“Men. What was God thinking of?”

Nate could ask the same about women, but he had the good sense to keep that sentiment to himself. Besides, he couldn’t help but be impressed by Allie MacLord. She didn’t back down when challenged. “You, uh, have any unmarried female relatives in the forty to fifty age range?” he asked, remembering his plan to find a wife for his dad. “Mothers? Aunts?” Any female biologically related to this termagant would have no problems keeping Nate’s dad under control. Same gene pool, after all. Same domineering attitude, he figured.

“Unmarried female relatives?” Allie asked. “What are you talking about?”

“Nothing,” he mumbled, and was mortified to feel a blush creeping up his neck. When was the last time he’d blushed? Good grief. What was that all about?

If Nate didn’t know himself better, he might suspect this woman was causing him to think about marriage—for himself!

Dear Reader,

The summer after my thirteenth birthday, I read my older sister’s dog-eared copy of Wolf and the Dove by Kathleen E. Woodiwiss and I was hooked. Thousands of romance novels later—I won’t say how many years—I’ll gladly confess that I’m a romance freak! That’s why I am so delighted to become the associate senior editor for the Silhouette Romance line. My goal, as the new manager of Silhouette’s longest-running line, is to bring you brand-new, heartwarming love stories every month. As you read each one, I hope you’ll share the magic and experience love as it was meant to be.

For instance, if you love reading about rugged cowboys and the feisty heroines who melt their hearts, be sure not to miss Judy Christenberry’s Beauty & the Beastly Rancher (#1678), the latest title in her FROM THE CIRCLE K series. And share a laugh with the always-entertaining Terry Essig in Distracting Dad (#1679).

In the next THE TEXAS BROTHERHOOD title by Patricia Thayer, Jared’s Texas Homecoming (#1680), a drifter’s life changes for good when he offers to marry his nephew’s mother. And a secretary’s dream comes true when her boss, who has amnesia, thinks they’re married, in Judith McWilliams’s Did You Say…Wife? (#1681).

Don’t miss the savvy nanny who moves in on a single dad, in Married in a Month (#1682) by Linda Goodnight, or the doctor who learns his ex’s little secret, in Dad Today, Groom Tomorrow (#1683) by Holly Jacobs.

Enjoy!

Mavis C. Allen

Associate Senior Editor, Silhouette Romance

Distracting Dad
Terry Essig

www.millsandboon.co.uk

For everyone at Silhouette—

thanks for noticing that manuscript

with the crayon drawings on the back all those years ago

and rescuing it from the slush pile,

as well as all the help and guidance since then.

Here comes lucky number thirteen.

Books by Terry Essig

Silhouette Romance

House Calls #552

The Wedding March #662

Fearless Father #725

Housemates #1015

Hardheaded Woman #1044

Daddy on Board #1114

Mad for the Dad #1198

What the Nursery Needs… #1272

The Baby Magnet #1435

A Gleam in His Eye #1472

Before You Get to Baby… #1583

Distracting Dad #1679

Silhouette Special Edition

Father of the Brood #796

TERRY ESSIG

says that writing is her escape valve from a life that leaves little time for recreation or hobbies. With a husband and six young children, Terry works on her stories a little at a time, between seeing to her children’s piano, sax and trombone lessons, their gymnastics, ice skating and swim team practices, and her own activities of leading a Brownie troop, participating in a car pool and attending organic chemistry classes. Her ideas, she says, come from her imagination and her life—neither one of which is lacking!

Contents

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter One

“An older woman. That’s what I’m thinking. Widowed, divorced, I’m not in a position to be picky. Or it could be somebody younger with a mother. Everybody has a mother. One of them must be widowed or divorced, you would think.”

Nathaniel Edward Parker paused in his speech, leaning back in his chair behind the large wooden desk in his office. Across from him was his longtime best friend and business partner, Jared Hunter. They were supposed to be having a business meeting. Jared looked up from the papers in front of him wearing a very puzzled look on his face. “What? Nate, could you please stay focused here? We need to convince Harry Zigler to sign this contract so we can pay our rent next month.”

“Sorry. I’m a little distracted.”

“No kidding. Look, buddy, I need you to pay attention. This is important.”

“And this isn’t? I’ve got a serious problem here, Jared.”

Jared looked disgruntled. “Yeah? Well, you’ve got another one right here. This contract…”

Nate ruthlessly interrupted Jared. “I cannot pay attention to the contract. God knows I’ve tried, but it’s impossible. Maybe if we clear up this other issue I’ll be able to concentrate.”

Jared blew out a sigh. “What other issue? We have to make up a list of people we know who have mothers before you can focus? What is that all about?”

“Available mothers. Big difference.” Nate drummed his desktop with his fingers. “For my dad. Ever since Mom died, he’s been making me crazy.”

Jared snorted. “So what else is new? Your mom’s been dead for two years. You should be used to it by now.”

Nate raked a hand through his blond hair. “No. Lately it’s been getting worse. I can’t concentrate because I keep expecting him to come bursting in here with some other bizarre way we can improve the business.”

“Giving away Fourth of July fireworks with the company logo on the package wasn’t that bizarre.”

“Please. Nobody who saw them blow would realize that blue and green are the company colors and the first person who loses a hand would sue our butts off. You can bet dear old Dad wouldn’t offer to pay the lawyer’s bill, either. He can’t. He doesn’t have that kind of money.”

Jared rattled the papers on the table. “About this contract,” he began determinedly.

Nate flattened his palm over the rustling papers. “Not until I have my list.”

Throwing up his hands, Jared relented. “All right, all right. I’m almost afraid to ask. What do you plan to do with this list of people with mothers. Available mothers,” Jared immediately corrected before Nate could. “Marry the old guy off?”

“Well, yeah.”

“You’re not serious, are you?” Jared pointed an accusing finger at his buddy. “You are serious.” He threw himself back in his chair. “Aw, man, I don’t believe this. What are we, a dating service now? We’ve got a business here, Nate. We don’t have time to run a lonely hearts club, too.”

“Well, we can’t take care of business with my father breathing down our necks, now can we? The man is lost without Mom, lost. The way I see it, the only solution we’ve got is to find him some other interest in life besides me, his only son.” Nate sat up, his irritation with his partner’s obtuseness obvious.

“A wife, for example?” Jared asked.

“Exactly. Look. It’s obvious.” Nate picked up a marker and leaned to the side, writing on a large sheet of paper clipped to a tripod. “Look, we’ll flowchart it. Try and follow along.” He wrote the word father in large block type at the top of the paper and pointed to it. “My father.”

Jared rolled his eyes and nodded. “Your father.”

“Has been sticking his nose in where it doesn’t belong, making us crazy on a daily basis since my mom passed away.” Nate drew a dash down from the word father and wrote Nate and Jared.

“I still don’t think the fireworks were that bad an idea.”

“Shut up. Dad needs something to distract him from us, right?”

Jared nodded. “Okay. Distractions can be good. That would probably work.”

“He needs a woman in his life. He never bugged me like this when Mom was around. She kept him occupied.”

“I don’t mean to speak disrespectfully of the dead, but your mom was nuts,” Jared pointed out, stating what he thought to be the obvious. “Keeping her out of trouble was a full-time occupation for your father.”

Nate shrugged. It was the truth. “Mom distracted him, see?”

“Uh-huh. So we make this list of available women and this helps us…how? Exactly how do we get them together?” Jared waggled a finger admonishingly. “And no force allowed. Shotgun weddings went out a long time ago.”

Nate waggled the marker right back at his partner. “We’ll worry about that part when we get that far. Think about it. This makes perfect sense. Somebody we know is bound to have an unattached female relative of the right age somewhere in their family tree. We just have to find her. Once we accomplish that, we sic her on Pop. Women are supposed to be naturally nurturing, right? She’ll be all over him, cooking him wholesome dinners and stuff like that. He won’t be able to resist. She distracts him, see? Then he leaves us alone. Easy.”

Openly snickering at his buddy’s logic, Jared asked, “Naturally nurturing, huh? I don’t know about that. I’ve been out with one or two that would probably eat their own young.” But he gave it some thought. “You, um, really think this will work?”

Nate reached for the coffeepot that sat on a warmer on one side of the table. “Damn straight.”

Jared held out his coffee cup. “Okay, if you say so. Now, who goes on the list? And don’t say my mother. I don’t want her tangled in your nutty schemes. Then she’d start driving me crazy.”

Nate took a cautious sip of hot coffee. “No, your mother’s out. I’ll admit I thought about her, but I don’t think she’d put up with my father’s antics. Doesn’t she have any unmarried sisters or anything?”

“No.”

“Not even one?”

“No. God broke the mold after creating my mother.” Jared folded his hands together and raised his eyes piously. “Thank you, God.”

Nate slumped in his chair. “Okay, all right. Who do we know who does?”

The two men sat, marking the highly polished conference tabletop with fingerprints as they drummed their fingers and thought.

Tentatively Jared offered out loud, “Anne Reid brought in brownies the other day. She must have a mother.”

Nate snorted. “They were awful. Her mother probably taught her everything she doesn’t know about baking and Dad’s an old-fashioned kind of guy. He’d never go for a woman who couldn’t bake.”

“All right, I tried. This is your problem, you think of somebody.”

“Our problem,” Nate corrected. “Remember the contract? I can’t concentrate until we take care of this.” Nate gave Jared a mean little smile. “And just so you know, Dad’s signed up for a computer class over at the high school’s adult education program. He’s decided to help us with our books.”

Jared unstacked his feet and sat up straight, suddenly far more serious. “Fine. Mitzi Malone.”

“She was hatched, not born. Try again.”

The phone rang. Both men looked at it, then at each other. “You get it. If it’s my father, I’m not here.”

“You get it. It’s probably my mother.”

“Could be Sue Ann calling to tell you she can’t live without you. What if it’s a client?”

“They’ll leave a message.”

The machine did, in fact, pick up. Nate and Jared’s argument was broken into by a vivacious female voice. “Mr. Parker, this is Allison MacLord. I live in the condo just below yours? Please call me as soon as you get this message. There’s something leaking from your place down into mine. You’ve got a broken pipe or something. My bed’s soaked. I think you may have ruined my ceiling. Oh, ick, the carpet’s all squishy. You have insurance, right? My number’s 27…”

Nate snatched up the phone, and yelled into it, “What are you talking about Miss…whatever you said your name was? What’s leaking?”

Allison Marie MacLord held the phone away from her ear and blinked at it. One minute she’d been talking to a machine and the next a very vital, very vibrant, very forceful male voice. “Well, um, I don’t exactly know, Mr. Parker. I mean I just got home. My ceiling’s dripping, some paint’s already peeled and fallen, my mattress may never dry out and water’s welling up every time I take a step on the bedroom carpet. My feet are getting wet right through my shoes, which really makes me mad because I paid ten dollars for that water protecting spray they’re always trying to sell you at the shoe stores.”

Nate swore.

On her end, Allie grimaced. She hated confrontation. When the answering machine had picked up, she’d been almost relieved, except for the fact that leaving a message wasn’t going to stop the steady flow of…whatever anytime soon. “Mr. Parker? You are 3H, aren’t you? That’s what the mailbox says. Your next-door neighbor thought this was where you worked.”

Nate put his hand over the phone’s receiver. “Dad insisted my garbage disposal wasn’t working right the other night. God only knows what he did while he was crawling around under my sink.” He lifted his hand and spoke into the phone. “3H, yeah, that’s me. Damn it.”

“Um…” Allie sighed. This wasn’t going at all well. “Ah, I don’t suppose anyone around here has a spare key to your place?”

Nate dropped his head into his hand. “No. No spare keys.”

“You really should leave one with a neighbor, you know. What if you lock yourself out sometime? Then what would you do?”

“Miss M—”

“Allie. You should probably call me Allie. You did just destroy my bed, after all. You know, if you’d left a spare with a neighbor I could go in there for you and try to figure out what the problem is. Maybe call a plumber.”

Nate sighed. “What color is it?”

“What?”

“The…whatever that is dripping.”

“Oh.” Allie’s gaze drifted up. “It is, uh, kind of a very light brown.” It could be water simply picking up color as it passed through the beams over her head, but it could be something else totally. Yuck. “Ah, it seems to be picking up speed. I don’t know how much more my bed and carpet can absorb. If we don’t hurry here, it’s going to go down to the ceiling in 1H below me. If it hasn’t already—”

Nate swore again. “I’m on my way.” He threw down the phone and stood. “I’ve got to go. My father is singlehandedly destroying my entire building and something tells me he doesn’t carry workman’s insurance.”

Jared had the low class to laugh. “Better hurry, man.” He quickly grew serious. God only knows what havoc the old guy could wreak on their books. “Meanwhile, I’ll keep thinking.”

“Thanks, man.” Nate glowered as he raced out the door.

Slamming the car door as he jumped into his car did nothing but make the hand he caught in it hurt, and the speeding ticket he collected on the way cost him valuable time. By the time he reached his building, Nate was fuming. Still he pulled cautiously into a parking slot lest he somehow overshoot the space and smack right into the side of the building. If bad luck came in threes, he’d met his quota for the day. But there was no point in pushing his karma or whatever. One thing for sure, Nate was not meeting with any clients or signing any contracts today. Climbing out of the car, he closed the door without slamming it and hurried into the building. Not willing to wait for the elevator, he took the stairs two at a time. He juggled his keys in his palm as he made his way down the hall, then took a fortifying breath before opening the door to 3H. Cautiously Nate peaked in.

“Hell,” he said to no one in particular, and followed it up with something more pungent.

The living room carpet he stepped onto was dry. But he could see that water came to within a few inches of its border. Gingerly he made his way across the island of the living room to stare at the flooded kitchen. In the center of the room the water appeared to be over an inch deep. That was obviously the low spot created when the building settled. With a distasteful expression on his face, Nate toed off his good shoes. He leaned down to pull off his dark socks and roll up his pant legs. He waded in.

“Like I don’t have enough problems,” he muttered as he slogged his way over to the sink. “Economy’s nuts, dot coms dropping like no tomorrow.” He pulled open the cabinet door below the sink and squatted down to peer at a spaghetti bowl of pipes he would have preferred never getting to know on such an intimate basis.

“Not only do I have to put up with Dad’s business advice and dire warnings on the economy but now he’s got to turn into Handyman Negri’s evil counterpart. Unhandy-man Ted runs amok. Again. Damn it, Dad, what did you do under here last night? I swear to God it’s the last time I invite you to dinner because I feel bad about you eating alone. I eat alone practically every night and I survive.” Tentatively Nate reached out and touched an alien-looking length of white PVC pipe.

The phone rang.

Nate jumped and cracked his head on the underside of the counter.

“Ouch! Damn it!”

He backed out from under the sink, grabbed one of the kitchen towels his last girlfriend had bought him—see? women worried about stuff like that—swiped it over his hands and nabbed the telephone. “What,” he growled. “Make it good. This is not turning out to be one of my better days.”

“Um, Mr. Parker?”

Nate sighed. It was that Allison person. The one whose apartment his father had ruined. Nate struggled for a bit of sympathy, but honestly, it was tough to find when he was standing in the swamp that used to be his kitchen. “Yes?” It was all he could manage with any degree of civility.

“This is Allie MacLord. 2H?”

Nate rubbed tiredly at his forehead, took the portable phone with him as he ducked back down to peer under the sink again. “Ms. MacLord, I just—”

“Allie.”

Nate rubbed his forehead harder and dutifully repeated, “Allie. Look, I just walked in the door. I haven’t really had time to—”

“Oh, my timing is perfect then. I’ll be right up to help. My place won’t dry out until you quit dripping into it, you know.”

“I know—” He stepped, realizing he was talking to a dead phone. The woman had hung up on him. He, Mr. Masters in Business Administration, hadn’t managed to finish one sentence during their entire conversation. Now she was on her way up to finish off his ego by watching what a nonstarter he was with plumbing issues. “Real men know how, where and when to use a pipe wrench,” he told himself as he poked the end button on the phone and reached above his head to set the receiver on the counter.

Nate didn’t even own a pipe wrench.

He comforted himself. “Like I was saying earlier, the apple doesn’t fall all that far from the tree. It’s pretty obvious to me that Dad’s not all that hot with a wrench, either. At least I’m man enough to admit I don’t know what I don’t know.” It wasn’t all that much comfort as water continued to gush.

The doorbell sang out Allie’s arrival. “God help me,” he muttered as he closed his eyes in silent resignation. Nate called out, “Come in. It’s not locked.”

Nate heard the door open, then close. Seconds later a feminine voice said, “Oh, my.”

Not exactly the response that had come first to his mind upon viewing the scene, but hey, everyone was different. “Yeah,” he said. “Goll darn. What a mess.” He looked back over his shoulder and about fell on his butt into the water.

Allison, oops Allie MacWhoever was a pixie. A sprite. Nate bet she was a foot shorter than his own six foot two and if she turned around, he believed he’d see fairy wings. She was slightly built and, he’d bet his last dot com, Irish. Or Scottish. One or the other. Her hair was deep red verging on auburn. It was cut short and framed her face in soft waves. Her eyes were a clear, brilliant emerald-green and, even from across the room, he could see the freckles marching across the bridge of her nose, not because the freckles were so large or dark; they weren’t, but because her skin was so milky pale anything would stand out in contrast.

She stood on tiptoe at the edge of the floodplain, her hands tucked into the front pockets of stone-colored shorts that rode below on her hipbone. Her pink tank top barely met the top of her shorts and when she moved, as in breathed, a tantalizing narrow band of belly peaked out. For a short person, she had amazingly long legs. They were slim yet shapely and ended in little elf feet sporting amazingly pink flip-flops with orange and pink silk floppy flowers growing from the vamp.

Damn, but she was cute. Not pretty. Cute.

But cute could be good.

All Nate’s manly protective instincts went on red alert and he scowled. Who had let this little baby doll loose on her own in the world? What kind of parents did she have that they’d let a maybe eighteen-year-old alone with nobody to watch out for her? Morons. This Allie had morons for parents.

Allie gave Nathaniel Parker an odd look as she kicked off her flip-flops and prepared to wade in. The guy looked like he was in a trance or something. What was he staring at? Self-consciously she rubbed along her upper lip, feeling for remnants of the pb and j she’d scarfed down while waiting for some sign of life up above her, but she didn’t feel anything.

“Are you okay?” she asked, moving closer.

“What?” Nate shook his head to clear his brain and put a hand down in the water to help with his balance. “Sorry. I just—spaced out there for a moment, I guess.”

Allie splashed her way over to squat next to Nate. “What have we got?”

“A problem. A real problem. See this pipe here?” Nate gestured to the culprit pipe that was spurting water down under the sink. “It’s broken. My father must have bumped it and loosened it last night when he was playing around with the garbage disposal. See how close it is to the disposal? Pressure must have built up during the day until it burst.”

“Yeah, looks like,” Allie agreed, looking at Nate expectantly.

“Yeah.” Nate nodded solemnly. “Looks like.”

“You going to fix it?”

“Um. Well. Where’s the water turnoff in your place?”

Allie reached past him and turned a knob. “Right here.” The flow slowed to a trickle.

Nate moved her hand aside and tightened the knob farther. The water shut off completely. “Great. Now let’s see. I guess I need a wrench or something.”

“Call a plumber,” Allie advised. “Where’s your mop?”

“No, look. See? If we just align these two ends again and give this thing a couple of twists—”

“What is it with men? You can’t ask for directions even if you have no idea where you are. You can’t admit when you’re in over your head with a home repair. What is wrong with calling in a professional? Look at this mess!” Allie made a wide sweep with her hand and Nate had to lean backward to avoid being hit.

“It would have taken a plumber one third the time and I’d have a bed to sleep in tonight if you and your father hadn’t decided to play handyman last night.”

Nate puffed up with indignation over that. He’d practically ordered his father to leave his plumbing alone last night. This was not his fault. The blame lay squarely with his dad. “Now just hang on a second—”

But he never got to finish his sentence.

Allie rose in disgust. “Men. What was God thinking of?”

He could ask the same about women, Nate thought, but had the good sense to keep the sentiment to himself. “Look—”

“And where’s the darn mop? There’s no point in even starting on my place until yours is taken care of. It’s just going to keep dripping down otherwise.”

You had to be impressed. He towered over her, yet she didn’t back away. It was as if Allie didn’t even notice the size difference. Nate opened his pantry door and got out a mop. “You, uh, have any unmarried female relatives in the forty-to-fifty age range?” he asked as he began sopping up water. “Mother? Aunts?” Any female biologically related to this termagant would have no problems keeping his dad under control. Nate would bet the business on it. Same gene pool, after all. Same domineering attitude, he figured.

Allie had gone into the bathroom to raid his clothes hamper. She had several dirty bath towels in her hands, which she threw on the floor. “Unmarried female relatives? What are you talking about?”

Nate squeezed out the mop over the bucket he’d retrieved. “Nothing,” he mumbled, and was mortified to feel a blush creeping up his neck. When was the last time he’d blushed? Good grief. His father had him so crazed, he wasn’t even filtering his thoughts. They were simply entering his head and exiting his mouth. “Nothing at all.”

Allie gave him a suspicious look before picking up a sodden towel and twisting it over the bucket. “You need to do your laundry,” she said. “Your hamper’s full.”

“I know,” he replied humbly, not willing to argue with the termagant. She was on a roll and with good reason, Nate grudgingly admitted to himself. He had ruined her apartment, after all, which meant that when he finished his own lengthy cleanup, he’d be only half-done. With that thought, Nate excused himself and called his father.

“Pop, get over here,” he said into the receiver. “We’ve got a problem.” He stressed the plural pronoun. “And there’s somebody you’ve got to meet.”

The senior Mr. Parker showed up in time to watch the last bucket of water being dumped down the toilet. He entered the condo with windblown hair and a lot of grumbling over the abrupt summons. He’d been studying his computer manual, he groused. Had just started getting the hang of those little icon things and what the heck was so all-fired important?

Nate had gotten his blue eyes from his father, Allie noticed. And probably his hair color as well, though it was hard to tell from the older man’s graying crop. Allie would guess Nate to be in his late twenties to early thirties, which meant his father was at least somewhere over the midcentury mark. The man had aged well. Physically fit with broad shoulders and relatively flat stomach, Nate’s dad still had all his hair, excellent posture and only faint crow’s-feet extending from the corners of his eyes. If Nate took after his father, his wife would have no complaints thirty-odd years down the road.

His dad’s handshake was firm when Allie stuck out her hand. “How do you do, sir?”

“Ted,” Nate’s father corrected. “Call me Ted. And I do fine.” He frowned at his son. “Most of the time. When this one’s not giving me ulcers.”

If anybody was giving anyone ulcers, Nate thought irritably, his dad was doing Nate’s stomach lining in, not the other way around. “Your timing is impeccable, Dad,” Nate said. “The dirty work is over.”

Allie frowned. “Don’t forget about my place.”

Nate smiled painfully. “Right. How could I?” He sighed. “Dad, you take the clothes basket down to the laundry room and get a load of towels started, will you? There are quarters in my top bureau drawer. I need to go downstairs and see how bad Allie’s condo is.”

But his father wouldn’t hear of it. “No, I’ll go. I caused the problem, I guess, although I can’t believe it since I didn’t touch the pipes. I only worked on the garbage disposal, which is not leaking, from what I understand.”

Nate rolled his eyes. The pipes were only right next to the garbage disposal.

“Still, I’ll check out Allie’s place. You go ahead and get your laundry taken care of. Allie and I will be just fine.” With that pronouncement, Ted took Allie’s arm to lead her out of the condo. “So, my dear, how old are you?”

“Twenty-eight, Ted.”

Nate narrowly missed dropping the heavily laden hamper on his foot. Twenty-eight? No way. He thought he’d been generous with a guess of eighteen.

“Really?” he heard his father say. “My, my, getting up there. Any boyfriends? Serious ones, that is. Little thing like you could use a man to look after her, right?”

“Actually I’m quite capable of looking after myself.” Allie glowered over her shoulder at Nate. “That is, unless some big strapping male with nothing better to do with his time decides to flood my condo.”

Nate immediately pointed the finger at his father. “Hey, don’t look at me. This was his doing, every bit of it. Everything was working fine until he stuck his nose under my sink.”

Allie arched an eyebrow. “Aren’t you a little old to be passing the buck?” she inquired.

“I am not passing the buck,” Nate said. “It’s the truth.” He waved a frustrated hand in an erasing motion. “Oh, never mind. It doesn’t matter. Just go down and show my father the mess, will you? I’ll get this load started and be right there.”

“You shouldn’t leave your clothes in the laundry room,” Allie informed him. “Someone might steal them.”

“Out of a working machine?”

She nodded. “Yes. It happened to me in my college dorm.”

Oh, yeah? And what was her degree in? Mother hen-ism? Writing advice columns? “I’ll chance it,” Nate said with a forced smile. “You’ve got enough problems,” he advised her. “You really shouldn’t worry your pretty little head over mine.” He smiled condescendingly, knowing he’d just gotten her goat but good.

“Wouldn’t think of it,” she said. “Just don’t knock on my door when you need a towel so you can take your shower.”

“Wouldn’t think of it,” Nate responded just as insincerely. He rolled his eyes and took off for the laundry room before this ridiculous nonconversation went any further.

Nate dumped soap into the bottom of a couple of washing machines then started tossing lights into one, darks into the other in a rather haphazard fashion. He only shrugged when he noticed a dark sock had gotten in with his underwear, not bothering to retrieve it.

“All right, so I wrecked her bed, her ceiling and quite possibly her floor,” Nate muttered to himself as he gave the controls a vicious twist. “I said I’d take care of it, didn’t I?” Nate’s stomach clutched at the sound of water running into the machines. He ran his palm over his abdomen soothing it. “Just like a woman. Get a hold of something and never let it go. Probably thinks I won’t make good on it,” he continued to mutter as he stacked the detergent box into the empty clothes hamper. “Well, she doesn’t need to worry. When Nathaniel Parker says he’s going to take care of something, it’s as good as done.”

Self-righteously he picked up his supplies and, with one final baleful glare at the filling machines, turned away. “I’ll tell you what, anybody takes anything out of those machines before I get back and that woman gets to say I told you so, they’re dead meat. Dead meat,” he repeated, almost wishing someone would try. He was in the mood to take somebody on, no doubt about that.

Nate bounded back up the stairs. He dropped his hamper off at his place, grabbed the mop and bucket and headed down to 2H. No point in putting off the agony.

The door to Allie’s condo wasn’t closed tightly and Nate nudged it open with his foot as his hands were full.

“Yes, well it’s like I was saying, my son seems to be having trouble finding himself a good woman, Allie. Course, he’s looking in all the wrong places. Singles bars.” Ted made a disgusted sound. “What do you get when you pick up somebody at a bar? An alcoholic, that’s what. A good woman doesn’t hang out in a bar, for God’s sake.”

Nate had obviously caught the end of a conversation. Sad, sorrowful and deep, that was definitely his dad and, unless Nate missed his guess, dear old dad was on another one of his rolls, with Nate once again the topic of choice.

“And a man needs a good woman. A wife can make or break a man,” Ted continued to expound. “God knows I’ve tried explaining that simple concept over and over, but Nate just doesn’t seem to get it. I don’t suppose, since you don’t have anyone special…no? Well, maybe you have a friend?”

Nate dropped the bucket on his foot.

He couldn’t believe it. His father was sneaking around behind his back trying to marry him off! If that wasn’t the most underhanded, conniving, manipulative thing the old man had tried yet, Nate didn’t know what was.

And besides, he’d thought of it first.

Chapter Two

With the sound of the clattering bucket, two heads poked into the room. “Wha—oh, uh, Nate, you get your laundry started already?”

Nate righted the bucket, then stood up and looked at his father. “Yeah, Dad, I did. Can I talk to you for a moment?” Nate gestured to the open condo door. “Out in the hallway maybe?”

Ted cleared his throat. “Well now, nothing I’d rather do than have a heart-to-heart with my one and only son, don’t you know. But little Allie here was showing me her bedroom. I gotta tell you, son, it’s a mess. Yes, indeed.” Ted pointed behind him. “I’m afraid our little talk will have to take a back seat. Here, have a look at this.”

Nate shook his head in disparagement. No way was his father getting away with this. “Dad—”

“No, really, come have a look.”

Nate heaved a great sigh and pushed away from the mop and bucket. He could hold his own with the CFO of any major corporation, but with his own father, he was clueless as how to proceed. “Fine, Dad. Let’s see. Show me the mess.”

Allie’s condo appeared to be laid out exactly the same as his own, only reversed. But the décor screamed female in the house. They ought to get one of those decorator magazine editors in here, Nate decided as he reluctantly wound his way through the small foyer, to the efficiency kitchen, and on into the living-dining area and then the bedroom.

Nate took a last look around. Yeah, some editor could do a great series on how the same layout could look totally different with just a few changes in paint and furniture. Nate liked to think of his own place as, well, masculine. Little wonder, as it just so happened his condo was full of what Nate considered manly stuff. Guy choices. Tan carpet, brown leather sofa pit, modern pictures loaded with these really cool geometric shapes in tan, brown and black that didn’t try to be anything other than what they were: cool shapes. There wasn’t a candle in the place, no overburdened silk flower arrangements and definitely no little artsy-fartsy ceramic bowls brimming with stinky potpourri sitting around catching dust, making you sneeze. And pink? What was that? Certainly not a color in Nate’s vocabulary.

Allie’s place couldn’t be more girly girl. Pink might not be the only word in her vocabulary but it was darn close. And knickknacks? Good grief, the woman could open a store. She could stock it for a year out of her living room alone. Nate sniffed in dismissal, turned around and looked up at the bedroom ceiling.

Oh, God. He needed to check his insurance policy. The problem was, he knew he’d taken a high deductible to lower the rates. He hoped to heaven this type of thing was covered, because he suspected he’d exceeded even his exorbitant deductible.

“Holy cow.”

“Yes,” his father agreed. “It’s a mess all right.” He slapped Nate on the back. “Well, we’ve got our work cut out for us, son.”

Nate, his father and Allie watched as a drop of water fell from the stained ceiling and hit the bed with a sodden plop.

Ted scratched his head. “Probably take a while for the water that was already trapped between your floor and her ceiling to work its way through now that we’ve stopped the leak. I hope it doesn’t drip too much longer, though. The carpet’s pretty well saturated already. Know anybody with a wet vac?”

Allie volunteered to ring neighbors’ doorbells while Nate and Ted wrestled the mattress off the bed.

As they struggled to guide their sodden burden through the bedroom doorway, Nate mused that it wasn’t so much the mattress he minded replacing, it was the bed linens themselves. This room too was done in early Easter egg. Come on, pink and yellow and wimpy purple—no, lavender—that was what you called washed-out purple, lavender. Nate decided then and there to just give her the money. She’d have to replace the stuff herself. No way was he going to go into a store and buy pale purple anything. From the looks of things, this Allie woman didn’t have many guys staying over, that was for sure. No guy would sleep in a bed done up like a flower bower. And it smelled…girly in here. Wet, but still girly. Nate sniffed deeply and told himself he didn’t like it.

Ted looked back up to the ceiling as he helped Nate shove the box spring out of the room, and Nate’s eyes followed.

They watched another drop work its way loose from its moorings and do a free fall. Nate winced.

“Hey, look what I’ve got,” Allie called as she appeared in the doorway pushing what appeared to be a giant, lethal-looking vacuum cleaner. “A wet vac. Cool, huh? Mrs. Naderly had one. She said the basement in the house she used to live in before she scaled down to an apartment used to get water. She also has some floor fans to help dry things further after we suck up as much as we can out of the carpet.”

Nate gave her a halfhearted smile. “Great. That’s just really…great.”

Ted slung companionable arms around his son and Allie as though they were the best of buddies. “Tell you what. Let’s handle the carpet as best we can and then while we’re waiting for things to dry up some, why don’t we head to the hardware store? We can pick up what we need to repair the ceiling. If the seams in the drywall start to pop as it dries, we’ll be ready. Get little Allie here taken care of in no time.”

“I really think it might be better if we called in a professional, Ted,” Allie said.

“Dad, since when do you know how to repair plaster?”

“No need to bother some busy construction company when we can take care of this ourselves,” Ted insisted. “They’d never come for something so little, anyway. And how hard can it be?” He gestured toward the ceiling. “It’s not even real plaster, just that drywall stuff. Hell, we’ll go buy a can of that gunk you use, the kind that’s all premixed, and slap some up there. Have the whole thing back to normal in nothing flat. You’ll see.”

“Oh, God. Where have I heard those words before?” Nate asked the heavens.

His father turned on him. “I still say this has nothing to do with anything I did last night. It’s strictly coincidental that your water pipes decided to introduce you to your neighbor the day after I worked on the garbage disposal.”

“Yeah, right. Whatever.”

“It’s true,” Ted insisted.

Nate put his hand up in a “hold it” gesture. “Look, the how is no longer important. The situation exists. Let’s call a plasterer, let him deal with this and I’ll take you both out to dinner. What do you say?”

All Ted had to say was a chiding “Nate—”

Nate turned away from his father while he ground his teeth together. Then he spun back around to face him once more. “Dad, you really need to go back to work. Early retirement was a mistake. You need a life outside of—” Nate gestured up “—making me crazy doing this kind of thing.”

Ted shook a finger at him. “No. No, you’re wrong. All those years I concentrated on my career and for what? I missed my son’s childhood, my wife became a virtual stranger. She pulled all kinds of antics just to be noticed, is my guess. Then when I realized what had happened, arranged things so we could get to know each other again, it was too late. Your mom passed away.” Ted punctuated his words with vehement arm and hand gesticulations. “Well, I’ve learned my lesson and I’m telling you, this is what’s important. My son and the things that affect his happiness. You’re all I’ve got left. You may be a man now, Nate, but I’m still your father. And you know what they say.”

Nate gritted his teeth. “No, Dad, what do they say?”

“Better late than never, that’s what. I may not have always been there for you when you were a kid, but I’ve turned over a new leaf, learned my lesson. You can count on me. I’ll be here for you from now on. That’s a promise you can take to the bank.”

That’s just what Nate was afraid of.

“Now here’s what we’re going to do. We’ll go to the hardware store and then the Sleep Factory. After that, you’ll take Allie and me out to dinner, okay?”

Nate clenched and unclenched his hands several times in frustration. His father really seemed to believe that making him crazy was in reality a way of a father reaching out to his son. How could you argue with a guy for trying to bond with his son? You couldn’t. You’d only lose and look like a heartless jerk in the process. Might as well save some time and cave right then and there. “Okay, Dad, you win,” he said, but he didn’t like it. “Let’s go to the hardware store.”

His father slapped him heartily on the back as Nate gave a last, disgusted look up at Allie’s ceiling. “That’s the spirit, son, that’s the spirit.”

Nate was pretty sure that Allie had called the situation earlier. They should just skip over the screwing-everythingup-royally part and go right to calling in a professional. Save a lot of time, effort and money. He’d seen his dad in action before. It wasn’t a pretty sight. But now, in an attempt to humor his dad, they were going to take a project that would take somebody else a day or two, complicate it, lengthen it and multiply the cost, all by a factor of at least two. Nate sighed to himself. Well, maybe it would work out. If he and his dad hung with Allie for a while, they might meet some of her friends or relatives. An unmarried older female relative with Allie’s spunk might work out real well here.

Nate commandeered the wet vac and extracted a good couple of gallons of water from the carpet while Ted and Allie bagged up her wet sheets, blanket and spread to take to a Laundromat, which had oversize machines that could handle the load, the next day. When Nate felt they’d accomplished as much as possible, he called a time-out. “All right, people, that’s it for a while. It’s getting late and I’m hungry. Let’s head on out of here.” Ted beat them all to the door. Nate assumed he was hungry, too.

Allie grabbed her purse as she passed through the kitchen area. She wasn’t that hungry, but she didn’t want to look at the mess her beautiful condo had become any longer, either. “Your father is such a sweetheart,” she said as she locked up.

Nate rolled his eyes. Sweet. Yeah, right. The old sweetheart had just about demolished Allie’s apartment. What was that all about? A major cavity caused by all that sweetness? “Listen, Allie,” Nate said. “I know this is going to be a big inconvenience for you, but I’ll make it up to you.” Somehow. “Dad means well and he really wants to try to fix things up for you. If you’ll just let him putz around in there for a while before we call in somebody else, someone who actually knows what they’re doing, I swear I’ll make it up to you. I don’t know how, but I will.”

Allie looked at him askance. “You’re being kind of mean-spirited, don’t you think? It’s not like he did it on purpose. It was a mistake. What are you, Mr. Perfect? I mean, maybe you don’t get along with your father, but you still shouldn’t downgrade him like that.”

Nate recoiled. She was attacking him? All he was trying to do was correct an error his father had made. Not Nate’s error, Ted’s. He felt justifiably put-upon. “Of course, it was a mistake. Nobody would do this kind of thing on purpose, and no I’m not perfect. I’m just saying I’ve dealt with my father all my life. You haven’t. I know what to expect here.” Chaos. Bedlam. Further disaster.

“He certainly sounds as if he knows what he’s doing.”

“Yeah, he does, doesn’t he?” And he’d seen his mother weep real tears over some of the repair jobs Ted had done for her. And they hadn’t been tears of gratitude. Nate held up his hands in surrender. “Okay, fine. Not another word. We’re going to get the taping compound right now,” Nate informed her. “And then I guess we’ll see.”

“Yes, I guess we will.” And Allie’s expression stated more clearly than words who she thought would be getting their eyes opened.

“Come on, children, you’re dawdling.”

“Right behind you, Dad.” Nate lowered his voice once more. “Just don’t say I didn’t tell you so.” Nate held up one hand. “Maybe I’ll be proved wrong.” When pigs flew. “I hope I am. Honest, I do. But just in case, here’s how we’ll play it. We’ll let him play around a little bit, you’ll tell him what a great job he did—I hope you’re a good liar—we’ll wait a couple days for him to lose interest and stop checking on it to make sure his repair is holding, which it might, although it’ll look like garbage. Once he’s satisfied, that’s when I’ll call in somebody who actually knows what they’re doing. You know, a professional.” Nate held up one hand, palm out. His index and middle fingers were up, his thumb touching his bent fourth and fifth digits in an old scouting gesture of sincerity. His other hand lay on his chest over his heart. He had all bases covered. “I swear. Trust me.”

Allie glared at him. “You are being such a jerk.”

“I just don’t want you panicking, that’s all.” And she would. Nate grimaced, thinking of some of his father’s home repairs he’d witnessed. Would she ever. “So when the time comes, remember. I promise I’ll take care of it.”

Allie rolled her eyes. “Fine. I’ll remember.”

“What are you doing over there, reciting a boys’ group pledge? Come on, the poor girl’s probably starving to death. Look at her. A good stiff wind would blow her away. Why, she probably eats barely enough to keep body and soul together. I’m thinking we may have to take her under our wings, Nate. See to it she takes care of herself. Seems to me her family’s falling down on the job.”

“Oh brother.” Allie sighed softly. If he only knew. Allie was more than willing to let Ted do any repairs he wanted to attempt so long as they could keep her interfering family out of things. She’d be eighty and her father and brothers would dotter over on canes to smooth life’s little wrinkles for her. She loved them all dearly, but sometimes she felt so…smothered.

Nate opened the car door for Allie, waited for her to climb in, then chuckled as he circled the vehicle. This was great. He’d forewarned her, so Allie couldn’t say she hadn’t known what to expect. Talk about taking lemons and making lemonade. He’d just bought himself a whole bunch of relative peace and quiet while his father was occupied at Allie’s. Hot damn.

Oh sure, he knew what Ted was up to—and it wasn’t only a repair job. Nate was wise to him now, thanks to overhearing his conversation with Allie earlier. But Nate wasn’t worried about falling prey to any matchmaking. He was immune. But think about this. His father would be occupied for several days playing handyman and safely out of his hair. Unfortunately, it was going to cost Nate, at a time when his money should be plowed back into his new business, but the price would be well worth it. Heck, now that he thought about it, he was going to talk to Jared about deducting the repairs as a business expense. An extremely worthwhile business expense.

He drove to the hardware store, well aware of the disparaging glances Allie shot him from where she sat in the passenger seat. Well, good. He didn’t want her to like him. He wasn’t ready for anything permanent and this would keep things simple. He was grateful, yes, he was. If only she had a single mother, a maiden aunt he could recruit to keep Pop busy once the apartment repairs were taken care of, life would be perfect. He was on to his dad, but, heh-heh, he didn’t think his dad was on to him.

Subtlety was lost on a man, Nate told himself as he drove, because men were usually so up-front about everything. But with a woman, a man had to be circumspect, come in the back door, otherwise women tended to get on their high horses and basically go ballistic. Well, no problem. Nate could lead a conversation, bring it around to where he wanted it to go without the other party even being aware. All he had to do was ask a few leading questions, get her talking. He’d find out everything there was to know about Allie and any unmarried female relatives without her being any the wiser.

“So, Allie,” Nate started jovially, “tell us a little about yourself.”

Lord, he wasn’t interested in her, was he? Allie wondered. He was a good-looking guy and everything—really good-looking, to be honest, with his body by Apollo, wavy blond hair and Lake Michigan blue eyes. But she’d gotten vibes from Mr. Parker senior that Nate was having problems getting himself a woman who’d put up with him. And after conversing even briefly with the six-foot-plus Mr. Parker junior, Allie could understand why. Heck, the guy couldn’t be loyal to his own father, talking him down the way he had. Her father made her crazy, too, but she didn’t diss him. Not out loud. Not to a total stranger. She crossed her arms defensively over her chest. She wasn’t interested. Absolutely not. And he didn’t need to know anything about her. “Why do you want to know?”

Nate shrugged. “No reason. Just making conversation, that’s all. You, um, come from a big family?”

“Not really.”

Man, this was like pulling teeth. “Define not really.”

“Brothers, okay? I’ve got three older brothers. They’re great, but they all think I’m still ten. The three of them plus my father would be down here in nothing flat if they catch so much as a whiff of this. They’ll have the repairs done—but to their specifications, not mine—and the entire place remodeled in a day and a half. They don’t understand that I want to do things my way. Your dad at least asked my opinion on color and stuff. He’s great,” she finished, turning to smile at Ted in the back seat.

Nate shrugged. “Ceilings are white and carpet is supposed to be beige. For resale. A Realtor friend of mine told me that.”

See? Just like her brothers. Allie rested her case.

Nate thought about her family description. Was there a problem with producing females in her family? Maybe this wasn’t such a hot idea. Allie MacLord was cute in a Cathy Rigby with red hair gymnast kind of way. Nate assumed a female relative, provided she had some, would also be attractive. The problem, as he saw it, was cute really didn’t stand up well against four large overprotective males who might misinterpret his interest in Allie. He’d go to the wall for the woman he’d eventually marry, of course, take on an entire legion if necessary, but that was years down the road. Years.

Nate tapped his fingers on the steering wheel while he thought about that. A trio of overgrown siblings on one side of the scale, his father on the other. Hmm. He could still be persuaded to take them on if the stakes were right. Like if an elderly maiden aunt could be found among her family members for his father. In fact, this was actually a no-brainer. If push came to shove, he’d take on the brothers and do it with a smile on his face. Nate made the decision to continue the interrogation, see if there was anything worth pursuing.

“How about your parents?” Were they conveniently divorced? Mom need a shoulder to cry on? Hey, it just so happened his dad had broad shoulders, for an older guy. When you thought about it, an interfering family and Allie’s condo’s proximity meant her relatives would be around a lot for his father to bump into. This could be good. Eagerly he awaited her response.

“There’s just Dad,” she reluctantly confided. Her large, gruff, love-you-till-he-smothers-you dad.

“Oh, really? Where’s your mother?”

“She died. Breast cancer.”

Oh, man. Nate winced and braked hard for a changing light, then turned to stare at her. “I’m sorry.”

“It’s okay. It was a while ago. I was sixteen.”

Sixteen was a very vulnerable age. Damn.

Nate shot Allie a sideways look as he pulled into the parking lot for the hardware store, his gaze falling automatically to Allie’s face. She still looked vulnerable. Like she was in need of protection. He had a sudden urge to pull over and wrap his arms around her. What, was he crazy? He ought to know better than to fall prey to his father’s matchmaking.

“Nate, where are you planning on parking?” Ted wanted to know. “You’ve driven by three perfectly good spots. I know you’re protective about your car, but do we really have to park at the far end of the lot?”

“What? Oh, sorry, Dad, I got distracted.”

“I keep telling you, this isn’t going to be that bad. We’re both college graduates, aren’t we? We can figure this out. Watch out for the light pole, will you?”

“Oops, sorry.” He swerved, missed the pole in question and could feel a flush rising to stain his cheeks. Somehow that sudden spurt of feeling for Allie had gotten him positively flustered. Damn it, get a grip, Parker, he told him self. You’re acting like you’re fifteen instead of thirty. Like you’ve never seen breasts before.

Nate pulled into a spot and turned off the ignition. He leaned back in the seat for a moment to rein his thoughts in.

“Nate, you coming or what?”

“Yep. Right behind you two.” And he was, he realized, after he got out of the car and locked it. He was also getting a great view of Allie’s gently swaying derriere. She had a perky posterior Nate decided as he watched it swing through the turnstile in the front of the store. Decidedly perky.

“That all right with you, Nate?”

Nate’s eyes rose guiltily from Allie’s butt to the inquiring glance his father was sending back over his shoulder.

“Sure. What?”

Ted sighed. “Is it okay if, after we buy the guck and whatever tools we need to fix the ceiling, we go eat and then hit the mattress store? I’m starved and Allie just admitted she didn’t have time for anything but an apple at lunchtime.”

“No problem. We just have to be sure and replace Allie’s mattress and bedding before the stores close.”

Nate continued to watch Allie interact with his father as he trailed them around the store. She hadn’t hesitated in showing him her vinegary side and yet she was being unfailingly polite and kind to his father. Allie smiled, made small talk and teased Ted. It was almost as though she sensed his father was needy and lonely and was doing her best to be kind.

Nate scowled at their backs. It wasn’t like he hadn’t figured out that much. He was every bit as damned perceptive. Nate just didn’t know how to help his father, that was all. There was no need for him to feel like a worm, though, he told himself. Think about it. Besides, his father was practically glowing in Allie’s presence. If Nate played his cards right, this whole situation could work to his advantage. Pawning his dad off on Allie for a few days would buy him some time to find a few older women to throw in Ted’s path, either from Allie’s family or wherever. That would in turn make his dad happy while keeping him occupied so Nate could get a few things on his own accomplished.

He loved his father dearly.

He’d love him even more with a little distance worked into their relationship.

Let’s face it. He was being a heartless jerk dumping his interfering father on an unsuspecting neighbor, but in a situation like this a little free time to concentrate on things he needed to take care of in his professional and private lives took precedence over fair play. No contest.

When they got to the appropriate section of the store, there was a bit of a debate over what type of guck spreading tools were appropriate. The store was busy, the help already occupied. Nate ended up buying a couple of different ones, picked at random. What did it matter? He was going to have the whole thing redone in a couple of weeks anyway. Let his dad play around however he wanted. He’d make it up to Allie somehow. Nate shot Allie one of his best woman-killer smiles.

She returned a look of suspicion and confusion.

Nate’s eyes widened. Man, he must be losing his touch. Guilt struck again. This really was a rotten thing to do to someone. Now he knew how the high priests felt sacrificing young virgins to the various vindictive gods. You didn’t have to like it, but a man’s gotta do what a man’s gotta do. You just had to convince the virgin it was all for the greater good. Nothing to it.

Was Allie MacLord still a virgin?

God, he hoped not. Because in the back of his mind Nate was entertaining some ideas about how he’d like to make it up to her once this mess was over and done with. It wouldn’t be much of a hardship to, well, jump her bones. Nothing with strings attached or anything like that. No, just a mutual enjoyment kind of thing. Provided he could keep the overprotective males in her life and his father out of the picture, of course.

And he absolutely, positively would not feel guilty over letting his father try his hand at the repairs at Allie’s place, even though it would double or triple the repair time. He’d warned her. All was fair in love and war, after all. Nor would he allow himself to feel badly for whatever female relative of Allie’s he managed to lasso. Anyone could see his cause was just. Well, anyone but a woman. They loved being perverse. And half the time it was perversity for perversity’s sake, which made it all the more frustrating.

Men, however, loved nothing better than a challenge. Nate figured he ought to be able to handle any roadblocks his father or a little bit like Allie could put in his way. They had met their match with Nathaniel Edward Parker. You bet they had.

Ignoring Allie’s expression of confusion and his father’s generally random choices from the stock in the drywall aisle, Nate shepherded his little flock of two to a checkout line. Ted made a production of paying, all the while still protesting his innocence. Nate let his dad pay without argument. It was too his fault.

It wasn’t that much longer before Nate had everyone seated at a nearby restaurant. He rubbed his hands together. Life was good and Nate was starved. “So, what’s everyone in the mood for?”

Allie gave him a glance and muttered, “Your head.”

He was going to have to remember to bring earplugs—or a gag—when it came time to jump her bones. “To eat, Allie. To eat.”

Giving the menu a cursory glance, Allie announced, “Salad.”

Nate looked at her doubtfully. “Salad? That’s it? Just…salad?”

“Of course that’s not it,” his father interrupted. “What, does she look like a rabbit? The salad’s just to start.” Ted turned his attention to Allie, patted her hand. “Don’t pay any attention to him, honey. Now what else do you want? Anything on the menu. Nate’s paying. I bought the plastering stuff. Pick the most expensive thing they’ve got if that’s what you want.”

Nate rolled his eyes. “Dad, if she wants salad, she can have salad.” He smiled apologetically at Allie.

“She doesn’t want just salad. It’s not healthy. She needs red meat. Look at her.” Ted gestured with a hand. “Nothing to her. Chicken bones. Why a good breeze would blow her away. Pht” Ted made a flicking hand gesture. “There she goes.”

“You don’t know anything at all about women, do you, Pop?”

“What are you talking about? Of course I know women. I was married to one, wasn’t I?”

“Yeah, and she always complained that you didn’t understand her.”

Ted snorted. “Your mother’s mind was more convoluted than most and you know it.” He aimed a finger at Nate. “Still, I had her pretty much figured out. Most of the time. I just didn’t always agree with her and she’d feel like she had to complain a bit, that’s all.”

Nate looked at his father in amazement. His parents had been champion arguers. Champion. They’d also done a lot of kissing and making up, but still…He shook his head to clear it. “Whatever. The thing is, Dad, women read these female magazines, see, with these advice columns in them, okay? They think it’s a turnoff if us guys see them eating a lot so they eat a bunch before they go out with a man so they’re not that hungry. They don’t want the guy to think they’re not all delicate and feminine.” Nate rubbed a hand over the top of his head. “I know you’ve seen Gone with the Wind. Mom used to watch it several times a year. The ladies loaded up before going to dinner so they wouldn’t look like pigs in front of the men. What the ladies don’t get, however, is that it ticks us off when we take them out to eat and they just pick at their food.” He pointed a finger at Allie. “She probably snacked before we even got to her place.”

“I did not!” Allie was incensed at the accusation. Like she cared what Mr. Nathaniel Parker thought. “I simply don’t happen to be hungry tonight. Just because I don’t eat like a truck driver is no reason—”

Ted patted her hand some more. “Now, now. Don’t let him get you all upset. We’ll just order you a hamburger. You look a little…what do you call it? Anemic, that’s it. We gotta build your blood count up.”

“Mr. Parker, it’s okay. Really. I don’t eat a lot of red meat. It’s not good for you, you know.”

“Ted, remember? We’ll get you chicken, then. Look, here’s a nice blackened chicken breast although I still say red—”

“I promise you there’s nothing wrong with my blood count. I’ve got a lot of Irish in me. That’s why I’m pale. Well, and I’m a little stressed at the moment, too, but it’s mostly my heritage. See my freckles? Irish. And a little Scots.”

Was he good or what? Nate thought.

“Are you folks ready to order?”

“Yes. I’d like the house salad, please. Light Italian dressing. Thank you.”

“Chop some chicken on there for her, will you?” Ted directed. “She needs the protein. We’re trying to build her up a little bit. Maybe some egg, too.”

Allie gave up. “Fine. Put chicken on it. Put an egg on it. Use Geritol for the dressing. That ought to give me a blood count right off the charts and make everybody happy.”

“Uh, I don’t think we have any dressing like that.”

Allie just sighed and put her head in her hands. “Mom, I really think you can do better than this. Honest to God, I really think you could. Put a little heart and soul into it, why don’t you? Try harder, darn it.”

Nate put a hand on Allie’s shoulder, patted her soothingly. It was her first exposure to his father, after all. She was bound to be a bit stressed. “Excuse me? I didn’t catch that. Can you lift your head? You’re mumbling.”

Allie turned her head out of her hands and glared at Nate. “I’m not talking to you.”

“Oh, sorry. Dad, Allie’s talking to you. Pay attention, will you?”

“Not him, either.”

“Not him and not me. Fine. Then you were speaking to…whom?”

She glared harder. “If you must know, I was speaking to my mother. And it was a private conversation.”

Nate cleared his throat. “Your mother? The one who’s—”

“Yes, that’s right. Frankly, I’m very disappointed in the way she’s handling things up there and I just told her so. I’m sorry, but she could do a better job of watching out for me than she’s currently doing. She is a lot nearer to the final seat of authority than I am, after all.”

“Is that so?”

Allie nodded stubbornly. “Yes, that’s so and that’s just what I told her.”

“Uh-huh. Okay, you told your mom off. Did she, um, have anything to say in return?” He held up his hands. “Just wondering.”

“No, she doesn’t talk back. Dead people don’t, as a rule,” Allie explained kindly. “Which doesn’t mean she isn’t listening, though,” Allie stubbornly insisted. She raised her voice a little bit. “And I expect her to get her act together and do a better job.”

“Oookay.” Nate sat back in the booth, eyeing Allie warily. And she’d looked so normal. The waitress returned with their drinks. Nate took his and released the straw from its paper wrapper. He stuck it in his drink and sucked up half the liquid in his glass. So maybe he’d steer clear of Allie all together and forget even the mutually satisfying enjoyment of each other part of the deal. He might have been able to avoid the three brothers. Maybe even handle both fathers as well. But a knows-all, sees-all mother spirit? He didn’t think so. And Nate liked his private life…private.

Chapter Three

Nate made it through dinner. He doubted he’d win the crown for Mr. Sociability, but he’d grunted a couple of times in response to direct questions and frankly, Nate doubted that either Allie or his father had much noticed his lack of participation. The two of them had managed a continual running conversation that Nate would have only interrupted had he tried to participate. So fine. To heck with them. Besides, wasn’t this exactly what he’d been hoping for? It didn’t hurt that his dad’s attention had been so quickly and so thoroughly diverted. He might actually get a few constructive days in at work.

Allie and Ted continued to bond over brownie hot-fudge sundaes. An oddly disgruntled Nate picked up the tab. He held the restaurant door for Allie, who was so involved in her conversation with his father, she didn’t even seem to notice the courtesy. Even so, Nate got the car door for her, closing it when she was safely seated. Darn, but for a short person she’d swung some long legs into the car.

Edgy for some reason, Nate paid extra attention to his driving as he made his way to the Sleep Factory.

“Of course I’m edgy,” Nate muttered under his breath as he signaled a lane change. “I’ve had the day from perdition and by the time I’m finished just getting back to where I started from this morning, it’ll probably have turned into the week from hell, possibly even the month from Hades.”

“You say something, Nate?” his father asked.

“No.”

“Humph.” His father shrugged. “Thought you did. Oh, well, getting old. Allie, what about…”

Left out of the loop once more, Nate shook his head and pulled into the Sleep Factory’s lot and parked.

Allie opened her door and swung her legs out. “Oh,” she said when Nate showed up to offer her his hand since he couldn’t open the door for her. “Oh. Thank you, Nate. I can manage on my own, but thank you.”

“My mother taught me to treat a woman with respect.”

Allie just looked at Nate, really seeing him for the first time. She’d been so involved in the mess her apartment had become, she hadn’t really processed what had been right there in front of her. Hard to believe. Nate was tall, over six feet, she’d bet. From her seated position, he towered over her. She’d thought him blond, but now that she was noticing, it was really all streaky with different shades of blond and light brown all mixed together as though he spent a lot of time in the sun—or paid a lot to a hairdresser. Somehow she doubted Nate Parker spent a lot of time in a beauty parlor. His eyes were blue. There was the beginning of crinkles around their corners and his skin was lightly tanned. He reminded her a lot of this lifeguard she’d had a crush on when she’d been sixteen. She’d never gotten him to notice her that whole summer. If it hadn’t been for the plumbing going berserk in Nate’s apartment, she doubted she’d be spending time with him, either. Allie tried to be honest, especially with herself. She just wasn’t the type to inspire lust in modern-day Apollos. Maybe her mother had burst his pipe for him? No, that was too ridiculous.

“Well?” Nate asked, his hand still stuck out there. “You coming or what?”

Allie swallowed. Yes, yes she was. Allie gave Nate her hand and let him draw her up and out of the car. “Thank you,” she said.

Nate looked at her oddly. “You’re welcome.” He closed the door, locked it and then put his hand on the small of Allie’s back to guide her into the store.

She shivered.

“Cold?” he asked.

“No, I’m okay.” She wasn’t but she wasn’t really sure how to explain what was wrong with her and wasn’t about to try, not to Nate. A guy who looked like him probably already had a swelled head; no way was Allie going to add to it. A second shiver went down her spine.

“Sure?”

“Yes, really.”

They entered the store, both the men standing back, allowing her to be first. Allie glanced around.

“Oh, Lord,” she murmured. She’d been so thrilled that her unknown neighbor hadn’t given her a hard time about replacing her mattress, she hadn’t considered the shopping-for-it-with-him aspect. Allie stood just inside the door, staring at an entire showroom of mattresses. Mattresses she should lie on to check for comfort before purchasing. Lie down on in front of Nate Parker. “Oh, Lord. Mom?” She whispered, rolling her eyes heavenward.

“Hey, can we come in, too?”

Allie turned. Nate and Ted were bottlenecked in the entryway behind her. Allie stepped to the side. “Sorry,” she said.

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