“Okay,” she said, and scooped up as much as her tiny hand would hold. She dropped the chips into a smaller bowl Darren had provided her on the floor and went back to her mysterious project. It seemed to involve irregular bands of paper closed into a circle with tape.
“When did you start having trouble with the nanny?” Darren asked. He’d returned to the kitchen and come back with a bottle of Chardonnay. He poured a healthy measure into Jared’s glass.
Jared looked at Darren in surprise. His brother wasn’t usually able to read his mind. It occurred to him that he must really be transparent if his problems were clear to Darren.
He indulged himself by resisting an admission. “I’m not having trouble with the nanny. She’s great with the children.”
Darren took a sip of his own wine, then put it aside and, propping his feet on the edge of the coffee table, leaned Zachary against his raised knees.
“I noticed that.” Darren angled him a knowing glance. “But I’ve seen you look at her. You’re thinking she’d be good with you, too.”
“No, she’s meddlesome. I hate meddlesome women.”
“Then resign yourself to permanent bachelorhood. They’re all meddlesome.”
They were quiet for a moment. Darren cheered a pass. Jared couldn’t concentrate on the game. He couldn’t clear his mind of the memory of Libby in his arms in the cool darkness of her room, of her arms wrapped around his neck, of her voice sounding curiously sad making an abortive wish.
He sighed.
Darren turned to him, his thumbs caught in the baby’s fists. “What are you doing here on a Sunday?”
“It’s her day off,” he replied defensively.
“So, why didn’t she go out?”
“Because she’s painting a border in Savannah’s room, and I didn’t want to be in her way.”
That made no sense. He knew it didn’t.
“You mean you ran away from home because she’s there.” It wasn’t a question. Darren seemed convinced he understood the problem.
Jared took a long gulp of wine. “Yeah. I think so. She woke up last night during the thunderstorm, afraid and confused, and I…all I did was hold her.” He leaned his head against the back of the sofa and groaned, anguished by his own reactions. “But I felt like I was twelve and dreaming about seducing Laurie Biederman. Remember her?”
Darren nodded, his eyes losing focus as he thought back. “Do I. We could watch her sunbathe one block over through Dad’s telescope. That was a chest for the Hall of Fame.”
Jared rebuked him with the jab of an elbow. “Watch it. I’ve got children here.”
Darren came out of his thoughts. “Then I’m right. You’re lusting after the nanny.”
“It’s not lust, precisely. It’s interest,” Jared corrected, trying to analyze what he felt as he spoke. He’d been working on it all night and still couldn’t figure it out. “It’s wanting to know more, to break the employer-employee prison without…I guess without surrendering the protection of it.”
Darren appeared to consider that, then shook his head. “I don’t think you can do that. You can’t protect yourself from what a woman could mean to you. Her power is insidious.”
Jared took another sip of wine and studied his brother sympathetically. “You have it out with Justy the way I told you?”
“Of course not. I may be able to preach this stuff, but I’m not so sure I can practice it.”
“Then why am I listening to you?”
“Because you’ve been eating my food all afternoon and you feel obligated.”
“All right. As long as I have a good reason.”
“Anyway.” Darren lifted the now-sleeping Zachary off his knees and tucked him into the crook of his arm. He stroked the baby’s bald head and studied the tiny features in apparent fascination. “You’re better at family life than I am. You’ve usually got the answers to everything. You’re already adjusting to being a father.”
“One divorce doesn’t mean you’re unable to have a family life. Nobody’s ready to do what it takes to hold a family together when he’s nineteen.” He smiled blandly. “If you recall, I tried to tell you at the time.”
“Oh, shut up. Can’t you just tell Libby how you feel?”
“Can you tell Justy?”
Darren sighed. “Then what are you going to do? Allow the chance to go by because you’re afraid to let her close enough to hurt you the way Mandy did? That’s stupid. Not to mention trite.”
“No,” Jared replied candidly. “She’s not at all like Mandy, and I made my peace with that a long time ago. It’s just that there’s something…suspicious about her. Not in a criminal way or anything, but until last night, I’d have sworn she was out to prove me incompetent with the children.”
Darren looked up in surprise. “Why? What would she stand to gain?”
“Got me. If there’d been others challenging me for custody, I’d suspect she’d been planted by them. But the agency sent her, so that doesn’t make sense.”
“Maybe it’s just paranoia on your part because you’re attracted to her and you’d rather not be.”
“Maybe.” He turned to Savannah, who’d been standing beside him and patting his shoulder for attention for the past two minutes. “What is it, baby?”
She made a dramatic face of disapproval. “I’m not a baby.”
“Right. I’m sorry. What is it, you beautiful young lady?”
Savannah took that praise with a very feminine inclination of her head. She held both hands tightly behind her back with a great show of hiding something, and smiled widely. “I made you a present, Daddy. Guess what it is!”
Daddy. The word hit him with the impact of a punch. He looked back into her bright, sparkling eyes and tried not to alarm her with an overwhelming reaction. But he felt a little weak, very humble and deeply shaken.
“Ah…a picture?” he guessed.
“No.”
“A paper chain?”
“Nope.”
“A necklace of potato chips?”
She giggled. “That’s silly. No. Give up?”
Her excitement warmed and pleased him. It was remarkable, he thought, how a child’s moods could affect one. “Okay. I give up.”
“Ta-da!” She held up a band of paper scribbled with blue. An unidentifiable object with several sharp ends was set off in the middle in bright yellow. “I made you a crown!” she announced, obviously very pleased with herself. “With a star on it so you can make a wish.”
He remained still while she placed it on his bead. He was surprised to discover he wasn’t at all embarrassed. Her delight in the gift seemed to override his usual cool.
He turned to Darren, daring him with his eyes to laugh. “How do I look?”
He saw in his brother’s eyes that Savannah had charmed him, too. Then Darren met his gaze and there was gentle mockery in it, and acknowledgment of his good fortune.
“Very royal,” he said.
“I made you one, too, Uncle Darren!” she announced, reaching to the paper rubble on the floor for another scribbled circlet with the same yellow pattern.
A star, Jared now understood. For wishing on.
Darren leaned carefully over the baby for his coronation. Savannah stood back to admire her work, her baby-toothed grin stretching from ear to ear.
“Thank you,” he said solemnly. “I’ve always wanted to be king.”
“No, he’s the king,” she corrected, pointing to Jared. “You’re the prince.”
Darren sent him a disparaging glance. “Story of my life. Always second to you.”
“Yeah, but I’m a noble despot. I always take care of the little people.”
“You’re lucky I’m holding a baby.”
Savannah settled down to make herself a crown to match, and Jared and Darren focused on the television again in time to see the camera panning a screaming, flag-waving crowd.
“What happened?” Darren demanded.
“No idea,” Jared replied. “I was busy with mat
ters of court.”
Darren groaned as the announcer explained an interception that everyone would be talking about for days—a play—and a replay—that they’d missed.
He turned to Jared, wry amusement in his eyes. “Did you think it would ever come to this? The two of us watching football on a Sunday afternoon with a baby in my arms and a little girl at your feet?”
He hadn’t, and it was beginning to change him. He could feel softness creeping into his emotions where he’d maintained strict security. And he found himself thinking that since he’d opened himself up to the children anyway, what would be the harm in seeing what might develop with Libby?
But he knew it wasn’t as simple as that. Placing yourself at a child’s mercy was less dangerous that opening yourself up to a woman. And it was generally unlikely that a child would leave you for another father.
He hated problems he couldn’t solve.
“No,” he answered. “And your crown’s crooked.”
LIBBY COULD NOT dispel the feeling of impending doom. And she didn’t pretend to wonder what supernatural forces were at work to cause it.
It had nothing to do with the cosmos, or the weird kink in time that had sent her back, or any other kind of paranormal activity. It was her own guilty conscience.
All afternoon while she’d finished the border in Savannah’s room, she’d thought about what she’d done. She’d lied, she’d pretended to be someone she wasn’t and she’d weaseled her way into Jared Ransom’s household for the sole purpose of finding a way to wrest the children from him.
She was still firmly convinced that her goal was just—even ordained, judging by the way she’d come back in time. But the end never justified the means.
She marched up and down the driveway in the cold darkness, hoping the biting air would clear her beleaguered brain.
She was going to tell him tonight. He would think she was insane, but she would explain everything from her thirty-fifth birthday party, to the bicycle that landed her in the hospital, to the incredible discovery she’d awakened to, to Jared’s misunderstanding when she appeared at his door.
Then she would fall upon his mercy and ask if he would keep her on as nanny so she could be near the children. After that…Last night with all its small but delightful discoveries played over in her mind’s eye for the hundredth time that day. She could feel his warm, strong arms holding her; feel his lips nibbling along hers, his fingers in her hair.
Longing so strong it ripped her feelings of guilty conscience aside took center stage. He was a man worth loving, and he had the children she was supposed to have. The answer was obvious.
If he let her stay, she would make him fall in love with her. They would be the family the children needed, and the kind of lovers who became legend.
The loud screech of tires brought her out of her thoughts to sudden awareness. She jumped back as two bright lights stopped inches in front of her. One foot on the edge of a dip in the gravel, she lost her balance and went down with a little scream of surprise.
Jared’s heart lurched as he caught sight of Libby in the path of his headlights. He slammed on the brakes, certain he couldn’t stop in time, and watched in horror as she fell.
Convinced love had been stolen from him for a second time, he tore out of the car while it rocked to a stop and ran to the still figure on the gravel.
“Libby, God! Libby!” He knelt beside her, vaguely aware that Savannah, strapped in her car seat, was screaming.
Afraid to move Libby, he put a hand to her throat, feeling for a pulse. And as he did that, she groaned, pushed up on an elbow and winced at him.
“Hi,” she said, her voice a little faint, as though she’d had the wind knocked out of her. “I didn’t see you.”
Relief overwhelmed him for a moment, then the residual adrenaline in his body demanded an outlet.
“Oh, I can see why,” he said, taking hold of her upper arms and pulling her to her feet. “It’s just a two-ton truck with two headlights and two red running lights! What in the hell are you doing in the driveway?”
“I was…getting some exercise,” she said, trying to yank out of his grip. She knew she’d frightened him, but she hadn’t done it deliberately. She’d been pacing to try to figure out how best to tell him the truth.
“In the dark?” he demanded. “In the driveway?”
A little edgy herself, she shouted back, her arm still pinned in his hand, “Why not? Are there rules about when and where you can get it? I’ve been working in Savannah’s room all day and I wanted some fresh air.”
He held her one more moment, his gaze thunderous, then he freed her arm and shifted his weight. “I almost ran you over,” he growled.
She straightened her jacket and tossed her hair. “I’d be happier if you were more pleased about the fact that you didn’t.”
He glared at her another moment, then turned back to the truck. Through the open door, she could hear Savannah and Zachary screaming. She ran to lend a hand.
He held the screeching baby on his hip and pulled at the buckle on Savannah’s car seat.
She reached to take Zachary from him. He resisted for an instant, and she said angrily, “If you tell me it’s my day off, I’ll hit you.”
He freed the baby and she marched off to the house with him. He pulled Savannah from her car seat. He knew she hadn’t seen anything but was reacting to the atmosphere of fear that surrounded the moment.
“It’s all right,” he told her, striding toward the house. “Libby’s okay. It’s all right.”
Libby got coffee going, hot water boiling for cocoa and the baby’s bottle warming while Jared built a fire.
He fed the baby while she made Savannah’s cocoa, then helped her with a bath. In yellow-footed pajamas, Savannah stood in the middle of her room and admired the completed border. Libby turned off the lights so that the stars would gleam.
“Now I can wish on lots of stars,” Savannah said excitedly. “Do you want to make a wish?”
Libby caught her hand and drew her toward the window seat. “I think you have to wish on an outside star if you want the wish to come true.”
Savannah frowned at the starless sky. “But where are they?”
“They’re there,” Libby said. “They’re just resting behind the clouds. Do you want to wish for something?”
“I already did. But I wished on that star.” She turned to point at the big star near the central spire of Notre Dame on her wall. “Daddy said it’s okay.”
Daddy. So she did feel secure enough about Jared for him to become “Daddy.” Libby was not entirely surprised when that revelation failed to horrify her. As recently as yesterday morning, it would have terrified her, made her feel as though her chances of gaining the children were diminishing.
But now she had a new hope. If she could make the children’s father hers, the children would follow.
She ruffled Savannah’s hair. “Then it must be okay. Come on. Let’s get you into bed.”
“Isn’t Daddy gonna tuck me in?”
Jared appeared as though on cue, a bright-eyed Zachary on his arm. “You want to trade?” he asked Libby. “I’ll put her to bed if you’ll wear him out.”
“You’re being optimistic,” she said with a wry smile, taking the baby from him. “But I’ll do my best. Good night, Savannah.”
“’Night. Libby.”
Libby took the baby downstairs to the living room, where the stained-glass lamp bloomed light in a corner of the cozy room. A fire crackled in the fireplace, raying warmth toward the sofa, where she propped the baby up against a wedge of pillows.
Zachary gave her a wide, toothless smile and flailed both arms, delighted with her attention.
“So, what did you do today?” she asked, tucking her legs under her as she curled up beside him. “Did you go to town again? Visit friends? I put in a long day at the top of the ladder, trying to finish your sister’s room. Did you notice how good it looks? I’m sorry I frightened you and Savann
ah and your…dad.” It was still a little difficult to say the word, but she knew denying their growing relationship wouldn’t make the fact of it disappear. And if she was going to find a way into their lives, she had to know what she was dealing with. “I was just trying to clear my head.”
As Jared reached the bottom of the stairs and rounded the corner into the living room, he heard Libby talking to the baby, her tone high and soft. He felt a stab of guilt for having shouted at her—and a strong wave of electric awareness when she heard his approach and smiled at him over the back of the sofa.
“Hi,” she said, her voice going down an octave for him. “Savannah asleep?”
He nodded. “The minute her head hit the pillow. Your border in her room is a masterpiece. Even I kept staring at the stars in the dark.”
She shrugged. “I had the luminescent paint for a craft project I’d done for the hospital, and it seemed like a good idea. I’m…sorry about frightening you in the driveway.”
He shook his head and went to sit beside her. “That was my fault. I came tearing into it, not expecting anyone to be there. No ill effects from the fall?”
“Just a skinned elbow.”
“This one?” He caught the arm closest to him and gently pushed her sleeve up. A rough, red scrape covered several square inches of flesh.
“It’ll be fine,” she said, trying to draw her arm away. “I’ve washed it, and I’ll put something on it when we go to bed. When…I…go to bed.” She guessed nothing would have happened if she hadn’t corrected the innocent remark. It was just that it had sounded as though they’d be going to bed together, and because that thought had been on her mind much of the afternoon in the interest of sharing the children with him, she was sure he’d read that into it.
As it was, he seemed to pay no attention, until she corrected herself. Then she saw something ignite in his eyes, and without warning, she was in his lap.
She whispered his name. “Jared!” There was surprise in the sound, but not dismay. She knew he’d heard that note when he smiled.
“I’ve been thinking about you all day,” he said, his lips a mere centimeter from hers. His dark eyes roved her face, and she felt her body’s tension begin to melt in the warm comfort of his arms.
The Comeback Mom Page 13