I can’t do this. Guilt wracks me, clamping my chest like a vice as I spin my wedding ring. There’s no way this can work if I can’t concentrate and maintain authority in my own damned house. I make up my mind, I’ll be nice, I’ll let her down gently. I’ll call the agency and ask for someone… else. We should have just gone through the interview process instead of trying to rush it, and then I could’ve discounted her earlier, but then her eyes find mine again and I’m lost.
‘Daddy?’ says my middle daughter, Willow. She’s crept up beside us, her little voice snapping me out of it and for a moment I tense until she says. ‘Are you just gonna stand there? It’s rude to stare.’
‘Sure,’ I say. ‘My apologies, Miss Miller. Please, come in.’
‘Thank you, sir,’ she says, stepping forward and over the threshold. I’m about to say something dumb about calling me Blake, but the moment she’s inside, Harper bolts for the door and slams it shut.
‘Do you wanna come see my bedroom?’ she says, grabbing the girl’s hand. ‘I have a real-life unicorn.’
‘Hold up, Harpy,’ I say as she grins. ‘Let’s get Miss Miller a drink first and have a little chat. Then maybe we can show her around.’
‘Okaaay,’ she says, crestfallen. ‘But the unicorn might poop.’
Mackenzie laughs, shaking her head as her cheeks glow, then her eyes find mine and she says. ‘She makes a compelling argument.’
‘I never argue,’ says Harper, looking at me in confusion.
‘She means you’re good at changing people’s minds,’ says Willow, almost eight years old and sharp as a whip, her head buried in a dictionary as often as it is in a novel.
‘Do you know what?’ says Mackenzie. ‘I heard that unicorns poop rainbows and that their poop smells like candy-floss.’
‘Noway,’ she says, her eyes popping so wide I can tell she’s going to be dining out on this one for months.
‘No, they don’t,’ says my eldest daughter Thea, practically spitting the words out as she appears and making Mackenzie jump out of her skin.
For a moment the little redhead looks bewildered, her mouth opening and closing, then she composes herself and blinks.
Ten years old and already a teenager, Thea learnt the word sullen - probably from one of Willow’s dictionaries - and ran with it some time ago. I give her a look, and she turns away heading up the stairs with a pout, then I shake my head and chuckle. I haven’t laughed this much in a long time, and I’m struck by how comfortable this new girl is making me feel.
Which is why she needs to go.
I need a functional nanny, not a distraction, and Mackenzie is distracting in a lot of ways, some of which I’m trying not to look at. I walk through to the kitchen and the three of them follow me, but when I turn around I see that Harper has taken the girl’s hand, and is throwing it back and forth like the swing boat ride at the county fair, and Willow’s gazing up at her like she’s glowing… which she kind of is.
Christ.
They’re already attached, and she’s barely been here five minutes. Sometimes I wish they were more like Thea and me - detached and self-absorbed. I close my eyes and rub my temple. This is going to be hard.
‘Look, Miss Miller,’ I say, my heart already aching as I gear up.
‘I know what you’re going to say,’ she says, interrupting me and pissing me off. ‘I’m too young to be a nanny, and you’re right I am young, but if you allow me to stay and give me a chance, I promise you I’ll prove my worth. I’m tidy, I’m organised, I’m good at scheduling, I’m a mean cook, and I’m not seeing anyone, so there won’t be anybody else coming around here breaking up the peace.’
I blink.
She talks fast, and I wonder if she’s been preparing this little speech all the way over, or if she’s just come up with all that on the hoof. Either way, I’m impressed, but still pissed off. I hate being interrupted, it’s a pet peeve of mine, but what’s bothering me the most is that all I can focus on right now is her declaring that she’s not seeing anyone.
I shake my head, rubbing my palms over my silver beard and sighing as I look at her, and just as I’m about to tell her off for interrupting me, she does it again.
‘And I’ve got credentials,’ she says. ‘References. You can call them right now and they’ll say how super-duper I am.’
She bites her lip nervously and bounces on her heels as Harper and Willow look back and forth between us like they’re on a tennis court watching a championship game.
‘Never interrupt me when I’m talking,’ I snap. That gets her attention. Her cheeks glow red. ‘Besides, it’s got nothing to do with that, it’s…’ because you’re so damned cute you’re sending shivers down my spine. ‘I’m used to-‘
‘Mrs Turner,’ she says, finishing my sentence. This is getting annoying, fast, but goddamn that body of hers is singing a different song to the one her bratty little mouth is crooning.
‘She had her ways and they suited mine,’ I say, practically growling.
‘You want me to leave?’ she says, calling my bluff. She sounds polite, but I can tell she’s being a brat as her eyes narrow and a sly grin purses her lips. She knows she’s got me. She doesn’t want to misbehave in front of the girls, but her body language tells me everything I need to know. She’s a troublemaker.