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Daniel blew a breath into the hands-free mouthpiece of his cell phone. “When can I talk to her?”
“She made an appointment. I told her five—figured that would work.”
Daniel sighed. “I didn’t realize how much time it would take just to hire a housekeeper. What’s your take on that first one I talked to last night?”
“She gossips. Everybody knows it.”
“Hmm. The next one had an excellent reference.”
“From Shaw’s Supermarket, yes. If you were needing a butcher, then she’d be your woman.”
Daniel had disliked the other two he’d met after five minutes with each of them. “You’re not much help,” he grumbled.
“I’m not too excited about this housekeeper idea.”
“Duh,” Daniel said, and frowned. “Well, okay, I’ll make the decision about the one who’s coming in this afternoon. I’m not even going to let you see her.”
“Humph,” Jesse said, and hung up.
It was a busy afternoon. Jesse had caught Daniel on the way to the Dupras farm to check on Maggie, a prizewinning pig who should be delivering her piglets in the next few days. After he’d seen Maggie, he went back to the office to see two cats, a dog, a mynah bird who called him “pond scum” in a radio announcer’s voice and a boa constrictor that kept wrapping itself around Daniel’s arm.
He was still a little rattled by the snake’s fondness for him when Mildred, his receptionist—actually, she did everything except practice medicine—put her head through his office door and said, “Your five o’clock is here. No pet.” She gave Daniel a quizzical look.
“Housekeeper applicant,” he said.
“Hmm,” she murmured. “Can you see her now?”
“Sure. Whoever she is, she can’t be worse than the snake.”
Mildred shuddered and went back to the waiting room.
A minute later, he heard a timid knock on the door. The woman who stepped in wasn’t what he expected, not at all like the other applicants. She couldn’t be more than thirty, but her face looked old with worry. She was tall, or at least not short. Her sedate dress was clean but wrinkled, and her blond hair hung limply around her shoulders…
Hadn’t he said the same thing to himself about some other woman recently? Yes, she was the woman he’d seen at the church, the one whose little boy had made friends with Nick.
She hadn’t seen him there, he thought, so he wouldn’t mention it. He stood and held out his hand. “Daniel Foster,” he said.
“Yes,” she said, shaking his hand, “Lilah Jamison.”
Her hand was damp, and she was trembling. “Good of you to come by,” Daniel said. “Have a seat. So you’re new in town?”
“Yes.” Her voice grew firmer. “My husband died, and my son and I needed a fresh start.”
He nodded. “You have references?”
She flushed, but she looked him straight in the eye. “I’m afraid not. I’ve never worked as a housekeeper but I’ve always kept a spotless house, even though I worked full-time.” She stared him down as if she expected him to say, Sure you did.
“What sort of work did you do?”
When she told him she’d been a nurse doing home care, it occurred to him that it wouldn’t be bad having a nurse in the house to deal with four risk-taking boys. But his attention was distracted by how desperate she looked.
She wasn’t merely thin, but haggard. The half-moons under her eyes, which were dark blue, indicated sleep deprivation and worry; lusterless hair suggested a poor diet. A modest sundress showed off arms that were too thin. Ivory skin that might once have been beautiful was now dry and lifeless. Her husband’s death must have thrown her a knockout punch. Either he had been much older than she, or he’d died tragically young.
And she had a little boy. His blood suddenly ran cold. How could she take care of a child in her condition?
This was hitting him too close to home. The boy—what kind of life was he living? Nick had liked him. Nick was scared of his own shadow, so her son couldn’t be a bully or a troublemaker. But still, Daniel was looking for a housekeeper for his kids and he was taking no chances.
“Why didn’t you take a nursing job?” he asked, keeping his voice gentle. “The Churchill hospital is—”
“Filled with nurses already.” He saw her face tighten, but she didn’t sound bitter.
“I understand,” he said, and he did. “Nepotism” wasn’t in the local vocabulary. It was simply understood that jobs were passed down from generation to generation. “You seem like a pleasant person, which is important to me, since you’d be keeping house for four foster children. But without references—”
She seemed to sag in her chair.
“Tell you what,” he said, starting to think that perhaps because this woman needed help so badly he could trust her to do the job well. “Give me your address and phone number and I’ll call you with my final decision. I’ve had several applicants,” dreadful ones, he reminded himself, “and I need to think things over.”
“As you said, we’re new here. No phone service yet.” He could tell she was trying to be matter-of-fact, but he could also see the pain in her eyes. “I’ll come by the clinic in a few days. You could leave a message with your assistant.”
She stood up, too, and just as Daniel held out his hand to shake hers again, he heard a familiar sound, one of the boys coming to tell him about some wonderful—or terrible—thing that had just happened.
“Daniel!”
“Mom!”
His job applicant rushed toward the boy who’d yelled, “Mom,” and said, “Honey, you were supposed to stay outside…”
But Nick drowned her out. “This is Jonathan, the one I was telling you about. I saw him in his car, and he said he had a present for me. Look what his mom made!”
Daniel, not as rattled as he had been about the snake but close to it, moved around his desk to stare at the weird thing Nick held in his hand. It could be a voodoo doll. No voodoo in his house. Or it might be a Satanic totem.
A Satanic totem that looked like a Red Sox baseball player?
He tried to clear his head. “That was kind of you,” he said to the mysterious Lilah Jamison, who had an arm around her son. “What is it?”
“A dreamcatcher,” she answered for Nick. Then she relaxed her hold on Jonathan and turned her attention to Nick, her voice soft and musical. “It captures bad dreams before you dream them. You told Jonathan you have nightmares, but if you really and truly believe in it, we’re sure this dreamcatcher will bring an end to them.”
“I do believe in it,” Nick said reverently. “Jonathan told me it worked for him. Look at it, Daniel,” Nick said. “It even has a catcher’s mitt on its left hand!”
Daniel admired this thing they called a dreamcatcher, then gazed at Lilah’s son. He was a little taller than Nick, with his mother’s blond hair and deep-blue eyes. But he didn’t have his mother’s look of despair. Whatever had befallen them, Jonathan was a happy child.
His gaze moved toward Lilah, and she must have had that feeling of being watched, because she looked up at him at once. “I think you’ve just provided your reference,” he said, ruffling Jonathan’s hair, “and he’s an excellent one.”
Her eyes widened. “Thank you,” she said.
He’d decided he could trust her to be good with the boys. Even if she wasn’t a perfect housekeeper, any assistance would be an improvement. He needed help, she needed help—they could help each other and everybody would be better off.
“I’d like the rest of the family to meet you before I make a final decision, and you should meet them so you know what you’d be getting into,” he said. “Stay for dinner. It’s the best way to catch them all at once.”
He saw Jonathan’s gaze turn on her, but she gave him a quick glance and said, “Oh, I’m not sure we should…”
“It’s some kind of chicken stew, it smells great, and there’s apple pie for dessert.”
“Mom?” The look in Jonathan’s eyes was a dead giveaway.
“Well, I…” She was wavering.
Then she turned to Daniel. Her determined expression made him sure she’d say no, but she surprised him. “Thank you for your invitation,” she said formally. “We accept.”
Nick and Jonathan sped away, cheering. Lilah looked limp. “Thank you for seeing me,” she said. “I know you’re busy, so I’ll just wait outside.”
“Look around, if you want to,” Daniel said. “I’m warning you. It’s a big place.” He opened the back door of the clinic, which led into the house.
She gave him a slight smile. “I’m not afraid of hard work.”
You’re afraid of something, Daniel thought as she ignored the open door and went instead through the waiting room into the yard. He shook his head. She was running scared, and he wished he could figure out why.
IN THE YARD, LILAH tried to still the trembling of her hands. She wanted and needed this job so badly. But she hadn’t intended to become a member of Daniel Foster’s family. She’d imagined herself slipping in at nine and out at five, a human vacuum cleaner, nothing more. This situation might be too intimate. She’d wanted to stay invisible. But she had to have a job. For Jonathan’s sake. And this one was her best bet.
Worry was wearing her out. To distract herself, she studied the house. The patterned wood shingles were painted lavender, with the molding details picked out in dark purple and turquoise. It was an enormous place, with a turret rising into the sky. She’d entered the clinic through a separate entrance that had its own stoop and overhang, with a discreet brass plaque on the door that read, Serenity Valley Veterinary Clinic, Daniel Foster, DVM. and in front of it, the small graveled parking area where she’d left her car.
She gazed back at the fancifully painted building. The man she’d just met didn’t look like a lavender, purple and turquoise kind of person. She’d read his name on the door plate, wondered if he could be the Daniel who was Nick’s foster father, and was expecting to see an old, fatherly country vet, not someone close to her own age, undeniably masculine, tall, lean and muscular. She’d felt a moment of fright when she walked into his office, and she wondered—would the sight of a large, powerful man always have this effect on her?
The thought was enough to dim her mood, her hopes, the illusion of confidence she’d been able to maintain after that first uncomfortable minute. If Daniel offered her the job, she’d stay as far away from him as she could.
He seemed to be a kind person. His sandy hair, which fell across his forehead, made him look boyish. His eyes were an interesting color—mocha, she’d call it. They were thoughtful eyes, assessing, analyzing her while they talked.
But you never knew. Bruce had been attractive, too. And she’d let herself become dependent on him; too dependent to run away from his abuse, too afraid she couldn’t raise Jonathan on her own.
His years in prison had changed her. Now, even though she had no money, she was independent. Confident in her ability to give Jonathan the important things—love, support, emotional security. She’d never again let a man take control of her life. But just being a housekeeper wouldn’t be taking a risk, would it?
Daniel appeared at the back door. “Come on in,” he said. “Dinner’s almost ready.”
Here we go. My future and Jonathan’s depend on the next few hours.
DANIEL HADN’T CALLED THE boys to dinner yet. He wanted them to barrel in one or two at a time, as they usually did, so Lilah wouldn’t grab her son and run screaming from the chaos.
The fact that the kitchen was relatively empty seemed to unnerve her for a second, but then he saw her face as she took in her surroundings. The old-fashioned maple cupboards, which rose high enough so that even he needed a stepladder to reach the upper ones, the big range and the even bigger refrigerator. The old brick floor, worn smooth by the feet of several generations of occupants. The round table that sat in the middle of the room surrounded by mismatched chairs. The table centerpiece: a bicycle helmet instead of flowers.
He couldn’t read her expression. Was she thinking it wasn’t quite as clean as a kitchen should be for a houseful of children? Was she appalled by the oilcloth cover on the table? If that was it, was she out of her mind? Did she have any idea what laundry problems real tablecloths and napkins would cause?
He reminded himself to postpone showing her the laundry piled in the basement until after she’d accepted the job.
“Jesse, meet our job applicant, Lilah Jamison. She and her son are staying for dinner.”
Jesse, stirring something in a gigantic pot, wheeled around on his good leg. “Major Jesse O’Reilly at your service, ma’am.” Having done his duty, he whirled back to the stove. Jesse didn’t want a housekeeper, and he’d spoken pretty crisply. Then he stopped stirring, and slowly turned back to take another look at Lilah. His expression changed. Daniel could tell that now he was seeing her not as a potential interloper, but simply as a nice-looking young woman who needed feeding.
Jesse dipped a spoon into the pot and held it aloft. “Mind tasting this stuff?” he asked her. “Might need more salt.”
She joined him at the stove, instantly looking comfortable with the situation she’d walked into. “It’s just right,” she told him, licking her lips.
“When’s dinner?” Nick and Jonathan shot through the door, Nick yelling the question at Jesse.
“Hold on, hold on,” Jesse grumbled, and focused his attention on Jonathan.
“This is Jesse,” Nick said to Jonathan.
“And this is Jonathan, Lilah’s son,” Daniel explained.
Jesse gave Jonathan the same thoughtful gaze he’d given Lilah. “I need a junior opinion on this stew,” he said, and handed spoons to the boys.
Daniel wondered if Jesse was starting to look a little obvious. At just the right time, Will raced in through the door. “Brunswick stew,” he shouted. “I could smell it all the way upstairs.”
“Hey, Will, you almost knocked Nick over.”
Daniel smiled at Jason, noticing how his voice had deepened even more in the past few weeks, seeing how he ruffled Will’s hair and smiled even as he scolded him.
“You said four boys?” Lilah murmured, looking stunned by the sudden frenzy of activity.
“Yeah, it just feels like more. That’s why we do a lot of yelling around here. Have to, if you want anybody to hear you. Meet Jason, he’s the blond one—and Maury, the one who looks like a football player, which he is. This is Lilah, and this is Jonathan. Did anybody let Aengus in?”
“I’ll do it,” Jason said.
“We’re moving in on it, kids,” Jesse said. “Grab a couple of those round loaves of bread out of the pantry, Sergeant Jamison. Step lively. It’s that door over there.” He pointed with his stirring spoon and juices dripped on the floor.
“The rest of you boys get that table set and everybody sit down. You’re startin’ to make me dizzy.”
NOBODY’S LIFE COULD BE this good. The boys threw cutlery and plates haphazardly onto the table and sat down at once, including Jonathan. Shyly, Lilah joined them.
“What can I get you to drink? Water? Wine? Beer from my secret stash?”
“Water, please,” she said, “and thank you.” Secret stash? He was a closet drinker? While he harbored a houseful of foster boys, he drank himself into oblivion night after night?
“Good choice,” he said. “I was down to my last beer—I have one every Saturday night after I get the kids to bed, and the wine is the stuff Jesse uses for his fancy beef stews. The alcohol boils off,” he explained, as if he thought she might be planning to report him for serving wine to children.
So. Not a big drinker. He had to have a different fatal flaw. All men had a fatal flaw.
Or maybe just the ones who’d had some impact on her life.
Already stretched as tight as a bungee cord, every bone in her body went stiff when the biggest dog she’d ever seen leapt into the room and ran directly toward Jonathan. She gasped, jumping up so rapidly she knocked over her chair.
Before she could rescue her son, if it was possible to rescue him from a beast this huge, the dog had set to work licking Jonathan’s face. Jonathan was giggling uncontrollably, hugging the animal.
She picked up her chair and sat down. “I see he’s friendly,” she said, feeling limp as a frozen celery stalk. “What—is he?”
“An Irish wolfhound,” Daniel said, “who’s way too big to be way too friendly.” In a quiet tone, he said, “Aengus. Sit.”
Aengus sat.
