“Aren’t you here on vacation?” Sam asked. “I’d hate to take up whatever free time you have. You said two weeks, which, if you can work with Libby regularly, should give her a good head start on getting caught up. I’ll worry about a more permanent solution once I find one.” He sighed. “Anyway, I really don’t want to monopolize your time off.”
“It’s only sort of a vacation.” How did she begin to explain the meltdown in the office, the clear signs that she needed to get away, to leave town, to start over? How once she’d arrived here and had more than five minutes of quiet, all those thoughts and memories and emotions she’d been avoiding washed over her like a tidal wave? And how the one thing she was banking on with being Sam’s tutor was that it would leave her too busy to think? “This job works perfectly with my plans.”
“Well, I am glad to hear that.” Relief washed over her at his words. He mentioned a decent hourly rate, and she agreed. His phone buzzed and he pulled it out of his pocket, then read the text on the screen. “Thank God. Charity is on her way over. Normally, I bring Henry to storytime at the community center my uncle runs, and Charity picks him up from there. But since Libby doesn’t have school today, it’s easiest if I just leave Henry here. She can watch him while you work with Libby. If it’s at all possible, do you think you could start with Libby today?”
“Today?”
“If you can’t, well, I understand, but Charity is still new and though she’s great, she gets overwhelmed when she has both kids. With you here, that should help her out. I’d take them, but I have this job interview and I can’t take the kids because I’m still paying for Henry’s ‘creativity’—” Sam rolled his eyes and made air quotes “—at the last place I interviewed at.”
She bit back a laugh. Sam was so clearly out of his depth with these kids that she couldn’t help but want to make it easier on him. Plus, if she started today, she wouldn’t have a long, endless day stretching ahead of her with nothing to fill the hours. Colton was sleeping, after getting off his shift at the fire station, and wouldn’t be available until dinnertime. “Today sounds perfect.”
“Great. Thank you.” He glanced over at the sofa. “The kids are quiet right now, so if it’s okay, I’m going to run upstairs, take a shower and get ready. Charity should be here in ten minutes, but I have to leave in...eleven. If you don’t mind waiting, I’d appreciate it. Give me five minutes. Ten, tops. Okay?”
“I think I can handle this for ten minutes.” She gave him a soft smile, and tried to pretend a part of her wasn’t thinking about the hunky man before her taking off his clothes and stepping into a shower.
When Sam went upstairs, Katie wandered into the living room. This space, too, looked like the aftermath of a tornado, complete with a second carpet of tiny little bricks. Now that it was just her and the two kids, she wasn’t quite sure what to do or how to engage them. She glanced at the television. Some cartoon sponge-shaped guy was running around in his underwear and letting out an annoying nasal laugh. “Hey, guys, what are you watching?”
“SpongeBob,” Libby said. “He lives in the water. With Mr. Krabs. And Patrick.”
“Sounds, uh...educational.” Whatever happened to Sesame Street? The Electric Company? Shows she remembered and understood.
A commercial came on and Libby turned toward Katie. “Do you have a boyfriend?”
“Uh...no.” She’d had a boyfriend. Who had dumped her the second he found out she was pregnant. She’d never in a million years thought nerdy Leonard Backstrom, another accountant at the firm, would be the one to break up first. He’d talked a lot about wanting to settle down, buying a house in an up-and-coming neighborhood, then starting joint retirement and 529 accounts. One stupid night when they both had too much to drink, and his tune had changed. He was, apparently, all talk and no real action. Last she heard, Leonard was dating Meredith the receptionist. He’d never even called Katie after she told him she was pregnant, as if he figured it was all her problem now.
After Katie had accepted that she was pregnant, she’d begun to think of a future with a child. A future of just the two of them. Those thoughts had grown into dreams, a plan—
Until she’d started cramping ten weeks later and lost everything.
So yeah, that was the complicated answer to do you have a boyfriend? Probably best to keep it to uh...no.
“My father says I can’t have a boyfriend until I’m thirty,” Libby said, and once again, Katie was struck by how mature she sounded. She sat down and Libby leaned closer. “Are you thirty?”
Katie laughed. “Almost. I’m twenty-nine.”
“My father is thirty-four.” Libby held up all her fingers, then flashed the digits three times. “That’s old.”
“You won’t think so when you’re thirty-four.” Interacting with these kids wasn’t so hard. She could do this. And she and Libby seemed to get along okay. The tutor thing should work out perfectly. In and out, an hour at a time. No biggie.
Libby considered that, then glanced over at Henry. “That’s my brother. He’s three.”
Henry sat there, a blanket curled in one hand, just watching the exchange. He was a quiet kid. Probably easy to handle, Katie was sure. “He seems very nice.”
Libby’s nose wrinkled. “He smells funny and he takes my toys and he makes a mess with his food.”
Katie laughed. “My brother was like that. But you know, he grew up to be really cool. Henry probably will, too.”
Libby’s nose wrinkled more. “My father makes me eat vegetables.”
“Vegetables are good for you,” Katie said.
“Are you gonna make me eat vegetables?”
“I don’t think that’s in my job description.”
“Good. Because I don’t wanna eat them,” Libby said.
“Libby Bear, be nice to Katie. She’s only here to help you with your schoolwork. No broccoli involved.” Sam’s voice came from behind Katie. She turned in her seat and her pulse did a little skip.
If she’d thought he looked handsome in a T-shirt and jeans, he was positively devastating in a suit and tie, with his hair still wet from the shower, smelling of fresh aftershave and soap. He was adjusting the cuffs on his white shirt, and for some reason, she thought that was one of the sexiest things she’d ever seen. Everything from the dark blue windowpane-pattern suit to the crimson tie at his neck and the black wingtip shoes gave him an air of power and manly confidence. Like a lion stepping onto the prairie and claiming his turf.
“I don’t want to do schoolwork!” Libby sat back on the couch, crossed her arms over her chest and let out a huff. “You’re mean.”
“Yup. I am.” He gave Katie a grin. “Still want the job?”
A job that came with perks like seeing Sam in a suit? Sign her up. “Yes, yes. I... I do.”
Good Lord, she was stammering. The confident partner at the accounting firm had been replaced by a hormone-crazed teenage girl. She got to her feet, smoothed her skirt and cleared her throat. “Perhaps it’s best if we went over any additional rules or expectations now.”
He didn’t say anything for a second, then he seemed to refocus, and nodded. “Yes. Yes, you’re right.”
She followed him out to the kitchen and they took the same seats as before. “So, do you have a list of things that Libby needs to work on?”
“Her teacher said she needed help with times tables and three-digit addition and subtraction problems. The whole