by Susan Meier
Not wanting to rile Ty before they had the discussion about Cooper, Madelyn only stayed at the office until noon. When she opened the door to the kitchen, she found a note from her mother sitting on the table.
She slid Sabrina into the high chair and slipped out of her pink pumps as she read the missive, which told her about a slow-roasting chicken that was in the oven.
“It’s too bad you can’t eat this,” she told the baby who gurgled her response. “My mother makes the best stuffed chicken.”
“Lucky for us.”
At the sound of Ty’s voice, Madelyn spun around. “What are you doing here?”
“I saw you brought the baby to work again, so I came home to call nannies. Almost shot Captain Bunny as an intruder.”
Madelyn dropped her head to her head. “Oh, no!”
Ty brushed off her concern. “Don’t worry. We handled it. Your mother is actually a very nice person.”
Madelyn breathed a sigh of relief. “I take it she didn’t have my dad with her.”
“No. Thank God. The Sarge must have stayed home.” He walked to the high chair and looked down at Sabrina, as if not sure what to do.
“Pick her up. Give her a hug. Kiss her cheek.”
Ty took a deep breath.
“Ty, you have to kiss her, hug her, touch her. You and Seth are her only family. If you don’t show her affection, no one will.”
Ty nodded, then raised the baby from the seat and into his arms. “Hey, kid.”
Looking into Ty’s face, Sabrina twisted her head as if examining him.
“She’s growing accustomed to you.”
“At least it doesn’t seem like she misses her M-O-M anymore.”
Madelyn laughed at the way he spelled rather than said mom, but her expression quickly sobered. “That isn’t just lucky for us. It’s kind of lucky for Sabrina, too.”
“Yeah,” Ty said, then rubbed his nose against Sabrina’s cheek. “It’s sad, though.”
“Yes, it is,” Madelyn agreed. Seeing her perfect opportunity to ask him about Cooper, she added, “You and Seth and your brother Cooper know firsthand how hard it is to lose parents.”
Ty stiffened. “We’re fine.”
Right. Madelyn disagreed with that, but she also saw that having Ty defensive was ruining his time with Sabrina. So she changed the subject, knowing she could bring this up later. “Tell me what happened with the nannies.”
“I start interviewing tomorrow.”
“Tomorrow?”
“Don’t pack your bags yet. I’ll probably have to do second interviews then once I choose somebody, it will take at least a week to do a background search.”
A strange whirlwind of conflicting emotions swirled through Madelyn as she stared at Ty. With the sleeves of his white shirt rolled to the elbows and his tie loosened as he very sweetly nuzzled Sabrina, he was the most adorable, sexy man on the face of the earth. But she didn’t like her attraction to him. Heck, she just plain didn’t like him sometimes. On the other hand, she wasn’t so stupid that she didn’t see that Ty’s employees believed her when she made observations about his private life because everyone knew she was living in his house, getting the inside scoop, seeing him with the baby. She didn’t merely appreciate that edge. She needed it.
But even if her heart caught at the thought of leaving Ty, she couldn’t stay here forever. Having any kind of feelings for him was foolish. His difficult life might justify his bad disposition, but that didn’t make it any easier to live with. She didn’t want to get involved with a grouch.
“Did she have a nap this morning?”
Madelyn glanced over at Ty, surprised that he was beginning to think ahead about Sabrina’s needs. In two days he had gone from ignoring his baby to considering her comfort. If Madeline didn’t so desperately want to stay here for her PR purposes, Ty’s rapid signs of improvement with the baby would be confirmation that it was time to go. But she did need to stay here for the PR. At least until the Wall Street Journal reporter was gone.
“Yes. She napped this morning in the play yard in my office. She slept right through two meetings.”
Ty shifted the baby to his right arm and peered at Madelyn, giving her such a confused look that she frowned.
“What?”
“I’m puzzled about whom you meet with.”
He really had no clue about how public relations worked. “Your employees,” she said in an attempt to enlighten him about her job. “Department heads mostly. I need to gauge how your employees will respond to the reporter about you and your company. That way I can steer him to the appropriate people.”
Ty said, “I see.”
“And you should speak kindly about them when the reporter asks you questions about the people who work for you.”
Ty laughed. “Really? I have to say nice things about a bunch of people who hate me?”
“You don’t have to say nice things to them, but it won’t be a lie for you to say you think they’re hardworking, honest people.”
Tickling Sabrina, Ty didn’t reply.
Madelyn’s instincts perked up. “You do think they’re honest, hardworking people, don’t you?”
Ty shook his head. “Yes, but for the past fifteen years they’ve been allowed to bad-mouth me—even though I’ve kept most of them employed. And I…” He sighed. “Never mind. I see what you mean and I’ll say what you need me to say. Though it might give an interesting slant to the article if I told the truth and admitted their perpetual dislike makes it very easy for me to make tough choices.” With that he walked to the kitchen door, Sabrina still on his arm. “I’m taking her into the family room to play for a few minutes. This will be our quality time for the day.”
He left and an odd thought tiptoed into Madelyn’s brain. He had a point. A very interesting point. He had employed virtually everyone in this town and no one appreciated it. Smart employees would have erected a statue in his honor, or at the very least made him man of the year. These employees went out of their way to persecute him.
Of course, he invited it. And now she realized why. His horrible reputation clearly kept his employees in line and made difficult decisions much easier to make. Everyone knew he was hard and cold, so no one disobeyed him. No one confronted him. No one challenged him. His word was law. His reputation allowed him to run the company the way he wanted to run it—without interference, without a boatload of questions, without having to explain himself—so he let his employees fear him to their hearts’ content.
But living with him gave her a different view of his life and things didn’t add up the way they did when she just looked at the surface. Ty supported nearly everyone in town. He had raised a very thoughtful brother in Seth. And he’d taken in an orphaned cousin. True, he was reluctant at first, but he had stepped in and was doing his duty with love and affection for Sabrina. Yet, his employees, the very people who counted on him for their paychecks, treated him abysmally, as if they didn’t see the good he did.
Because they probably didn’t see the good he did, or not enough of the good he did.
Madelyn suddenly got it. This was why Ty worked so hard to keep everyone out of his personal life. In two short weeks of living with him, seeing the quiet decisions and private choices, she was coming to the conclusion everybody else missed. Deep down inside, Tyrant Ty was a nice guy.
But he couldn’t let anybody know that. If he got too chummy with his employees then he might not be able to make the hard choices he felt he needed to keep his company successful—and to continue employing the very people who disliked him.
So he never let anybody get close to him. But Madelyn was close. Albeit accidentally. That was why her feelings for him were so odd, unmanageable and sometimes even insane. She liked the side of him that no one else knew existed. But if she tried to tell anybody in this town there was another side to Tyrant Ty, a good side, no one would believe her.
That night Ty volunteered to learn how to bathe Sabrina. Madelyn explained the foot
ball hold that allowed the baby to be dipped in the water, while held securely on his arm. She showed him how to wash her gently with the baby products her mom had picked up. Then she taught him how to wrap Sabrina in her yellow terry-cloth robe and had him carry her to the changing table.
“Special soap, special shampoo, special ways to hold her. God, I’m glad my brothers were older when I inherited them.”
“They might have been older but I’m sure they came with their own problems.”
Ty sighed. “Ms. Gentry, you are not supposed to agree with me.”
“Yeah, well,” Madelyn said, rummaging through the drawer for an undershirt and sleepers. “I guess I’m just not in the mood to spar.”
“Too bad.”
The day before she would have guessed he thought it “too bad” that she didn’t feel like bantering because he enjoyed the fight. Tonight she knew he was annoying her on purpose. Not because he wanted to protect them from another kiss, but because he was enforcing the idea that his life was easier when his employees disliked him.
She drew a quick breath. “Yeah, too bad,” she said watching Ty towel dry the baby. “Look, I know you have work to do so I’ll read to her and feed her her last bottle.”
“I’m fine.”
“I know. But technically I’m supposed to be doing this. It’s good that you’re learning, but when you hire a nanny she will do all these routine tasks.”
Holding Sabrina on the changing table, he studied Madelyn. “You’re not getting soft on me, are you?”
She wasn’t getting soft, Madelyn thought as she motioned Ty aside so she could begin dressing the baby, but she was finally seeing the light. When she took her analysis of Ty Bryant to its logical conclusion she realized he had sacrificed having friendships, relationships, even the ability to take a walk down Main Street, because he believed having everyone dislike him was a small price to pay to be able to keep everyone employed.
Still, he would hate it if he knew she had begun to figure all this out. “No, I’m not getting soft.”
“Good.”
Madelyn said nothing as she returned her attention to dressing the baby.
Ty stared at her. Something wasn’t right. Madelyn should either be applauding his efforts, acting like a cheerleader, or pushing him to change so he could give a good interview to the Wall Street Journal reporter. Yet she remained quiet.
“Who did you talk to today?”
“Aaron Ringwald in accounting. Megan Fontain in marketing.”
He tried to think of something nice either of those employees might have said that would cause Madelyn to give up her mission to reform him and couldn’t. He’d made Megan cry twice the month before. Aaron had been passed over for a promotion. If anything, talking to them should have increased her determination to change him.
Madelyn rolled Sabrina into a one-piece sleeper and Ty felt a tug on his heart. In a little over a week, he had grown to really like the little girl. He liked the way she smelled, the way she felt, even the sound of her voice. So if the tug on his heart trickled over into feelings for the baby’s caregiver, he wasn’t surprised. Now that he knew everything that went into baby care, he appreciated Madelyn’s help. He even understood her reluctance to get involved.
That was why he counted on Madelyn disliking him. Why he barked orders and continued to treat her as a servant instead of a friend. They had to be adversaries. It was the easiest way to keep them both in line. And if she suddenly got quiet or quit defending herself, their attraction was likely to spring up again.
“I want to see you in my study when she’s asleep.” He would get to the bottom of whatever nice thing she’d thought he’d done and he would get her hating him again if it killed him.
Madelyn showed up in his study door about ten minutes later. Ty tossed his pencil to his desk blotter. “Baby asleep?”
She nodded.
He sighed. “Come in. Let’s get this discussion over with. What did you hear today or figure out that has you acting so strangely?”
For a minute, Ty thought she wasn’t going to tell him, but she sighed and said, “That you’re a nice guy.”
He laughed. This would be easy to counter. “Who told you that?”
“No one. I figured it out for myself. You raised your brothers, then when they were grown you shifted your focus to taking care of the town by making sure your company stayed successful.”
“Not hardly. I built this company so I would be rich.”
“That might be part of it, but you’re proud that you employ almost everybody in town.”
“Madelyn, I fire people. I yell at people. I can make vice presidents cry and not have a single regret.”
“You have no qualms about pushing people because the company you’re running supports them. You even said having your employees dislike you makes it easy for you to make tough decisions. It’s pretty clear to me you’re giving up friends and even a comfortable place in the community so you can ensure most of the people in this town have a job.”
He dropped his head to his hands and wearily ran his palms down his face. “Oh, lord.”
“Why won’t you let me leak a little bit of this to your employees?”
“Leak what? That I raised my brothers? They know that.”
“They also know that you took in Sabrina when there was no one else to raise her. But there’s more to you than family responsibility. You have a huge sense of responsibility to this town. Such a sense of responsibility that you’re willing to sacrifice your own personal life to make sure your company runs smoothly.”
He stared at her incredulously. She honestly believed this crap she was telling him.
She drew another huge breath. “You might be gruff, Ty, but deep down you’re a nice guy.”
“Not even on a good day!” Angry now, he walked around the side of his desk and stood directly in front of her. “I told you in our first meeting that I had worked fifteen years to get this reputation and if you start spreading this manure you’re going to screw it up.”
“See! You just proved my argument. You use this reputation! But I think you’ve taken the grouch thing too far. Or maybe it’s gone on too long. You don’t have to be mean anymore to get your employees to work hard.”
“Oh, really, Miss Smarty Pants. And how many companies do you successfully run?”
“You know what I’m saying.”
He stepped closer. She didn’t as much as move a muscle. If he was out to intimidate her, it was clear that she was every bit as determined to prove he couldn’t. And that could very well be true. She might be the only person on the face of the earth who didn’t fear him.
Suddenly he knew that was the problem but he also knew the solution.
He ran his fingers along her cheek, gently, tentatively, ignoring the tornado of arousal that spun through him when he realized how soft her skin was and when he saw the way her eyes darkened from a simple touch. Just as she considered it her mission to get his employees to speak kindly of him, he had an equally important mission to keep their respect. If the only way to keep her in line was to…
He bent his head and kissed her. The arousal that had begun with touching her cheek turned into a full-scale attack on his senses. The scent of her perfume combined with the taste of her mouth and the feeling of her lips pressed against his. The sensations of all three flooded through him, sending all his blood to one part of his body. His response was quick and instinctive. He fanned his fingers through her hair and plunged his tongue into her mouth, forgetting this kiss had a purpose. She was soft and warm and sweet and tempting. So tempting. Why did she have to be so tempting?
When he pulled away, she blinked up at him. Her green eyes were cloudy with desire. Her lips were moist and dewy from his kiss. He knew exactly what she was feeling because he was feeling it, too. But it was wrong. She was young. He was old. She thought the world was good. He knew it wasn’t.
Though he was internally shaking with need, outwardly he remained calm
. “If you really think I’m nice…If you really think I’m totally different personally than I am professionally…have sex with me tonight and see how I treat you in the morning.”
With arousal still wreaking havoc on his nervous system and need pounding in his veins, Ty half prayed she would accept his invitation, if only to call his bluff, so he could feel the thrill of her acknowledging she wanted him, too.
Fortunately, he used the other half of his prayer to hope that if she called his bluff, he’d have the strength to refuse her.
Clearly debating, she stared at him. Ty felt his resolve weakening, as his mind formed images of what would happen if she agreed to go to his bed. With their chemistry, they would spontaneously combust and she knew it. It would be the best sex of both of their lives. And she knew that, too. What she was debating really was how he would treat her in the morning.
That she didn’t know. So, that was what he had to use.
“Come on. You threw out the theory that I’m nice. Prove you really think that. Sleep with me tonight.”
She took a pace back and Ty knew he had his answer. He felt a sharp jab of insult from the rejection, but reminding himself that he needed her to reject him, he ignored it and shook his head.
“I didn’t think so.” Turning to walk back to his desk, he said, “Good night, Ms. Gentry.”
Chapter Seven
The next morning Madelyn arrived at Bryant Development late for Ty’s regularly scheduled meeting with his department heads. When she got off the elevator, she said good morning to Joni, then took a quick breath, straightened her shoulders and walked into the conference room.
“Ms. Gentry, I see you’ve decided to join us. Even though you’re—” he glanced at his watch “—thirty minutes late.”
Head high and spine ramrod straight, Madelyn took a seat at the far end of the long table. “I dropped Sabrina off at my parents’ this morning.”
“Really? What a novel idea to have a third party watch the baby rather than bring her to work.”
Madelyn opened her notebook, glad he was behaving like a moron. She’d actually mourned her decision not to sleep with him the night before. Not because she wanted to prove she thought he was a good person, but because the fire burning through her veins every time they touched was unlike anything she’d ever felt.
