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“Let him go.”
The man shrugged off her touch. “He’s being—”
“Lucas Whatever Your Name Is, I think you need to tell me what’s really going on.”
Chapter Two
LUCAS FINLAY LOOKED at the small woman staring expectantly at him with eyes the color of aged wheat—not quite golden but not wholly brown—and stilled himself.
What was really going on?
How about total incompetency in dealing with kids?
Or helplessness?
Or guilt?
Or all of the above?
All those would likely cover the past forty-eight hours spent in the company of three kids he knew nothing about, a house that creaked and moaned and had weak pipes, and pets that needed constant feeding and walking. He’d encountered more poop in the past two days than in his entire lifetime...and he raised cattle on his ranch.
Not to mention, Michael had been correct.
Not about eating small children. Lucas might be tall, but he’d given up devouring tiny tots long ago...when he’d sold the golden-egg-laying goose. But the boy had been right about him hating his brother and sister-in-law. Unequivocally correct.
“It’s a long story.”
Addy hooked a dramatic eyebrow. “Yeah?”
“I need to go.”
“Where are Ben and Courtney?”
For a moment, he didn’t answer. Was it any of her business? She was a neighbor. Neighbors carried tales and Lucas wasn’t sure what Courtney wanted to reveal about Ben’s injuries...about the fact Lucas’s younger brother lay in a hospital bed miles away, knocking on death’s door. “They’re in Virginia.”
Not a lie. Walter Reed Army Hospital was in Virginia.
“Ben’s deployed to Afghanistan. Was he injured?”
Lucas didn’t move a muscle. “I can’t give out information without their permission.”
“What about your parents? Why aren’t they here instead of you?”
“Mom and Dad are in Europe, trying to get back so they can meet Courtney in Virginia. There was no one else to stay with the kids on such short notice.”
The woman didn’t say anything. Just studied him, which made him uncomfortable. This is what he didn’t like about being back in New Orleans. People lurked around every corner and there were so many things in his way—trees, bushes, grass, lushness. Yes, everything was so damn plush and suffocating.
Not like West Texas where a man could breathe. Where a man could stretch out and see for days what came toward him. There were no corners...and very few people. And those very few people left him the hell alone. Just as he wished.
Here in New Orleans, he drowned in all the stuff surrounding him.
Mostly in dog piss because Kermit the golden retriever had bladder issues. The vet was on the list for tomorrow, but if he had to go to Home Depot...
She cleared her throat.
He glanced at her again. She hadn’t warmed up to him, but most people didn’t. There was something hard in his demeanor, something off-putting that sent people away from him rather than toward him. Probably his size. He stretched six foot four inches and filled up most doorways with his breadth. He wasn’t fat, but neither was he slim. Solid. Thick. And unlikely to smile. Charm was his antonym.
But he liked the look of her. Petite but not mousy. Brown hair that caught in the waning sunlight. Pleasant heart-shaped face. Very natural—no caked-on makeup or weirdly patterned shirts with spiky high heels. Just simplicity. Yeah, this woman looked simple. His fingers itched to photograph her. He’d use the new Nikon and catch the natural light falling soft against her golden skin.
Then he remembered where he was.
“Look, I don’t feel comfortable talking about the situation. Courtney hasn’t told the kids what issues she and Ben are facing.” Damn. Even that was too much to say. He could tell Addy knew the situation wasn’t good, but he couldn’t take back his words. Yet, somehow he knew this woman wouldn’t spread them around.
She nodded, mink hair falling over slim shoulders. He wondered what she’d do if he reached over and felt it between his thumb and finger. Scream?
Then he remembered the pepper spray on her key ring and shoved his hands into his pockets.
“Okay, I’m smart enough to realize it’s something bad otherwise you wouldn’t be here. I’ve never seen you before so that means you’re not close to your brother. The children seem scared of you, likely perpetuated by Michael who is locked in a power struggle with you. So I’d say—”
“You a counselor?”
She smiled and her face transformed into beauty. Not an overblown, sexy beauty, but the kind a person observes as a swan glides over the water on a still morn, the kind reflected in a pool sitting taciturn beneath a towering mountain pass. Serene beauty. Peaceful beauty. “I’m a floral designer.”
His expression must have betrayed the question.
“Fine. It’s a fancy way of saying I’m a florist.”
At this he gave a rare smile. “So you arrange things. Pull apart, reassemble and create something that makes sense...just as you’re doing now?”
She made a face. “I don’t think anyone has ever put it in such a way, but I suppose that’s accurate.”
A scream erupted from the house. Chris or Charlotte? He couldn’t tell.
“That’s my cue. Need to go, but I’ll send over whichever child’s not bleeding for your list.” His strides ate up the distance between her drive and the gap in the bushes. For some odd reason he didn’t want to leave her just yet.
Or maybe he merely tried to avoid the slap of reality awaiting him. He’d learned kids were fantastic at delivering those particular slaps.
Before he disappeared, Lucas turned and held up his hand. “Good to meet you and sorry about—”
Another scream.
Addy jerked her gaze to the blue house. “Go.”
So he did.
Of course when he saw what awaited him when he stepped through the front door, he wished he’d stayed awhile longer basking in the serenity that was his brother’s next-door neighbor.
Charlotte stood in the living room screeching like a parrot, pointing at a huge puddle of something.
“What?” he shouted, stomping onto the area rug.
Charlotte froze.
“Where are your brothers?”
She didn’t say anything. Just looked at him like he had horns. Like he might be looking over the plumpest parts of her for his nighttime meal.
“Michael!” He called up the stairs.
No answer.
Kermit, the ancient golden retriever, slunk past, quickstepping it toward the kitchen and back door.
“Oh, no,” Lucas muttered, glancing at Charlotte. “Is that dog pee?”
She slowly nodded. “I stepped in it. Gross.”
Chris came in holding a large plastic storage bag filled with ice, sank into the leather recliner and propped his ankle up, plunking the ice on his bare foot and grabbing the remote control. “Looks like Kermit the Dog peed again.”
Lucas closed his eyes and counted, throwing in a Hail Mary and the Serenity prayer for good measure. When he opened his eyes, the things he couldn’t change were still there. Dog pee, three-year-old and a ten-year-old watching Cinemax.
“Hey, turn that to a kid’s channel or something,” he said, giving Chris the same eyeball job his father had given him when he sneaked off to watch shoot ’em up movies.
“But it’s PG-13. No sex or nothin’.”
“You’re not thirteen. You’re barely ten. Turn the channel. Now.” Lucas skirted the pond of pee and looked at his niece who balanced on one foot.
“It gotted on me,” she said by way of explanation.
“Of course. It’s nearly time for your bath, so we’ll take one early, okay?”
“’Kay. Can I have frooty-ohs for dinner?” she asked, allowing him to lift her. She didn’t even shudder, but she didn’t hold on to him, either. Maybe they were making progress. “You weally ain’t a monster, are you?”
“No. I’m your uncle. Your daddy’s older brother. I’m just big.”
Her blue eyes didn’t blink.
“You’re little. Does that make you a fairy?”
She smiled and something near the rock that was his heart stirred. Felt like gas but not as sharp. “Like Tinkerbell?”
“Who’s Tinkerbell?”
The little girl relaxed against him as he climbed the stairs. “You don’t even know who Tinkerbell is?”
Music blasted from behind Michael’s closed door. Lucas knocked but got no response, so he kept moving toward the kids’ bathroom. Courtney had obviously taken pains to make it bright and kidlike, but the boys seemed to care little, tossing their socks, undies and wet towels on the floor and leaving streaks of toothpaste in the sink.
“Here. I’ll start your bath then I’ll get Michael to help you while I clean up the mess Kermit made.”
Charlotte balanced on one foot, holding aloft a tiny foot with chipped pink polish on her little toenails. “’Kay.”
Lucas banged on Michael’s door.
No answer. Of course.
“Michael!” Lucas raised his fist to pound on the door once more but it jerked open.
Music battered him and an angry thirteen-year-old with sullen brown eyes met him. “What?”
Lucas lowered his fist because the kid’s eyes darted to it and there was a hunted look in them. “I need you to bathe your sister.”
“That’s not my job. I did my homework and took out the trash. Plus, I already wiped her and put her pants on.”
“Fine. I’ll bathe her. You clean up your dog’s pee. Use the steam cleaner.” Lucas turned toward the bathroom.
“Fine. Whatever. I’ll bathe the flea.” There were equal parts disgust and resignation in Michael’s voice.
Good. Lucas didn’t want to bathe Charlotte again. The first night she’d sung songs about spaghetti at the top of her lungs and insisted on using something called Dora the Explorer shampoo...which he could not find. He’d also thought she’d bathe herself, but that didn’t seem to be the case. Seems he was supposed to bathe her. And it felt weird because he’d never washed a little girl before. Big girls and a bottle of bath gel? Sign him up. Little girls with Strawberry Shortcake soap and a Mardi Gras party cup to rinse her hair? Not so much.
He’d take dog pee any day of the week.
Chris quickly changed the channel when Lucas entered the room so he tossed him another Father Knows Best stern look and went in search of the paper towels stored in the half bath under the stairs.
Fifteen minutes later he stood in the kitchen looking at the retriever who sat innocently at the back door, tongue lolled out, happiness pouring out of sweet brown eyes. He sort of wanted to kick it...and he sort of wanted to take it for a walk. Or maybe fishing. He’d always wanted a dog to take fishing.
“Out, Kermit. And don’t piss in the house again.”
The dog lumbered out into the fenced yard. And the Wicked Cat of the West darted in.
Mittens. Meaner than a two-headed snake.
Lucas sighed and leaned his head against the smooth painted wood of the door.
He needed help.
He didn’t know what in the hell he was doing as evidenced by being yelled at in the carpool line while picking up Charlotte from school. Sister Regina Maria had actually scared him...and she was barely five feet tall.
Why did he tell Courtney he would come to New Orleans and watch the kids?
Of course, he knew the answer. But it was complicated...and tied around the fact the brother he’d once loved and now hated was teetering on the precipice of death. Nutshell.
But all the other shit he felt cluttered around that reason made it harder than he’d ever thought to be here in the world he’d left behind.
Long ago.
Courtney’s voice. Please, Lucas. I know you hate me, but please. I don’t know what else to do. I have to be with Ben. Have to. Please, he’s your brother. This is me begging you.
Words he’d longed to hear, but never in such regard. He’d wanted to punish Courtney. Wanted her to grovel. To regret. To know what she’d given up.
