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A definite sensation of déjà vu washed over him. As did an unexpected, warm feeling he immediately banked down. He did his best to collect his temper and lower his tone. “Did you forget something?”
Now here was a man whose very voice could scare off burglars, she thought. Lucky for her she wasn’t faint of heart. “Yes, that you had no actual pots and pans beyond the one I used for soup.”
And what did that have to do with anything? he wondered. He glanced at the large box she held. By the way she boosted it, he figured it had to be heavy. “And what? You bought a set for us?”
“No, I’m lending you a set.”
As she confirmed his suspicions, Simon took the box from her. He was right, these were heavy. The woman was stronger than she looked.
“These are mine,” she told him, following him into the house. “You can use them until we start outfitting your kitchen.”
Hearing her voice, Madelyn came hurrying into the foyer to join her sister. Both girls wiggled in ahead of him, Simon noted, in their efforts to get closer to this woman who was obviously some sort of modern-day female Pied Piper.
Either that or she’d cast some kind of hypnotic spell over his daughters. He’d never seen them take to anyone so quickly. Or so eagerly.
“You came back!” Meghan cried happily, her eyes shining.
Kennon grinned at her and tousled the girl’s dark hair affectionately. “Yes, I did.”
“Are you going to come in?” Madelyn asked in a sophisticated tone, though it didn’t hide her feelings about Kennon’s return.
Kennon looked up at the girls’ father. He appeared almost stoic, standing there with the box of pots in his hands.
“I don’t know. Am I, Dr. Sheffield?” she asked the man.
He feigned surprise. “You’re actually asking my permission?”
Her expression said that was a given—he had no idea if she was sincere or merely putting him on. He had a feeling that his decorator got her way a lot.
“It is your house, Dr. Sheffield. You can invite anyone you want, or bar them from your property just as easily.”
He supposed, all things considered, it could be that easy—if he weren’t dealing with wistful, turned-up little faces.
“Lucky me.” And then he stepped back, giving her some room. “Come on in. The girls have already invited you. Who am I to stand in your way?”
As if it were that easy, Kennon thought. If the good doctor didn’t want her here, she’d be gone in a heartbeat and they both knew it.
Even as he invited her in, he saw her turn toward her vehicle. Now what?
“Just let me get the rest of the pots and pans out of the car,” she told him.
There were more? Who did she expect Edna to be cooking for? A reserve branch of the marines?
“Can we help?” Meghan asked eagerly.
Kennon paused. “That’s up to your dad, but I would love some help if he says it’s all right.”
How had she done that? Simon wondered. How had she lobbed the ball back onto his court and stolen his team at the same time? He wondered if that was part of her business training or if executing sleights of hand like that just came naturally to her. In either case, this was not the simple, fluffy-looking woman she appeared to be at first encounter.
“Fine.”
Balancing the box she’d given him and shifting it to one side against his hip, he silently gestured for his daughters to go ahead and help the woman retrieve whatever else she’d decided to bring along to “lend” him.
For once, neither Madelyn nor Meghan needed to be told twice.
Chapter Six
The next half hour was a whirl of activity. Aided and abetted by her two pint-size assistants, Kennon took over the kitchen and within exactly twenty-eight minutes produced a small pork loin that tantalized with an aroma that whispered of Italian herbs and various grated cheeses. There was a side dish of brown rice, initially cooked in chicken broth, that had been mixed with shredded asparagus, shredded carrots and shredded zucchini, to mention only the three main vegetables that had been added to it.
His daughters, avowed vegetable haters both, couldn’t dig in fast enough.
Simon began to think he’d opened up his house to a sorceress. She had definitely charmed his daughters and his housekeeper within an inch of their lives. Edna was still in the living room, eating the same dinner that was being served in the kitchen. Kennon had seen to that, bringing out a full plate for the woman before finally sitting down at the table herself.
There was conversation at the table, something that had been seriously lacking in the last year. Both girls were eager to snare the sorceress’s attention. For her part, the woman was equal handed, giving both the same amount of attention.
No doubt about it, she was good. And, he supposed, he could learn from her. Meghan, and especially Madelyn, looked happier than he remembered them being in a long time.
“You know, if this decorating thing doesn’t work out for you …” Simon began after he realized that he had cleaned his plate not once, but twice. Only the fear of settling in for an evening nap rather than doing the work he’d brought home had kept him from taking a third helping. “… you could always get a job as a chef,” he continued.
Or as an all-round whirling dervish, he added silently.
Humor highlighted her face, fluidly moving from her lips to her eyes. She looked very pleased with herself. He supposed she had every right to be.
“I’ll keep that in mind.” Her eyes captured his. He had no idea what she was thinking, nor why he felt so intrigued by her.
“Could I count on a letter of recommendation from you?” She asked so straight-faced he actually thought she was serious for a moment. Until the slight telltale curve of the corners of her mouth returned and subsequently gave her away.
Simon shrugged. “Why not?” he replied.
“High praise, indeed,” she quipped dryly. “Don’t worry, the only recommendation I’m interested in has to do with decorating.” She had no intention of doing anything else, ever. “I’ve been in the decorating business for a number of years and I’ve ridden out a lot of highs and lows. This dip in the economy is all part of that.”
Although she had to admit it would be nice to get back to the point where she was juggling assignments, looking for a way to squeeze yet another one in, rather than waiting for the phone to ring so that she had something to do. Until this assignment—if indeed it actually was one—had come along, she’d quietly begun paying Nathan out of her personal account because the business account was close to flatlining.
“And speaking of references,” she threw in, switching gears back to his initial comment, “my references are available for viewing anytime you’d like to look them over.” She had a website, plus an actual physical file where she kept her letters of reference, all of which were glowing.
But Simon waved away her offer, uninterested. “No need,” he told her.
She looked at him in surprise. He struck her as a belt-and-suspenders kind of man, taking precautions, making sure everything was on the up-and-up—and then devising a backup plan just in case. Did this mean he’d changed his mind about hiring her for the job?
“You don’t want to see my references?” she asked, wondering why he’d suddenly switched courses. Had she said something to offend him?
“Recommendations from people I don’t know don’t impress me,” he told her. “An enthusiastic one from someone I know or have dealt with—like Ms. Sommers—does. She seemed to be very high on your ability to, in her words, turn a ‘sow’s ear into a silk purse.'”
Since Maizie was her aunt, the endorsement could be misconstrued as nepotism. But while Maizie would never bad-mouth anyone, she would never praise anyone if she felt their work was lacking in any way. She was far too honest to lie.
“Nothing quite that drastic,” Kennon assured him. “But I have been able to turn some pretty awful rooms into lovely extensions of the client’s home, bringing up the total value of the house.” Warming to her subject, she rose from the table, ready to make a quick run to her vehicle. “I’ve got an album of my work in the car that I can show you.”
His words stopped her in her tracks.
Wiping his mouth, Simon retired his fork. “You can save yourself the trouble, Miss Cassidy. I don’t have time to handle the job myself and I certainly don’t have time to conduct any more lengthy interviews.”
Any more? Kennon bit her tongue to keep from echoing the last part of his statement incredulously. Did this qualify as a lengthy interview in his mind? On what planet? He hadn’t asked her for any kind of information, any backup statements, nothing. This didn’t qualify as an interview. It didn’t even make the grade for a run-of-the-mill conversation.
Don’t antagonize the gift horse, Kennon, she cautioned herself.
Putting on her brightest smile, she asked, “So then I’m hired?”
Simon raised his deep blue eyes to hers, silently asking what part of his statement she didn’t understand. Of course she was hired—unless she had a comprehension problem.
“That’s what I just said.”
Not really. Her smile never shifted.
The man needed to work on his communication skills. She wondered if he was just as obscure and distant with his patients when he spoke to them. Heart patients, she would think, would want to have their hands held, would want to be comforted and put at their ease. They would want to know that their surgeon cared. There was absolutely nothing about this exceedingly handsome, exceedingly sexy, reserved man that came close to even hinting that he cared about the people he operated on. Was it a protective device? A mechanism he employed so that he couldn’t get close to anyone, just in case they didn’t make it?
Focus on what’s important. You’ve got bills to pay, Kennon. “Thank you,” she told him. “I can start tomorrow. Tonight if you like.”
He shook his head. Her eagerness made him feel tired. It was almost as if her energy was growing only because it was sapping his.
“What I’d like,” he informed her, “is to go to my study and get back to the paper I was working on yesterday. The paper with the quickly approaching deadline.”
She backed away quickly. It did no good to get a client stirred up about anything except color schemes. “Of course. So when can I speak with you?” she asked so she could plan accordingly.
“You just did,” he pointed out, rising from the table. “This was very good,” he told her, as if he was measuring out each word carefully, taking them out of some invisible bank account and leaving a deficit in their wake.
Kennon watched him leave the room, heading for the stairs. She did her best not to let her frustration show in her face. No matter what he thought, she was really going to need to speak to him about the house. Decorating was a matter of personal taste—in this case, his. She wasn’t about to impose her own aesthetics on him. Aside from perhaps a fondness for blue, she had a feeling that their individual preferences would most likely clash fiercely.
“He doesn’t mean anything by it, Miss. He’s just hurting.”
Edna’s voice floated in from the living room, cutting into her thoughts. Giving the girls a quick, fleeting smile, Kennon cocked her head and looked around the side into the living room.
Edna was sitting up on the sofa, propped up exactly where she and the girls had left her. The plate Kennon had brought out to her earlier lay on top of the black-lacquered folding TV tray, which she’d brought with her expressly for Edna’s usage until the nanny was literally back on her feet.
After first encouraging the girls to have another serving, she left them to finish their dinner and crossed over to the living room and Edna.
“I understand,” Kennon said, lowering her voice so that it wouldn’t carry. “But I need to know what Dr. Sheffield wants me to do with the house besides just ‘fill’ it.”
The girls had heard her anyway. “I’ve got pictures,” Meghan volunteered happily.
Kennon’s attention instantly shifted. Something was far better than nothing. “You mean pictures of your old house?”
Ignoring her older sister’s pointed scowl, Meghan nodded. “Daddy said to pack away our pictures, but I wanted them with me so I could look at them. Mama gave me the album. I didn’t want to throw it away or lose it,” she explained.
Gutsy little thing, Kennon thought with admiration. Simon Sheffield seemed as if he was capable of casting a large shadow over his children. Secretly defying the man took courage.
“Daddy didn’t want you to throw it away, stupid,” Madelyn chided. “He just wanted to put everything we wanted to keep into that big storage place.” Seeing that her sister still didn’t grasp the concept of what she was saying, Madelyn explained what storage was. “It’s a big room for all our stuff, but it’s not in the house.”
Meghan didn’t look as if she believed what she was being told. “Then where is it?”
“Someplace else,” Madelyn told her, this time letting her shortened fuse show.
Pictures would definitely help, Kennon thought. But she wasn’t sure just how much they’d help until she had a basic question answered. Did the surgeon want to get away from everything that reminded him of the life he’d lost, or would he want to recapture that feeling? Or would it be a blending of old and new?
She definitely needed help in coming to the right conclusion.
“Why don’t you two carry your plates to the sink?” she suggested.
The two were instantly on their feet, grabbing up their plates as well as the silverware they’d used. Both acted as if bussing a table was a treat rather than a chore. Kennon couldn’t help wondering if the doctor knew how lucky he was.
She turned toward Edna. She’d given the girls the chore so that she could talk to the nanny privately. The questions in her head were multiplying. “You said that Dr. Sheffield was still hurting. Over his wife’s death?” Kennon guessed.
“Yes.”
She could see by the look in the older woman’s eyes that this was not an easy subject for her either. The doctor’s wife must have been a very special person to merit such fierce love and loyalty.
“He blames himself,” Edna told her simply.
“Why?” Kennon could think of only one reason. “Was he to blame?”
“No!” Edna cried with feeling. “It’s because she took his place.”
“His place?” Kennon echoed. She tried to make sense of the answer. “You mean like on a plane?”
Taking a deep breath, Edna started at the beginning. “Dr. Sheffield belongs to Doctors Without Borders. He joined because Dr. Nancy wanted him to. He was supposed to go to Somalia but at the last moment, his last triple-bypass patient took a turn for the worse a few hours after the surgery. The doctor didn’t want to leave the man in someone else’s hands, so Dr. Patterson—that was Mrs. Sheffield’s professional name—told him not to worry. She said she’d go in his place.”
“Dr. Sheffield’s wife was a cardiovascular surgeon, too?” Kennon asked incredulously.
Edna smiled with pride, tears shimmering in her eyes. “My Nancy was a general surgeon. In a pinch, she could perform almost any kind of regular surgery that needed doing.” Edna’s voice grew very quiet as she added, “When the tsunami hit, she was one of the ones who was swept away.”
“Oh. I’m so sorry to hear that,” Kennon told her, genuinely feeling the woman’s pain. But Edna had caught her attention with what she’d said before recounting the abilities of the doctor’s late wife. “Excuse me, you said ‘your Nancy …'” Kennon’s voice trailed off as she waited for a clarification. The girls’ nanny couldn’t mean that the surgeon’s wife was her daughter. Could she? Dr. Sheffield wouldn’t be treating his former mother-in-law like one of the servants, would he?
The tears that shone in Edna’s eyes threatened to come spilling out. She blinked them back with effort, but a few fell, sliding down her cheek.
“I raised that girl from the time she was an infant. Both her parents were busy earning a living—much the way Dr. Sheffield and Dr. Patterson were,” she added. “Because we had such a close relationship, when her own two little ones came along, she asked me to take care of them.” She did her best to collect herself. “I was thrilled to be of use to her. I love those girls as if they were my own.”
Kennon didn’t doubt it. “I take it that by moving from San Francisco to Southern California, Dr. Sheffield felt that he needed a fresh start?”
Edna nodded her head. “He never said so in so many words, but that’s what I think, yes.”
Kennon was already processing what she’d been told. “Then what we’ll probably need is only the slightest touch of the past, with the main emphasis being on the future.” Having voiced her thoughts out loud, she looked at Edna to see if the older woman agreed with her.
The nanny took another deep breath, as if to push herself forward.
“I think that would be for the best. Miss Nancy would have wanted Dr. Sheffield to move on. She wouldn’t have wanted him to be this unhappy. She was always teasing him about being too serious,” she said fondly, remembering. And then she looked up at Kennon, as if appealing for her help. “This is way beyond that, and he needs to laugh again.”
Again. So the man was capable of actually laughing, Kennon thought. That was good to know. It meant that there was something for her to work with.
“Well, I don’t know if I can make him laugh, but we’ll really try to get him to smile again,” she promised Edna.
At that moment, Madelyn burst back into the room and headed straight toward them. Madelyn looked at Kennon pointedly. “Anything else?” the little girl asked.
Right on her sister’s heels, not to be outdone, Meghan echoed in a louder voice, “Yeah, anything else?”
For tonight, Kennon thought, she just wanted to immerse herself in the interactions of the family. Since the good doctor wasn’t down here with them, the girls—and memories of their mother—would just have to do.
Immersing meant blending in.
“Now I’m going to go and wash the dishes,” Kennon informed the girls as she got up off the arm of the sofa where she’d perched while talking to Edna.
“You wash dishes? By yourself?” Madelyn questioned, looking at up her uncertainly. “We’ve got a dishwasher that does that.”
“Don’t you have a dishwasher?” Meghan asked her, pity in her young voice.
Kennon laughed and put her arm around the younger girl’s shoulders, pulling her in for a quick hug. “Yes, I do, but I never like to have things pile up in the sink so I wash them before there’re too many. Besides, running the dishwasher for one person just seems sort of wasteful to me. Don’t you agree?” she asked Meghan.
Thrilled to be asked for her opinion, Meghan nodded her head vigorously. Kennon had a feeling that the little girl would have easily agreed to anything that she suggested.
“You really have a way with them,” Edna told her with genuine sincerity. She looked from one little girl to the other. There was approval in her voice as she said, “You seem to bring out the best in them. Do you have any children of your own?” the older woman asked, curious about this new person in their lives.
Kennon shook her head. “No.”
Not that she wouldn’t have wanted to have children. Several children. But before there were children, there had to be someone who could be a good husband, a good father. And if he could actually make her heart skip a beat or two, well, so much the better. If she was going to dream, she might as well go all the way.
“I never met the right man,” she told Edna. And with that, she closed the subject.
“Were you the oldest in your family, then?” Edna asked. “The one your mother depended on to look out for the others?”
There were no others. Her parents were divorced before she could get any siblings. She had always regretted that. A lot of her time as a child had been spent imagining what having a brother or sister would have been like. Even inventing an imaginary one when she was very young.
“Sorry to disappoint you, Edna,” she said with a smile, “but I’m an only child.”
“Then it’s a true gift you have,” Edna pronounced. “You’ve been blessed.”
She didn’t know about being “blessed”—it was just something that came rather naturally to her. Maybe it was even born out of that desire for a sibling. But before she could say anything to the contrary, Madelyn had caught her by one hand while, not to be left out, Meghan took hold of the other.
“Then we’ll help you do the dishes,” Madelyn declared.
Amused, Edna laughed. “Like I said, Miss Cassidy, you’ve got a gift. You’re not all that bad at healing, either.”
Kennon looked at her quizzically over her shoulder as she was about to be pulled away.
“I’m feeling much better, thanks to you and your chicken soup,” Edna told her.
“If that’s the case, that would be more due to the chicken than to me,” Kennon told her. She wasn’t one to take praise unless she believed she really deserved it. All she’d done in this case was try to make the woman feel a little better—and comfort food had always accomplished that for her.
The next moment, Kennon found herself being taken off to the kitchen again by her pint-size helpers. It was time to address the dishes in the sink.
“And modest, too,” Edna said to herself with an approving nod. “I think you’d like her, Nancy,” she said softly under her breath.
When Simon came down from his study an hour later, he expected to find the kitchen in darkness and his daughters either in their room for the night or in the family room, taking advantage of the fact that he wasn’t around. He was rather strict about the amount of time they could spend watching television.
He was rather strict about most things when it came to his children.
Instead, he found the kitchen ablaze with light. Not only that, but he heard the sound of laughter coming from there, as well.
Curious, he went to the source. And discovered that the woman he’d just hired as his decorator was there, sitting at the head of the table, with his daughters flanking her on either side.
Schoolbooks were spread out on the surface of the table and, from what he could discern as he drew closer, the girls were doing homework—with a little help from the overly effervescent blonde.
Laughter, he realized as he listened and allowed it to warm him, was a sound that had been missing from their lives for much too long.
He’d been right in his earlier assessment. Apparently he’d not only hired a decorator but a sorceress, as well.
Chapter Seven
Out of the corner of her eye, Kennon saw Simon walking into the kitchen.
Even if she hadn’t, she could tell he’d entered the room because of the way Madelyn and Meghan reacted. They became a little more subdued, a tiny bit less relaxed. A little more anxious to please. It was obvious to her that they loved their father, but were hemmed in by not quite knowing how to behave around him. As for the good doctor, he wasn’t exactly cold—she could sense that he did care about his daughters—but he was reserved, as if he was following some sort of a strict code that only he was aware of.
Meghan saw him first. “Daddy, Kennon’s teaching me to write,” she declared proudly.
Simon was paying a none-too-shabby tuition so that Meghan and Madelyn would receive the best parochial education possible. Even so, he’d been debating getting a tutor for the younger one because Meghan was having a harder time learning than her sister ever had. Apparently all he’d had to do to insure her improvement was get his house decorated.
He looked at the woman who had burst into his life like an unforecast hurricane. “Master chef, gifted teacher, instant nanny and, oh, yes, a top-flight decorator.” There was a touch of sarcasm in his voice as he ticked off the talents she’d displayed today. “Anything you can’t do, Miss Cassidy?”