Somebody to Love (7 page)

James cleared his throat. “Sign here, and then initial here… .” Her hair smelled so good, all clean and flowery.
Don’t go there, idiot,
his conscience advised.
Right, right,
he agreed. Her skin was perfect. Beautiful hands.

She signed with brisk efficiency and didn’t look at him when she gave the papers back.

“Lucy was wondering if she could come by,” Ethan said.

“Absolutely,” Parker answered. “I already told her that.”

“You’re not too tired?”

“Are you kidding? I feel like a superhero.” She grinned up at the baby’s father.

“You
are
a superhero,” he answered, smiling back.

A nurse came in. “How’s it going, Mom?” she barked.

“Great,” Parker answered.

“Good! I need to check those stitches, then I’ll leave you in peace.”

The dad went over to the chair, murmuring to the burrito.

James, idiotically, didn’t move. He was having trouble thinking. Those eyes were so…the whole face, so…

“Thing One? I’d rather not have you see my episiotomy,” Parker said. “If you don’t mind, of course.”

Shit. “Right, no. Sorry. Congratulations, you two,” he said and, with that, got out of there. Went home and did a Google search, saw her books. Ordered a bunch. Sent them to Mare. Got a pleasant thank-you note from her about a month later.
Thank you for the rabbit you gave Nicky. It was very thoughtful. Best, Parker Welles.

Harry didn’t visit his grandson until the baby was three months old. He asked James to come with him, stayed at Grayhurst for forty-five minutes, then informed Parker that he and James had a business dinner. “You sure you don’t want to stay a little longer?” James had murmured in the great front hall as they put on their coats. Harry had held the baby for approximately thirty seconds.

“My daughter’s a little intense,” Harry had said tightly. “Baby’s a good-looking boy, though, don’t you think?”

“Oh, definitely,” James answered. Thus ended the conversation, and while James was curious, he knew better than to bite the hand that fed not just him, but Mary Elizabeth, as well.

From that point on, Harry began sending James to family events. Even when Harry did show up, he’d call James and ask him to come, as well. No matter how much James tried to subtly protest, to hint that family was family, Harry was insistent, and so James ended up at quite a few Nicky-related events—christening, birthdays—always on the edges, always uncomfortable.

Parker would greet him and say goodbye. That was about it. She was civil, though she continued to call him Thing One, and after a while, James adopted a somewhat wry attitude at those dreaded family gatherings. He worked for Harry, the end. But he’d watch Parker, see that she made her kid’s birthday cake herself, clearly adored him, made sure he thanked James for whatever gift he’d brought. She treated Ethan’s family warmly, even though she never did marry the guy. And she worked for a living, writing those books, giving all that money away. Not your typical trust-fund baby.

And then there was that one time—

“Watch it, idiot,” he said as a driver with Massachusetts plates blazed by at an easy ninety miles an hour. “And you, idiot,” he added to himself, “should really think about something else. You’re here to help Harry’s daughter flip a house. No more.”

CHAPTER SIX

O
NCE
UPON
A
TIME
,
there was a family of chipmunks who found a lovely, clean place to live for the winter. They climbed inside and got all snugly and fell asleep. Then, alas, someone started their home, which was actually the engine of a car, and they were pulverized in their sleep. But they went to animal heaven, so it wasn’t a total wash.

The Holy Rollers sighed with deep satisfaction. “Save it,” Parker muttered, putting aside the red notebook she always carried in case inspiration struck. Chipmunk puree would probably not sell, no matter how much her publisher wanted a new series. As for herself, she would not be recommending an overnight in a car anytime soon. Not comfy, no, sir. She’d woken at the horrible crack of morning and had been, quite honestly, avoiding going inside the house again. But it was now 7:14 a.m. Couldn’t pretend she was working on a story, couldn’t avoid the day ahead of her.

She checked her phone; too early in California for Nicky to call her, of course—it was still practically the middle of the night there. Thing One hadn’t bothered calling her back, she noted with irritation. Of course, he’d probably found another job by now, since Harry was in jail.

The thought that Harry was actually in prison gave her pause. She’d called him twice so far; both times, the conversation had lasted less than three minutes. Harry was as busy in prison as he’d been on Wall Street, it seemed. No time for that pesky daughter of his. He had, she admitted, asked after Nicky. At least there was that.

At that very minute, her phone chimed, startling her so badly that she dropped it.
Harrington, L.,
the screen said. “Hello?”

“Yeah, hi,” said a horrible voice. “Is this Pahkah?” For a second, Parker thought it was the guy from last night—Malone—but of course, he wouldn’t have her number.

“Excuse me?” Parker said, running a hand over the back of her head. Her hair was matted.

“Ah you Pahkah?”

“Oh! Um, yes. I’m Parker.” Man. That was some accent.

“This is Lavinnyer Harintin.”

Lavinnyer…aha! The caller was her distant cousin! Lavinia Harrington.

“Hi!” Parker said. “Right! How are you?”

“Word has it you’re here in town,” Lavinia said.

“I am. I got in last night.”

“Where’d you sleep?”

“Um…in the car.”

Lavinia laughed, a dark, horrible sound that ended in a hacking cough. “Is that right? Quite a shit-nest you gawt there, isn’t it?”

Parker tried to smile. “That’s a pretty accurate description.”

There was a sucking sound…Lavinia had to be smoking, and with a voice like that, had been smoking three packs of Camel cigarettes a day since the age of four months. “Welp,” she said, exhaling, “you wanna meet sometime this week? Seems like we should lay eyes on each other.”

“That’d be great,” Parker said. Honestly, she had no idea where to start with this house, and Lavinia could probably give her some names and places.

“Wanna come to the diner for breakfast tomorrow?” Lavinia suggested.

“Sure,” Parker said. A real breakfast with eggs and bacon. Beat the two Nutri-Grain bars she’d had an hour ago.

“Know where it is? Joe’s?”

“I passed it yesterday.”

“Good. See you tomorrow.”

Parker got out of the car carefully; if she’d been stiff yesterday, she was practically crippled today.

Eyeballing the house in front of her, Parker decided it looked even worse than last night, if possible. It had a water view, yes. The cove spread out before her, Douglas Point to the north, the harbor to the south. So that was a plus, the view. The house…eesh.

Well, nothing to do but face the music. She got her toiletries bag from her suitcase and, pushing through the long grass, went inside. Her bird friend from last night seemed to be gone, thank God. She left the door open just in case.

Clearly she’d need to rent a Dumpster and buy some seriously sturdy trash bags. Almost everything in here would need to be thrown away. She winced, picturing trash stuffed in her beloved Volvo. But cleaning the house out would show her what she had to work with, at least. Maybe it could be a jewel. She really needed it to be a jewel.

She went into the bathroom and turned on the faucet. Right. No water. Sighing, she brushed her teeth dry and combed her hair, trying not to touch anything in the bathroom. This would be first on her list of things to scour.

She turned to leave, figuring she’d put on a clean shirt in the car, rather than inside, when she felt something at her ankle…a tickle.

She looked down. Nothing there. Just an itch, she decided, from being in this house of crap.

Nope, there it was again, right under her ankle bone. A mosquito? She shook her foot. Nothing.

Then, horribly, the tickle moved. Moved
up.

“What the hell?” she hissed, shaking the leg of her jeans. If that was a cockroach, she’d die.

The tickle moved up again. Faster this time, toward her knee.

“Shit!” Parker said, flapping her pants. “Get out!”

The tickle was now past her knee…and it had a lump. It was a lumpy, warm tickle.

“Nooo!” Parker shrieked, jumping up and down. The lumpy tickle zipped around to the back of her leg, then across her
ass
and around to the other side, and with that, Parker ripped open her pants and there it was, a
mouse
in her
pants.
Its eyes were huge and terrified and Parker heard a scream rip through the air—
her
scream—and the tiny rodent—rodent!—leaped, practically flying through the air, and landed in the pile in the tub.

Parker ripped off the jeans, dimly hearing herself shrieking, and ran out of the house, through the grass and right up onto the hood of her car. “Bugger! Bugger! Jeesh!” she yelped. Her jeans were clutched in her hand. What if there were more in there? What if a whole family of rodents was in her jeans right now?
Once there was a family of mice who loved to snuggle up against the warm flesh of an unwitting human.
She whipped the pants against the car, cracking them against the hood again and again and again, shrieking at the remembered feeling of tiny claws. On her leg. Her skin. On her
ass!

“Hey, Parker” came a voice. She kept cracking. “Parker?”

She looked up, her breath stuttering in and out of her chest.

Thing One. Thing One was here.

“Hi,” he said, as if she wasn’t murdering her jeans against the hood. “How’s it going?”

“There was a mouse in my pants.”

He raised an eyebrow and smiled. “Lucky mouse.”

Her breath caught. Wrong thing to say. Wrong. “It’s pretty traumatic to have a
rodent
in your pants, Thing One,” she snapped. “Unless you like that sort of thing.”

“Oh, hey, sorry, princess,” he said, approaching her car. “Didn’t mean to make light of your tragedy.”

“There was a
mouse
in my
pants,
” she blurted. “It’s bad enough, okay? I mean, do you see that house? That’s mine! I own it! And I was doing fine, I wasn’t panicking or anything, even when that fricking
bird
flew into my hair last night but a
mouse—
I…I can’t have Nicky here! That place is infested!”

“Okay, okay,” he said. “Settle down. You are aware that you’re not wearing pants, right?” Another quirked eyebrow. “Not that I’m complaining.”

She looked down at him, her throat working. She could murder him and throw his body in the water. Or she could put on her pants. She took a shaky breath. “I’m not…eager to put them back on. In case the mouse had cousins.”

“Well, here. Let me check.” Thing One took the jeans from her and turned them inside out, then shook them vigorously. Checked the pockets, too. “Nothing.”

“I saw it. It was there. It ran all the way up this leg, then across my butt, then God knows where it was headed.” His mouth twitched. Did he think this was funny? This was not funny! “It’s not funny, Thing One.”

“Well. It’s gone now.” He looked down. She suspected he was smiling. Idiot.

“It’s in the tub,” she said, giving the jeans a last shake before pulling them on. “You can go find it. Maybe it’ll crawl up your pants and we can compare notes.”

“How was your trip up?” he asked, and really, what kind of a question was that when they were sitting in front of a hovel?

“It was lovely, Thing One. This house, however, is a sty.”

He looked at the house for a long moment, then back at her. “Well. Good thing I’m here, then.”

Right. It suddenly dawned on her that he was
here.
A familiar face, at least. Something moved in Parker’s chest. She looked away, but no, there was the mouse-infested house. The harbor. Better. Nice view.

“All right. Let’s see what we’re up against.”

Thing One went into the house, and Parker heard a few clunks and thunks. She sat on the hood of the Volvo, her panic fading gradually into the occasional shudder. A rodent running up her leg…
there
was a sensation a person wouldn’t forget, right up there with an episiotomy.

Her father’s attorney emerged a minute later. Now that she wasn’t screaming, she noticed he looked…different. It took a minute to figure out why.

He wasn’t wearing a suit. First time ever she’d seen him out of— Well, this was the first time ever she’d seen him in jeans and a T-shirt, that was for sure.

Parker looked away and cleared her throat. “So what are you doing here, Thing One?”

He sat on the hood next to her. “Since I’m devoting the next few weeks to overhauling this dump, Parker, you think you could call me by my real name?”

“I seem to have forgotten it.” There. She was getting her old vibe back. Good.

He smiled slowly, his dark eyes crinkling. Dangerous, those eyes. “Again?”

“Is it John? Jason?”

“It’s James. James Francis Xavier Cahill.”

Goose bumps broke out along her arms. It was chilly. Or something. “So what are you doing here, James?”

“Your father asked me to come up.”

Right. James was an obedient pet; she’d give him that. She didn’t say anything for a minute, just pulled her knees to her chin and wrapped her arms around her legs. “How’s he doing?”

“He’s okay.”

She’d bet her left arm James got more than three minutes on the phone with her father. She sighed. “So. This place. Did you know how bad it was?”

He shook his head. “I called my uncle this morning to ask about a security code, and he told me it was kind of a dump. I didn’t think it’d be this bad, but I can help you out.”

She really needed the Army Corps of Engineers, from the look of it. “So law school trained you to overhaul a house, Thing One? I know you’re good at emptying trust funds, but carpentry?” There. Hopefully that would erase the edge he’d gained from having seen her hysterical and in her panties.

He gave her a look of his own. “Nothing I did was illegal, Parker. Your father had the right to do what he wanted with those trust funds, because you gave him that right. You signed papers letting him have full authority over every penny. And even if I’d wanted to say something—which I did—attorney-client privilege prevented me.”

“Wow. You’re a great guy. Maybe my dad will give you a sticker.”

He ignored that. “At any rate, my father was a builder. I worked on a construction crew summers when I was in college. Do you really want to kick me out because you don’t like me?”

She felt her jaw locking. She’d be an idiot to send him away.

He took her silence as protest. “Look. Aside from hauling all this crap to the dump, you’ll need to reshingle the entire exterior. The roof needs to be replaced, the gutter’s hanging off the front, the chimney is crumbling. I’m guessing there’s dry rot under the linoleum in the kitchen, the cupboards are pulling away from the walls, and the stairs down to the dock are a death trap. The back door frame is warped. You probably need some significant rewiring, not to mention a new paint job inside.” He paused. “I happen to find myself free this summer.”

“Where would you stay?” she asked.

“Here.”

“Here? Where here? In the Harbor Suite?”

“Actually, we can get a lot of this stuff cleared out pretty fast. I already have a Dumpster being delivered today.”

He did? “How’d you do that?” she asked.

“My uncle lined one up.”

This summer was supposed to be about doing things on her own, a fresh start. The plan had been to take sheets off aging but lovely furniture and paint the sunroom. The plan was to meet George Clooney before his boat went down in a hundred-foot wave, have a fling, then welcome Nicky for a few weeks of blueberry picking and sailing.

It was not to have her father’s minion living with her.

But she hadn’t realized what she was up against. “Well, you can’t stay here. What about your uncle’s place?”