Kathie DeNosky – The Millionaires' Club: David, Clint & Travis: Entangled with a Texan / Locked up with a Lawman / Remembering One Wild Night (страница 4)
David waited in his car until the baby store unlocked and opened its doors, then he and other customers rushed inside. Feeling lost, he hurried down aisles past tiny dresses and small suits until he reached a section with diapers, little shirts and rattles. While he was searching for a clerk, Autumn began to cry.
“Oh, please don’t cry,” David said. Frantically, he hunted for a clerk, turning a corner and starting up another aisle, jiggling Autumn in his arms as she refused the bottle and continued crying.
“Little baby, don’t cry!” David was desperate. He hadn’t shaved this morning and was barely dressed; he’d thrown on whatever shirt he could grab and old jeans. He suspected his hair was sticking straight up in the air, but that was of small consequence at the moment.
“Aw, Autumn, baby, don’t cry,” he pleaded. He heard someone moving and saw a clerk bending down behind a counter. He rushed for her as if he were drowning at sea and had spotted a raft.
“Can you help me?” he asked, hoping he didn’t sound too alarmed.
The clerk straightened, and David stared at her in shock while she gazed back wide-eyed at him.
Two
The woman was wearing a pink sunbonnet the likes of which he had seen only in movies or in pictures of his great-great-grandmother. She had on a flowered, frilly dress covered with lace and pink velvet bows. Her dark blond hair was tied in long pigtails with pink bows and each cheek had bright rose circles. Her lashes looked too thick for her to be able to open her eyes, black feathery lashes that framed lively chocolate-brown eyes that gazed at him with a curious intensity. She had a luscious, deep red rosebud mouth.
In turn, Marissa Wilder gaped at David Sorrenson, taking in all six feet two inches of the ruggedly handsome man. Her heart thumped faster, and her temperature rose. How old had she been when he’d first had this effect on her? She was probably eleven years old. At eighteen, he had barely known she was alive. As a matter of fact, she suspected that right now he didn’t have a clue who she was. But was he a sight for female eyes! More handsome than ever with his thick, wavy raven hair and sexy sea-green eyes.
Then she became aware of the tiny baby in his arms. The little one was bawling at the top of its lungs and he simply stood there and looked helpless and desperate. Where was the man’s wife? Coming out of her spell, Marissa reached out.
“Let me hold your baby,” she said, taking the infant from his hands.
“Is there a microwave oven in this store where I can heat a bottle for her?” he asked. He fumbled in the brown paper sack he was carrying and fished out a bottle.
“Yes, there is,” Marissa answered, taking the bottle and motioning to him to follow her. David trailed after her to a tiny lounge with chairs covered in yellow vinyl and signs to employees lining the walls. He watched her warm the bottle and then take it out of the microwave to give it to the baby.
She cuddled the baby in her arms and placed the bottle close, letting the nipple touch the baby’s cheek. The little one turned her head the fraction needed, found the nipple and began to suck.
Quiet settled and Marissa gazed down at the baby. Longing filled her. How much she wanted her own baby! She yearned for a child. She forgot the man watching her as all her attention settled on the child. Yielding to her imagination, she wished the baby was her own precious darling.
“You’re a natural with her,” said a deep voice that yanked her out of her reverie, and she looked up into green eyes that now were fully focused on her. David Sorrenson looked as if he wanted to devour her, and her breath caught.
“A natural?”
“With babies,” he said, nodding his head as he looked at the baby in her arms.
“Oh, well, I’ve been around a lot of them. I have one niece and three nephews and two younger sisters,” Marissa answered. “She’s a precious baby. Where’s your wife?”
“I’m not married. And she’s not my baby. Well, she is for now.”
Marissa stared at him, realizing the man was distraught. This was rather shocking, because she had been to more than a few football games when he had been a senior and quarterback of the Royal High team and he had always remained cool and unflappable. She had been much younger, but she had heard her older sisters talk about him and she had seen him play football. She studied him. He needed a shave. His shirt wasn’t buttoned correctly. He ran his fingers through his tangled mop of black hair while he continued to stare at her as if she were a bug under a microscope.
“Are you married?” he blurted.
“No, I’m not,” she answered, beginning to wonder if he was under some kind of mental pressure that was causing him distress. “I’m divorced.”
Her answer seemed to relieve him, but she couldn’t imagine why, because she knew all too well, he didn’t want a date. He thrust out his hand.
“I’m David Sorrenson.”
“Yes, I know,” Marissa said, feeling her hand enveloped in his large, warm one. The contact was as disturbing to her jangled nerves as his steadfast gaze. “You were in school with one of my older sisters. I’m Marissa Wilder. You were in high school with Karen.”
“You don’t say. I didn’t recognize you. You’re a natural with babies, though. And you seem to like them.”
“I love babies,” she said softly, looking at the little girl in her arms. “What’s her name?”
“Autumn,” he replied.
“Autumn. That’s a lovely name. How old is she?”
“Five to ten days probably, give or take a few.”
“Something like that. Have you worked here long?”
“About two years,” she said. If she didn’t know whom she was talking to, she would summon the store security guard. David’s questions were weird, and she clearly recollected a lot of female discussion through the years about David Sorrenson. Never once had the description “weird” been included.
“Would you like a job as a nanny?” he blurted. “I need one badly and I’ll pay extremely well. Whatever you’re making here, I’ll triple it.”
After moments of silence ticked past, Marissa realized she was staring at him with her mouth open. Dumbstruck by his offer, she was momentarily speechless. “Triple my salary?” she repeated finally.
“Yes. You seem to know how to deal with a baby and I don’t. I need help.”
If it had been anyone else on earth, Marissa would have sent him packing, but for the better part of seventeen years of her twenty-eight-year-old life, she had had a schoolgirl crush on David Sorrenson. Once again, she was speechless. Work for him? Triple her salary?
“This is sort of sudden. Do you mean to come to your house every day?”
“No. I mean to live in my house and care for Autumn daily.”
“Oh!”
“What’s that?” he asked sharply, studying her even more closely.
Her brain began to function again. “I’m sorry, but I can’t do that. My folks are out of the country, and I take care of my grandmother and my younger sisters.”
“Maybe they can all move to my house. How old are your sisters?”
“My grandmother won’t move,” she replied, thinking he had the most sinfully seductive eyes she had ever seen. Cool, clear green with a thick fringe of long, black lashes. “Greta is a junior in college, and Dallas is a senior in high school.”
“The junior in college is old enough to take care of your grandma and your youngest sister.”
“Well, that’s true,” Marissa reasoned. “When do you want someone to go to work for you?”
“This morning.”
Again she stared at him. The man’s mind must have slipped a cog in the past few years. Although, physically, he still looked extremely well put together. Those were very broad shoulders. “I have a job. I can’t walk out on the store.”
“I’ll pay you to walk out. I’ll talk to the manager and straighten it out with him,” David said decisively. “I’ll give you an extra thousand-dollar bonus to leave your job this morning.”
“A thousand dollars? Just like that?” She stared at him, still stunned by his sudden offer and his snap decisions.
“Just like that. I’m desperate,” he replied.
“I’m beginning to believe you are.” Her head swam now. He had stepped into her world and turned it upside down. Triple her salary. Live with David Sorrenson. A thousand dollars. She had heard the man had retired from Air Force Special Operations. He was independently wealthy, living on his ranch. There were two or three women in town whom he had been seen with—wealthy, sophisticated beauties. Marissa hadn’t heard any remarks about his mental condition. Or that he had a baby.
Triple her salary. A thousand dollars. Live in his house. The offer spun in her thoughts repeatedly. That last thing—live in his house—she knew she should avoid, because that was the road to heartbreak. As distraught as he was and as rumpled and unshaved and uncombed, he was still a hunk. But weird. On the other hand, enjoy the moment, she thought.
“I don’t know about leaving my job right this minute,” she replied cautiously, her mind racing over the possibilities. “This is a drastic decision. I think you and I need to sit down and discuss your offer.”