The Mummy Proposal

MAI STAYED WITH a visibly upset Jessalyn Walker. Brooke and Nate split up. She covered the east half of the house, while he covered the west. Both were diligent in their search. Neither found a trace of the wayward teen.

Mute with worry, they headed out to the lagoon-style swimming pool, complete with elaborate greenery. He wasn’t there. Ditto the sport court. The detached six-car garage. The only thing left was the caretaker’s cottage.

“Naturally,” Nate murmured, as they approached the porch of the ranch-style domicile and spied Landry settled in front of the television inside. “He’s in the last place we looked.”

“And also,” Brooke noted thoughtfully, “the most eclectic.”

Unlike the house, Brooke observed, which had been decorated with style and cutting-edge decor in mind, the cottage was a ramshackle collection of mismatched furniture and odds and ends. It was, in short, a designer’s nightmare—and a disgruntled teen’s hideout.

Surprised and a little disappointed to suddenly find herself in the same situation she had endured in her youth, she pivoted toward Nate. He stepped nearer at the same time. Without warning, she was suddenly so close to him she couldn’t avoid the brisk masculine fragrance of his cologne, or the effect it had on her senses. Turning to her cool professionalism, she stepped back slightly. “This is where you wanted me and my son to stay?”

Nate’s brow furrowed. Obviously, he saw no problem with the arrangement, but was astute enough to realize she was momentarily disconcerted. Not just at the obvious discrepancy between this and the main house, but what the decision obviously said about his estimation of her. This was no cozy abode, or the sort of lodging suitable for a respected colleague. Rather, it was a place for a servant one didn’t care much about. Worse, there was a thick layer of dust on every surface, which would play havoc with her son’s asthma.

“It doesn’t look like it’s been cleaned in forever,” Brooke stated grimly. And Nate had wanted her and her son to stay there that night!

“I apologize for that,” Nate murmured, clapping a hand on the back of his neck. “I was unaware.”

Typical man. Brooke sighed in displeasure. This job hadn’t even started yet and it was already a mess in practically every respect. She had half a mind to forgo the lucrative contract and walk out.

“I suggested it because it was separate from the house, and therefore private. I hadn’t really thought about the condition of the place or the decor. I haven’t used it in the two months I’ve lived here. Nor has anyone else, since I don’t employ any live-in help.” Nate took another look through the window. “But I see why you’re less than tempted to accept. I guess for someone like you, who pays attention to the aesthetics, these accommodations could be …”

“Insulting?”

“It’s not what I meant when I issued the invitation.” He ran a hand through his thick black hair and looked seriously chagrined.

Brooke let him off the hook with a raised eyebrow.

Clearly not one to let a mistake of any kind go, Nate persisted with narrowed eyes, “Obviously, we’ll get this place scrubbed from top to bottom, and fixed up, too. And we’ll take care of that before we even start on the main house, if you do agree to move in here with your son.”

Brooke had not come this far in her career to get the reputation of a diva. And if the story got out that Nate had been forced to redo her quarters before starting on his own, her competitors would have a field day. She stopped him with a glance. “It’s not a problem. I’ve lived in worse. Foster care, remember?”

“Oh.”

“I can make anyplace a home.” In fact, she told herself sternly, she welcomed the challenge.

At the moment there were far more pressing problems to deal with.

Brooke cast another look at the fourteen-year-old slumped on the hideously out-of-date orange-green-and-brown-plaid sofa.

“Let’s go inside and talk to Landry,” she murmured, touching Nate’s arm.

The boy was the picture of defiance as the two adults entered the cottage.

“You can’t run off like that,” Nate chided, switching off the television.

Landry leaped up, hands balled at his sides. “Who are you to tell me what to do?” he demanded. “And don’t go saying you’re going to be my dad, because you’re not!”

Nate explained about the legal papers that had been signed.

Landry fell silent. “So I’ll live here,” he grudgingly agreed at last. “It doesn’t change the fact that you’re just some guy doing a favor for my great-grandma.” He stormed out of the cottage and back toward the house, leaving Brooke and Nate no choice but to follow.

In Landry’s place, Brooke knew she would have been wary, too. Seeking a reason that would alleviate the orphaned child’s distrust, she inquired matter-of-factly, “Why haven’t you been part of Landry’s life until now?”

For a moment, Nate didn’t answer. Finally, he explained, “I didn’t know he existed until twenty-four hours ago, when Jessalyn Walker called me. She told me Seraphina had died of cancer a year and a half ago, and that Landry had been living with her ever since. Jessalyn said at first it was all right. He was clearly grieving the loss, as was she, but they were a team. Then, in the last month or so, as her health began to fail and she had to sell her home and arrange to move into the assisted-living facility, he became really angry about the hand fate had dealt him.”

Understandably so, Brooke mused.

“He did his best to care for her, apparently, and convince her she didn’t need nurses looking after her, when she had him,” Nate related. “But she knew Landry deserved a better life. So she took a letter that Seraphina had left behind, for a worst-case scenario, and had it messengered to me.”

And the combination of phone call and letter had worked to get Nate involved.

“What did the letter say?” Brooke asked, telling herself that her curiosity had nothing to do with her interest in Nate the man and his previous relationship with Landry’s mother, and everything to do with trying to create a home decor that worked for both Nate and his charge. There might be clues in that note about what his mother thought her son would one day want and need ….

Nate reached into the pocket of his suit jacket. Wordlessly, he handed over a piece of cream-colored stationery. Brooke opened it and read:

Dear Nate,

Landry needs a man he can look up to in his life. I know I have no right to ask you this after the way our engagement ended, but please put the past aside and be the family to my son that my grandmother Jessalyn and I can no longer be. And if you can’t do that, I trust you to find someone who can give Landry all the care and attention he is going to need in the years ahead.

I never stopped loving you. Seraphina.

Finished, Brooke handed the letter back. It was obvious Seraphina had really looked up to Nate, despite whatever had transpired to break them up. “Why didn’t she ask you to do this before she died?”

Nate’s tone grew turbulent. “Probably because she didn’t know how I’d feel or what I’d do. When she knew me, I was all-career, all the time.”

“And yet she trusted you either to be the father Landry needed or to find one for him.”

“What can I say?” The emotion in Nate’s eyes dissipated and he flashed a charming grin. “I’m a trustworthy guy.”

What wasn’t he telling her? Brooke wondered. Did it have anything to do with the reason Nate and Seraphina had stopped communicating and made little or no effort to remain friends after their breakup?

Brooke studied Nate, the mother in her coming to the fore. “Are you sure you want to take this on?” Landry had already weathered a lot of loss. Nate had no experience with children, and gallantry, no matter how well intentioned, took a potential parent only so far.

He nodded, his blue eyes serious. “In the end Seraphina and I may not have been right for each other, but I loved her, too, and always will. And I know I can—and will—love her son.”

“YOU’VE GOT TO BE kidding me!” Cole said, when Brooke picked him up at day camp several hours later. He regarded her with all the disdain a thirteen-year-old boy could muster. “What about the promise you made to me about not taking on any more ridiculously demanding clients and ‘restoring balance’ to our life?”

Brooke had meant it at the time. She still did. “I had to take this job,” she explained.

She eased away from the carpool line and pulled out onto the street. Her minivan picked up speed as she drove. “Because the circumstances were extenuating—and Alexis McCabe asked me to do it, as a special favor. And I owe her … you know that.” Brooke let out a beleaguered sigh.

“Not only was she one of my very first customers, after your dad died. She helped me get my business off the ground, with tons of referrals.” To the point Brooke was now doing only big projects, with unlimited budgets.

“I liked it better when your clients weren’t so rich they felt they could ask you to do anything and you’d have to say yes.”

So had Brooke, in the sense that she hadn’t felt so pressured. That the more prestigious jobs brought better pay … well, she was happy with that. “I know. And if my last client hadn’t canceled the job abruptly—”

“When you refused to fly to Paris to look at fabric.”