Oh, no. Rachel was determined to limit her exposure to Todd’s sunny smiles and cute toddler ways. Right now, she was bent on damage control and would eat low fat peanut butter and reduced sugar strawberry jam if it killed her. Rachel stood and tossed her foam cup into a nearby dark green metal trash barrel. “Thanks for the offer, but I have a few things to do before I come down.” Like sit down and weep for a while over her own stupidity. “I’ll be down around one o’clock or so.”

Daniel stood, too, unable to believe his good fortune. This was one fine-looking woman and she obviously had a tender heart. She was going to take pity on him. Daniel, the former lady killer, was both humble and grateful. Also extremely attracted to Rachel, although he knew enough to sit on that. He wasn’t about to do anything stupid and scare her off. ‘One o’clock. I really appreciate this, Rachel.” He snapped his fingers. “Todd will be down by then, so don’t ring the doorbell, just knock, okay? Or better yet, I’ll leave it unlocked and you can just come right in.”

“Sure, fine,” Rachel said and waved to Todd as she went to leave the park. But it wasn’t fine, not really. Entering a home without knocking bespoke a certain intimacy Rachel would really like to avoid, especially since she seemed so bent on self-destruction.

Chapter Three

Daniel left the park shortly after Rachel. It was still a bit early for lunch, but Todd had decided that dumping fistfuls of sand on top of his head was nothing short of hysterically funny. When the first two explanations of how he could scratch his cornea, possibly go blind, have to go to the hospital and wear a patch over his eye for the rest of his life failed, Daniel packed in the logic. He simply picked the child up, tucked him under his arm and removed his nephew from the source of temptation.

“You’re going to regret your precipitous course of action, little buddy,” he advised as he strode down the street. “Every bit of that dirt has to come out of your hair before you take your nap. It could still get into your eyes, you know. I wasn’t kidding about that patch. At the very least you’ll have sand in your bed and you’ll hate it.” And so would Daniel, who in order to get a peaceful, quiet naptime out of Todd was now going to have to shampoo the little one’s head, a thankless task Todd took as a personal affront. Daniel fully expected his eardrums to shatter someday during one of Todd’s bath times.

Daniel stood out on his front lawn and held Todd as if he were a football. Todd’s body was horizontal and his head projected out in front of Daniel at waist level. Then Daniel ruffled his hand through the tot’s hair, gently massaging his scalp as he tried to dislodge as much of the sand as possible before going into the house. Todd thought it was pretty funny and spent his time squirming around as he attempted to grab Daniel’s leg and hang upside down and whoop. From that, Daniel assumed he’d managed to keep the gritty particles out of his eyes, thereby successfully avoiding any trips to the emergency room.

“That’s about as much as I can take care of out here,” he finally told Todd. “We’re going to have to hit the tub to get the rest.” He went into the house, Todd still tucked under his arm and let the screen slap shut behind him.

“Shoot,” he said and reversed himself, reopened the screen and swung Todd upright so he could reach his sneakers. Holding Todd’s feet just outside the front door, he pulled off his shoes and dropped them out on the porch into the small pile of sand that had poured out of the offending articles when Daniel had removed them. “Thank God I thought to do that,” he muttered as he reentered the house. “I wouldn’t want Rachel to see a mess like that inside the house. She’d think I was totally inept.” And he never thought to question why he cared one way or the other.

Daniel got thoroughly soaked during Todd’s bath and shampoo. All he could think about was how his life had changed in two short months. “I was engaged to be married, made good money, had job security, decent insurance coverage and probably would have made partner by the time I was thirty-five.” Daniel shook his head. “How the mighty are fallen.” Hard to believe it had only been June when he’d decided to strike out on his own and excitedly so informed his fiancée. He’d thought she’d find it a great adventure—the two of them as a team working their way together, side by side, shoulder to shoulder, through thick and thin—including those lean years that tempered every new business. They’d have eaten a lot of inexpensive pasta and cheap red wine at first, but they’d have done it with panache—by candlelight.

Wrong.

“If Marie couldn’t handle the idea of my giving up a secure job with nobody but two adults to worry about feeding, what the heck would she think of this situation?” In retrospect it was obvious Marie had only been interested in him when his future was firmly in place. “But she sure had me fooled for a while there,” Daniel admitted as he towel-dried Todd’s hair and wriggling little body. “She’d have probably had a heart attack and died if I’d asked her to help out with raising you, you little pill-face.”

Todd took the slander with a sunny smile and wrapped his arms around Daniel’s neck.

“Hey, lighten up,” Daniel protested as he loosened the child’s arms. “I’m glad you’re starting to adjust, but you’re going to choke me.”

Todd laughed out loud at that and Daniel rolled his eyes as he carried Todd out to the kitchen and deposited him in the high chair. “Real funny, champ. So funny I forgot to laugh.”

Daniel assembled a cheese sandwich and dropped it into a skillet. While it browned, he poured Todd half an inch of milk. Remembering how Rachel had taken pains to describe everything to the child the day before, he said, “Some good white milk, Todd,” as he handed the tumbler to the child. “Your milk’s in a green cup today. Green, got it?”

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