Project: Daddy

“Oh,” she said. With an apologetic grimace, her eyes flickered to her watch. “I guess it is early. I wasn’t sure if you’d hired anyone else yet and if you hadn’t, I wanted to be the first one here today.”

“Believe me, you are,” he grumbled. “Since you’re here, you might as well come on into the kitchen.” He led the way up the short flight of steps from the entryway to the living room, and his gaze darted around self-consciously. It hadn’t bothered him before to let people see the place, bare and uninviting as it was, but something about this bright-eyed woman made him glance back for her reaction. It was a mistake. Her burnished hair and swirling skirt made it look as though someone had trapped a butterfly in the icy gray-and-whiteness of his living room.

Surprisingly, she didn’t say anything about the bareness of the room. After a moment, he wondered if she’d even noticed it because her gaze was fixed on the huge plate glass windows.

“Incredible view,” she murmured, evidently in awe of the vast expanse of ocean visible beyond the glass. The water was capped by flecks of white foam thrown up by the breeze and brightened by the morning sun slanting in from the east. “I’ve always wanted to live near the ocean.”

He’d heard that line before. Annoyed, he said, “If that’s your only reason for wanting this job, you’re in the wrong place.”

She turned swiftly and gave him a direct look from those clear green eyes. “It’s not my only reason. In fact, it’s not a reason at all. I didn’t know about the ocean view, remember? I’m here because I need a job and this is one I’ll be good at.”

Mac gave her the full force of his frown, the one he’d been told made him look like a grizzly bear with indigestion. The butterfly didn’t back down from the impact of it, but tilted her head and gave him another of those expectant looks as if she was asking if he had any other comments to make.

He did. “Well, we’ll see about that. Come on.” Turning, he led the way past the windows, through the formal dining room which held nothing but a built-in sideboard, empty of all but a gray film of dust, and through a wide archway into the kitchen.

He heard her rock to a stop behind him and looked back to see her taking in the sight of the kitchen. It was certainly impressive. On the right, a stainless steel restaurant-quality range and oven stood beside a glass-fronted refrigerator. On the left were a double sink, a vegetable sink, and long, bare white-tiled counters. All the cabinet fronts were painted stark white and had plain steel hardware. A food preparation island in the middle of the room was topped by a concrete slab that he’d been assured was the height of home fashion.

“When does the surgical team arrive?” Paris murmured, then gave him an apologetic look and clamped her lips shut.

He frowned at her again, although he agreed with her assessment. However, he hadn’t been the one to choose the decor, and it didn’t really matter to him. It was a kitchen, he could get food there, after a fashion, and that’s all that mattered, or had been all that mattered until a few days ago. Now he spent more time there and the desolate place was beginning to get on his nerves.

He gestured for her to follow him to a bay window. In the alcove was a chrome and red vinyl dinette set straight out of the nineteen fifties. It was a castoff from his parents’ house and the only thing in the place with a speck of personality. Paris must have thought so, too, because her gaze swept over it appreciatively before landing on his niece and nephew.

Four-year-old Elly knelt on one of the chairs where he had settled her before he and Simon had headed for the shower. She was rocking rhythmically as she leaned over the table and ate from a bowl. Her head full of coppery curls had gone uncombed since she’d arrived at Uncle Mac’s house. Eighteen-month-old Simon, also a curly redhead, was perched on a stack of books and tied securely onto the chair with a necktie that ran beneath his armpits and was knotted behind him. Both children looked up when the adults entered. Their faces were smeared with chocolate, giving them a comical appearance, but neither child smiled. Reacting to the sight of yet another stranger, Elly scooted down from her chair and hurried around to stand protectively beside her baby brother.

It made Mac uncomfortable to meet the solemn blue eyes of his niece and nephew, but he didn’t know quite how to remedy the problem. He’d rarely seen them before their arrival two days ago and he knew absolutely nothing about kids, could barely even remember his own childhood, in fact.

Paris flashed one of her vivid smiles at the two kids who blinked at her hesitantly. “Hello,” she said. “My name is Paris. What’s yours?”

Elly gave Mac a questioning glance and he nodded reassuringly even as he wondered at this about-face. Two days ago, the little girl had been afraid of him. Now she was looking to him for reassurance. Finally, Elly lifted a chocolate-covered hand to point to herself. “Elly,” she said. “And that’s Simon. He’s just a baby.”

“So I see.” Paris moved toward the table and glanced into the children’s bowls. Mac shuffled his feet and looked down when he saw the amazement that crossed her face. “What are you having for breakfast?” she asked in a strangled voice.

“Choc’late bars,” Elly answered, returning to her own bowl and scooping up another fingerful. “It’s good.”

Mac felt Paris’s gaze on him and he met it with a one-shouldered shrug. “Haven’t had time to get to the grocery store,” he muttered, then could have kicked himself for offering an explanation to this woman he didn’t even know.

She brightened and he figured she was probably laughing at him. “Then that’s something I can handle for you, isn’t it?” Seeing that Elly was finished with her breakfast, Paris flashed a quick look around the untarnished kitchen and said, “Why don’t we wash your hands before you get down?”

Before Elly could answer, Paris tore paper towels from a roll by the sink, wet them and began wiping Elly’s hands free of chocolate. Elly gave Paris a startled look as if she wanted to pull away, but Paris began prattling on about what a beautiful day it was and how lucky they were to live by the ocean, and had they seen the seagulls flying overhead that morning? In the face of such good-natured chatter, cautious Elly relaxed. She even offered Paris a tiny, tentative smile.

Mac felt disgruntled. Elly hadn’t allowed him to touch her until late last night, screaming for her mother each time he tried to do something for her. Poor kid, her mother was long gone. Simon, on the other hand, seemed to like Mac. At least he didn’t holler whenever Mac came near him.

Just so she wouldn’t think he was completely hopeless, Mac got both children glasses of water to drink, but when she treated him to another of those questioning looks he had to admit, “No milk, either.”

He hustled the children into the family room to watch Saturday morning cartoons. When they were lying on the floor in front of the screen, he breathed a sigh of relief that they’d be safely occupied for a while, and turned back to the kitchen. He’d never interviewed a housekeeper/nanny before, but he had a basic idea of what questions he needed to ask. Any good parent, even a temporary one, knew that there were certain things kids needed: food, cleanliness, companionship, discipline. He figured if he paid for the first one, and paid the nanny enough, she could provide the rest of the list.

In the kitchen, he found that Paris was busy going through the cupboards and refrigerator. She had located a piece of paper and a pencil and was making a list.

“Wait,” he said, holding up his hand. “Before you make plans to move in and take over, I need to know a few things about you.”

“Sure,” she answered breezily, as she clucked over the bareness of his refrigerator. He frowned at her. It wasn’t bare. He had two six-packs of beer and a couple of stale doughnuts in there, as well as five different kinds of gourmet mustard. He didn’t usually eat at home, but picked up breakfast, lunch and dinner at any fast-food place he happened to pass on his way to and from work.

“My name is Paris…oh, I already told you my name. I’m a widow.” He couldn’t read her expression or her tone of voice when she said that, but he thought she sounded very matter-of-fact. “I need a job and this looks like something I can do.”

Mac strolled over to where she was standing, slapped his hand against the refrigerator door to shut it, and said, “What exactly do you mean by that?”

She tilted her head and smiled. A California jay had nothing on this girl in the perkiness department. “It means I can take care of this house and your children.”

“They’re not my children,” he admitted, then stepped back when he realized he could detect the scent of her perfume. It smelled like April violets and somehow went straight to his head. He needed coffee. Turning away, he reached for the coffeemaker and began making the brew.

“They’re not?”

“Elly and Simon are my sister’s kids. Sheila arrived a couple of days ago, just after I got home from work and said she needed for me to take care of them for a while. She was on her way to Africa on a photographic safari.”

“She’s a photographer?”

Mac growled, “She doesn’t know a lens cap from a viewfinder. Her new boyfriend is a photographer and she went along to keep him company. Unfortunately, she had two little responsibilities standing in her way.” As Paris made a soft sound of distress, Mac viciously ripped the plastic lid off a can of coffee and scooped grounds into the filter. It still infuriated him that Sheila had shown up blithely assuming that he would take the kids, kissed them goodbye and left them, wailing loudly, in his faulty care.

He didn’t know why he was surprised. The whole family had spoiled Sheila and done her bidding throughout her life. Her divorce had come about because her husband, as feckless and selfish as she, wouldn’t cater to her the way the Weston family had. The husband had taken off shortly after the divorce, had never even seen Simon. When Sheila had decided to go on safari, big brother Mac had seemed the logical choice to take care of her children.

Poor little tykes, he thought, pouring water into the coffeemaker and switching it on. Dragged from pillar to post their whole lives, then left in the care of the one person who was the least likely to know what to do with them. Surreptitiously, he studied Paris who had seated herself at the table after carefully checking to make sure she’d cleaned up all chocolate smears. He wondered how capable she was of caring for the two children. So far, he hadn’t pulled any hard information out of her except that she was a widow. His gaze drifted over her as he wondered what had become of her husband and how long the man had been dead. She didn’t seem too broken up, but then, who was he to judge how misfortune affected anyone? The good citizens of Cliffside said the lousy things that had happened in his life had only served to make him meaner and more stubborn. Too bad he couldn’t disagree with them.

He poured coffee for both of them and handed her a cup. She sipped it cautiously and opened her mouth as if to ask for cream or milk, then apparently recalled that he had none, so she drank stoically. Mac supposed he shouldn’t have made it the way he usually did, strong enough to float an ax handle.

“Do you have a resume?” he asked abruptly.

“Certainly.” She had left her suitcase by the front door, but had set her purse on one of the kitchen chairs while tending to Elly. Paris opened the large bag and pulled out an envelope which she handed to him with a flourish, her eyes full of the same bravado he’d seen moments before. Mac wondered about that as he pulled out the folded page and smoothed it.

He scanned it quickly and his eyebrows inched up. Finally, he bent down one corner of the paper and looked at her over the top. She seemed to be busy examining the blue sky outside the window. When she felt him looking at her, she brought her attention back to him and gave him a sprightly smile. “Impressive, isn’t it?” she asked on a hopeful note.

Mac stared at her, stared at the paper, then at her again. “Organized the annual fund-raiser for the Junior League?”

“And topped our previous year’s earnings, I might add,” she said with a firm nod and a tap of her fingernail on the tabletop.

“Chairman of the country club ball committee?”

“Everyone in attendance said it was the best ball they’d ever seen.”

“Scandinavian cooking classes?”

“My Danish frikadellar are to die for,” she assured him as she linked her fingers together loosely on the tabletop and sat forward as if waiting for his applause.

He scanned the resume again, just in case he’d missed something. “There’s no evidence here that you’ve ever held a real, salary-paying job.”

Her hands tightened around each other. “Oh?”

“Have you?” he prompted.