Page 13 of Marrying the Nanny

She would do anything, including teach three reluctant alpha men to wipe a bottom, but she felt exactly as filled with despair as when the doctor had told her she would never get pregnant. She was a good person. Why did the universe not want her to have a baby in her life?

“You’re the reason I’m giving them a chance at all.” Harpreet gave Emma’s arm a light squeeze. “I like the way you’re standing up for Storm. I hope you can bring them around. The health nurse will come by in a few days. I’ll check in by phone. The men have my card, but you take one, too. Good luck.”

*

Wilf Fraser had instilled in all three of his sons that they were crew, not cargo. Their father might not have had much taste for the hard work of marriage, but he’d never shied from the physical kind. His sons had been expected to lean in and always had.

Thus, Reid was unsurprised when he turned from lifting the hatch on the back of his rented SUV to find his brothers right behind him with the bags Emma’s taxi driver had left on the sidewalk.

How many times a day did the kid crap out her drawers to need this many diapers? He pushed his carry-on case aside and stowed the shopping, leaving room for the luggage his brothers would collect from their hotels.

His mother knew he would be tied up making arrangements, but she would still expect a call. Reid had no idea what to tell her. He didn’t want to get into the financial issues, especially because she thought a check was already in the mail, not that she strictly needed it. Wilf’s payments had always kept her comfortable, and Reid topped up to ensure she could take a warm vacation at least once a year and provided other extras that kept her as stress free as possible. He even paid for private therapy sessions and a housekeeper who kept her house as spotless as her anxiety desired it.

A lump sum out of Raven’s Cove was something Reid wanted for her on principle. Miriam Fraser had been cheated in many ways. Rather than recognizing she needed diagnosis and care, Reid’s grandfather had married her off, making her mood swings Wilf’s problem, no longer his own. To be fair, the old man had had terminal cancer. Maybe he’d thought that anyone was better than no one, but it had still been a lousy match.

The old man had died shortly after the wedding, and Wilf had promptly sunk Miriam’s inheritance into a venture she opposed. While she’d still been nursing her newborn, he had taken her to a remote island where he let her build her dream home to the tune of a ridiculous mortgage. Her emotional swings became more than Wilf could handle, though. He had sought comfort with the cook at the pub where he spent the bulk of his time. Miriam stormed off to Victoria with Reid where she tried to handle motherhood alone.

The expression “set up for failure” applied tenfold. No amount of money would fix her sense of betrayal over her husband’s affair and, later, losing her son to him, but a gesture of compensation might provide some of the closure she longed for.

Reid dreaded telling her the money might not ever show up. It was more of what she’d already suffered at Wilf’s hands and was liable to spark a spiral like she hadn’t had in years.

He sighed as Emma came out of the lobby pushing a stroller. A baby, for the love of Mike.

Reid wasn’t afraid to put his back and his own money into Raven’s Cove, especially if it meant his mother might see a settlement after all. But a baby? He just couldn’t.

Emma had the bag with the changing items over one shoulder and a student backpack on her other. She was trying to shake an umbrella open with one hand, hanging on to the stroller with the other.

“This is a day trip for you?” he asked, striding forward to relieve her of the bags.

“I thought we might be here overnight. Or…” He almost didn’t hear the rest. “Storm would go somewhere else.” Her stricken expression bumped up against his latent suspicion she might be after Storm’s inheritance.

Of course, that begged the question, What inheritance? The fact she’d come back after hearing what dire financial straits the place was in suggested she was genuinely attached to the kid.

He was counting on her being driven by coin to some extent, though. The social worker had delivered a stern lecture on what the government expected. He had nodded agreement but had been planning the whole time to grease Emma’s palms as much as necessary until they found a permanent solution.

He might have to go back to Raven’s Cove to lay his father to rest and tidy up whatever state he’d left things in, but he would not live that man’s life there.

Emma unclipped the baby carrier out of the stroller. Trystan took the stroller by the handles and squeezed a lever.

“This collapses, doesn’t it?”

“That’s the brake.” The rest of what Emma said was muffled as she transferred the car seat out of the rain and into the back seat of the SUV. She straightened.

“You should watch how I do this.” She reached in again and her ass thrust out.

Yeah, Reid was on that, gaze crashing into those curves even as his brain told him to stop it. He glanced to see if Logan had caught him. The dirtbag was also examining the pattern on Emma’s seat pockets.

“You getting all that?” Reid asked with a glower.

Logan shrugged, rueful. “Modern engineering is a marvel.”

“We’re going to need ground rules.” Reid elbowed Logan back a step so he could see what Emma was doing. Rule one, No one sleeps with the nanny. He would personally roast any nuts that hadn’t rolled far enough away from Wilf’s tree of mistakes.

Emma climbed in beside the car seat. Trystan was still screwing with the stroller.

“Really?” Logan said with disgust. “You can pack a parachute, but you can’t fold a stroller? Give it to me.”

“No, I got it,” Trystan insisted, but he didn’t have it.

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