The baby, as stunned by finding himself in his uncle’s arms as his uncle himself, was shocked into sudden blessed silence and regarded him with huge sapphire eyes.
The Buddha-like expression of contentment lasted for a blink. And then the baby frowned. Turned red. Strained. Made a terrifying grunting sound.
“What’s wrong with him?” Joshua asked, appalled.
“I’m afraid now it is, um, you know.”
If he didn’t know, the sudden explosion of odor let the secret out.
“Amber,” he called. The man who reacted to stress with aplomb, at least until this moment, said, “Amber, call 911.”
Dannie Springer’s delectable lips twitched. A twinkle lit the depths of those astonishing eyes. She struggled, lost, started to laugh. And if he hadn’t needed 911 before, he did now.
For a time-suspended moment, looking into those amazing blue depths, listening to the brook-clear sound of her laughter, it was as if disaster was not unfolding around him. It was as if his office, last sanctuary of the single male, had not been invaded by the enemy that represented domestic bliss. He might have laughed himself, if he wasn’t so close to gagging.
“Amber,” he said, trying to regain his legendary control in this situation that seemed to be unraveling dismally, “forget 911.”
Amber hovered in the doorway. “What would you like me to do?”
“The children haven’t eaten,” Miss Pringy said, as if she was in charge. “Do you think you could find us some lunch?”
How could anyone think of lunch at a time like this?
Or put Amber in charge of it? Even though Amber disappeared, Josh was fairly certain food was a question lost on her. As far as Joshua could see, his secretary survived on celery sticks.
Did babies eat celery sticks?
For a moment he felt amazed at how a few seconds could change a man’s whole world. If somebody had told him when he walked into his office, he would be asking himself questions about babies and celery sticks before the morning was out, he would not have believed it.
He would particularly not have believed he would be contemplating celery sticks with that odor now permeating every luxurious corner of his office.
But he, of all people, should know. A few seconds could change everything, forever. A baby, wrapped in a blue hospital blanket, his face tiny and wrinkled, his brow furrowed, his tiny, perfect hand—
Stop! Joshua ordered himself.
And yet even as he resented memories of a long-ago hurt being triggered so easily by the babe nestled in his arms now, he was also aware of something else.
He felt surprised by life, for the first time in a very, very long time. He slid his visitor a glance and was painfully aware of how lushly she was curved, as if she ate more than celery sticks. In fact, he could picture her digging into spaghetti, eating with robust and unapologetic appetite. The picture was startlingly sensual.
“I’ll just change the baby while we wait for lunch.”
“In here?” he sputtered.
“Unless you have a designated area in the building?” she said, raising an eyebrow at him.
Joshua could clearly see she was the kind of woman you did not want to surrender control to. In no time flat, she would have the Lalique bowl moved and the change station set up where the bowl had been.
It was time to take control, not to be weakened by his memories but strengthened by them. It was time to put things back on track. The nanny and the children had arrived early. The thought of how his sister would have delighted in his current predicament firmed his resolve to get things to exactly where he had planned them, quickly.
“The washroom is down the hall,” Joshua said, collecting himself as best he could with the putty baby trying to insert its pudgy fingers in his nose. “If you’d care to take the baby there, Miss Pringy—”
“Springer—” she reminded him. “Perhaps while I take care of this, you could do something about, er, that?”
A hand fluttered toward the Lalique. He knew it! She was eyeing the table for its diaper changing potential!
“It’s art,” he said stubbornly.
“Well, it’s art the children aren’t old enough for.”
Precisely one of his many reservations about children. Everything had to be rearranged around them. Naturally, he needed to set her straight. It was his office, his business, his life. No one, but no one, told him how to run it. She and the children were departing as soon as he could arrange the limo and reschedule their reservations by a day.
But when she took the evilly aromatic baby back, after having fished a diaper out of a huge carpetbag she was traveling with, he was so grateful he decided not to set her straight about who the boss was. After she looked after the baby change, there would be plenty of time for that.
Dannie left the room, Susie on her heels. In a gesture he was not going to consider surrender, Joshua went and retrieved his suit jacket from where it hung on the back of his chair, and gently and protectively draped it over the bowl.
“Thank you,” the nanny said primly, noticing as soon as she came back in the room. A cloud of baby-fresh scent entered with her, and Jake was now gurgling joyously.
“Naked is not nice,” Susie informed him.
“Well, that depends on—” A look from the nanny made him take a deep breath and change tack. “As soon as we’ve had some lunch, I’ll see to changing the arrangements I’ve made for you. You’ll love Whistler.”
“Whistler?” Miss Pringy said. “Melanie never said anything about Whistler. She said we were staying with you.”
“I’m not staying with him,” Susie huffed. “He hates us. I can tell.”
He wondered if he should show her all those little x and o notes, placed carefully in the top drawer of his desk. No, the nanny might see it as a vulnerability. And somehow, as intriguing—and exasperating—as he found her, he had no intention of appearing vulnerable in front of her.
“Don’t worry,” Joshua told Susie, firmly, “No one is staying with me, because I don’t want—”
“Don’t you dare finish that sentence,” Miss Springer told him in a tight undertone. “Don’t you dare.”
Well, as if his life was not surprising enough today! He regarded her thoughtfully, tried to remember when the last time anyone had told him what to do was, and came up blank.
And that tone. No one ever dared use that tone on him. Probably not since grade school, anyway.
“Amber,” he called.
She appeared at the doorway, looking mutinous, as if one more demand would finish her. “Lunch is on the way up.”
“Take the children for a moment. Miss Pringy and I have a few things to say privately.”
Amber stared at him astounded. “Take them where?”
“Just your office will do.”
Her lips moved soundlessly, like a fish floundering, but then wordlessly she came in and took the baby, holding him out carefully at arm’s length.
“You go, too,” Miss Pringy said gently to Susie.
It was a mark of her influence on those children, that with one warning look shot at him, Susie traipsed out of the room behind Amber, shutting the door with unnecessary noisiness behind her.
“You weren’t going to say you didn’t want them in front of them, were you?”