Doorstep Daddy

by Shirley Jump

  He drew up short, surprised by the abrupt shift in conversation. “What does that have to do with anything?”

  “I’m just wondering.”

  “I write crime fiction. Thrillers. You know, catch the bad guy and all that.”

  She picked up one of his books from the end table and flipped it over. “Wow. Is that you?” She pointed to a publicity shot from several years ago.

  “Yeah.”

  “You’re not bad looking.”

  “Yeah. It’s amazing what a good photographer and a graphic designer with some Photoshop experience can do.”

  She laughed. “Oh, I didn’t mean that.” She tapped the book. “You really are a good-looking man.”

  He’d been complimented by women before, but this woman—a determined spitfire if he’d ever seen one—well he sure hadn’t expected her to say anything nice to or about him. The words left him a little discomfited, something Dalton rarely, if ever experienced. “Uh, thanks.”

  Ellie turned a few pages in the book. “These are really, really bad guys.”

  “Yeah.”

  She shook her head. “No wonder.”

  “No wonder what?”

  “No wonder you’re so grumpy. You spend your entire day cooped up with the worst the world has to offer.”

  “I’m not cooped up.”

  She arched a brow, then leaned forward. “When was the last time you went to the park?”

  “Park? What park?”

  “The one around the corner, at the end of Elm, silly.” She laughed at his blank look. “You really need to get out more.”

  “We have a park near us?”

  “Of course we do. It’s why 90% of the people live in this neighborhood, because it’s so perfect for families. Isn’t that why you bought a house here?”

  “Uh, no. I bought this house because my brother Peter said it had really good resale…” Dalton shook his head. “Peter,” he said under his breath, the name almost a curse.

  “What?”

  “Nothing. You’d have to know my brother. He’s one of those happy-endings-are-for-everyone kind of guys.”

  “And you’re one of those—” she looked at the pages of the book again “—‘he choked the life out of her’ kind of guys?”

  He chuckled. “Exactly.”

  “Maybe that’s why you have that writer’s block. You need some fresh air. People around you.”

  “It’s not a block. It’s…” His voice trailed off. The stress of the last few months, the frustration of sending pages to his editor that only ended up being torn apart and rejected, caught up with Dalton. He let out a gust, and ran a hand through his hair. He’d been stuck in this house for three months, cut off from his friends, his family, everyone, except for Mrs. Winterberry, whose sole solution to Dalton’s writer’s block had been a tin of chocolate chip cookies. Good cookies, unfortunately not full of inspiration. “It’s more of a…logjam. My writing has hit a wall of sorts.”

  Had he just admitted that? To a near stranger? He rarely talked about his work—and especially his lack of progress—to anyone.

  Damned embarrassing, the whole thing. He, Dalton Scott, New York Times bestselling author, stuck and sinking deeper every day into a quagmire of bad writing—writing so awful, not even his agent—who was paid 15% to gush over everything Dalton wrote—could stomach.

  “Because?”

  He dropped into an armchair, the weight of his career, or current lack thereof, sitting heavy on his shoulders. “Because I seem to have a wonderful knack for writing ‘unemotional, flat novels’ to quote just one of the critics who reviewed my first book. And that was the best thing he said about it.”

  “Well, if there’s one thing I have in abundance right now, it’s emotions.” Ellie let out a little laugh. “Too bad you can’t peek into my head. I’d give you plenty to write about.”

  “Yeah, too bad.” His editor had specifically mentioned that Dalton’s female characters were the least well developed. He had to admit, he shied away from writing deeply about them. Give him a hard-boiled detective, a jaded cop, a sarcastic villain, and he’d write his fingers off. But a woman?

  Dalton would rush past those pages, preferring any other kind of scene.

  And he knew why. He wasn’t much good with women. Hadn’t he already proved that years ago with Julia? He’d lost her—

  Lost everything. Because when it had come to crunch time, he’d let her go. He’d walked away. Maybe he hadn’t really had a choice, or maybe he had.

  Either way, he wouldn’t go there. He had no desire to get close to a woman again. Not even to take a “peek inside her head,” as Ellie had said.

  He’d find another way to finish the book. A less involved way.

  “You know what you need?” Ellie said, interrupting his thoughts. “The same thing I need.”

  The craziest thought popped into Dalton’s head just then, as he looked into Ellie Miller’s wide green eyes. His gaze dropped to her curvy figure, and a charge of desire ran through him. He might not want to peek inside her mind, or get involved, but it had been a long time since he’d been involved with a woman and every ounce of testosterone in his body was reminding him—very insistently—of that fact.

  What did he need right now?

  A kiss. Maybe a little more.

  “Uh…what are you talking about?” he asked, pushing those thoughts away.

  “A break.” She smiled. “I think both of us could use some fresh air. You’re about as pale as death warmed over.”

  “Thanks. Glad to know you find me so attractive. Maybe I should go around with my back cover photo pasted on my face.”

  She paused, and a flush crept into her cheeks. “Oh, I didn’t say…I didn’t mean…”

  Ellie was flustered. Desire raged in Dalton’s veins, rushing so fast, the feeling took him completely by surprise. He hadn’t had a woman in his house in a long time. A long, long time. And here this one came along, and upset a totally perfect balance. “Of course you didn’t.”

  Then she recovered, and that feisty gleam was back in her emerald eyes. “All I meant was, we should play a little hooky.” She put out her hand. “Are you game, Dalton Scott?”

  He hesitated only a second, then took her palm in his, wondering if he was doing the right thing. When he touched Ellie, a nearly electric pulse traveled up Dalton’s arm. Something he could almost call attraction, if he’d been in the business of being attracted to a woman. A woman with a kid, no less.

  And that told Dalton he was getting way more than he bargained for in this deal. Something he hadn’t been prepared for—and a bonus he wasn’t so sure he wanted.

  Ellie Miller was apparently a pro at the picnic thing. Dalton stood by in amazement as she bustled around his kitchen, getting the baby tucked into a stroller, along with what seemed like a year’s worth of supplies jammed into a diaper bag. She had raided his fridge for ingredients for a late lunch, and packed them into a cooler he unearthed from the garage.

  At the last minute, despite her mantra about needing a break, Ellie had packed her calendar and her notepad, along with the cell phone that never stopped. Even as they were walking out the door and rounding the corner of her street, toward the park, she was arguing with someone about lighting their facial features or some such thing, leaving Dalton to push the kid.

  Making him feel altogether way too much like the father in this little trio, and not at all what he had intended when he agreed to go along on this expedition. The pink striped stroller rolled along the sidewalk, the kid cooing happily, while neighbors sent them friendly smiles and waves. As if he, Ellie and the kid were just another family heading toward the park.

  As soon as Ellie ended the call, Dalton transferred the handles to her grip. “You push this. It’s your kid, after all.”

  “You’re the babysitter.” She tossed him a grin. Rays of sunshine bounced off her delicate features. Below them, the kid was singing an endless tune of ba-ba-ba. “I’m just along to mak
e sure you don’t cheat and turn around after five minutes.”

  “Look who’s talking.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  He gestured toward her cell phone. “You might as well have glued that phone to your hand. I thought we’d agreed to play hooky.”

  “We are, when we get to the park.” She gestured the few hundred yards toward the entrance. “It’s just up there.”

  He snorted. “I’m calling you on a technicality, Miss Miller.”

  “That’s not a technicality, it’s a reality. I still have a few details to sew up before the end of the day. If I don’t work, I don’t pay the rent. If I don’t pay the rent, Sabrina and I are homeless—”

  “I thought I was the fiction writer. You can afford to take a half an hour off to go to the park, including the five minutes it takes to walk there and back. And you know it.”

  She opened her mouth to protest. Shut it again. Opened it, shut it. Gave him a glare, then finally turned the phone off and tucked it away, deep inside the diaper bag. “Thirty minutes. Any more, and the company I work for will send out a search party.”

  He laughed.

  “I’m not kidding.”

  Sabrina punctuated the statement with a ba-ba-ba and a rattle shake, as if she had her own personal set of cymbals.

  “Makes me glad I don’t have a real job. I don’t think I could take a boss breathing down my neck like that.”

  “I’d give about anything to work at home all day like you do. But in my industry, that’s just not feasible.” She sighed.

  “Then why are you in that industry?”

  She shrugged. “I sort of…fell into it. I met Cameron, and he needed an assistant, and he hired me. I stayed, and got promoted, and here I am. Working a million hours a week.”

  Cameron. The name perked Dalton’s attention. Was Cameron the missing baby’s father? Or someone else? He wanted to ask, but told himself it was none of his business. He was here for a couple days at most, to help her out, then get back to his private, non-social life. That was all.

  As they entered the park, a cacophony of small children surrounded them. Kids everywhere—climbing on the bright playground equipment, swinging on the swings, running on the wide expanse of grass, dodging each other among the trees. Playing in the huge sandbox shaded by a red-and-white striped awning. Dotted around the area were mothers, chatting together and dispensing hugs and snacks as needed.

  Dalton seemed to be the lone man. He couldn’t have felt more out of place if he’d walked into a lingerie store on bra fitting day.

  “Let’s go over here,” Ellie said, pointing toward a small bench under a wide oak tree. “It’s in the shade.”

  They settled the stroller to the side, the baby now asleep, then Ellie sat. He plopped down beside her, unable to shake that feeling that the image they presented was surely Family on an Outing.

  “You going to take her on the swings or anything?” he asked. Anything to get them off this bench and moving.

  “She’s too small for the ones they have here and they don’t have a baby swing. Maybe I’ll take her on the slide after lunch, if the bigger kids are done. Either way, Bri just likes being outside. So do I.” Ellie tipped her face to meet the sky above. Dappled rays sneaking through the blanket of leaves kissed her skin like golden jewels. “Let me just enjoy this for a minute before we eat. And you can get a chance to relax, too.”

  “Uh, yeah, relax.” Easier said than done when he realized how very aware of her he was.

  She was beautiful. Almost…luminescent.

  He chided himself. What was he doing? Pulling out a mental thesaurus? He really needed to get out more or something.

  Dalton put one arm on the back of the bench, and shifted his position. Put his ankle across the opposite knee. Dropped the foot down again. Turned his hip, tried another seating arrangement for his backside. And found comfortable, and being beside a beautiful woman like Ellie, didn’t go together. “I’m not really a park bench kind of guy.”

  Her eyes were closed now, her head leaned against the back of the bench, the expression on her face as serene as a lake on a summer day. “Then what kind of guy are you?” she asked, her voice lazy, quiet.

  The kind who wanted to kiss her right now. Who wanted to absorb just a little of whatever it was that she had found, that peace. That sweetness.

  He’d definitely been working too much. Been, as she’d said, cooped up way too long.

  He leaned over, searching her face, seeing the absence of lines, of stress, wondering how the heck she had gone from sixty to zero in such a short period. He reached up a hand—inches from her ivory skin, so close, he could feel the slight heat emanating from her, catch the slight scent of raspberries in her perfume—but not quite close enough to touch her.

  Her eyes opened and she jerked up, narrowing the distance between them. “What are you doing?”

  “Uh…” What was he supposed to say? How would he explain this? “Nothing.”

  Then he sat back against the bench again, before he gave in to the crazy ideas in his brain, ideas that came from too much sunshine.

  And not enough sense.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  FOR a second, Ellie had thought Dalton was going to kiss her, but at the very last second, he drew back. Two emotions rocketed through her.

  Relief. And disappointment.

  She didn’t need a man in her life, a complication like that, but oh, the loneliness that wrapped around her every night in her bed, had seemed to quadruple at that moment. She had wanted him to kiss her very much.

  But then he had sat back, and she’d decided she’d misread the move. It had been a long time since a man had made a move on her, so a little misreading was an easy thing for her to do.

  There were times—times like this one—when being a widow hit her square in the gut. When she was reminded all over again of all she had lost and how much it hurt. When she was forced to deal with the loss of her husband, and how she was no longer one of two.

  But just one.

  Ellie blinked back a few tears, and told herself she would think about that later. Those words had become her mantra over the last few months. Later, later, later.

  Yeah, like when Sabrina was eighteen.

  They sat there for a moment, both of them pretending to watch the groups of children climbing up and down the jungle gyms. Beside them, Sabrina kept on sleeping. No timely distraction would be coming from the baby, not now. “Mrs. Winterberry tells me you come from a family of twelve,” Ellie said, if only to break up the tension with a change of topic.

  “Mrs. Winterberry talks too much.”

  “She said that’s where you got all your…baby experience.” Ellie arched a brow. “Such as it is.”

  “Are you saying you don’t think I’m good with kids? Or in your case, one kid?”

  “Well, you’re not exactly Mr. Warm and Fuzzy.”

  “No one said you have to be warm and fuzzy to watch a kid. I don’t remember it being in the babysitter manual.”

  “Since when have you ever read a babysitting manual?”

  A flush filled his cheeks and Ellie realized she’d just exposed a vulnerable side of Dalton Scott. Well, well. She waited, watching him, letting silence press him into filling in the blanks. It took several long seconds, but finally he did.

  “Hey, my sister left one lying around once. A guy can get desperate for reading material sometimes.” He shot her a quick glance. “That’s my story and I’m sticking to it.”

  She laughed. “And was the Evil Eye that silences small children an inherited trait, or a tip in the book, too?”

  “That,” Dalton said, wagging a finger at her, “was one I developed on my own. Call it…a survival tactic.”

  “Survival tactic? Surviving what?”

  “What does it matter?”

  “I’m just curious,” she said.

  He scowled. “Let’s just drop it. I’m helping you out for a couple days, I’m not moving
in and become dad, okay?”

  A glacier had moved between them, and clearly, there’d be no moving it, no taking it down. Conversation over.

  “Yeah, sure,” she said.

  He got to his feet and swung away from the bench, putting several steps of distance between them. Clearly, what they had been talking about had hit some kind of nerve. Odd.

  She didn’t need to care. Or get involved. Dalton’s life was his own. She had her own to worry about. And that, right now, was enough. Still, the worry nagged at her, and she found her gaze straying to him, to the lone tall figure silhouetted against the bright summer sun.

  What had happened to him? What had made him so…hardened?

  There had to be more to it than the typical hermit writer. But what, Ellie didn’t know. Either way, Dalton wasn’t talking, and she wasn’t asking.

  She shrugged off the thoughts, reached under the stroller for a blanket, then pulled out the small cooler they had packed earlier. “I’d say it’s time to eat, wouldn’t you?”

  He turned back, the perpetual scowl back on his face. “I’m not hungry right now.”

  “Well, I am. In fact, I’m starving. And you probably are, too, considering you missed lunch when I was there earlier.” She propped a fist on her hip, determined to change the subject and perhaps tease him back to where they’d been before. “Now if you’re done being grumpy, you can join Sabrina and me. We prefer pleasant dining companions.” Then she turned on her heel, taking the stroller over to the shade of the oak tree a few feet away.

  As soon as she stopped moving, the baby woke up, putting out her arms, clamoring to be held. Ellie smiled and reached for Sabrina. This was where her priorities lay. Not with a relationship. She couldn’t juggle both, along with a job, and the bills, and the stress of all she had gone through. She’d concentrate on Bri, and work, and leave it at that. It would be enough for now.

  It had to.

  She held her daughter tight for a few minutes, then went to put her back into the stroller, to have her hands free for setting up the picnic. But as soon as Ellie did, Bri started crying. There’d be none of that, the baby declared with her lungs, not while her mother was there and had available arms.