Cassidy's Kids

Shaking her head, Sara felt her strength returning. “I’m fine, really,” she insisted, anxious now to get back to her customers. Her tips. “It was just weird there for a minute. I heard a baby cry and I just—I don’t know, I lost it for a second.”

Frowning, Ellie studied her. “Were you maybe remembering something?”

The possibility had crossed her mind. The feeling had been so strong, so devastating. “Nothing but a feeling, if I was,” she said.

A feeling she was petrified to trace. What awful things were lurking in the darkness of her locked-up mind?

“I guess I better get back to the diner,” she said, before Ellie could pursue the conversation.

“If you ever need to talk, my office is right down the hall.”

Though she couldn’t imagine taking Ellie up on the offer, Sara was warmed by it just the same.

“DA-EE, UP!”

“No, Alisha, I’m changing Ariel,” Sloan explained to the toddler tugging on the leg of his jeans.

“Da-ee up!” Alisha demanded a second time, her voice starting to tremble and gain volume both at the same time.

“Alisha, Daddy’s changing Ariel,” he said, trying to reason with her. “I can’t pick you up right now.”

Keeping both of his hands firmly on the baby squirming on the change table, Sloan spared a quick glance for the little girl clutching his leg with pasty fingers.

“Da-ee, up!” Alisha wailed.

Sloan picked her up.

“You ever gonna learn to stick to your guns?” Charlie asked from the doorway of Ariel’s room.

Damn. Sloan hadn’t known Charlie had arrived yet that morning. It was humiliating having the older man see him make such a mess of things.

“I stick to my guns on the things that matter,” Sloan said. He just couldn’t think of what mattered that much at the moment.

So here he was, one daughter sucking her thumb in his ear, the other rolling over, half dressed, on the table in front of him, and his housekeeper shaking his head as if Sloan were the biggest loser on the face of the earth.

Unwilling to have Charlie witness the uproar if he attempted to finish dressing Ariel, Sloan picked up the diaper-clad infant and pretended that he’d meant to take one half-naked daughter to breakfast. At least Ariel was halfway ready. Alisha was still in her pajamas, having thrown such a fit when Sloan had laid her down to change her that he’d decided to give it a rest and tackle Ariel first.

He was saved from further admonitions when the phone rang, and Charlie went to answer it. He hoped whoever it was would keep his housekeeper busy for half an hour at least. It was going to take Sloan that long to convince his darling daughters to sit in their high chairs for breakfast.

“It’s for you—I’ll take them,” Charlie said, back in the doorway.

Sloan would have argued, but he knew better. As he handed the girls over, he also knew that he could be on the phone five minutes and return to find Charlie with both girls dressed, strapped in high chairs and happily eating Cheerios.

“Sloan Cassidy here,” he said, picking up the phone in the office, oddly ashamed at the relief he felt now that he’d escaped to his haven.

“It’s Ellie.”

His heart dropped. And then sped up double-time. In all his life, he suddenly realized, there’d never been any time he’d felt happier than during those hours he’d spent with Ellie in high school. “I’m glad you called,” he said. It was the first thing that came to mind.

“I’m not agreeing to anything, Sloan, so don’t run with this or anything, but what exactly did you have in mind when you asked for my help?”

Don’t run with it. He silently repeated her warning, but it was no good. He was dashing all over the countryside. “There are times when I need to go places with the girls and could sure use a companion to help with double car seats, double spilled food, double tears,” he said, thinking for starters.

That was the easy part.

“I can’t guarantee I’d be available whenever you have to go somewhere.”

“Even some of the time would be great,” he hurriedly assured her. “Even one time would be heaven.”

“They’re that much trouble?”

He hadn’t been talking about the girls.

“They’re a handful, at least when I’m around.” And the way he remembered it from high school, he’d always felt stronger, more capable of coping when Ellie was there. She just had a way of making things seem manageable, and, Lord knew, he could use managing.

“They’re different when you’re not around?” she asked, homing right in on the problem, as Ellie always had.

“So I’m told.” So he knew. He could hear Charlie in the kitchen already, pouring cereal. Which meant the girls were in their high chairs, right where they belonged.

“Why?”

Sinking into the big leather chair behind his desk, Sloan turned and looked out the picture window at his ranch. Cattle, tornadoes, squatters, he could handle. Baby girls, he could not. “That’s what I really need your help on,” he admitted. “I need you to teach me how to be a father, or a mother, or any kind of parent at all.”

The admission should have been humiliating, but with Ellie, it wasn’t.

“I’m hardly an expert,” she warned.

“I took them to the zoo.” Sloan heard himself recounting one of his worst nightmares. “Neither of them would sit in their stroller. But when I tried to carry them, they kicked and squirmed to get down. I put them down—they’re both walking now—and they wouldn’t hold my hands. Thankfully they were distracted by a cotton candy vendor. I bought some for them, but they refused to sit down to eat it. Ariel threw hers and hit me in the chest with it. Alisha just cried all over hers. The animals ran scared, and everyone was looking at me like I was some kind of demon. I finally had to leave with them screaming so loud all the way out to the car, I’m surprised someone didn’t call protective services.”

He wasn’t sure, but he thought Ellie was laughing. “It wasn’t funny,” he said, breaking out in a sweat just thinking about the awful day.

“Ever thought of not giving them everything they ask for?” she finally said, her humor, if it had been there, under control.

“I don’t.”

“Okay, so when do we start?”

Wanting to pin her down before she had a second to change her mind, he asked, “Is tomorrow too soon? We have eighteen-month well-baby checks, and I won’t even bother to tell you how awful the last doctor visit was.”

“What time?” Ellie asked, all businesslike.

Sloan looked up the appointment on his calendar, and Ellie said she would take a late lunch to accommodate him.

He hung up as soon as he’d made plans to pick her up at the clinic shortly after one. And the only reason he suddenly felt fifty pounds lighter was that he finally had some help with his burden. It had nothing whatsoever to do with the fact that he had Ellie Maitland back in his life again.

He was an adult now, his self-control well and truly tested. He wouldn’t make hash of the friendship as he had in high school. Wouldn’t tarnish it, or Ellie, by giving in to his baser appetites. She was going to help him with his girls. Period.

He wasn’t going to repeat old mistakes.