The Instant Family Man. Shirley Jump
“I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t interested in you.”
“And I’d be lying if I said I was interested in you.” Peyton brushed at her skirt as if kissing him had left her dusty, or as if she just wanted to whisk away the memory of his touch. “I'm here so you have a chance to get to know your daughter. Nothing more. And I mean that, Luke. Nothing more.”
“Then why did you kiss me back?”
“I …” She opened her mouth, closed it. “I didn't mean to. I got caught up in the moment and—”
“Overcome by the heat? Swept away by the romantic atmosphere of a children's zoo?” He shifted closer. Still, she kept her distance, stood strong and cool, dispassionate. If he hadn't been there himself, he wouldn't believe that ten seconds ago this same woman had been leaning into him, letting out soft mews of desire. “Don't pretend you didn't enjoy that. Don't pretend it was nothing.”
* * *
The Barlow Brothers: Nothing tames a Southern man faster … than true love!
The Instant Family Man
Shirley Jump
New York Times and USA TODAY bestselling author SHIRLEY JUMP spends her days writing romance so she can avoid the towering stack of dirty dishes, eat copious amounts of chocolate and reward herself with trips to the mall. Visit her website at www.shirleyjump.com for author news and a booklist, and follow her at facebook.com/shirleyjump.author for giveaways and deep discussions about important things like chocolate and shoes.
To my husband, Jeff, because he is amazing—as a dad, as a husband and as a man.
He’s the family man I always dreamed of meeting and am blessed to have married.
Contents
When Peyton Reynolds was a little girl, tearing through her grandmother’s house on her way to whatever excitement waited outside the front door, her grandma Lucy would reach out, corral her granddaughter in a fresh-baked-bread-scented hug and say, “Goodness gracious, child, you gotta slow down. Life is just gonna pass you by if you don’t learn to take a breath or two.”
Peyton never had learned to slow down. She’d taken every day of her life ten steps at a time, running from high school to college, graduating in two and a half years instead of four, and putting in more hours at Winston Interior Design than any other designer—earning her four promotions in three years. Then, a month before her twenty-third birthday, her world turned upside down when her older sister Susannah died in a car accident, suddenly leaving forty pounds of cuteness and need in Peyton’s full-time care.
In that instant, Peyton had put the brakes on her rising career while she figured out how to be a surrogate mom to her niece, Madelyne, and still stay on the fast track in the design industry. She’d been so very close to a promotion to associate, just a step below her goal of partner, but in the past four weeks, everything she had worked for started to fall apart. And it wasn’t just her career self-destructing that had Peyton worried...
It was the quiet. The words unspoken, the tears unshed.
Maddy hadn’t grieved, hadn’t asked about her mother, hadn’t wanted to talk about it. She’d gone on playing with her toys and eating her meals and brushing her teeth, but her mood was more somber, her heart more distant. Her laughter dulled, almost silenced.
That sad quiet was what finally spurred Peyton to go back home from Maryland, arriving yesterday in Stone Gap, North Carolina, one of those small Southern towns where it seemed the world stopped spinning. Where the trees and green landscape seemed to offer peace, and quiet, and healing. And where the last man on earth she wanted to see lived. A man who had no idea she was about to upend his world in a very big way.
For a very good reason. Peyton could only pray that he would see it that way, too.
“Auntie P?”
The soft voice of Madelyne, four years old next week and as beautiful as a ray of sunshine, rose from the space on the carpet between the two double beds in their hotel room. Peyton’s only niece, and the only real family she had left. There were times in the days since her sister had died that Peyton wondered how she could move forward, take a breath, without letting the grief drown her. Then she’d look at Maddy, at her bouncy blond curls and her lopsided, toothy smile, and a blanket of warmth would surround Peyton’s heart. For Maddy, Peyton would do absolutely anything.
Peyton came around the beds, then bent down and offered her niece a warm smile. “What do you need, kiddo?”
“Can you play dolls with me? I gots a house set up and everything.” Maddy waved toward an empty suitcase tipped on its side, flanked by a quartet of blond-haired, blue-eyed Barbie