Professor and The Pregnant Nanny. Emily Dalton
her two brothers. But this was different. Very different.
Charles grabbed her shoulders and gently returned her to her seat. “Whoa! You’re not fainting on me, are you?”
“Of course not,” she said, embarrassed and angry at herself. Her heart was fluttering and racing like some lovesick teenager’s!
“Then why—?” His face was very close to hers and his gaze—searching her eyes and face for pinpoint pupils and a waxy complexion, she supposed—suddenly dropped to her feet. “Oh! Your shoelaces are untied. You must have tripped on them.”
Melissa could have explained why she had been unaware of her untied shoelaces, but it was just too mortifying to admit that she couldn’t see her feet unless she deliberately stuck them out in front of her. Simply looking down and seeing them where they usually were just wasn’t an option anymore.
“Those darn things are always coming untied,” she mumbled, wrapping her arms awkwardly around her stomach to tie her shoes.
“Let me do that,” Charles offered, getting down on one knee. He smiled up at her as he quickly and easily accomplished what took her plenty of heavy breathing to do. “Annette had trouble tying her shoes, too. And don’t get me started on pantyhose. It took her and me and a small crane to get her into those.”
Melissa laughed. “Hey, I quit trying to get into pantyhose four months ago. It was when I went to—”
Melissa stopped herself just in time. She was about to reveal that she’d last worn pantyhose when she met her lawyer at the Grand America Hotel for a fancy lunch to celebrate the signing of her divorce papers. It had been a great day and a great meal, even though the pantyhose had started cutting into her waist by the time the white chocolate cheesecake showed up for dessert. She’d only managed two bites of the luscious stuff because the pantyhose just wouldn’t budge.
Charles didn’t ask her to complete what she’d been saying, but he sobered and quickly stood up. She realized then that he probably thought she’d been about to refer to Brad’s funeral, that she’d last worn pantyhose at her dead husband’s funeral! Oh, that damn lie was going to torture her all week long!
“I’ll go home, Charles,” she said meekly, leaving him to draw whatever conclusions he wanted to from her sudden capitulation. She was just too tired to care right now. And another slip of the tongue could be disastrous.
“Good,” he said, then picked up her nanny bag. “I’ll walk you to your car.”
Melissa couldn’t believe his kindness. She wanted to repay him somehow, and the first thing that came to mind was to bake for him. “Charles, thank you for being so kind!” she blurted out impetuously. “To show my appreciation, I’ll make you some cookies tomorrow. I have a wonderful chocolate-chip recipe that was handed down from my grandmother.”
Melissa was surprised when her spontaneously offered gesture of gratitude was received by Charles with a look of surprise, then a frown, then a fleeting expression of…scorn? “That won’t be necessary, Melissa.”
“But I want to. I really—”
“Have you got everything? Let’s go.”
Melissa felt hurried as Charles escorted her to the front door and outside to her car. She snatched quick glances at him, puzzled by his closed expression. Since mentioning the cookies, his mood had definitely changed!
It was still sweltering outside and it was quite a shock to go from Charles’s cool house into one hundred degrees of dry, suffocating Utah heat. Melissa could hardly bear the thought of driving home in her little hot car with only the windows and vents as cooling devices, as all the while she’d be trying to figure out what she’d said or done to make Charles suddenly so distant.
Melissa pried herself in behind the steering wheel as Charles waited and watched. He didn’t look angry or scornful anymore, just rather stern. Maybe, like her, he was simply tired, she reasoned.
Melissa turned on the ignition, smiled tentatively and waved through the open window.
“Better get those windows up and the air conditioning on, or you’re going to have a hot drive home,” Charles advised, not bothering to wave back or smile.
Melissa rolled up the window. No point going into an explanation about the car’s air conditioning being broken and her frugal decision not to fix it. He didn’t look receptive to any conversation, much less something so mundane and pathetic, anyway. Once she turned the corner at the end of the street and was out of sight, she rolled down all four windows.
HOW IRONIC, Charles thought, as he watched Melissa’s car turn the corner. Cookies.
He shook his head and chuckled, glad he was finally seeing the humor in the situation. It was history repeating itself.
He was smitten and couldn’t help being nice to her, so much so that he neglected his own concerns.
She was promising cookies as a thank you.
Well, it would be interesting to see if she actually came through this time. But if she didn’t, it wouldn’t matter. Not like it had mattered thirteen years ago.
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