If I Loved You

by Kress, Alyssa

  With a definite sense of satisfaction, Zane followed Nick out the door. Oh, he wasn't being a white knight here, not doing any of that Dudley Do-Right, self-sacrificing business.

  For one thing, the object of his not-heroic actions looked ready to eviscerate him at the earliest opportunity.

  For another, this felt way too good to be any kind of sacrifice at all.

  Zane was grinning as he went to fetch Tristan.

  CHAPTER THREE

  Pattie was going to gut him—with a dull serrated knife.

  Zane Kincaid had gotten Nick—and Tristan—to complete the paternity test.

  She seethed as the three of them walked onto the elevator of the Getty Administration building. How dare he? How dare Zane Kincaid interfere?

  Okay, objectively speaking, getting the test done was a good thing. It was the result she'd set out to obtain on this jaunt. But—but—she should have been able to do it on her own. Without this...interloper butting into her family business.

  So maybe she wasn't mad at Zane so much as ashamed of herself. He had succeeded where she had failed.

  The elevator doors closed her in with her nephew and his meddling nanny. Despite her anger—possibly misdirected—she was very aware of the nanny, where he stood, his height and breadth...a certain tangy, masculine smell.

  Determinedly, she turned her attention to her nephew. To her surprise, Tristan's dark eyes were already upon her. He held up a piece of paper. It had apparently been cut from the coloring book Dot kept behind her desk for young visitors.

  "See what I did?"

  Pattie was flabbergasted when Tristan then handed her the drawing. He'd never before offered to share with her.

  "Um. Oh, let's see." Flustered, she spread the drawing with her hands. Desperately, she racked her brain for advice from one of the parenting books she'd crammed during the first week Tristan had become her responsibility.

  Don't ask what it is.

  Find something to like about it.

  Be sincere.

  "Uh, let's take a good look here." Pattie squinted at the drawing. She saw a big orange scribble over an illustration of Van Gogh's irises. Could she find something to like about it? "It's very...bright," she tried. "And...lively. Yes, a lot of energy."

  Proud of herself, Pattie smiled. Tristan, however, reached up and snatched the drawing from her hands. Pattie watched in horror as he crumpled the paper into a fist-sized wad.

  "What? Why did you do that?" The kid never reacted the way the books said he was supposed to react.

  The elevator smoothed to a stop. Tristan glared at Pattie. "You're not my mommy."

  "What?" Baffled, Pattie blinked a few times. "No, of course not—"

  "You're not!"

  "I know—"

  The elevator doors jerked open. Pattie scrambled for something to say—anything—to ease the expression of pure loathing on her nephew's face.

  Be sincere. The directive robbed her of words to ease anything. Pattie couldn't tell Tristan his mother was coming back. She couldn't promise to take her place. She couldn't even tell Tristan she loved him. Maybe it was unnatural, but she didn't. She felt sorry for him, she felt responsible for him, but she didn't feel love. To be honest, she wasn't even sure what love was.

  Meanwhile, Tristan didn't stick around long enough for Pattie to say the wrong thing. He ran out of the elevator, tossing his wadded-up drawing to the ground on his way through the empty lobby.

  Pattie felt herself shrink. Or maybe Zane grew. In about two seconds, it was as if an elephant stood in the elevator with her.

  If the nanny had thought his parenting skills superior to Pattie before, he was going to be insufferable now. Right in front of him, she'd just proved how awful she was at taking care of her nephew, even down to the little stuff.

  Dammit. Why couldn't she handle this?

  The elevator doors started to close, but Zane reached out to spring them back open.

  "Don't worry about it." His voice was low and deep. "Just keep trying."

  Pattie shot her gaze to him, stunned.

  A very unexpected expression lit his eyes. Not condescension, not impatience, but...

  Pattie frowned. If she had to put a name to it, she'd have to call it...understanding.

  Understanding?

  A very strange sensation slithered through her, something oddly warm. For a second she almost believed he did understand.

  No. Oh, no. This wouldn't do. She couldn't afford to believe that. That was too close to the weakness which had pushed her toward Nick three years ago. Besides, Kincaid couldn't actually be nice. He'd laughed at her.

  Quickly, she affected a cool and skeptical look. "Keep trying? Oh, that makes sense." She didn't mind if it sounded like a challenge. She was up for a fight.

  But he only quirked his mouth and replied mildly, "It's an idea, anyway."

  He wanted to take the wind out of her sails, but she wasn't slowing this ship. Pattie opened her mouth, determined to make him bite. Unfortunately, she didn't get a chance to issue another challenge. Tristan's voice, high and unhappy, floated at them from across the lobby.

  "I can't...get...the door...open!" He'd latched onto the metal handle of the glass exit door and hurled backward with all his might, but the door merely shuddered.

  Zane's gaze left Pattie's face.

  "Help!" Tristan screeched.

  Zane replied with utter calm. "Hang on there, Squirt." Obviously dismissing the possibility Pattie might be of aid in the situation, Zane made a leisurely path toward Tristan.

  Sure enough, Tristan calmed down once his hero announced he was coming to the rescue. The boy waited patiently until Zane reached his position, then grinned up at the nanny while Zane pushed the heavy glass door open.

  "Race you to the grass," Zane suggested.

  As if the man had pressed an energy switch, Tristan perked up. "Race!" he agreed with a shriek, and took off.

  Chuckling, Zane jogged after.

  With a sigh, Pattie stepped into the empty lobby. There'd been no fight, no tussle. Not between herself and Zane, nor even between herself and Tristan.

  The kid's crumpled drawing still lay on the floor. With a wry twist of the lips, she walked over and bent to pick it up. For her, Tristan crumpled his drawing. If Zane had commented on it instead, the kid would have treasured the stupid scribble forever. And Tristan had only known the nanny about an hour.

  Just keep trying. The notion made her want to laugh. Zane had to have been kidding. She'd never make it as a parent.

  Slowly, Pattie unfolded Tristan's drawing. Over it she peered through the glass doors. Zane and Tristan were now wrestling on the big lawn outside. Zane's teeth flashed when he smiled. Was that a dimple in his cheek? God. Did he have to be so attractive?

  Meanwhile Tristan was giggling. He was acting happy, healthy...like a regular kid instead of a monster.

  Watching the kid and registering what his giggles meant caused Pattie's stomach to take a long, slow dive.

  She was going to have to hire Zane Kincaid, major pain in the ass and toddler hero.

  Fine. But it would only be for a short while, only until the paternity test result came back and Nick took over parenting duties. Then she'd be done with Kincaid; he couldn't...ruffle her feathers any more.

  Not that she was afraid of hiring him or anything. Pattie let out a slow breath and smiled. God, no. It took a lot to scare her. Certainly more than some silly male nanny.

  ~~~

  Zane admired the Porsche's tight turning radius as he swung the vehicle into the third spot of the four-car garage beneath his living quarters. While Maeve had gotten the big house in Manhattan Beach, Zane had kept the car. It was a good deal as far as he was concerned. He'd never much liked the mansionized mausoleum Maeve had persuaded him to buy five years ago. Now he was out of it.

  With a flourish, he switched the Porsche's motor off. Before opening the car door, he automatically reached for a briefcase on the seat beside him.
<
br />   There was no briefcase.

  Muttering a brief curse, Zane got out of the car. After a year, bringing nothing home from work still felt weird.

  Weird, but good, Zane assured himself.

  Just like it felt good not to have a wife waiting for him at the end of the day.

  Passing through the back garage door, he entered his sister's backyard. His niece, Brittany, was practicing tennis against the other side of the garage wall. Without missing a swing, she waved her free hand. "Hi, Uncle Zane!"

  Danny, on his bicycle, stopped riding and dropped the bike to run forward. "Uncle Zane! Uncle Zane!"

  Layla, in a bathing suit, if you could call the scrap of orange-flowered bikini bottom a bathing suit, stood up from her wading pool. "'Cle Zane!" In greeting, she tossed a wet tennis ball toward him.

  "Whoa!" Laughing, Zane caught the tennis ball before it could interfere with Brittany's practice, then braced himself as Danny threw his eight-year-old body against him.

  Ah. Sanity. In the space of two seconds, he lost the odd tension that had gripped him since the Getty Center. This was his real world. His real world did not include some blond giantess with ginger-colored eyes and a mountain of attitude. Zane's smile widened as he felt his pants leg dampen. Layla had run over to press her wet little self against him, too.

  "'Cle Zane," she cooed.

  Maybe it was a cop-out to live in his sister's 'bonus room,' the one-bedroom apartment over the garage, but Zane was more inclined to consider it the smartest thing he'd done since his divorce.

  The screen of the main house's back door swung open. Zane's sister, Cassie, stepped out, wiping her hands on her apron. "Well, well, well." Her smile was both affectionate and sarcastic. "The conquering hero returns."

  "Hero, shmero," Zane claimed. "They just see me as fresh blood."

  "Gross!" Danny said, but with evident glee. "Bl-o-o-d."

  "G'oss, g'oss, g'oss!" Layla burbled happily, tugging on Zane's hand.

  "Hey, Uncle Zane, would you look at something that's wrong with my handlebars?" Danny asked.

  "After that, want to hit a few balls with me?" Brittany asked.

  "See what I mean?" Zane grinned at his sister.

  Cassie shook her head. "They have no pity. And after your hard day at the office, too." The sarcasm that had been in her smile slipped noticeably into her voice.

  Zane ignored the sisterly barb. Over the past year, he'd had loads of practice. Besides, he knew Cassie meant well. Turning to Danny, he said, "Sure, I'll look at your handlebars."

  "Tennis," Brittany begged.

  "'Ncle Zane," Layla insisted, tugging some more. "Pool."

  "See what you can accomplish in ten minutes," Cassie said. "That's when supper'll be on the table."

  Turning, Cassie went back into the house, evidently assuming Zane would be one of the party at her dinner table. Zane didn't bother trying to tell her, once again, that he didn't expect her to make meals for him. Though he paid the going rate in rent for the rooms over the garage, Cassie still considered him family. With his nieces and nephew all regarding him with eager anticipation, Zane could hardly argue he was anything else.

  Fifteen minutes later, seated at the dining table in Cassie's house, Zane was absolutely positive he was solid family, and no mere renter. That's when Cassie, while passing the platter of meat loaf to her husband, Jim, asked, "So, Zane, when are you going to get a real job, already?"

  Only family would speak with such tactless candor. Zane was prepared, though. Cassie's earlier sarcasm had warned him one of her periodic rants was coming.

  "I do have a real job." He calmly confiscated the ketchup bottle from Danny, who was creating a red ocean with it on his plate. "The most important job in the world, taking care of kids. Don't you agree?"

  Brittany chuckled, obviously getting his point. "Yeah, Mom. That's what you always say, when people claim you don't have a job."

  Cassie's husband jerked his lips, in an apparent attempt not to laugh, himself. Quickly, Jim turned a nascent grin into a cough when his wife turned to glare at him.

  "You're no help." Cassie dumped a pile of peas onto her husband's plate. "Why don't you tell him? Tell him to go get a job in the field for which he was highly trained and which he'd still enjoy if he only gave it another chance."

  Jim cleared his throat. He looked over the table toward Zane. "What she said."

  Zane lifted a shoulder. "I don't feel like it."

  Jim turned back to his wife. "What he said."

  Cassie blew out hard through her nose.

  In a way, Zane could understand his sister's frustration. Three years his senior, Cassie had seen Zane progress from a boy who built gliders from paper towel rolls into an aeronautical engineer in charge of designing fighter jets. She knew Zane's work at Savik Engineering had been challenging and fulfilling...up to a point. The point at which Zane had discovered Savik's dirty little secrets.

  Jim now slid a wink Zane's way. With three kids to support, Jim would never dream of chucking everything for a minimum-wage job. Nevertheless, he consistently backed Zane up. It was a matter of vicarious living, Zane supposed. Thumbing one's nose at The Man.

  On a more practical note, Jim claimed he appreciated having Zane around to look after things when Jim was away on one of his many business trips. After taking Danny to the emergency room twice this year and fixing three midnight bathroom plumbing crises, Zane understood Jim's claim hadn't been empty.

  "Boys!" Cassie muttered. "Always sticking together."

  "We got to," Jim declared.

  "We have our principles," Zane agreed, giving Danny, beside him, a large nudge in the ribs.

  "Uh—yeah. We guys got our principles," Danny obligingly piped up.

  Brittany rolled her eyes. Layla threw a pea. Cassie sighed and put on her troubled look. She'd supported Zane completely when he'd resigned from his position as Vice President of Design Engineering at Savik. But it hadn't taken her long to start hammering on this idea Zane shouldn't 'throw the baby out with the bathwater.'

  Deep down, Zane agreed with her. He loved engineering, he loved figuring out how to make something work. He'd loved steering a project from abstract design to reality.

  But he wasn't sure he could even find another job. Everyone in his business knew he'd blown the whistle on Savik—or at least attempted to blow the whistle. The government bigwigs he'd contacted about the phony test results Savik had been turning in hadn't wanted to listen to Zane. Savik had promised the bigwigs a jet using five percent less material in the wings and the bigwigs had wanted to believe it, safety be damned.

  So Zane had been out of a job, and out of a profession—not to mention out of a marriage—all for insisting on doing the right thing. Being a white knight. A big, stupid hero on a fat destrier.

  "I just think you should do what you love," Cassie muttered.

  "But I love what I'm doing," Zane replied.

  "Being a nanny?

  "Absolutely."

  "Oh, really?" Cassie fluttered her eyelashes at him. "And just what did you enjoy about it...today?"

  Brittany hid a snicker behind a forkful of meatloaf while Zane felt a sudden knot in his gut. What had he enjoyed about it today? He hadn't exactly enjoyed today, had he? The knot in his gut twisted.

  "I like...the kids," Zane replied, generalizing the question by his answer. He didn't want to talk about today.

  "What? You don't like the moms?" Jim grinned. "And here I had this fantasy you were cutting a swathe through the single mothers of the Westside."

  Zane stared at Jim. "A swathe?" The knot in his gut moved noticeably lower down his body. Okay...so that was one of the things that had happened today. His sleeping libido had opened an eye. Briefly. So what? It didn't mean he had to—or wanted to—do anything about it. He wasn't getting involved with Pattie Bowen.

  She was trouble with a capital T. Any man with brains could see that.

  Fortunately, Pattie didn't want Zane's involvement any more
than Zane wanted to give it to her. She'd practically snapped his head off after he'd handed her the completed paternity test. Rather than use Zane's assistance, she'd have walked out of Nick's office empty-handed.

  It would be easy to avoid playing the hero for her.

  Smiling, Zane turned back to his meat loaf. "The moms are..." He paused to search for the right word. "...irrelevant."

  "Irrelevant!" Cassie huffed. "Huh!"

  With a rueful look in Zane's direction, Jim put a hand on his wife's shoulder and pulled her close enough for a kiss. "You are certainly not irrelevant to me, darlin.'"

  Cassie smiled and tapped his cheek. "You are not an idiot."

  "Absolutely not."

  "Meaning I am," Zane remarked, and laughed. "Maybe I was once—but not any more."

  Oh yeah. He'd learned a lot from Maeve. He'd learned it never paid to act the hero for a woman—his sister excluded. Too many females owned emotional claws, and wouldn't hesitate to use them. He'd learned not to believe in a woman's faith or affection—no matter what vows she'd taken.

  Cassie's smile turned into a sigh and she shook her head.

  Feeling he'd won this round, Zane smiled and reached for the bowl of peas, setting it in front of his meat-loving nephew. Certain Danny would now take a spoonful of peas, Zane sat back and relaxed. He'd never again play the fool—not for any woman. Never again would he allow himself to get so vulnerable he couldn't see what was right in front of him. Nobody would get the chance to slice him open at the gut the way Maeve had sliced him.

  He was done with betrayal. Done with pain.

  Which meant he was done with romantic relationships.

  "The moms are totally irrelevant," Zane repeated.

  And so were the aunts.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  "That was weird," Pattie remarked as she came to the dining room table.

  "What was weird?" Pattie's friend Angela raised her dark eyes from the heirloom table and her task of mixing the Mah Jong tiles.

  "Tristan." Pattie frowned. Once Zane had left her door this afternoon, she'd thought she was done with him for the day. But subsequent events were proving otherwise.