the house. They are old enough to arrive at dinner on time, without prompting.”
She sent the girls a sweet smile. “After all…you don’t need a nanny. Right?”
Lachlyn, whom he’d mentally dubbed the ringleader almost since birth, tipped up her chin. “Exactly.”
“Excellent.” Rowan divvied out the remaining food.
“Is this all?” Chloe asked, a mournful droop to her mouth.
“I’m afraid so.” Rowan showed zero remorse. In fact…was that a twitch to her mouth?
“Can you at least heat it up?” Lachlyn demanded.
Greyson opened his mouth to rebuke her rude tone, but Rowan beat him to it.
“Arrive to dinner late, eat cold food. You chose to be late. Next time, maybe you’ll arrive on time.” Rowan nodded as though that closed the discussion, and all three girls, in various stages of anger and shock, shut their mouths and accepted their plates without further debate. Greyson had never seen them so subdued. Then, again, no other nanny had handled today quite as Rowan had, either.
After a quiet, and rather strained, rest of dinner, Rowan wiped her mouth with her napkin and stood. “Girls, you may clear the table and clean up the kitchen before you go to bed.”
“What? —” Chloe screeched. She turned to him. “Dad, we never clean the kitchen.”
“Then it’s about time you start.” Rowan’s quiet words held steel, and he found himself hoping he never landed on her bad side. Of course, if she used that husky voice in that bossy way with him, he might have to do something about it. Something that involved—
What in the seven hells is wrong with me?
Greyson gave himself a mental shake. Instead, he tried to focus on the scene before him and had to hold in a laugh at the three identical expressions of disgruntled acceptance. He should’ve called Delilah sooner, because Rowan McAuliffe was exactly the person his family needed.
“I’ll check on you in about an hour.” Rowan turned to leave but paused in the doorway. “I wanted to thank all of you.”
Greyson sat back and waited.
Rowan smiled warmly. “Each household takes time to settle into and become part of the routine. I can’t tell you how much I appreciate your efforts to make my day so warm and welcoming and…special.”
Did she just Sound of Music his family? It worked. Guilt settled like a granite boulder in his gut. Based on their wide-eyed exchange of glances, the girls were dealing with a similar reaction.
Rowan’s smile didn’t alter exactly, but suddenly a mischievous glint sparkled from those amazing eyes. “I look forward to repaying your kindness.”
He didn’t remember Julie Andrews saying anything like that in the movie. With a cheerful nod, Rowan turned and quietly left the room. A whisper would’ve sounded like a shout in the silence she left in her wake.
“Do you think she meant she’d get even?” Lachlyn asked, breaking the hush that had fallen over them.
He dropped his napkin onto his plate. “I suspect so.”
“Is she mad?” Atleigh asked.
“Hard to tell. I’ll go talk to her.”
He left the girls clearing up and made his way to the basement. He fully expected to find Rowan packing her things. Instead, he discovered her on the couch, feet propped on the coffee table, watching a rerun of an old sitcom.
He paused at the sight of cute, bare toes, tension crawling across his shoulders and up his neck. He rolled his head, trying to ease the muscles. It didn’t help. Because of toes.
Freckles and now toes.
“I don’t appreciate you threatening my children.” Not what he’d planned to say, but he didn’t take it back.
She jerked a little at the sound of his voice only to ease back against the couch, a small smile tipping her lips up on one side. “That wasn’t a threat,” she said. “Did I pass your little test?”
She’d definitely figured it out. “Yes.”
“I don’t appreciate being tested that way.”
He wouldn’t, either, but his children and their needs meant he’d do what he had to. “When did you know?”
“When you didn’t comment on the burned smell or the fact that I’d left the girls in the attic. Do you do this to all your nannies?”
He sat on the coffee table in front of her, mostly to get her to put those toes away. On the floor where they belonged. Only, instead, she shifted on the couch to bend her knees to the side, tucked up like a fastidious kitten, toes still perfectly visible. What would she do if he flipped a pillow over them? Probably question his sanity and quit.
What was her