Housekeepers Say I Do!: Maid for the Millionaire / Maid for the Single Dad / Maid in Montana

Billy rolled his eyes. “No.”

“He owns a construction company.” Amanda all but glowed with enthusiasm. “I’ll bet he could teach you a million things.”

“I don’t need to know a million things, Mom. Besides, I want to go to med school.”

“And you’re going to need money,” Amanda pointed out. “Mr. Nestor put himself through university working construction.”

Billy glared at Cain.

Cain shifted uncomfortably. “Construction isn’t for everyone,” he said, clearly unhappy to be caught in the middle. “I was also a bartender.”

“But you’re here now,” Liz said, unable to stop herself. Her gaze roamed over to Cain’s. “And you could teach him so much.”

She let her eyes say the words she couldn’t utter in front of the angry teen who desperately needed to at least see how a decent man behaved.

Cain pulled in a slow breath. Liz held hers. He’d changed. She knew he’d changed just from the sympathy he’d displayed to Amanda the day before. He could do this! All he had to do was say okay.

She held her breath as she held his gaze. His steely eyes bore into hers, but the longer their connection, the more his eyes softened.

Finally, he turned on his chair, facing Billy. “What I’m doing today isn’t hard. So it might be a good place for you to start if you’re interested in learning a few things.”

“There! See!” Amanda clasped Billy on the shoulder. “It will be good for you.”

Cain rose and motioned for Billy to follow him out of the kitchen. Liz stared after them, her heart pounding. No matter how much she wanted to believe he’d done that out of sympathy for Amanda’s situation, she knew he’d done it for her.

She turned back to her coffee, smiled at Amanda, trying to appear as if nothing was wrong. But everything was wrong. First, spending time with him had caused her to realize he deserved to know he’d created and lost a child. Now he was softening, doing things she asked.

For the first time it occurred to her that maybe he wasn’t changing because of their situation but to please her.

And if he was…Lord help them.

Ten minutes later Cain found himself in the living room with an angry, sullen teenager. He debated drawing him into conversation, but somehow he didn’t think the charisma that typically worked on egotistical bankers and clever business owners would work with a kid. And the chitchat he was forcing himself to develop with Amanda and Liz hadn’t served him all that well, either. He and Billy could either work in silence, or he could hit this kid with the truth.

“You know what? I don’t like this any more than you do.”

Surprised, Billy looked over.

“But your mom wants you here and every once in a while a man has to suck it up and do what his mom wants.” Technically, he and Billy were in the same boat. He was in this room, with this angry boy, because he hadn’t been able to resist the pleading in Liz’s eyes. And that troubled him. He was falling for her again. Only this time it was different. This time he had nothing to prove professionally. No reason to back away. No way to erect walls that would allow him to be in a relationship and still protect his heart. She’d broken it once. She could do it again.

“If you’d kept your mouth shut I could have gotten out of this.”

“How? By being a brat? That’s a skill that’ll really help you in the real world.”

“I don’t care about the real world.”

Cain snorted. “No kidding.” He slid his tape measure from his tool belt and walked to the wall. Holding the end of the tape against the wall, he waved the tape measure’s silver container at Billy. “Take this to the other end of the wall.”

Billy sighed, but took the tape box and did as Cain requested.

“What’s the length?”

“Ten feet.”

“Exactly ten feet?”

“I don’t know.”

Exasperated, but not about to let Billy know that and give him leverage to be a pain all day, Cain said, “Okay. Let’s try this again. You hold this end against the wall. I’ll get the number.”

Without a word, Billy walked the tape back to Cain and they switched places.

He measured the length, told Billy to let go of his end and the tape snapped back into the silver container. He reached for one of the long pieces of trim he’d purchased the day before. It bowed when he lifted it and he motioned with his chin for Billy to grab the other end. “Get that, will you?”

Billy made a face, but picked up the wood.

Cain carried it to the miter box. The tools he had in his truck were from nearly ten years before. Though they weren’t the latest technology they still worked. And maybe teaching this kid a little something today might be the best way to get his mind off Liz. About the fact that he didn’t just want her, he was doing crazy things for her. About the fact that if he didn’t watch himself, he’d be in so far that he’d be vulnerable again.

“You know, eventually you’ll have to go to somebody for a job. You’re not going to get through school on your good looks.”

Adjusting the wood in the box, Cain made his end cuts. He gestured for Billy to help him take the piece of trim to the wall again. He snapped it into place and secured it with a few shots from a nail gun.

“I was thinking maybe I’d try the bartending thing like you did.”

Surprised, Cain glanced over. He cautiously said, “Bartending is good when classes are in session and working nights fits into your schedule. But summers were when I made my tuition. To earn that much money, you have to have a job that pays. Construction pays.”

Billy opened his mouth to say something, but snapped it shut. Cain unexpectedly itched to encourage him to talk, but he stopped himself. If the kid wanted to talk, he’d talk. Cain had no intention of overstepping his boundaries. He knew that Liz had set Billy up with him to be a good example, but he wasn’t a therapist. Hell, he wasn’t even much of a talker. He couldn’t believe this kid had gotten as much out of him as he had.

“My dad was—is—in construction.”

“Ah.” No wonder Liz thought this would be such a wonderful arrangement.

“Look, kid, you don’t have to be like your dad. You can be anybody, anything, you want.” He glanced around the room. “Doing stuff like this,” he said, bringing his words down to Billy’s level, “gives you a way to test what you’re good at while you figure out who you are.” He paused then casually said, “You mentioned that you wanted to go to med school.”

“It’s a pipe dream. No way I’ll swing that.”

“Not with that attitude.”

Billy snorted. “My mom can’t help.”

“Hey, I made my own way. You can, too.” Motioning for Billy to pick up the next board, he casually eased them back into conversation. “Besides, it’s a good life lesson. The construction jobs I took to pay for tuition pointed me in the direction of what I wanted to do with my life.”

Seeing that Billy was really listening, Cain felt edgy. It would be so easy to steer this kid wrong. He wasn’t a people person. He didn’t know anything about being raised by an abusive father. There were a million different ways he could make a mistake.

“I think I want to be a doctor, but I’m not sure.”

“You’ll work that out.” He motioned for Billy to grab the tape measure again. “Everything doesn’t have to be figured out in one day. Take your time. Give yourself a break. Don’t think you have to make all your decisions right now.”

Oddly, his advice to Billy also relaxed him about Liz. Every decision didn’t have to be made in a day. That’s what had screwed them up in the first place. They jumped from seat mates in a plane to dating to sleeping together in a matter of days. Melting and doing her bidding just because she turned her pretty green eyes on him was as bad as working to seduce her the first day he’d met her.