The Christmas Baby (3 page)

Just then, Lily woke up and started crying. Will joined in a moment later. Faith picked up her daughter to soothe her while Brian went to take care of his son.

Yeah, he’d completely lost his mind.

T
HREE WEEKS LATER
, Faith, Lily, Brian and Will had all moved into a five-bedroom home two streets over from Jay and Gail’s house. In the meantime, Faith had kept Will at her apartment during the day and overnight for a couple of nights when Brian had gone to Dallas to pick up some of his and Will’s belongings. He’d rented a U-Haul for the most important things and arranged for the rest to be packed and brought to him several days later.

Will was a sweet baby, Faith discovered quickly. But he wasn’t the cheerful child she suspected he’d been before his mother’s death. He needed a routine badly. And, unfortunately, he needed his mother. She was glad Brian had managed to rent the house prior to closing so they could start getting settled, for Will’s sake if nothing else.

With a lot of help from the Kincaids, they had unpacked the boxes and moved in Brian’s furniture, as well as the furniture from Faith’s apartment. When the rest of Brian and Will’s stuff came from Dallas, they had either stored or sold what they wouldn’t be using. Most of the remaining boxes wound up in the fifth bedroom, which was intended to be Brian’s office.

Brian had told her he was going to freelance from home until his computer consulting business was up and running. Once he began needing employees, he’d move into an office building. But he didn’t seem in a big hurry to do that. Faith had heard the kind of work he did paid very well and figured the rumor must be true or he wouldn’t be able to take so much time off. Besides, everything about him said he had money to spare, from the car he drove, a candy-apple-red classic Corvette, to the designer clothes he wore. Even in blue jeans, he looked like he’d stepped out of a magazine ad.

Faith put the babies down for a nap and then sought out Brian in his office. She found him sifting through one of the boxes. He looked up when she came in and smiled. “Don’t tell me you got them both down at the same time.”

“So far, so good. This is Lily’s regular nap time, but Will fights it. I’m trying to establish a routine. Babies do better when they know what to expect.”

“Yeah, the poor kid has had a lot of turmoil in his life lately. Maybe getting settled into the house will help.”

“I think it will. Just give him some time.” She took in the mess around her. “Anything I can do for you here?”

He shook his head and continued to take things out of the cardboard box. “You have enough to do taking care of the babies.”

“I can help you unpack a few boxes. They should sleep for at least an hour. More if I’m lucky. Lily’s usually a good napper.”

“You should nap, then. I know you were up during the night with Will.”

“It wasn’t for long. He went right back to sleep. So let me help.”

He looked like he was about to argue, then shrugged. “Okay, I can use it. I’m trying to make some headway in this room so when the DSL folks come out tomorrow I can get online. I can’t do any work without a connection.” He pulled a stuffed animal out of the box and set it aside. “I’m going to put in a wireless network. I can add your computer to it, if you want.”

“Thanks, but I haven’t had Internet access since before Lily was born, so I’m in no hurry. I just used my computer when I brought work home. I’m not even sure it can still get online,” she added with a laugh. “It’s a dinosaur. A friend of mine gave it to me when she got a new one and that was several years ago.”

“I’ll take a look at it for you. I might be able to upgrade it and get you online without much problem.”

“You don’t need to do that.”

“It’s not a big deal.” He stopped what he was doing and turned to her. “You’re not a technophobe, are you?”

Faith laughed. “No, I’m computer literate. But with Lily I haven’t had much time for it.”

“I can understand that. I tried surfing the Web the first few days I had Will by myself. I researched child care when he was asleep.” He shook his head. “Way too much information. I did better with the books Adrianna had.”

“That must have been tough for you, not knowing anything about children.” She opened up another box and started to sort through it. It was filled with photo albums and what looked like mementos. Flipping open one of the albums she saw baby pictures and realized they must have belonged to Will’s mother.

“It was tough on both of us. It’s a blur, but I think he screamed and cried almost the whole time he wasn’t sleeping. Nothing I did seemed to help.”

Maybe that explained why Brian tended to disappear whenever he heard the babies crying.

Brian pulled a framed picture out of the box. “This is Will and his mother. I think it must have been taken shortly before she died. Maybe we should put a couple of photos in his room.” He handed it to Faith. “Why don’t we start a pile of what’s going to Will’s room and what I’m going to put in the attic for him to have later. The stuff in these boxes is either his or Adrianna’s.”

No surprise to Faith, Will’s mother was a very pretty, very sexy blonde. Exactly the type of woman Brian was rumored to date. Speculation was rampant in Aransas City about whether the third Kincaid brother really intended to settle down there and raise his son. Even before she took the job Faith had heard talk. Everyone, from people in the grocery store to the nurses at the clinic, had an opinion. In the sense of gossip spreading like wildfire, Aransas City was a textbook small town.

She noticed Brian staring at another photo as if he didn’t know what to do with it. “If this is hard for you, I can take care of it. Or at least organize everything into what I know Will might need and things I’m not sure about.”

“Hard for me?” He looked puzzled for a minute, then shook his head. “I wouldn’t say hard. Adrianna and I didn’t know each other that well. It’s just…” He hesitated before continuing. “It’s weird going through her stuff. The movers packed most of this and I just had them transport it all down here. I figured I could go through the stuff once it got here.” He gestured at the cardboard boxes. “Her whole life is all packed up in a bunch of boxes.”

“Not her whole life. There’s Will.”

“True.” He sorted through a couple more things. “I feel like I should be able to tell Will about his mother one day, but how can I? I don’t know anything about her. She didn’t even have family for him to get to know.”

Faith bit her lip. What she’d started to say was definitely not something you’d say to your boss. Not if you wanted to keep your job.

“You can go ahead and say it,” he told her with some amusement. “You don’t exactly have a poker face.”

She turned away, picked up a teddy bear and carefully placed it on Will’s pile of stuffed animals and assorted toys. “I wasn’t going to say anything. It’s none of my business.”

“We’re living in the same house. You’re helping me take care of my kid. You have a right to know who I am. And to say what you think.”

“I know who you are.” Brian might have faults but he had taken responsibility for his son. He was trying hard and she recognized and appreciated that. It couldn’t have been easy for him to learn he was a father, especially with it coming out of the blue as it had. Still it was clear he didn’t know what to do with Will. Perhaps he would get better at it with time.

“You don’t approve of me, do you? Because I didn’t know about the baby.”

“I didn’t say that.”

“But I can see you’re thinking it. Adrianna and I didn’t have a relationship, Faith. We had a good time and then we went our separate ways. She never tried to get in touch with me. She wasn’t any more interested in being serious than I was.”

“Being pregnant is serious. Take it from me.”

He met her gaze. “That’s the problem, isn’t it? You think I’m a jerk because I wasn’t there when she was pregnant.”

“I don’t think you’re a jerk.” Who knew how he would have reacted if Adrianna had told him? Faith knew she should give him the benefit of the doubt.

“I’m sorry Lily’s father hurt you.”

Damn him for reading her so well. She tried to shrug off his comment. “He was a player from the get-go. I should have recognized that. I was naive not to.” And she’d paid the price. But he’d given her Lily and she wouldn’t have missed out on having her baby girl for anything. Still, she couldn’t deny she disapproved of playboys. How could she not? But neither did she believe that Brian would seduce a woman with false promises as Peter Bruce had done to her. He’d played with her dreams and then dumped her the second she became inconvenient.

She glanced at Brian and found him watching her. Brian Kincaid wouldn’t need false promises, she admitted. Dark hair, dark green eyes.
And don’t forget hot
.

He could seduce a woman with just a smile. Especially a woman like her, who always fell for the wrong type of man. Thank goodness Brian had no interest in seducing her. She didn’t think she’d be much of a challenge for a man like him.

He cleared his throat and, realizing she’d been staring, she turned away. “There’s something I wanted to talk to you about,” he said. “Two things, really. I think we need to hire a housekeeper. But I want you to hire her. I had a hard enough time hiring a nanny.”

“Don’t you want me to clean the house?”

“No, I want you to take care of Will. We can have a housekeeper come in once a week. It will save everyone’s sanity.”

“Are you sure?” The thought of having someone to do the heavy housework was foreign to Faith.

“I hired you to spend time with Will and see to his needs, not to clean my house. I’m sure.”

“All right, I’ll check into that right away. What else did you want to talk about?”

“Gail tells me there’s a program called Mothers’ Day Out at the church. It’s twice a week, four hours a day. I think we should enroll the babies in it to give you a break. I called them today and there’s room.”

“You just said you wanted me to take care of Will and that’s why you’re hiring a housekeeper.” She knew about the program but had never used it since she had needed full-time day care to go back to work.

“You are taking care of him. But even nannies need a little time off. No one should work 24/7. What do you say?”

It didn’t seem right, but Will was his child, after all. “Of course, if you want Will to go, that’s up to you.”

“Babies. Plural. Lily should go, too.” When she hesitated, he added, “Don’t worry, I’ll take care of her bill.”

“I couldn’t ask you to do that.” He was already being far more generous than she would have believed when she took the job. Not just her salary and living expenses but all the fringe benefits, and now he was talking about making the job even easier. She felt guilty, as if she weren’t doing enough. “Lily will be fine with me.”

“They’re expecting two babies. Consider it an investment in your sanity.” He smiled. “Come on, Faith, let me take care of this. You’re doing all the child care, all the cooking. You need some time off. And we haven’t discussed it, but if you want a night or two a week off, let me know. Unless I’m out of town, I’ll take care of Will and you can make arrangements for Lily.”

“You’re going to take care of Will by yourself?” He hadn’t shown much interest in doing that so far. He left all the day-to-day care of Will to Faith. He didn’t ignore him exactly, he just didn’t seem to know how to relate to him. And now he wanted to take care of him by himself?

“Don’t sound so shocked. I did it before I hired you.”

She decided not to point out that he’d been staying with his brother and that Gail and her daughters had probably helped him out quite a bit. Still, he’d apparently taken care of Will by himself before he’d brought him to Aransas City.

She was weakening. Having nights off wasn’t a big deal since she really had nowhere to go, but she might think of something for her and Lily to do simply to give Brian time alone with his son. She thought he and Will would both benefit from that. But time off during the day sounded heavenly, she had to admit. Four hours, twice a week. She could do the grocery shopping without crying babies. She could even get a haircut without holding Lily on her lap. However, she felt duty bound to protest. “That’s very generous. But one of the reasons I took this job was so Lily wouldn’t have to be in day care. She was sick constantly when I was working full-time.”

“Gail says they’re pretty good about insisting sick kids stay home, and if she starts getting colds a lot you can reevaluate. You’re not a slave, Faith. Taking a little time off will be good for both you and the kids.”

“You’re not going to take no for an answer, are you?”

“What do you think?” His lips curved into a devilish smile.

That wicked smile of his was too damn attractive was what she thought. “All right. Thank you.”

“Good, we’ll take them in tomorrow and get everything set up.”

He was her boss. And even if he hadn’t been, he was miles out of her league. Brian Kincaid was entirely too good-looking—and, worse, way too nice—for her peace of mind.

Lily’s father had been nice and charming, too, she reminded herself. Right up until the time she’d told him she was pregnant.