SUSAN MEIER - Bringing Up Babies

“Excuse me, Mr. Brewster…Chas?” Lily said, sheepishly stepping into the den.

Flustered by her unexpected presence, Chas bounced out of his seat. “What’s wrong? Is something wrong with one of the kids?”

“No, no,” she said, laughing a little and batting her hand in dismissal. “They’re all asleep.”

“Oh.” Chas sat again. “So, what can I do for you?”

“Well, you said we’d discuss my salary and your expectations for me last night, but we never got around to it.”

He remembered. After she’d gotten settled, Grant announced that it was bathtime and that he would show Lily what to do. Together they’d gone to the nursery, and though Chas had determinedly stayed away, laughter had floated down to him until he rushed upstairs to chaperon.

Chas scowled at the memory.

“I’m sorry,” Lily said, obviously responding to the expression on his face. “If this is a bad time, I can come back.”

“No. This is a good time,” Chas said, putting the bottle of scotch back in the drawer. He was thirty years old and starting his own law practice. Three bad relationships had taught him several good lessons—lessons a man couldn’t toss aside for a pretty face. And over a year had passed since the last one. He’d finished law school, paid most of his debts, and kept himself out of trouble the entire time. If he couldn’t get a hold of himself long enough to have a conversation with the woman who was caring for the triplets, then he needed his head examined.

“In fact, I should apologize for not remembering to talk with you last night.”

“That’s okay,” she said, meekly making her way into the office. She took the seat on the chair in front of his desk, while Chas organized his thoughts, jotting down a few things on paper so he wouldn’t forget them.

As he calmly explained her salary and the Brewster expectations, Chas felt another stab of attraction, but he controlled it by reminding himself of the valuable lesson that he learned with Charlene—good looks were only part of the package. Absorbing that, really taking in the full meaning of that lesson, he realized this conversation could actually work to his benefit because he could use it to strengthen his resolve.

Sitting across the desk from him, wearing jeans and a sweatshirt, Lily Andersen was still more attractive than most women dressed for an evening on the town. Her sunny blond hair had been pulled into a loose knot at her nape and pointed out how beautiful, how perfect her face was. High cheekbones, bright with color, accented her large blue eyes. Even unpainted, her pink lips were full, generous. If this were any other place, any other situation, he probably would roll the dice one more time and try for a relationship with her. But because she was his employee and this was his house, having a relationship with her was out of the question. Since his libido couldn’t seem to understand that, Chas decided to try to get it under control by reminding himself that looks were frequently deceiving. In the past Chas had made the three biggest mistakes of his life after leaping into relationships with pretty girls, without first gathering enough information about them.

It was time to cure his libido of this affliction once and for all.

“So, Lily, I didn’t really get a chance to interview you yesterday, and there are still a few questions I’d like to ask you.”

She smiled. Her face lit with pleasure. Her blue eyes sparkled.

Chas’s libido went on red alert. There was no way a man could find anything wrong with that face…with that smile.

“Like what?”

Chas cleared his throat, telling his libido to cool its heels for a few seconds and he’d find a flaw, a reason not to like her. “Well, you talked about caring for your sister’s children, but I was curious about other child-care experience you’d had.”

“None, really,” Lily answered easily, truthfully.

Chas waited for her to elaborate, but she didn’t. She sat with her hands on her lap, her soft smile firmly in place and her blue eyes clear and direct.

Chas’s libido laughed. She was honest and unpretentious. She didn’t try to fake or fudge her résumé. She was quite definitely a take-me-as-I-am person. No pretense or artifice here. Strike one on trying to make her unattractive.

“College?”

She shook her head. “I’m afraid not. I never wanted to go to college, I only wanted to get married and have a family.”

Chas mentally snickered at his libido.

“Really?” he said, getting comfortable in his chair, thinking he was finally on the road to proving his point. There was nothing more unattractive than a woman who needed a man to complete herself.

“Really,” Lily said, and gave Chas another pretty smile. “Frankly,” she said with a self-deprecating sigh. “I fell in love in high school. Everett was good-looking, smart and loved his family. He was everything a woman could possibly want in a man. I was so enamored I couldn’t see straight. I would have sacrificed anything for him.”

Chas’s libido didn’t say a word. It didn’t have to. Only a fool would have missed the sincerity in her explanation. She hadn’t needed a man to complete herself, she’d fallen in love. And she’d been loyal and trustworthy. If only one of his women had been loyal or trustworthy….

Strike two.

“So what happened?” Chas asked quietly.

“I waited for him while he went to college, forgave a couple of indiscretions, then suffered public humiliation when he left me at the altar a couple of weeks ago—white dress, bridesmaids, impatient minister and all.”

Chas and his libido tried to picture it and couldn’t. It didn’t make any sense that a normal, red-blooded man would leave this beautiful, charming, sweet, sincere woman at the altar. The man must have been an absolute fool.

“I’m sorry. What did you say?”

Chas didn’t realize he’d spoken aloud, but deduced he must have mumbled or she wouldn’t have needed a repeat. “I said that was absolutely cruel.”

“It was cruel,” Lily agreed softly. “And painful.”

“And that’s why you left Wisconsin,” Chas said, finishing her thought for her. It all made perfect sense to him now. A beautiful woman shows up on his doorstep with no purpose or direction in life, save that of wanting to help him with his kids. He should have known. She was rebounding from another relationship.

Even as Chas breathed a sigh of relief because he knew only a blockhead got involved with someone who had two weeks ago been publicly jilted, his libido didn’t seem to have any problem with her story at all.

Though he judged himself to be an honest, honorable man who would never take advantage of a struggling, vulnerable woman, he also knew he’d lost this battle, because his intellect and integrity weren’t the problem. His libido was.

A beam of bright autumn sunshine woke Lily. Slowly, contentedly, she opened her eyes to the golden warmth.

As she stretched languidly, like a cat stirring from a nap on a sunny sidewalk, she recognized she was happy for the first time in weeks. She knew it was because she’d finally found a job. Then she suddenly realized that she should have been awakened in the middle of the night to help care for the triplets, and she should probably be feeding them breakfast right now.

Bouncing out of bed, she glanced at the clock and groaned. Nine-thirty! She was late. She couldn’t afford to be irresponsible. She needed this job too much. She had less than fifty dollars to her name, and not only did staying employed mean she had a source for a paycheck for an undetermined span of time, it also meant she was going to be fed and housed courtesy of Grant and Chas Brewster.