Amy Frazier - Family By The Bunch

A dangerous thought.

His dark hair was straight and a little too long to be manageable. His forehead was broad and intelligent. Under dark brows, even darker eyes took in everything. Didn’t miss a trick. Tonight his strong jawline and chin showed the blue of a five-o’clock shadow. Very masculine. Neesa wondered if a heavy beard meant...

Mentally admonishing herself to remember the point of this visit, Neesa took a step backward as if standing outside his considerable aura might protect her.

“Hank!” Little six-year-old Casey Russell hurtled into the room. “Nobody will play video games with me! I’m all alone in there. Chris left me. Nobody loves me.” In a piping voice, her blue-streak complaint held more drama than substance.

“How awful!” Hank scooped the girl into his arms. “I love you. If I ever had a little girl, I’d want her to be just like you.”

Casey blushed, clearly enjoying the compliment. Still she affected a pout. “But nobody will play pokey pony with me.”

“Did that fact make you lose your manners?”

Casey gave him a perplexed stare.

“We have a guest. Say hey to Miss Neesa.”

The child snuggled against Hank’s neck. “Miss Neesa isn’t a guest. She’s our neighbor. She gives real big chocolate bars at Halloween.”

Hank raised one dark eyebrow in question.

“True,” Neesa replied, chuckling. “My favorite.”

“Remind me to come back to the neighborhood for Halloween,” he said, his voice low and lazy, his eyes now a seductive shade of dark gray. “I love trick or treat.”

She just bet.

He lowered Casey to the floor. With one big hand he ruffled the little girl’s hair. “Let me walk Miss Neesa to the door. Then I’ll play pokey pony with you. Now scoot.”

The man obviously liked kids. That would be perfect in her professional scheme of things. It was an automatic out, however, in her personal relationships ball game.

When Hank turned to look at Neesa, it was with the same soul-searching gaze he’d sent her this morning. Only in the close confines of the kitchen, it seemed a hundred times more potent. Why did he throw her one of those looks when she was feeling most vulnerable? Her knees suddenly went wobbly. She felt color drain from her cheeks. Felt unexplainably giddy.

“Are you all right?” He reached for her. Encircled her upper arms with a strong grip. “You’re looking mighty peaked all of a sudden.”

His touch only increased the giddiness.

“I’m fine,” she managed, drawing away from him with difficulty. “It’s just that it’s been a long day at work.”

“And here you thought to bring us supper.” His eyes turned the color of smoke. Tender. “We’re much obliged.” Lordy, if he’d been wearing the Stetson, he most certainly would have tipped it.

“You’re very welcome.” The words stuck in her throat. She prayed her knees would hold. “I’d better be going.”

Concern flickering in those dark eyes, he walked her to the door, then opened it for her. “See you at the pool tomorrow?”

“Oh, I don’t know.” She attempted a smile. “I’m not much for cement ponds, either.”

He smiled with enough wattage to blow a fuse. “Well, Miss Neesa. See you at Halloween then. Save me a real big chocolate bar.”

He winked and slowly closed the door, leaving Neesa standing on the Russells’ front doorstep, weak-kneed, flustered and frustrated. Flustered because she’d just experienced a full-blown case of attraction for a stranger who, for all she knew, had a wife and kids of his own back at the ranch. Kids. It was clear from just a few moments of observing him that he was a natural-born parent. Even if he were single, his obvious desire for children would eliminate him from her eligible bachelor list.

She was frustrated, too, because she’d paid good money for that chicken and dumplings at Myra’s Diner. Even as good as it had smelled, it hadn’t come close to getting Hank Whittaker to admit he was a rancher. Hadn’t provided the opportunity for Neesa to innocently say, Is that right? Funny, but I’ve been on the lookout for a rancher for my Kids & Animals program....

She harrumphed softly. Now she had to dig her bathing suit out of mothballs and visit that cement pond tomorrow.

Chapter Two

“Hank?” Poolside, eight-year-old Chris Russell stopped blowing air into the rubber raft. “Why aren’t you married?”

Why wasn’t he married?

Funny, but you could hem and haw and evade a similar question from an adult, but a kid deserved an honest answer.

From his lounge chair Hank reached for a soft drink in the cooler. The noises and bustle surrounding the neighborhood pool assailed him. He longed for the quiet of his ranch. But Chris’s stare didn’t waver, and his question remained unanswered.

“I almost was,” Hank replied simply.

“What happened?”

“Oh, she was a city gal, and I was a country boy. We just couldn’t agree on most of the things you need to go about your daily business.”

“Did you love her?”

“Yup.” Now, that was the godshonest truth. And it had hurt like hell when she’d left him. The memory of it stil did, at times. The pain provided a good reminder that he might search high and low, but it would take a very special woman to become a rancher’s wife.

“I could help you find someone new.” Chris grinned. “My teacher’s real pretty.”

“Have you been talking to Willy?” Hank growled playfully. Reaching for the rubber raft, he ruffled the boy’s hair en route. “Here. Let me blow this up for you. Otherwise it’ll be dark before you get in the water.” He began to blow up the raft, safe from Chris’s questions. At least if Chris asked them, he now had an excuse not to answer them.

Casey streaked by with a friend.

Hank lifted his head from the task at hand. “Casey! Slow down, darlin’. The lifeguard will kick us all out, and Chris here hasn’t even had a chance to dip his toes in the water.” He sighed heavily. Would he survive this suburban weekend?

“Looks like you have your hands full.” The voice was soft and sultry and very familiar. But he’d heard so many new voices in the past twenty-four hours.

Peering up from under the brim of his Stetson, Hank saw a shapely silhouette etched against the early-afternoon sun. Shadow obscured the face, however.

“I don’t need the raft,” Chris said suddenly. He leaned close and whispered in Hank’s ear. “She’s even prettier than my teacher.” Before Hank could answer, the boy dashed off, executing a cannonball in the deep end of the pool.

“This seat taken?” That unmistakably feminine voice again.

“It is now. It’s yours.” Tipping his hat, Hank gallantly rose from his lounge chair while inwardly bemoaning the loss of his privacy. “Ma’am,” he added to give the invitation a distancing formality.

“Neesa. Please.”

Oh, that voice. Neesa Little of the angel blue eyes and the tiny red sports car. His suburban weekend just got more complicated.

Having fully expected that he’d never see the woman again, he’d allowed himself to flirt with her—just a little—yesterday evening when she’d come bearing chicken and dumplings. Damned good chicken and dumplings. But now here she stood, intending to occupy the lounge chair right next to him. Perhaps for the rest of the afternoon.

Regrets settled over him like dusk over the mountains, even as his pulse picked up in her presence.

Her beautiful blue eyes were covered with dark sun glasses, but her other attributes, covered only by a short. silky top, were much in evidence. He noticed for the first time that she wore no wedding ring. Trying to swallow, he found his tongue and throat uncommonly parched.