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“Which leaves you.”
“Yes.”
“You can’t be legally compelled by a will you knew nothing about.”
“I know. My lawyer made that clear. But how can I let her go to foster care and the adoptive system? How would I live with myself?”
“There’s time to think about it. You can’t solve everything in one night.”
When Lila tried to hop down from the counter, he stopped her. “I may not have gotten all the glass. Hold still.” He took her by the waist again, swung her over the sticky area and set her in the doorway. “Do you want me to get you another glass of milk?”
Lila shook her head. “No. I’m good. I’ll see you in the morning.”
“I have a housekeeper who comes in at ten. I’ve told her to avoid the guest room and my office for the time being.”
“I’m inconveniencing you. Why won’t you let me go to a hotel?”
“I think I owe you one.” He hadn’t meant to be so honest. Something about her demeanor tonight sneaked past his defenses.
She wrapped her arms around her waist. “You don’t owe me anything, James. Really. We both made mistakes. And it was a long time ago.”
“Okay. Fair enough. But quit worrying about everything so much. You’ll be back in your own house before you know it.”
Five (#ulink_b8f14769-e0a3-570b-93fe-b74f6c61c942)
As it turned out, James’s prediction was wildly optimistic. The day after the milk incident, she barely saw him at all other than the times she peeked out the window and watched him going in and out of her house. He had ordered a Dumpster and had it delivered right outside. It was slowly filling with chunks of Sheetrock and pieces of wallpaper.
He had told Lila she and Sybbie would have to be displaced only two nights, but at dinner that first night—lasagna prepared by his wonderful housekeeper before she left—he sat down at the table and ran a hand through his hair, his expression agitated.
“What’s wrong, James?” He’d never been good at hiding his feelings. “Is it going to take longer than you thought?”
He rubbed his chin and shook his head. “I might have run into a bit of a snag today.”
Sybbie didn’t like having Lila’s attention elsewhere. She wailed until Lila gave her another bite of bread. “Go ahead and tell me,” Lila said. “I can handle bad news.”
“You have termites.”
She blinked at him. “Say that again?”
“Termites.”
“But I have a pest control service.”
“That’s a good thing, because they’ll have to repair the damage at their own expense. You still have termites, though. I can’t work on the renovation until we take care of that.”
Her throat got tight and her eyes burned. She was trying so hard to stay positive, but this was a kick in the stomach. “What do I need to do?”
His gaze softened. “You don’t have to do anything, Lila, except take care of this little sweetheart.” He tickled Sybbie’s neck and was rewarded with a smile. “I’ll handle your house issues. I’ve seen worse.”
“I can’t let you do that.”
“Too late.” His grin blinded her. “You’ve already hired me.”
“To do a modest renovation, not to rip out all my walls.”
“Don’t be a drama queen.”
She felt her temper rise and had to tamp it down. He was teasing her...that’s all. An old habit. Perhaps the reason she and James had fought so much when they were together was because the making up afterward had been so much fun. But that wasn’t going to happen this time around. Which meant she couldn’t let him press her buttons.
“How long are we talking about?”
“If your termite people are on the ball, not long. They’ll have to do a major treatment. The more pressing issue is whether or not you have termites anywhere else.”
She hadn’t even thought of that implication. “People told me not to buy an old house. I should have listened.”
“Oh, come on, Lila. You know you love the place.”
“I do. But I don’t want it falling down around my ears.”
Having an infant at the table made adult conversation difficult. By unspoken consent, they tabled the termite talk and played with the baby. Wistfully, Lila watched James interact with Sybbie. Maeve Kavanagh had raised seven sons, mostly on her own. She had instilled in them the value of hard work and what it meant to be a gentleman.
To an outsider, the Kavanagh men might seem very different from one another. But under the skin—beneath the superficial differences of physical appearance and career choice—they each were carbon copies when it came to their character. Alpha males one and all. Tough, uncompromising. Committed to doing what was right even when the choice was difficult.
Hence her stint camping out in James’s guest room.
“Tell me something,” she said impulsively.
He looked up, his beautiful brown eyes regarding her with a hint of reserve. Maybe he thought she was going to give him grief about last night. “What is it? What do you want to know? I’m an open book.”
That wasn’t exactly true. He seemed like an open book, but she had a feeling she had only scratched the surface when it came to understanding James Kavanagh.
“Are you still looking for your father’s remains?”
“Where the hell did that come from?” Anger flashed in his gaze, warning her to tread lightly. But surely this was the key. Something about a son without a father and James’s insistence on having children. It wasn’t the kind of thing most guys who were barely thirty fixated on.
She handed Sybbie a small bite of banana. “When you and I were together, you spent a lot of weekends out in the woods. Searching. And every time you came home, I got the feeling you were upset. But I was always afraid to ask you.”
“Afraid? Of me?”
“I’m talking about your state of mind. When you came to pick me up for dates and you had been out on the mountain, I sensed a wildness in you, as if you were barely under control. Am I wrong?”
“I don’t want to talk about my father.” His tone said back off.
“I never knew my father either, James, not really. It’s a sad way to grow up. But at least you have a fabulous mother...and all your siblings.”
“If you think I’m fixated on a bastard who deserted his family, you couldn’t be more wrong.”
She inhaled sharply. James spoke as if the wound was fresh. When in fact, it had happened almost three decades ago. “He didn’t desert you.”
“Of course he did.” His raised voice upset Sybbie. “Sorry, munchkin.” He stood abruptly, part of his meal uneaten. “I need a shower. After that, I’ll probably hit the hay early. Do you and the kid need anything?”
It was barely seven thirty. Obviously, this was his way of telling her he wanted to be alone. That she and Sybbie weren’t there to socialize with him. “We’re fine,” Lila said. “I’ll call the pest control people first thing in the morning. I would never have asked you to get involved if I had known this would be the outcome.”
“Think of it as a blessing in disguise. If I hadn’t started the renovation, you might not have known about the termites until they had done catastrophic damage. Good night, Lila.”
When he strode out of the room, she stared at Sybbie, who played with a pile of Cheerios, unfazed by the tension between the adults. “Well, kiddo. I guess it’s just you and me.”
Lila tidied up the kitchen and cleaned the baby’s sticky hands. After that, she took Sybbie into the guest room and sat on the bed with her reading a stack of board books she had ordered from Amazon the morning she realized she was going to become a temporary mom.
Sybbie sat between Lila’s legs, her soft, sweet-smelling body tucked in Lila’s embrace with simple trust. The future was a scary void. What were they going to do? How could they be a family?
Today during naptime, Lila had begun ticking off a list of calls: her coworkers at the bank, women in her yoga class, friends she had made since she had moved to Silver Glen. Every conversation left her more and more despondent. Apparently, good nannies were very hard to find.
Not only that, but they were expensive. Obviously, if you wanted to hire a young woman with credentials, you couldn’t pay teenage babysitter wages. Money aside, it might take several months to locate such a person. Lila didn’t have that much time.
She had to be at the bank come Monday. Quitting wasn’t an option, because then she wouldn’t be able to support herself and a child. The only alternative was to cobble together some part-time sitters until she could make a permanent decision about whether or not to keep Sybbie.
Truthfully, she already knew how things were going to play out. This precious, chubby infant shared her DNA. In only a few days, Lila had fallen in love with her. But maybe Sybbie deserved better. Lila wasn’t the nurturing type. She worked long hours. And at the very heart of the matter, she was scared—scared to be responsible for someone so tiny and vulnerable.
By the time she had bathed the baby and put her in a fresh diaper and pj’s, Sybbie was drooping. Lila laid her down in the crib and turned off the light. “Good night, sweet pea.” The baby was already turning onto her tummy and curling into her favorite sleeping position.
Lila closed the door quietly and stood in the middle of her bedroom. She was accustomed to being on her own. Ever since she went off to college, she’d had no one to depend upon but herself. She rarely saw her mother, mostly because her mother made it clear that she didn’t want Lila around.
Maybe Lila had made a pest of herself by offering to pay for rehab one too many times. Her mom didn’t want to be helped. She didn’t think she had a problem, even though at the recent funeral she had been so drunk or medicated or both that she was barely able to stand.
Back when James and Lila had been going out, there was a time when Lila fantasized about becoming a Kavanagh. Not only because James was smart and funny and seriously hot...but because the thought of belonging to the large, tight-knit family made her yearn for something she had never experienced. She didn’t know what it was like to always know that someone had your back...that in a crisis you didn’t have to face things alone.
Suddenly, a wave of panic swamped her. She had to get out of this house. Grabbing a jacket and the baby monitor, she slipped out the back door. The range on the small electronic device wasn’t extensive, but she would go as far as she could and still see the baby.
First, she slipped next door to her own house and surveyed the mess James had made. Her tidy dining room was gone. James had moved the table into the guest quarters that would eventually be Lila’s downstairs bedroom.
Everything was coated in a fine film of dust.
How was she going to manage? She didn’t know anything about being a parent. Moms were supposed to bake cookies and sew Halloween costumes and host sleepovers. Lila was happiest in a room alone with paper and figures and tasks that she had the skills to do well.
She was exhausted and grieving for her sister and, at the heart of it all, bruised in spirit. Bruised because the one man she had ever really felt deeply about didn’t want a woman like her.
The tears, when they came, took her by surprise. But instead of choking them back, she gave in to the barrage of pain and sorrow and fear. She’d been leaning against a wall. Now she slid to the floor and buried her head on her knees, sobbing until her chest hurt.
Six (#ulink_8bf08000-849b-5ef6-89b9-76015e2dbb33)
James heard the back door open and shut. He watched from the upstairs bedroom window as Lila slipped across the side yard like a shadow. What the heck was she doing?
Don’t follow her. His gut was smarter than he was. He needed to keep his distance. Lila wasn’t his problem.
Five minutes later he cursed beneath his breath and went after his reluctant houseguest. He found her sitting on the dusty dining room floor, crying as if her heart was broken. His reaction stunned him. All he wanted to do was pick her up and carry her home and make love to her until she understood that everything was going to be okay.
Instead, he kept his distance and cleared his throat. Her head snapped up immediately. “James. What are you doing here? I have the monitor with me. I wouldn’t neglect the baby.”
Her face was blotched with tears, her nose red and her eyes puffy. “I know that, Lila.” She seemed so small and lost and alone. But he knew she was strong and confident and well respected by her peers at the bank. The president had hired her on the day she interviewed for the job. “Maybe it would help to talk about it,” he said quietly. “To a neutral third party.”
He wasn’t neutral about Lila. Probably never would be. The fact that he still cared about her made him a decent human being. Not a guy itching for another round of getting punched in the gut. She wasn’t what he needed. He wasn’t what she wanted.
Joining her on the floor, he stretched out his legs and sighed. “Let it out, Lila. I make a good confessional, I swear.”
In profile, her features were delicately carved. He saw the shuddering sob that signaled the end of her catharsis. Tears were good...for women at least. Sometimes he envied the fairer sex for their ability to express emotion. For him, it was usually chopping wood or hiking seven miles that took the edge off when he felt overwhelmed or sad.
“Talk to me, Lila.”
It took a long time, but finally she answered. “I don’t think I can keep Sybbie.”
Inwardly, he recoiled, but he kept his expression impassive. “Why not?”
“Look at me. You know who I am. I’m not the Martha Stewart type. I’m good at my job, but it requires long hours. That’s partly why you and I broke up. I don’t want Sybbie to be raised by a nanny. She deserves a traditional home with two parents. You and I both missed out on that. Surely it would be hypocritical of me to keep her when I can’t devote my time to raising her myself.”
“Can’t or won’t?”
Lila froze. His sharp question had spewed out uncensored, revealing his visceral reaction to the idea that she would give away her niece. “Thanks for the support,” she said.
For a split second he saw anguish in her eyes. He didn’t want to cause her pain, but he also didn’t want her to make a decision she would regret later. Carefully, he put a hand on her arm, expecting her to knock it away. Instead, she froze. “I’m not your enemy, Lila. Let me help you.” He was trying to reach her through touch. They weren’t a couple anymore, but they were neighbors, and surely they could become friends again.
“You’re already helping me,” she said.
“That’s different. You hired me to do a job. Anyone could have done that for you.”
“Then what do you mean?”
He squeezed her arm and let go. “I want to talk to you about something, but I’d feel more comfortable if we were closer to Sybbie. Let’s go back and I’ll pour us a couple glasses of wine.”
* * *
Lila had hit rock bottom. It was bad enough when she and James broke up. But she’d had her job and her friends to distract her. Tonight, she knew she had disappointed him. Why couldn’t he understand that she was proud of her job...that she enjoyed her work?
James surely had gleaned some of his ideas about women from 1960s sitcoms. He wanted a wife who would greet her husband at the door with a baby on one hip and a beer in the other. For him. Of course. His attitude really made no sense, because his own mother had worked her whole life, though admittedly in the family business.
Most of his sisters-in-law had careers. She’d never heard him be judgmental about them. Maybe it was only Lila’s life choices he found unacceptable.
In every other way, he seemed to be an enlightened male. But apparently not when it came to the future mother of his yet-to-be-born children.
James was already standing. She pretended not to see his outstretched hand. Instead, she got to her feet and brushed the sawdust from her legs. “Okay,” she said. “We’ll talk. But I can’t see how that changes anything.”
She absolutely had to show up for work Monday morning. Taking Sybbie with her was not an option. She was out of answers. Not only did she have zero prospects for a nanny, she had also bombed out when it came to lining up a few temporary babysitters. Of the two problems, the babysitter issue would be easier to solve. If she made another series of phone calls, she could surely find a few dependable people who could tag team during Lila’s working hours.
But did she really want to come home from an exhausting ten hours of work day after day and take care of Sybbie? She wasn’t a selfish person. Already, she loved the baby. Intellectually, she knew that many families with two working parents made this happen.
The difference was, Lila wasn’t married. Once the babysitters went home, she would bear the responsibility for everything else. The thought was not only daunting, it was terrifying.
And that was something James wasn’t going to understand. Not unless she told him her secrets. The things that gave her sleepless nights and caused her to wake up in a cold sweat from nightmares.
