Small-Town Nanny

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He cocked his head to one side, wondering suddenly about her past. “Oh?”

She waved her hand rapidly. “I was engaged once. It...didn’t work out.”

He nodded, inexplicably relieved. “Maybe you should come work for me on a trial basis, then.”

“A...trial basis?” That breathy sound again.

“Yes, since you’re not cut out for family life. It’s a live-in job, after all.”

“I do need a place to stay,” she said, “but no. That wouldn’t look right, would it? Me living in your house.”

Her eyes were wide and suddenly, Sam felt an urge to protect her. “Of course, I wouldn’t want to compromise your reputation. We have a mother-in-law’s suite over the garage. It has a separate entrance and plenty of privacy.”

“Really? You’re offering me the job? Because remember, I can’t cook.”

“You can learn.”

“Maybe, maybe not. I... What made you change your mind? I thought you didn’t like me.” She was nibbling on her lower lip, and right now she looked miles from the confident, brash waitress who’d stood up to a businessman in front of a restaurant full of people.

He smiled down at her. “My sister. My brother. And the way you handled Mindy.”

“But she’s probably not going to have another trauma reaction for a long time. Whereas cooking’s every day. You really don’t want to hire me.”

“Why are you trying to talk me out of it?” Her resistance was lighting a fire in him, making him feel as if he had to have her, and only her, for Mindy’s nanny. “I do want to. The sooner the better. When could you start?”

“Well...” She was starting to cave, and triumph surged through him. “My room is going to be remodeled out from under me starting this weekend.”

“Great,” he said, leaning in to close the deal. “I’ll have a truck sent round tomorrow. You can start setting up your apartment over the garage.”

“You’re sure?”

“I’m sure.”

“Paying what you told me before?”

He flashed a wide smile. “Of course.”

She paused, her nose wrinkling. Looked up at the stars. Then a happy expression broke out on her face. “Thank you!” she said, and gave him a quick, firm handshake.

Her smile and her touch sent a shot of joy through his entire body. He hadn’t felt anything like that before, ever. Not even when Marie was alive.

Guilt overwhelmed him and he took a step back. “Remember, it’s just a trial,” he said.

What had he gotten himself into?

* * *

Of course, everyone and his brother was in downtown Rescue River the next Saturday morning to comment on the moving truck in front of Susan’s boarding house. The truck carrying Susan to her absolute doom, if the scuttlebutt was to be believed.

“So you’re the next victim,” said Miss Minnie Falcon, who’d hurried over from the Senior Towers, pushing her wheeled walker, to watch the moving activities. “Sam Hinton eats babysitters for lunch!”

“It’s just on a trial basis,” Susan said, pausing in front of the guesthouse’s front porch. “If I don’t like the job, I can leave at any time. Don’t you want to sit down, Miss Minnie?”

“Oh, no, I’d rather stand,” the gray-haired woman said, her eyes bright. “Don’t want to miss anything!”

“Okay, if you’re sure.” That was small-town life: your activities were like reality TV to your neighbors, and truthfully, Susan found it sweet. At least everyone knew who you were and watched out for you.

“I’m going to miss you so much,” her landlady, Lacey, said as she helped Susan carry her sole box of fragile items down the rickety porch steps. “I’m really sorry about making you move. It’s just that Buck seems to be serious about staying sober, and he’s looking to make money, and of course, he’s willing to work on this place for cheap because he’s my brother.”

“It’s fine. You’ve got to remodel while you can,” Susan soothed her. “And we’ll still hang out, right?” She’d enjoyed her year at Lacey’s guesthouse, right in the heart of her adopted town. She wouldn’t have minded staying. But sometimes, she felt silly being twenty-five years old and having to use someone else’s kitchen if she wanted to make herself a snack.

“Of course we’ll hang out. I’ll miss you!”

“I know, me, too.” She and Lacey had gotten close during a number of late-night talks. Susan had comforted Lacey through a heartbreaking miscarriage, and they’d cried and prayed together.

“And it’s not just me. The cats will miss you!” Lacey said. “You have to come back and visit all the time.”

As if to prove her words, an ancient gray cat tangled himself around Susan’s ankle and then, when she grabbed the bannister to keep from tripping, offered up a mournful yowl.

Susan reached down to rub the old tomcat’s head. “You and Mrs. Whiskers take care of yourselves. I’ll bring you a treat when I come back, promise.”

They went outside and loaded the box of breakables into the front seat of Susan’s car, only to be accosted by Gramps Camden, another resident of the Senior Towers. “Old Sam Hinton caught himself a live one!” he said. “Now you listen here. Those Hintons are trouble. Just because my granddaughter married one—and Troy is the best of the bunch—that doesn’t mean they’re a good family. I was cheated by that schemer’s dad and now, his corporation won’t let up on me about selling my farm. You be careful in his house. Lock your door!”

“I will.” She’d gotten to know Gramps through the schools, where he now served as a volunteer.

“He wasn’t good enough for that wife of his,” Gramps continued.

“Marie was pretty nearly perfect,” agreed Miss Minnie Falcon.

From what Susan already knew about Sam, she figured any woman who married him would have to be. And yet, for all his millionaire arrogance, he obviously adored his little daughter. And a man who loved a child that much couldn’t be all bad. Could he?

“Is that all your stuff, ma’am?” the college-age guy, who’d apparently come with the truck, asked respectfully.

Gramps waved and headed back to the Towers with Miss Minnie.

“Yes, that’s it,” Susan said. “What do I owe you?”

“Nothing. Mr. Hinton took care of it.”

“Let me grab my purse. I want to at least give you a tip for being so careful.”

The young man waved his hand. “Mr. Hinton took care of that, too. He said we weren’t to take a penny from you.”

“Is that so,” Susan said, torn between gratitude and irritation.

“Money’s one thing Sam Hinton doesn’t lack.” The voice belonged to Buck Armstrong, Lacey’s brother. He put a large potted plant into the back of her car, tilting it sideways so it would fit. The young veteran had haunted eyes and a bad reputation, but whenever Susan had run into him visiting his sister, he’d been nothing but a gentleman. “You all set?”

“I hope so. I’m hearing horror stories about my new boss, is all.” And they were spooking her. As the time came to leave her friendly guesthouse in the heart of Rescue River, she felt more and more nervous.

Buck nodded, his eyes darkening. “Sam didn’t use to be quite so...driven. Losing a wife is hard on a guy.”

Sympathy twisted Susan’s heart. Buck knew what he was talking about; he’d lost not only his wife, but their baby as well. That was what had pushed him toward drinking too much, according to Lacey.

“You giving this gal a hard time?” The voice belonged to Rescue River’s tall, dark-skinned police chief. He clapped Buck on the shoulder in a friendly way, but his eyes were watchful. Chief Dion Coleman had probably had a number of encounters with Buck that weren’t so friendly.

“He’s trying to tell me Sam Hinton is really a nice guy, since I’m going to work for him,” Susan explained.

Dion let out a hearty laugh. “You’re going to work for Sam? Doing what?”

“Summer nanny for Mindy.”

“Is that right? My, my.” Dion shook his head, still chuckling. “I tell you what, I think Mr. Sam Hinton might have finally met his match.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Susan asked, indignant.

“Nothing, nothing.” He clapped Buck’s shoulder again. “Come on, man, I’ll buy you a cup of coffee if you’ve got half an hour to spare. Got something to run by you.”

Buck was about to get gently evangelized, if Susan knew Dion. He headed up a men’s prayer group at their church and was unstoppable in his efforts to get the hurting men of Rescue River on the right path. According to Daisy, he’d done wonders with her brother Troy.

As Buck and Dion headed toward the Chatterbox Café, Lacey came out to hug her goodbye. “You’ll be fine. This is going to be an adventure!” She lowered her voice. “At least, let’s hope so.”

An odd, uncomfortable chill tickled Susan’s spine as she climbed into her car and headed to her new job, her new life.

Chapter Four (#ulink_6db08d7e-356f-5c3d-a304-b47689784501)

Sam paced back and forth in the driveway, checking his watch periodically. Where was she?

Small beach shoes clacked along the walkway from the back deck, and he turned around just in time to catch Mindy in his arms. He lifted her and gave her a loud kiss on the cheek, making her giggle.

And then she struggled down. “Daddy, Miss Lou Ann says I can play in the pool if it’s okay with you. Can I?”

Lou Ann Miller, who’d worked for his family back in the day and had helped to raise Sam, Troy and Daisy, followed her young charge out into the driveway. “She’s very excited. It would be a nice way for her to cool off.” She winked at him. “Nice for you if she’d burn off some extra energy, too.”

Sam hesitated. Lou Ann was an amazing woman, but she was in her upper seventies. “If she stays in the shallow end,” he decided. “And Mindy, you listen to Miss Lou Ann.”

“Of course she will,” Lou Ann said. “Run and change into your suit, sweetie.” As soon as Mindy disappeared inside, Lou Ann put a hand on her hip and raised an eyebrow at Sam. “I was the county synchronized swimming champion eight years running,” she said. “And I still swim every morning. I can get Mindy out of any trouble she might get into.”

“Of course!” Sam felt himself reddening and reminded himself not to stereotype.

He just wanted to keep Mindy safe and get her home environment as close to what Marie had made as was humanly possible. Get things at home back to running like a well-organized company, one he could lead with confidence and authority.

The moving truck chugged around the corner and up to the house, and Sam rubbed his hands together. Here was one step...he hoped. If Susan worked out.

He gestured them toward the easiest unloading point and helped open the back of the truck as Susan pulled up in her old subcompact, its slightly-too-dark exhaust and more-than-slightly-too-loud engine announcing that the car was on its last legs. He’d have to do something about that.

As the college boys he’d hired started moving her few possessions out, she approached. Her clothes were relaxed—a loose gauzy shirt, flip flops and cut-off shorts revealing long, slender, golden-bronzed legs—but her face looked pinched with stress. “Hey,” she said, following his glance back to her car. “Don’t worry, I’ll pull it behind the garage as soon as the truck’s out of the way.”

“I didn’t say—”

“You didn’t have to.” She grabbed a box off the truck and headed up the stairs.

He helped the guys unload a heavy, overstuffed chair and then followed them up the stairs with an armload of boxes.

There was Susan, staring around the apartment, hands on hips.

“What’s wrong?” he asked. “Is it suitable? Too small? We can work something out—”

“It’s fine,” she said, patting his arm. “It’s beautiful. I’m just trying to decide where to put things.”

“Good.” There was something about Susan that seemed a little volatile, as if she might morph into a butterfly and disappear. “Well, you need to put the desk in that corner,” he said, gesturing the movers to the part of the living room that was alcoved off, “and the armchair over there.”

“Wait. Put the desk under the window. I like to look out while I work.”

The young guys looked at him, tacitly asking his permission.

Susan raised her eyebrows, looking from the movers to Sam. There was another moment of silence.

“Of course, of course! Whatever the lady wants.” But when they got the desk, a crooked and ill-finished thing, into the light under the window, he frowned. “I might have an extra desk you can use, if you like.”

“I’m fine with that one.”

He understood pride, but he hated to see a teacher with such a ratty desk. “Really?”

“Yes.” She waited while the young movers went down to get another load, then spun on him. “Don’t you have something else to do, other than comment about my stuff?”

“I’m sorry.” He was controlling and he knew it, but it was with the goal of making other people’s lives better. “I just thought...are you sure you wouldn’t rather have something less...lopsided? The money’s not a problem.”