The last thing he needed was a pretty woman hanging around and distracting him. Why couldn’t she be some wrinkled spinster with a sharp tongue instead of this young beauty?
As Willa gestured to Bobby, Daniel saw that she’d painted her nails a ridiculously bright purple, the tips lavender. What kind of a woman took the time to paint her nails two different colors? Daniel had never met one, that was for sure.
Right then, Bobby started saying something that sounded like gibberish to Daniel, but Willa seemed to understand the toddler perfectly.
Picking up the boy, she pointed to Daniel and said, “That’s your Uncle Daniel, remember? And that’s your Great-uncle James. They’re going to take care of you and love you so much.”
Bobby stared at Daniel—it was like looking into Robert’s eyes. Daniel’s heart clenched. He and Robert had been estranged for years, and Daniel had never met his nephew. Now, he’d never get a chance to tell his brother that he was sorry, that the whole fight had been stupid. Pointless. Regret stabbed at Daniel at the same time as he vowed that he’d care for his brother’s son as best he could. Bobby deserved nothing less.
Daniel wondered what to say to a toddler. His experience with small children was limited. He generally avoided them if he could. He found horses and dogs much easier to talk to.
Bobby stared up at him with a disconcertingly searching gaze. Then he turned his head into Willa’s shoulder and stuck his thumb in his mouth.
“It’s been a long day for him,” said Willa. “Normally he’s very chatty. Aren’t you, buddy? Here, go see your uncle.”
And suddenly Willa was handing Bobby to Daniel, and even though Daniel almost told her not to, he thrust out his hands almost automatically to receive the burden. The boy was heavier than he expected and smelled like baby powder.
Bobby’s eyes widened, and when his lower lip protruded, Daniel said the first words that came to mind. “Don’t cry, buddy. Nothing to be upset about.”
For whatever reason, that only made Bobby’s lip quiver, and then a full-fledged wail emitted from his throat. Daniel winced. He’d never heard something so loud come from something so small.
The wail continued, and then Willa took the boy from him with an apologetic look. “I’m so sorry,” she said as she rubbed Bobby’s back. “He probably needs a nap. He usually doesn’t have one for another two hours, but it’s been such a crazy day . . .”
As Willa soothed Bobby and the toddler’s tears turned into hiccups, Daniel finally noticed that his kitchen chairs were missing. What the hell? When he saw the missing furniture upended in front of the basement stairs, irritation rose inside him.
Just because she was the nanny didn’t give her the right to make changes in his own house! It wasn’t decent. No, decent people asked first, especially when messing around with furniture that had belonged to his grandparents. Decent people didn’t tromp all over your stomping grounds and move stuff around like they owned the place.
Daniel began to remove the furniture from the front of the stairs, grumbling the entire time as he did so.
“Oh, don’t move those,” said Willa as she came from the living room. “Unless you have a baby gate somewhere, instead?” she added.
He just grunted. “Don’t need a gate. Didn’t have one when I was a baby, and my parents did fine.”
“This isn’t fifty years ago,” said Willa.
Daniel looked up with a scowl. He wasn’t fifty years old, dammit. Not even close. Seeing Willa’s sudden grin as his annoyance amused her, his body’s response took him by surprise. He wasn’t sure if he wanted to tell her off or kiss her.
Definitely no kissing. She’d probably tell me how I was doing it wrong afterward.
Wanting to change the subject, Daniel said to Uncle James, “I was telling Miss Markson that she can’t leave right away. We need her to stay until Bobby is settled.”
“You aren’t staying?” Uncle James said in surprise, turning to Willa.
A guilty expression crossed her face even as her chin rose. “I can’t stay. As I was telling Daniel, I need to be back in New York.”
“What’s more important than taking care of an orphan boy?” In Daniel’s own ears, his voice was gruff, almost accusatory. Guilt pricked him when Willa turned a little pale, but he meant what he said. Shouldn’t Bobby be everyone’s first priority?
“What my nephew is trying to say is that we need your help,” said Uncle James. “You can see it for yourself. Just a few days, Miss Markson. That’s all we’re asking.”
Daniel saw Willa open her mouth and knew she was going to say no. He shot his uncle a look that said he wanted a moment alone with the woman, and Uncle James, after a moment’s hesitation, stepped further into the living room to crouch down to play with Bobby, giving him and Willa some privacy.
“Miss Markson,” said Daniel quietly. He’d left off putting away the furniture, no longer caring about restoring order—this woman was going to abandon him with a toddler he didn’t know how to take care of.
She blinked up at him in obvious confusion. Now he was close enough to see that she had freckles on her forehead, too, despite her best efforts to cover them up. Damn shame, he thought. Freckles on a woman were as sexy as a bare shoulder or a pretty pair of legs, in his opinion.
“I’m a farmer, a cowboy,” he explained, trying to find the right words to convince her. He wished right then he was one of those smooth talkers who could get people to do anything they wanted.
But all he could do right now was be honest. “I know about horses and corn and tractors. I can tell when the harvest is gonna be a good one and when it’s gonna be a bad one because I feel it in my bones.” He rubbed his jaw, stubble catching on his fingertips with a scratchy noise that made him put his hand down again.
He continued, “But I don’t know anything about babies or how to raise one. Now that my brother is dead, Bobby is all I got left of him. I’ll protect that little boy until my dying day; he’s my blood, and he ain’t got anyone else but me and Uncle James, here.”
Willa’s stubborn expression softened at his words, just as he’d hoped it would. He mentally shook his head at himself. Daniel hated talking. He never talked like this, but he needed to convince this woman to stay. From her response, it looked like he might be able to talk her around. He hoped so, anyhow. He didn’t know what he was going to do if he couldn’t.
Three
Daniel could see the stubbornness in Willa’s expression, and he was torn between being impressed at the starch in her spine and being frustrated that she wouldn’t do what he wanted. Most women, when he served them with his most severe looks, tended to wilt like daisies under a hot Texas sun.
Then again, Daniel wasn’t much for scaring women. Except right now, he wished Willa would do more wilting, less hands-on-hips-glaring, as she was doing right now.
“I should finish setting up Bobby’s room,” the aggravating woman said now as she picked up a large bag before darting around Daniel like a minnow. Daniel followed her, telling himself he was not looking at her backside or enjoying how great it looked in those tight skinny jeans she was wearing.
“It’s so bare,” she surprised him by saying, frowning as she took in Bobby’s room.
Admittedly, there wasn’t much in there except the essentials: crib, changing table still in its box, bookshelf. Daniel hadn’t known what else to get, if he were being honest. He’d thought he’d done a pretty good job. The room had all the essentials, didn’t it, or would, once he got the last of it assembled?
“We didn’t have a ton of time to get lots of things.” Daniel tried not to sound defensive, but he failed. Did this woman expect a bachelor to have every piddling thing a toddler needed on hand?
She bit her lip. “Sorry. I didn’t mean it like that. I’m just looking out for Bobby, you know. All of this change is hard enough on an adult, let alone a little boy, and not having his things around him will just make everything more difficult, you know?” She smiled slightly,
and he saw her eyes light up with some pleasant memory. “I know when I moved to my new apartment, it took me forever to get used to all the small changes from my old apartment.”
Daniel crossed his arms. “Routine is comforting,” he rumbled.
Her eyes brightened further. “Exactly.” She bent down and began to unpack the bag, pulling out toys, diapers, and other toddler “things” that Daniel would have no idea how to use. Did kids these days need all this stuff? He knew his own parents hadn’t had any of this kind of thing when he and Robert had been kids, and they’d grown up relatively normally.
“What is that thing?” He pointed at a stack of narrow white cloth . . . things.
Willa laughed. “They’re pads for the cloth diapers. Don’t worry, I’ll show you how they work. And don’t look like that. They actually save money in the end, I swear.”
Cloth diapers, wipe warmer, diaper genie— “Isn’t he potty-trained?” He’d been wondering since the diaper change.
“He just turned two, so not yet. I think Stacey wanted to start soon, but then the accident happened . . .”
Willa’s expression dimmed as she trailed off, a toy in the palm of her hand. The reminder of the accident hit Daniel right in the gut, and it took a moment for him to regain his bearings.
Willa shook her head. “That’s something you get to figure out,” she added with a wry smile.
Daniel was close to getting on his knees to beg her to stay. Potty training?
He couldn’t. It wasn’t in his DNA. He was a bachelor, tried and true, and young’uns were anathema to his very existence. He understood horses, cows, farming, living on his own. Taking care of a small human being who literally depended on him to live made no sense to him.
You take care of your animals just fine, his mind whispered, but he brushed the thought aside. Horses didn’t need to be babysat every hour of every day. And they didn’t need diapers, he thought wryly.
“This is Bobby’s favorite book,” said Willa. She held up a book with a bright-red dragon on the cover. “If you’re not careful, he’ll make you read it a hundred times in a row, but it usually puts him to sleep if nothing else does.”
Listening to Willa, Daniel heard for the first time a slight twang to her accent. He’d expected a New Yorker accent to come from her pretty mouth.
“Did you grow up in New York?” he asked.
It wasn’t just his curiosity about her accent, he told himself, though that twang was intriguing. If he was going to try to get her to stay, he’d have to get to know her. Draw her out. Make her feel safe. It was what he did with a new horse—move slowly, talk quietly, and if all else failed, a little sugar for a bribe was the best remedy.
“No, I actually grew up not far from here.” Aha!
Daniel felt his brows rise. “Really? I’m surprised I don’t know you, or haven’t heard of you.”
“I left right after high school, and I wasn’t the type of girl people would notice.”
She didn’t say the words with any bitterness, it seemed to Daniel, even as the thought—I would’ve noticed you—popped into his head. How could anyone not notice a woman as pretty as this one? If what she said was true, then the people in her hometown were both blind and stupid.
“I grew up in Macon, which is about a stone’s throw away from here, but I now say I’m from New York because that’s where I’ve always felt like myself,” she explained as she continued to place colorful books that looked like they were made of stiff, shiny cardboard on the small bookshelf. “And I’ve been there for so long now that coming back here feels strange. It’s like a foreign country.”
“Texas is like that,” he drawled.
She smiled before shaking her head. “There was a reason why I left. I’m not a Texas kind of girl.”
“What kind of girl is that?” He tilted his head back, curious.
“You know—big hair, big boobs. Wears cowboy boots and marries a cowboy right out of college. The kind of girl guys like you would marry,” she added with a sly smile.
Daniel didn’t know whether to be affronted or pleased at her statement. “How do you know what kind of girl I’d want to marry?” He guffawed. “I don’t suppose you’re offering yourself up for the position?”
His tone was clearly joking, but he saw Willa blush all the same. “Of course not. You know what I mean.”
He brought her back to her earlier point. “So, you didn’t want to be a ‘Texas girl.’”
She lifted her chin. “No, I didn’t. I wanted to study art,” this surprised him—people actually studied art?—seriously? “. . . and that wasn’t a thing in my hometown.” No kidding. But she was still speaking, and he nodded to show he was listening. “I was strange to everyone, like an alien. I thought I was an alien until I went to New York and found people who were like me.”
He tilted his head slightly and asked, “So now you have tons of artist friends?”
When Willa hesitated, Daniel realized that despite finding a place that fit her, she’d neglected to make a lot of friends. He understood that all too well. Sometimes it was easier to keep to yourself than put yourself out there. He’d been doing that for years, now. He lived his life, and he was content with it. If he admitted he was lonely, well, that was his own fault, wasn’t it?
“I have friends, but I’m also really busy,” she said at last.
“Helping with Bobby?” He didn’t know why he was suddenly so damn curious about her. Normally he preferred to keep his nose out of other people’s business, but there was something about this woman that intrigued him.
“That, yes, but also working on getting my dream job. I love your nephew, but being an au pair is hardly my life’s ambition or my dream gig.”
What would someone who’d chosen to study art, of all things, consider to be the gravy on her potatoes? Adopting her own words, he asked, “What is your dream gig?”
She seemed about to reply, but then she shut her mouth and shrugged. “Does it matter? I need to get back for an interview, regardless.” Oh, no, they were back to singing that song. “That’s why I can’t stay. I know the timing is bad, and I wish things were otherwise, but . . .”
Daniel stared at her for a long moment, wondering how he could convince her to stay. Beg? Threaten? Bribe? Should he give her a sugar cube like he’d done with the tetchy mare he’d bought last week? What would be the equivalent of a sugar cube to Miss . . . no, Ms. Willa Markson?
“I get that this interview you mentioned is important to you,” he said, feeling his way, “and that you have a life back in New York. I’m not asking you to give all of that up. That’s not fair to you.” Grasping at something she’d said earlier, he added, “But didn’t you just say that routine is important to little kids?”
He saw her expression soften at his words, and hope sprung up inside him. “I’m not saying stay forever, Ms. Markson.” He used the most coaxing tone he could muster. “Just until Bobby is situated. He’s been through so much already, and he likes you.”
And maybe, unlike in New York, you can make some friends here.
Willa sighed. “I do love Bobby. He’s important to me. I hope you don’t think otherwise.” She blew out a breath, brushing a stray curl from her forehead. “Okay, Mr. Gunn. I’ll stay for a few days. I can make it work.”
Daniel couldn’t help but smile in relief. He hadn’t been at all certain he could convince her to stay. But what would two bachelors do with a toddler? Poor Bobby deserved better than himself and Uncle James bumbling around like a bunch of idiots with no grain in the silo. Hopefully, Willa would stay long enough to teach them how to take care of Bobby, to understand the nuances of parenting that Daniel couldn’t even begin to contemplate.
“Call me Daniel,” he said, smiling widely. “Mr. Gunn is an old man’s name, and despite what you might think, I’m not that old yet.”
She smiled and laughed a little, and that smile went straight to his groin. She was radiant when she smiled. He wished he hadn’t notice
d that fact.
“Well then, you should call me Willa,” she said with a slight chuckle.
They shook on it, and if it seemed to Daniel that she’d let her fingers graze his palm a second longer than necessary, he told himself he’d just imagined it.
Four
Willa had planned on staying at the local bed and breakfast and then catching her flight back to New York the next day, but Bobby had screamed bloody murder when she’d stepped outside Daniel’s house to get something from the car, and she’d realized that she couldn’t leave the toddler so soon.
It wasn’t because she wanted to spend more time with the grumpy yet handsome cowboy. No, sirree.
If not for their conversation early on, Willa wouldn’t have known how to broach the subject with Daniel. Inviting yourself to stay at someone’s house was the height of rudeness. Luckily, Daniel had brought up the issue himself when he’d mentioned the guest room earlier. Too bad she’d been so emphatic in her refusal. She was going to have to eat her words now.
She took a deep breath before speaking. Uncle James had already gone home, leaving Willa and Daniel to shift for themselves.
“I had planned to stay over at the bed and breakfast in town and fly out in the morning, but now . . .” Willa sat down next to Bobby on the living room floor and ruffled his hair. “I don’t think this guy will be too happy about it.”
She heard Daniel let out an audible sigh of relief, and then he said, “Thank the lord. I was worried I was going to have to beg.”
Willa looked at him in surprise, and she was shocked to see a small smile on his face. Was he . . . flirting with her? She blushed to the roots of her hair.
Don’t be stupid, she scolded herself. He just doesn’t want to deal with a screaming baby all night if he can help it.
Bobby, unsettled by having to go to bed in an unfamiliar place, wailed nonstop when Willa put him to bed in his new crib for an afternoon nap. Standing in the hallway with Daniel, listening to the mournful sound, Willa ran her fingers through her hair and sighed. “Somehow, I don’t think the guest room is going to work. At least, not for the first night.”
Home with the Cowboy Page 2
