“I’m trying to get all my hours in now, so I can take off the last couple days to finish packing up before I move.”
A shutter came down over his face. “You know best. Take care of yourself.” He sent little Will a last, lingering look before turning toward the door without another word, only to be stopped by a nurse.
“Dr. Latham. I’m glad you’re here,” she said. “The doctor has given the okay to step your nephew down from the NICU to the nursery floor tomorrow, then release him the following day.”
“Release him?”
“Yes. He’s doing great. No adverse effects from the birth. Perfectly healthy, despite being three weeks early. He’s an awesome little guy, and will definitely be ready to go home.”
“Home?”
The look on Sean’s face would have made Bree laugh if the situation hadn’t been such a shock, and a very big problem. It hadn’t occurred to her to think about where the baby would go when he was given the green light to be released, even though it should have, and obviously hadn’t occurred to Sean, either. Emma would be recovering for a long time, and, even when she was stronger, she wouldn’t be able to care for an infant all by herself. Though her mother would be her rock, Bree knew. The woman who had Emma’s back and supported her no matter what.
Except her mother was on a ship in the middle of the Pacific Ocean at that moment, and who knew when she’d be able to get back?
“Yes, home.” The nurse was looking at Sean as if maybe he was a little dense, but Bree couldn’t blame him for his shocked reaction. With the baby healthy, his focus had turned to the seriousness of Emma’s condition. “I know his mother’s going to be in the hospital quite a while. How about I have the social worker get with you to give you information on day cares that take infants? Though you’ll need a nanny or nursemaid for at least a little while first.”
“Nanny?” His stunned gaze moved to Bree. “Nursemaid?”
Something about the way he was looking at her set off alarm bells in her brain. “No. Oh, no. I have work to do, I’m moving soon, and I don’t know a darn thing about babies.”
“Neither do I.” He reached to grasp her hand. “Which will make us the perfect team.”
She pulled it loose and stepped back. “No, Sean. I can’t. And we already found out we’re about as far from a perfect team as two people can get.”
“Okay, not a perfect team. But you’re a woman good at everything, and I need your help with Will.”
“Having ovaries doesn’t mean I know a thing about babies,” she said, trying to lighten the moment while staying firm on the subject. “Between you and a nanny, I know you’ll do just fine. I have faith in you, Sean.” She leaned up to give him a kiss on the cheek to show him she meant it, and the feel of his warm skin covered with stubble nearly sent her lips sliding a few inches over to his mouth.
She pulled back, lips still tingling, and turned to practically run out the door. Part of her felt bad abandoning him, but her self-preservation was kicking in. She had to stay away from Sean Latham as much as possible until she was on her way to Honolulu, before her heart got banged up all over again.
BREE TAPED SHUT the last box of books on her floor, then sat back on her haunches, unable to struggle to her feet at that exact moment. Compared to the day of the accident, she felt reasonably rested as far as sleep was concerned. Getting there hadn’t been too difficult, since any emergency department doc was used to dealing with erratic hours, and days getting mixed up with nights. But the aches and bruises that seemed to have multiplied over every inch of her body, not to mention the relentless headache that stabbed her temples with any abrupt movement, were making it a little tough to get around.
“Okay, Granny, move.” As she pushed to her feet, the doorbell pealed through her apartment. She was expecting the landlord coming with end-of-lease paperwork, and her heart slammed hard into her ribs when she opened the door. No landlord standing there. It was Sean.
Sean, wearing blue jeans and a T-shirt and, astonishingly, holding little Will awkwardly cradled in one arm against his broad chest. An infant car seat rested by his feet.
At least, she assumed the baby was Will, though the little guy was unrecognizable. The tiny knit hat he’d worn at the hospital covered his head down to his eyebrows, and he was swaddled with a blanket up to his lower lip. Then again, there was no denying he was a Latham. The alert brown eyes staring at her from under that hat were already remarkably similar to Sean’s, and she knew at that moment the boy was going to be a heartbreaker just like his uncle.
Her hand tightened on the doorknob as she watched Sean slowly slip his sunglasses from his eyes to tuck them inside the collar of his T. Eyes that were looking at her with an expression she couldn’t quite figure out.
What was he doing here? Showing off his nephew before she left? Maybe his real goal was to show her how cute babies were, as if she didn’t already know. But cuteness didn’t have anything to do with not wanting any of her own. Not wanting a child to consume her life, whether Sean believed that wasn’t the way it had to be or not.
“Sorry,” she said. “This is a no-stork zone.”
“I don’t see any signs posted.”
“Maybe they got blown down in yesterday’s windstorm.” She folded her arms across her chest to show him he wasn’t making himself and the baby comfy. The uncomfortable comfiness—could there be such a thing?—that she and Sean had shared two days ago in the hospital had been more than she could handle already. “What can I do for you?”
Impassive brown eyes met hers for several heartbeats until he finally answered. “Help me take care of His Willieness until Mom gets here.”
“I can’t.” Hadn’t she already emphatically told him that at the hospital, and the three times he’d called her after? “I’ve got work. And, again, I don’t know anything about taking care of babies.”
“You know as much about babies as I do.”
“Which means neither of us is qualified. Hire one of the nannies on the list you got.”
“When I finally got hold of her, my mother had a fit when I told her I was going to do that. Couldn’t believe I’d trust some stranger with her newborn grandson. She’ll be here in a few days, and told me in no uncertain terms he was my responsibility until she could take over.”
“So take time off from work until she gets here.”
“Please, Bree. Just for a couple days. We can figure out what we have to do with him together, then take shifts when the other’s working.” The entreaty in his eyes, not to mention a slight terror, started to melt her resolve, and she tried desperately to firm it back up again. “Emma needs you. Will needs you.” He reached for her hand, brought it up to press her palm against his chest. “I need you.”
He’d spoken the last words in the dangerously soft rumble he used to use when they’d made love, and the sound of it made her quiver, in spite of everything. Like the fact that he’d used that same voice when he’d proposed, and look what a disaster that had turned out to be.
But that was irrelevant history to this current situation. And darn it, how could she say no? It was a crisis situation, and she was partly responsible for that.
She stared into his beautiful, worried brown eyes. Feeling backed into a corner and a little apprehensive about taking on Will’s care, along with being too close to Sean when her heart was far from healed, weren’t good enough reasons to refuse again. She owed it to Emma to help any way she could, and it would only be for a short time, after all.
Her