SUSAN MEIER - Baby Before Business

Liking her direct approach, Ty met Ron’s gaze, as Ron said, “All weekend?”

“Maybe longer,” Madelyn said, while Ty continued to hold Ron’s gaze, taking his cue from Madelyn to face this head-on. “I’ve helped with Arlene and Jeff’s kids. I can certainly care for one baby.”

Good one! Ty broke his stare-down with Ron to bestow a look of respect on the big guy’s daughter. She had deliberately misinterpreted her dad’s concern to steer him off track. Point three. And confirmation that Ty hadn’t misjudged her. She could handle this. She could probably handle his PR, too. Even though just thinking about having to go out in public and make nice with a bunch of people who hated him made Ty want to sigh with disgust, at least he knew Madelyn could do the job.

Ron sounded like he was growling when he said, “I wasn’t talking about the baby. I was—”

Worried about his daughter sleeping with the town tyrant, Ty thought, just barely holding back a grimace. But Madelyn didn’t let her dad go there.

“You know what, Dad? We’ll discuss this later. Right now, I’ve got to get some things from my room.”

With that she turned and jogged up the steps to the porch. Ty took one look at her dad and decided he wasn’t hanging around. Explaining this situation was Madelyn’s job. And he did mean job. He had hired her to work for him, not…not…

An odd feeling tightened his chest when he tried to think of Madelyn and himself together, and he couldn’t form the words or the images in his mind. Madelyn was younger than he was. Way too young for him to even entertain a casual fling. She was as safe with him as Sabrina was.

Madelyn didn’t feel a qualm of conscience about leaving Ty with her dad. Though she’d staved off her father’s questions long enough that she would have time to gather her things, Ty should have been the one doing the talking. After all, this was his plan. Let him justify it to her dad.

But when she turned to grab a few T-shirts from a drawer, Ty Bryant was right behind her. She gasped and clutched her chest. “What!”

“Your dad thinks we’re going to sleep together tonight.”

She sighed. “Don’t worry. If I tell him we won’t, he’ll believe me.”

“You’re not my type,” Ty continued as if she hadn’t spoken. “Too young.” She saw him look around at the wedding ring quilt on her bed, her white Priscilla tie-back curtains. “And too nice.”

“What? You only date nasty women?”

“Sophisticates,” Ty corrected.

Madelyn tossed two pair of shorts in her duffel bag. Right. She knew that. Just as she knew it was wrong to be attracted to him because holding a baby did not change a man’s personality, she also knew that the CEO of Bryant Development would have absolutely no interest in her. But that was okay. She didn’t want him to be interested in her.

So why the hell did having him in her bedroom make her pulse jump?

Three reasons immediately popped into Madelyn’s head. First, with his shiny black hair and obsidian eyes, the man was absolutely delicious-looking. Second, holding the baby softened the hard edge of his personality. And, third, he was two feet away from her underwear drawer. All he had to do was look down to see her collection of lacy panties. Any one of those accounted for why her pulse was jumping. But the third was the best bet.

“Do you want to wait for me in the car?”

“No. I’m fine,” Ty assured her as if his comfort were the only thing to be considered.

“I’m not. I have to get a toothbrush, underwear and girlie things most guys don’t want to see.” She drew a long-suffering breath. “Could you just leave?”

For a second it appeared that he would tell her it didn’t bother him to see her undies. Not because he wanted a peek at her panties, but because he was trying to prove that sophistication of his. Luckily, he thought the better of it.

He glanced at Sabrina who was happily occupied with a rattle toy, and apparently decided it was safe to be alone with her for a few minutes. “I’ll see you in the car.”

“Wonderful,” Madelyn said, not meaning one syllable of the word.

She packed quickly, and scurried down the steps, but when she rounded the corner to rush to the front door she ran into her mom. A flour-covered apron covered Penney Gentry’s cropped jeans and T-shirt. A streak of flour decorated her graying brown hair.

Yet another great. Her dad thought she was moving in with the man who controlled the town and he wasn’t happy. But he wasn’t a match with Madelyn in a battle of wits because there were certain things he wouldn’t talk about in mixed company. Sex being the big one. Which meant he had called her mom home from baking pies for the upcoming church social to talk some sense into his daughter.

Another magic moment in the scrapbook of her life.

“You’re spending the weekend with a man?”

“In Atlanta, I could have spent hundreds of weekends with men and you wouldn’t have had a clue. But you knew I didn’t because you trusted me. Don’t spaz on me now, Mom.”

“I trusted you because we taught you better.”

“So, if you trusted me not to lie to you about Atlanta, that’s got to mean I’m not lying now. I really am spending the weekend with Ty Bryant to help him with his baby.”

Her mother smiled, making her green eyes twinkle. “You’re bad.”

“No, I’m good. And if it makes you feel any better, Mr. Bryant assured me he’s not interested. I’m too nice for him.”

Preoccupied with brushing the flour out of her hair, Penney absently said, “He only dates nasty women?”

“I asked him the very same question.” She kissed her mom’s cheek. “Go back to church and finish the pies. I’ll be home Monday or Tuesday night. I promised I would stay until he found a nanny, but I figured out in the car on the way over that he can probably hire someone from a reputable agency temporarily. We may not be able to get someone over a weekend, but Monday or Tuesday isn’t unrealistic. As soon as we get to his house I’ll have him call a service.”

“Okay,” her mom said with a smile. “I’ll handle your dad.”

“I’d appreciate it.”

When Madelyn came running down the walk, duffel bag over her shoulder, overnight case bobbing at her side and her face bright with the emotion of her parental confrontations, a weird sensation enveloped Ty. The way the scene was set, they could have been eloping.

He kicked that thought right out of his mind. But it ran back in and wouldn’t budge. And he knew why. Madelyn Gentry was a very sexy, very attractive woman, and though he might be discriminating he wasn’t dead. He found her as attractive as any man would find her. And now that he’d seen three rows of neatly folded pink, red and black panties, he could form those pictures and images that wouldn’t initially appear in his brain and she wasn’t as safe with him as he’d thought.

So he reminded himself that he wasn’t interested. First, she was too darned young for him. But, second, most women who pursued him only wanted his money. Madelyn, with dreams of establishing her own business, would be no exception. In fact, now that he thought about it, her financial situation was a lot like his former fiancée Anita’s had been when he met her. Wrestling with a failing business, Anita had impressed him as being tough and determined, so he’d happily lent her money….

He groaned, his hands forming fists on the steering wheel. That situation had ended abysmally. Anita hadn’t merely made him a laughingstock by taking him to the cleaners financially. She’d cheated on him the whole time they dated. Worse, she’d also cost Ty a brother. When Cooper discovered Anita was cheating, he’d warned Ty, but Ty had accused Cooper of using the information to manipulate him. By the time the truth came out that Anita was the one manipulating him and Cooper had been right about her cheating, Cooper was long gone. He’d packed his bags and moved to parts unknown and they hadn’t seen him since.