of the dining room with her. She couldn’t leave him alone with someone who wanted to stuff his head with theories she strongly disagreed with. This therapist would give her kid issues, not help him get rid of them. “Take your plate to the kitchen please, Austin.”
“Why? No one else has to.”
She hung on to her sorely tested patience. “Mr. Paden and Dr. Paden are our guests, and Aunt Penelope is still eating.”
“I’ll carry my plate,” Caleb said.
Olivia glared at him. He wasn’t being a good example. He was undermining her authority.
Austin looked at him without moving.
Caleb pushed back his chair. He stood and stumbled back against the chair. He caught himself and smoothed his jacket. He reached for his plate and stepped back from the table. Inexplicably, he lost his balance again. He windmilled his arms. The plate flew from his hands across the room. At the same time Caleb crashed into the chair and sprawled on the floor.
Olivia rushed around the table and knelt at his side. She’d never witnessed his clumsy side before. “Are you hurt?”
“I don’t know yet.” He gingerly raised his hand to his forehead. The beginning of a welt was forming in the center. He winced as his finger made contact.
“I’ll get some ice.”
Before she could stand up, he grasped her hand in a surprisingly powerful grip. “Look at me and tell me your child doesn’t have issues.”
She gave him a quick up-and-down glance but didn’t see anything else amiss. “This doesn’t have anything to do with Austin.”
“Nothing,” he agreed, “beside the fact that he tied my shoelaces to the chair.”
She looked down. A knot was still fastened around the upended chair leg. “You didn’t notice him doing it?”
“I was too busy trying to knock some sense into you.”
“I’d say Austin gets the point for this battle.” What her son did was serious and wrong. No matter how much she wanted to applaud him for putting Caleb in his place, she’d have to be stern and punish him. All of which could have been avoided if Caleb would simply get along with him the way Ethan did.
“I’ll take that ice now,” Caleb said.
She looked at his forehead again. It was definitely a lump, red and showing signs of colorful bruising to come. For a six-year-old to create that on a grown man, any intelligent person would conclude the kid had issues. Maybe she needed to reevaluate the therapist’s professional opinion, after all.
Chapter 9
Panic blossomed in Penelope’s chest. They were all deserting her. Caleb exited the dining room with an ice pack on his head. Olivia left through the kitchen, carrying Liam and dragging a sullen Austin with her. Now she was alone with Ethan. By the time she worked up the nerve to look at him, his gaze was trained on her.
“I checked my shoes. I’m clear,” Ethan said. A tiny dimple dented his right cheek as he grinned.
She steeled herself against his charm, although she had the sinking feeling it was a losing battle. Then she wiggled her feet to make sure she wouldn’t fall and make a fool of herself when she stood up. “I don’t understand what Austin has against Caleb.”
Ethan shrugged. “Caleb can stand to be brought down a couple pegs. How much do you charge for your perfumes?”
“As much as the people buying them can afford.” She’d definitely hike up the price for him.
“If that doesn’t give you enough money to buy decent food and a new toaster, you ought to consider selling to people who can afford to pay more.”
Her dreams and pride in her product warred with her automatic denial of being able to find anyone willing to pay more. “Are you interested in a custom scent?”
“Perfumes are for women. I wear cologne.”
She shook her head, enjoying what was surely a rare opportunity to feel superior to him. “Perfume and cologne are not gender-specific words. The label refers to the amount of oils and fragrances in the mix.”
His eyes didn’t glaze over as she expected when she started nerd-speak. He pushed his plate away and leaned across the table toward her. “What’s the difference?”
“Colognes are usually ten to twenty percent fragrance while perfumes are fifty percent. Some of mine run as high as sixty percent.”
“You make a high quality product, in other words.”
“Exactly.” She was pleased he made the connection.
“Your clients should pay a premium for it.” He crooked his finger. “Come over here and give me your impression of my cologne.”
“I’m still eating.” She picked up her forgotten fork to prove her point. She was not going to make a fool of herself by sticking her nose in his neck.
He stood and walked in slow, deliberate steps around the table. “I’m not afraid of criticism. Tell me what you really think.”
He sank into the chair next to her that Olivia had vacated and leaned over until his cheek was directly in front of her lips. All she had to do was move forward slightly and her lips would touch him. She could kiss him. She jerked back.
He tilted his head to look at her. “What do you think?”
Impossibly, the closer he came, the more handsome he was. Sculpted cheekbones, perfectly arched eyebrows, and lips that she had no doubt could melt her into butter. “I, uh — ” She couldn’t form a complete sentence. Her skin felt hot. In another minute she was going to smell like a big bowl of sweat. She didn’t wear her perfumes while she was working to avoid contaminating her olfactory analysis of the product. “I haven’t smelled you yet.”
“What are you waiting for?”
The floor to open up and swallow her. She scrunched her eyes closed to block the fact that he was the most handsome man she’d ever met. Then she lowered her head and pressed her nose to her neck. Oh God, he was hot. He was real. She was touching his skin.
And he smelled disgusting.
She jerked back. “What’d you do? Wallow in garbage before you came in here?”
He backed away, taking her fantasies of sensual bliss with him. “Excuse me?”
“Mimosa and gardenia are all wrong for you. Did you pick this out yourself?”
“It was a gift from an ex-girlfriend.”
“She obviously didn’t know you.” Then again, Penelope didn’t really know him. “Or she knew you were a cross-dresser who enjoys smelling like rotting fish.”
“Cross-dresser?” he exploded. He didn’t take criticism nearly as well as he claimed. “I like women’s clothes, but only on women.”
“Or off.” She smirked, pleased with herself for hacking away his polish and charm.
“If you take off your clothes and put them in a pile, I guarantee I won’t spend any time looking at the clothes.” His gaze turned smoldering.
She’d never felt so exposed from a single look before. She pushed back her chair and rushed to put space between them. She should have known better than to try to play his games. She retrenched to what she knew. “You need a better perfume. I’ll make it for you. If you like it, you can pay me what you think it’s worth.”
She dashed out of the room and down the stairs before he could say what she was sure he was thinking. Her opinion was worth nothing and her perfumes even less.
“Come in,” Caleb croaked. He could have gotten up to answer the door, but that required moving. His head throbbed murderously at the thought. Ethan wasn’t worth the effort.
“How are you?” Olivia walked cautiously through the doorway to the side of his bed.
He should have sucked up his discomfort and walked to the door. Now he was flat on his back in bed with Olivia bending over him. The fantasy was spectacular. Reality was terrible. Dr. Caleb Paden didn’t act on his sexual urges and make decisions with his lower anatomy when a single mother was the object of those urges. He was a man of control. Decisions made with hormones instead of logic harmed innocent people and caused years of regret.
“I’m fine.” He tried to make his features look pain-free as he lied. “Where’s Liam?”
“Ethan’s watching him right now. I’ll get him settled for bed tonight. Do you want something to drink?”
“Do you have any 7UP?” If she got him the drink, he could accept it at the door and close her out with little more than a “thank you.” Then he’d be sure his fantasies stayed in fantasyland.
“Sure.” She sat on the side of the bed and leaned toward him. She nibbled on her full, bottom lip as she studied his forehead.
Caleb closed his eyes. He wrote books about why men should pick friendship with women over physical relationships. At the moment, he couldn’t recall what the seven letters in Forever stood for.
“It doesn’t look that bad,” Olivia pronounced, carefully laying the ice back on his skin. She trailed a cold finger down his cheek. “You’re going to have a little bruise, but the ice has helped with the swelling.”
If she kept shifting the mattress and hovering her fingers around him, he was going to need the ice pack to remove the swelling in his groin. No matter how intimately positioned they were, sexual tension could be dispelled. All he needed was to find the topical equivalent of an ice pack. “I assume you disciplined Austin.”
She stopped touching him but didn’t back away. “We had a long discussion. I didn’t think you’d want to see him this evening, so he’ll apologize tomorrow.”
“What kind of punishment did you give him?”
She sat up straight. “That’s between him and me. He’ll think twice before pulling that stunt again.”
She wasn’t going to tell him the specifics. The bump on his head gave him the right to know. His psychology degree gave him the tools
to evaluate the appropriateness of her methods. “Single parents don’t get the opportunity for a second opinion to weigh in very often. Don’t waste your chance with an expert.”
She gave him a withering look. “Some expert you are. You’re the only person in this house who can’t relate to my son.”
The truth of her words stung. But this was Olivia’s chance to take advantage of his training for her own betterment. “Why can’t you respect the work I do?” Until he asked the question, he didn’t realize how much her answer meant to him. He didn’t need her to agree with his diagnosis as much as he needed her respect for him as a professional.
She rubbed her fingers over his temples. “Let’s set it aside. You don’t want to make your headache worse.”
Her fingers gradually worked down over his jawbone and to his neck. If he lay very still, maybe she would continue downward and relieve all his swelling problems.
He jackknifed into a sitting position. His forehead smacked against Olivia’s. The dull ache in his head exploded into brilliant, full-color pain. He fell back on the pillow. “Oh, ouch.”
Olivia rose slowly to her feet and rubbed a hand over her forehead. “What was that for?”
“You hit a nerve,” he mumbled, covering his bruise with the ice again.
“If you didn’t want me touching you, all you had to do was say so.”
He did want her touching him. Even more damning, he wanted to give himself permission to touch her. If he did, he might ruin any friendship he had a chance of developing with a Forever woman. Worse, it would cause irreparable harm to Austin’s already damaged psyche. A romp with Olivia wasn’t worth that.
At least his throbbing head told him so. Other throbbing body parts vehemently disagreed.
Someone knocked on Ethan’s door while he was in the middle of his morning shave. Not a polite little tap, but an urgent beating that refused to stop. He took a final swipe with his razor and tossed it in the sink before stomping to the door. He threw it open to find Penelope’s glowing face. She looked so happy and satisfied his irritation evaporated.