Czytaj książkę: «A Baby In His In-Box»

One

“What the hell is this?”

Flynn McGannon had just hung up the phone when the whirlwind barreled into his office. “What’s what?”

“You know exactly what.” The whirlwind slapped a clipped set of papers on his desk. She pointed a royal finger at the offending documents, then at him. “There are words for men like you—starting with lazy and irresponsible. If I didn’t believe you were eventually trainable, I swear I’d fire you.”

Flynn didn’t glance at the papers. He’d bet bookies odds they were boring. His accountant, on the other hand, both kidnapped and ransomed his interest even when she wasn’t breathing hard—and at the moment Molly Weston was breathing smoke. Thoughtfully he scratched his chin. “Don’t you think firing me will be a little tricky? Considering that I own the company and you’re the employee?”

“If you think that’s a relevant argument, you’ve got another think coming. You’re not going to own anything if you don’t shape up. You’ll be in court with the IRS—and they’d be justified in throwing the book at you. Now, I know you hate numbers, but this is ridiculous. You call these scraps of paper a serious effort at keeping records?”

Truth to tell, he did. Flynn had never needed an accountant when he was poor. Who’d have guessed that his software programs would take off like lightning in the marketplace? For him, the work was fun—pure playtime—or he’d never have done it. The gold he seemed to be hauling in for the last three years was a total accident.

The other three accountants he’d tried before Molly Weston had been total accidents, too. Two guys. One woman. All three of them had quit on him in a disgusted huff, puffing out the door in their pin-stripe suits and their starched spines.

Six months ago, Molly had started out as starched as the rest of them. She’d also started out soft-voiced and sweet and so shy she was intimidated by her own shadow.

Flynn took personal credit for ruining her.

Her pale pink fingertip located a sheet with a bunch of statistics—one of her favorite things in life—and started stabbing it. “You call this a record of expenses? What is this eight hundred dollars for lunch?” she snarled at him.

“Well, actually, it wasn’t for lunch. It was for that special ergonomic chair for Ralph, because he’s got that bad knee? Only I sort of misplaced the receipt, and I knew that’d tick you off, so I thought it’d be easier to...”

“You didn’t think.” She immediately corrected him.

Since he’d heard parts of this harangue before, Flynn cocked his moccasined feet on the desk and concentrated his attention on studying her. She was pacing. To effectively pace in his office, she needed to kick the basketball out of the way and manuever around the putting green by the windows.

Initially Molly had been appalled at the whole place—but especially his office. Personally Flynn thought the plush red carpet, teak cabinets and slab of lapus lazuli desk looked appropriately expensive and executive. Obviously he’d had to add personal touches, like the basketball hoop over the door and the putting green by the far windows. His office chair was almost as good as a mistress—eleven controls, programmed and willing to massage any part of the body on command. It couldn’t compete with a woman’s hands, but a guy couldn’t have everything in a work setting.

Molly wasn’t much on vibrating chairs. Her approval rating on his customary working attire of historic jeans and moccasins wasn’t much higher. There was no real reason why the staff of five couldn’t work stark naked if they chose. Clients came from across the globe, but impromptu visits to the office were rare.

The whole staff, including himself, were creative nerds who holed up in front of their keyboards and worked whatever hours they pleased. Flynn didn’t care about any of their life-styles or clothes as long as they did their jobs.

Molly, though, was addicted to formality. She liked suits—preferably navy, black or gray, but on a real wild day she’d go for herringbone. Today she was in Priss Mode. Navy skirt, navy heels, a crisp white blouse with a neat little pin choking her at the collar. Her hair was brownish-gold, the color of rich dark tea, expertly cut just short of her shoulders in a pageboy style. Even when she was pacing around, thwacking papers, threatening his cherished body parts, agitated enough to make her hair tumble and bounce...the instant she paused, her hair fell right back into its customary smooth, silky style. Flynn figured her hair didn’t have the nerve to stay mussed.

Her eyes were brown, too, but not tea brown. More melted-chocolate brown. Soft. Emotive. Those huge eyes mirrored her vulnerability, Flynn had always thought. The oval face had more of those hopelessly vulnerable features—feathered brows, delicate cheekbones and an itsybitsy mouth that was damn near shaped perfectly—if a man had his mind on kissing her.

Flynn invariably had his mind on kissing her lately. Aw, hell. He had his mind on tussling with her between cool, smooth sheets on a nice, hard mattress. He’d gamble his Lotus she was wearing a good-girl white bra under that crisp linen blouse. He hadn’t gotten far enough to find out. Yet.

“Are you listening to me?” she demanded.

“Uh-huh. You want to know why there’s extra money in that account. And where the paperwork is to explain where it came from. I’m trying to remember,” he assured her.

“You wouldn’t have to remember if you’d just keep reasonable records from the start! My God, you’re as tough to reform as a career criminal. I’ve set up an entire system to make this easy for you. I know perfectly well that you’re deathly allergic to concepts like organization. But I can’t help you if you won’t even try to come half-way, Flynn.”

“Yes, Molly.” Even her voice aroused him. There was nothing unique in her accent—they were both immigrants to Kalamazoo, but he’d fled from Detroit and she hailed from Traverse City country, so her speech patterns were as Michigan-based as his. But there was something liquid in her voice tone. Something pure female. Something that went down as easy as honey—even when she was mopping the floor with him.

“I’m serious, you jerk. You’re inviting problems with the IRS, and there’s no excuse for it. Your business is perfectly sound, for heaven’s sake. It isn’t that complicated to express that on paper. The rest of the staff has come around like troopers. And then there’s you. What exactly is so hard with keeping some simple, basic records?”

“Honestly. I just forget—”

Oops. Forgetting was a mortal sin in her eyes—which you’d think he’d know by now. She was off again, wheeling around his desk, throwing out her right hand, then her left, in gestures to punctuate her lecture about being disgusted with him.

Flynn had been terrified she’d quit like the others—for a while. But Molly claimed quitting would make her feel guilty. If she quit, he’d have to hire someone else. That someone else would be stuck handling his idiocy. As she put it, the buck stopped with her. She was going to shape him up or die trying.

He really was trying to shape up, but Molly’s standards were rigidly exacting. About work. The two times he’d stolen a kiss from her...well. He hadn’t managed to peel off any of those immaculate linen blouses, or find out if that slim, shapely fanny was as sexy as it looked without the zealously prissy skirt. But he’d discovered something fascinating.

Man, could she kiss.

It wasn’t Flynn’s fault he couldn’t forget. She kissed like a man’s wildest erotic fantasy. Those lips molded under his as if nature had created that soft, red mouth just for him.

Molly had a bank vault of principles she never bent on. It wasn’t as if she abandoned those values, more like there was a deep emotional current running under those first locked doors.

That current could drag a man under, if he weren’t careful. At thirty-four, Flynn had never been caught by the marriage trap, but life would be no fun at all if a man were too careful.

“You’re not paying attention to me,” Molly accused him.

“Believe me, I am. Weston, you have the best set of legs in the Midwest, and probably the whole damn country. And that’s an objective opinion from a leg connoisseur.”

“McGannon!” The first day he met her, he’d thought scarlet was her natural skin color—she’d been that flushed and nervous through the whole job interview. Now, it took more effort to make a blush bloom on her cheeks, but this was a good one, a full-fledged rose. The blush was old news, but the mischievous sparkle in her eyes was a noticeably gutsy addition.

Ms. Wholesome-Weston definitely wasn’t as prim and proper as she used to be. That sparkle in her eyes, in fact, inspired him to swing his legs off the desk.

“No,” she said firmly.

“Exactly what are you saying ‘no’ to?” He stood up.

“Get that look out of your eyes, McGannon. Right now.”

He advanced a step. She not only failed to look intimidated, but she also parked two slim fists on her delectably shaped hips. Flynn could still remember how she skittered and jumped if he looked at her crossways in those first days. He’d been bluntly honest with her—she’d never last a week if she couldn’t stand up to him. In six months, she’d come a long way.

But not as far as he’d like her to. “You’ve got the same look in your eyes,” he pointed out.

“I do not.”

Yeah, she did. And that unholy sparkle in her eyes only upped in wattage when he took another step toward her. And another.

“Back off. Or you’ll have a shiner so fast it’ll make your head spin, buster.”

“Nah. You wouldn’t give me a shiner unless I earned it. And there isn’t a prayer we’d be doing this if I wasn’t sure we both liked it. All you have to do is say no and I’ll behave. I swear.”

She didn’t say no. But when she was backed up against the plush red carpeted wall, she reverted to her favorite defense. Logic. “I like this job and I don’t want to lose it.”

“That makes two of us. You’ve made yourself so totally indispensable that I’d be lost with you. I’m not joking. I mean it. I told you the day you hired on that I’m an insensitive clod—but I learn. If I do one thing to make you uncomfortable, all you have to do is say so.”

“It’s not that simple, and you know it. People comingling where they work is never a good idea. Someone gets hurt, and then someone ends up out of a job.”

“It doesn’t have to be that way. If both people are honest with each other and play by the same rules.”

“You couldn’t define ‘rule’ with a big print dictionary, Flynn. You like anarchy. Everybody doesn’t. Some people can’t just hop into bed and have everything be the same the next morning.”

“Actually I wasn’t thinking about hopping into bed. Well, not much anyway. But I do respect that you’re real strong on that rings and commitment sort of thing....” He motioned with a hand, indicating his unfamiliarity with those alien concepts. “Really, all I had in mind was a kiss. To see if the last one was some kind of aberration.”

“Aberration?”

“Yeah. You put my knickers in the twist the last time we tried this. And I don’t wear knickers. Somehow what I assumed would be a little innocent mischief turned into spontaneous combustion. I wasn’t expecting it, and to tell you the truth, I hope you won’t do it again. You may not believe this, but I’ve been around a few blocks in life—”

“I believe it.”

“—So I’m definitely not used to falling in love on a first kiss. I’m figuring you must have caught me at a weak moment. When my blood sugar was low, or I was catching a fever, something like that. But the thing is, I can’t get that last power-punched kiss off my mind. Maybe if we did it again, and the kiss turned out tepid and dull, we could both quit this nonsense and go back to working like normal.”

“Flynn...”

Flynn used the word “love” easily, Molly knew. He’d claimed to be in love with her before—her, hot peppers, a crunchy-leaf autumn day, toasted almonds, a staff member who solved a tough problem and any puppy with floppy ears. That was just yesterday. Flynn was an upbeat, boisterously effusive man. “Love” was just a word he used on a daily basis. Molly knew perfectly well he didn’t mean it seriously.

But he was standing right in front of her by then. It was a butter-soft fall day, with blinds drawn to shutter out the bright mid-afternoon October sun beating in the windows this early in the afternoon. His computer screen was flashing, his fax noisily spewing out paper, the door to his office wide-open. Molly was aware of the sun, the office textures and noises, yet all she really noticed right then was him.

She was no shrimp at five foot five, yet he towered over her by a good six inches. Flynn always looked more like the wild warriors in his Scottish ancestry than anyone respectably civilized. His eyes were as piercing as blue lasers, his shoulders beam-broad, his thick, unruly hair the color of dark cinnamon and never looked brushed. His clothes were disgraceful the same way—jeans with holes, a long-sleeved black T-shirt with a threadbare neck—the man had money to burn, yet couldn’t seem to spare a dime to dress conventionally. Doing anything conventional never seemed to occur to Flynn.

He stood there. Within pouncing distance. But he didn’t move—and wouldn’t, Molly guessed. Flynn was an unpredictable, amoral, immoral rascal, but he never crossed a certain line. Once she’d made a teasing comment about sexual harassment, and startling her completely, he’d sobered faster than a judge and sat down with her for the next three hours. He’d listened, but Molly could see he honestly didn’t get it. That he had power. That he was a boss. He seemed to think of his owning the company as accidental, and unfailingly treated the staff as if they were a team of all equal players, with his vote weighing no more than anyone else’s. Flynn’s management style didn’t fit in any rule book she knew, but sexual harassment never even crossed her mind in a teasing way once she knew him. His code of behavior around women was crystal-clear.

He’d never tried that first kiss, never made any sort of move, until she’d invited it. He never intruded anywhere near a woman’s principles or choices.

Unless she were willing.

And let him know she was willing.

Those damn blue eyes of his were waiting. A kiss simmered between them like an untasted stew, the scent tantalizing, the hunger aroused by the possibilities.

Molly mused that she’d heard him call himself homely once.

Possibly he even believed it—heaven knew, his clothes reflected a total blindness or lack of perception about his physical appearance. Technically the blunt chin and craggy nose and broad-planed bones fit no classic claim to handsomeness... but he was still the sexiest man she knew. Those blue eyes could caress a woman before he’d even touched her; the mouth could tempt a nun to jettison her vows and jump him. The problem with Flynn—one of many—was that he loved everything about being a man, and it showed. He couldn’t seem to help being dangerous. That compelling, earthy sexuality was downright impossible to ignore, and God knew, she’d tried.

“You stalling, Ms. Weston?” he murmured.

“Yes.”

“You thinking about it? Whether you want me to kiss you or whether you want to knock my block off?”

“Yes.”

“Are you going to let me know before November what you decide?”

Maybe she needed that whole month, Molly thought desperately. Her decision should have been cut and dried, but somehow it wasn’t. Six months ago, if anyone suggested she could conceivably fall in love with a man like Flynn McGannon, she’d have checked herself into a funny farm for immediate shock treatments.

He was a bellower. A man who expressed both humor and temper at the same roaring volume. He worked like a slave, played like a glutton, intimidated strangers and clients both with his booming voice and unpredictable moods—and then invariably acted confounded why anybody would be afraid of him.

Molly knew precisely why she was.

He was too sexy for her. Too sexy, too self-centered, too dare-the-world wild, too everything that she wasn’t. She wanted a husband, children, a family. Not an affair with a man who was bluntly honest about his terror of wedding rings. Flynn loved risk. She honestly hated it. He saw every day as a free-wheeling adventure. She was a list-maker.

Nothing could come from kissing him but trouble. Heartache. A woman as sane as she was—and the whole world knew Molly Weston was practical and hopelessly straitlaced—simply had more brains than to hurl herself off a cliff without a parachute.

But he tempted her. Like no man ever had. It was those eyes. It was that nasty, simmering, electric thing that shimmered in the air between them. It was that daredevil zest for life that captivated her, and made crazy ideas fester in her mind—like that she’d regret it forever if she never made love with him. Like that she might only have this one chance. Like that maybe everyone should have the right, just once in life, to do something foolish and impulsive....

She heard sudden commotion from outside his office. A door slamming. Voices raised. Pandemonium wasn’t uncommon in the workday at McGannon’s, but something registered in her mind as off-kilter. Still, she couldn’t look away from the heat in Flynn’s gaze. Didn’t want to.

He wanted her. Maybe Flynn desired a couple hundred women—possibly even in the same day—but the whole sensation was new to Molly. She’d never felt washed in the warm liquid gaze of a man’s desire, bold, nakedly honest, dangerous, magnetic. She’d never figured out how the patooties she’d ever stirred his interest. Most men pegged her accurately and swiftly—she was a conventional woman, a picture-straightener, an obsessive list-maker, attractive enough but in a nice way. Everyone knew she was nice, for Pete’s sake. It was probably going to be on her epitaph.

Not him. He looked at her like she was Christie Brinkley who’d just popped in to strip for him. Or like she was a succulent choice bit of lobster and he’d just come off a week’s fast. She knew that was all nuts—but something went haywire in her perceptions around Flynn. Never mind what was real. How he made her feel was painfully real enough.

She’d been falling in love with him for months now. Denying it. Making excuses—calling it hormones, calling it PMS, calling it an affection that had naturally developed from working with a fascinating man every day. She’d been calling it every word under the sun but the one she was afraid was true.

Her hand lifted. Fingers already curving to the shape of his neck.

He saw. That slow, wicked grin of his faded. His face almost turned grave—and Flynn rarely took anything in life too seriously. His gaze shifted from her eyes to her mouth, the playfulness disappearing from his expression. This kiss would be different, she sensed.

The other ones really hadn’t been without a parachute. But this one might be.

Still her hand raised higher, until her fingers were bare, naked inches from touching him. Her heart was suddenly pounding, pounding.

Until she heard the bellowing wail of a baby.

Molly stepped back, startled, just as a woman barreled into Flynn’s office. And not just a woman, but a baby— a pumpkin-shaped squirt of maybe a year old, who was squirming in every direction and announcing loudly to the world that he was unhappy. The woman was flustered and distraught, trying to juggle the eel of a baby and baby gear and a flapping purse.

“Flynn, damn you. No one wanted to even let me see you...I practically had to battle past a nutcase in a bathrobe at the front desk—”

Molly froze for a second. Flynn whirled around. Bailey shot in just behind the woman, his face flushed like a brick—and yes, he was wearing a bathrobe over his clothes. Bailey was one of Flynn’s brilliant creative nerds; very sweet, just a little goofy. When he had a creative challenge inspiring him, he wore his lucky robe. No one paid attention, not even Molly anymore. Bailey never voluntarily met the public, because nerves brought out his stutter—and he was stuttering painfully, trying to explain to Flynn how the lady had barged past him.

Molly heard that conversation, but she wasn’t really listening. The intrusion was just so bizarre.

The woman dropped a diaper bag on the carpet. Then she plunked down the baby with the same kind of exasperated attitude. The baby, let free, quit bellowing and squirming and promptly took off on all fours.

“What on earth... ?” Flynn reached behind him to yank the blinds open further. Cheerful sunlight instantly poured in, but didn’t seem to illuminate anything that was going on. Flynn wasn’t easily thrown by any brand or flavor of surprises. His bushy eyebrows lifted in question, but initially his expression showed more intrigue than concern over the mystery woman’s arrival.

Molly didn’t catch the lady’s face until she straightened back up. Golden hair billowed around her shoulders then. A red sweater hugged a top-heavy bust; poured-on jeans showed off several miles of slim legs. Her face might have been strikingly pretty, if there hadn’t been huge shadows under the eyes and drawn lines around the mouth.

“Don’t you ‘What on earth’ me, Flynn McGannon. And don’t even try claiming not to recognize me.” Either fury or nerves made her voice shrill. Molly could see the skilled effort with makeup, but it didn’t conceal the pallor of her skin or the exhausted dark eyes.

“I didn’t claim anything. But I honestly don’t know...” Flynn was frowning now, studying her hard.

“Virginie,” she snapped. “Tuscon. The Silver Buckle. Add up thirteen months—the age of your son—and the nine months I carried him, and maybe that night’ll come back to you. You were with some party. I was with some party. But the only party that mattered was the one that ended up back at my place. Chivas was your drink that night, as I recall. Unfortunately, I recall more than that. You were a hell of a lover, you cretin. But no man’s worth the price you cost me.”

“Son?” Flynn echoed blankly, and then wildly shook his head. “That isn’t possible. You said you were protected—”

“Ha. So suddenly you do remember that night—and if it isn’t just like a man to remember the part that gives him an excuse. And at the time, I was. On the pill. But I missed a couple—and before you tell me that was my fault, let me tell you that I don’t give a damn. That doesn’t make the baby any less your responsibility—”

“Look, if you’d just try to calm down...you can’t just show up out of the blue, making claims that you seem to expect me to instantly believe—”

Virginie didn’t try responding to that. She seemed on a one-track road, the words spilling out of her at cyclone speed. “Your son’s name is Dylan. And he’s all yours as of this minute. You don’t know what I’ve been through. You can’t even guess. My life’s been a nonstop nightmare from the instant this child was conceived. I was sick. Lost my job. He had colic and he doesn’t sleep and I’m about to lose my apartment and I can’t do it anymore. Right now I don’t even have a way to feed him—”

“Wait a minute. Wait a minute, just slow down—”

“The hell I will. And don’t waste your breath offering me money because this isn’t about money. It’s about everything. I never figured you’d want to know you were a father, but that’s just tough. Every woman on earth isn’t cut out for motherhood. I gave it a shot—you don’t know how hard I gave it a shot—but nothing’s working out. I can’t do it anymore, and you’re responsible for this. It took me forever to find you—”

Molly had never seen Flynn lose color before. Normally when he was upset, he got noisy, not quiet. But he raked a hand through his hair and looked dead-quiet now. “Surely you realize this is impossible? You can’t just barge in here and claim I’m the father of a child. I can see you’re upset, but if you’d just calm down—”

“I’m not calming down. I’m leaving. You. With your son.”

“It’s not my son.” Flynn’s baritone could have carried to the next county. So could the blonde’s shrill soprano.

“Oh, yeah it is. I know it is. And if you’ll look back twenty-one months ago, you’ll know it is. If not, there has to be some blood test or something that’ll prove it to you—because believe me, it will.” She snatched up her tote-size purse again, but withdrew a folder from it and tossed it on his desk. Pictures spilled out. What looked like medical records, maybe a birth certificate. “I need a job. I need a place to live. I need a chance at life again, and I’m going after it The baby ruined everything I ever had. He’s your problem from this minute on.”

When she spun around, Flynn lurched toward her. “Wait a minute. For God’s sake, you can’t just walk out of here—”

“Watch me.”

Molly couldn’t seem to unfreeze. The whole scene was just so unreal. The frantic-faced woman and the whole yelling match couldn’t have taken five minutes. She stormed back out of the office as fast as she’d stormed in.

Flynn hiked after her. Molly had never seen his complexion turn that ashen gray before. She heard his booming voice from the hall, fading as the two of them reached the front doors. There wasn’t another sound in the entire office—not because Flynn’s handful of staff weren’t there, but likely because everyone had been listening as intently to the whole scene no differently than she had.

It took a few seconds before Molly could seem to gather her wits. And another second before she abruptly realized that the infamous “Virginie” had left a package behind her.

The baby had been padding around on all fours, fanny in the air, crawling at cruising speeds that could probably earn him a ticket on the freeway.

Temporarily, though, the baby was nowhere in sight.

And no one seemed to give a damn.