The Nanny And The Reluctant Rancher. Barbara McCauley
Everyone will be gone and my parents will be sound asleep in their own room, thanks to all the champagne they’ve had. We were checking out tomorrow anyway and going home, so my mother didn’t think it odd when she noticed I’ve already packed. I’ll be waiting for you outside the front entrance.”
“Someone’s going to see you,” he said, shaking his head.
“Let me handle that,” she whispered in his ear, then steered him toward the flutist. “You just show up on time.”
Two hours, twenty-six minutes later, Katrina picked up her suitcases and violin, then crept quietly down the hall and got on the elevator with three other people. She passed at least a dozen more guests in the lobby, then walked by the front desk, the doorman and valet.
Not one person spoke to her or recognized her, but later, the doorman did remember a woman wearing a rather large gray felt hat.
The woman was late.
Swearing under his breath, Logan stood at the large picture window in his living room and stared out at the endless Texas landscape. Heat shimmered off the dry ground and a hawk made lazy circles overhead. Pale gray clouds in the distance suggested rain, but didn’t promise. But then, Logan thought with a frown, he’d teamed long ago never to trust a promise.
The deep, resonant bong of the grandfather clock in the entry marked eleven o’clock. Logan swore again. The woman should have been here an hour ago.
“She’s not coming, is she?”
He turned at the sound of his daughter’s soft voice behind him. He never would have shown his impatience if he’d realized she’d been in the room. But it had been after midnight before he’d gotten to bed last night, and he’d been up since five a.m. feeding the livestock and mending fence on the south quarter. He still had a water pump to repair in the west feeding pens, and a missing heifer somewhere in the east section. He was tired as hell and as irritable as a hornet in a jelly jar.
“Of course, she’s coming,” Logan reassured Anna. Though his daughter rarely complained, he’d sensed her anxiety over meeting Mrs. Lacey’s summer replacement. His daughter was a sensitive, quiet child with dove gray eyes that turned his heart to mush every time he looked at her. She’d seen too much disappointment in her young life and he’d die before he’d let anyone hurt her again.
“It’s almost a three-hour drive from Dallas to Harmony,” he said, moving beside her and tucking one blond curl behind her ear, “then it’s another thirty minutes from town to here. Her plane may have come in late, or she may have had to wait to rent a car, but she’ll be here, honey, don’t worry.”
He hated lying to Anna, but he knew he’d only add to her nervousness if he told her that the plane had come in on time. He’d called the airlines three hours ago when he’d come in to have breakfast with his daughter, and the plane had arrived not only on time, but ten minutes early. It was certainly possible that she’d changed her mind. Her application had come in over the fax machine in his office, and he’d wondered why a woman from New York City would even consider working on a remote cattle ranch. Normally he wouldn’t have even considered her for the job, but he’d only received three responses, and he’d liked hers the best.
Miss Delaney’s references from an Oliver Grant had been glowing. Her educational background was more extensive than the other two applicants, though he had to admit he wasn’t overly impressed with her degree in music. Still, she also had a degree in English, a course of study certainly appropriate for Anna’s education. At fifty-four, she was also older than the other two and able to start right away, while the other women weren’t available for several days. Mrs. Lacey had already been gone for two weeks, and while Sophia, the housekeeper, was shopping and helping out with Anna, she was only able to work part-time and was a terrible cook. Anna was barely eating, and he’d lost a few pounds himself. Though cooking had not been in the job description for Anna’s nanny, he was hoping a few extra dollars would correct that oversight. If it didn’t, he and Anna might starve.
He looked down at his daughter and in spite of his irritation, couldn’t help the feeling of tenderness that came over him. If only Anna’s mother could have seen her daughter for the wonderful, beautiful little girl she was, perhaps she’d still be here and Anna would have the mother she deserved instead of live-in teachers.
Logan had never understood, nor would he ever understand, how a life on the road, singing in one dive after another, could have been more important to JoAnn than her own daughter. He didn’t give a damn for himself that she was gone. The last two years of their marriage had been a living hell, anyway. If anything, he’d been relieved. But to leave Anna, to walk out on her own child, that was something he could never forgive.
“Don’t you have some lessons Mrs. Lacey left for you?” he asked his daughter, hoping to distract her.
“I did them already.”
“What about the math? I know you were having trouble with division, I can—”
“Daddy, it’s summer. Other kids don’t have lessons in summer, why do I have to?”
He caught himself before he could say that she wasn’t like other kids. She was going to need every advantage that life had to offer, and an education would be her strongest asset. There was nothing he wouldn’t do to make sure she had every academic opportunity available to her. He was about to launch into his speech that she’d already heard dozens of times, when the sound of a car horn stopped him.
It was about damn time.
He moved to the window and frowned at the sight of Punch Wilkins’s pickup bouncing up the dirt road from the main highway. What the hell was the gas station attendant from Harmony doing here?
Of course. The Delaney woman’s rental car must have broken down. He should have considered that. Dust billowed behind Punch’s truck as he pulled off the dirt road onto the circular driveway in front of Logan’s house. Logan watched Punch hop out of the cab of his truck and reach into the back bed. He pulled out a suitcase and garment bag and another small case. The passenger door of the cab opened, but he couldn’t see the woman when she stepped out.
Logan turned to his daughter. “See, honey, I told you—”
But Anna had disappeared. It was no surprise. He knew how difficult it was for her to meet strangers. He’d coax her out later, after he’d spoken to and finalized everything with the new nanny.
He moved to the front door and opened it. Punch stood there, his fist in the air, ready to knock. His large frame blocked Logan’s view of the woman standing behind him.
“Howdy,” Punch said with a silly grin on his face. “Brought your new nanny to ya.”
“Thanks.” Logan reached for the suitcase and stepped aside. Punch moved into the entry past Logan and headed for the living room.
A tall, slender, distinctly feminine figure wearing a large gray hat stepped in front of him. Oh, no, he groaned silently when he noticed the violin case she held in front of her. Anything but that.
Slowly she tipped her head back. When her smoky green eyes met his, his throat went as dry as the dust still swirling outside from Punch’s truck.
Who the hell was this woman?
“I’m sorry I’m late,” she said with a touch of breathlessness to her voice. “Transportation here was much more difficult than I’d anticipated. I’m Kat Delaney.”
She held out one delicate, finely sculptured hand. In a daze, Logan took it. He had the distinct sensation of silk against sandpaper. Her fingers were long and tapered, her skin smooth and incredibly soft, like nothing he’d ever felt before.
Kat Delaney? This couldn’t be the woman he’d hired.
She shifted uncomfortably when he said nothing. “You, ah, must be Logan Kincaid.”
He had to think for a moment. “There