Loe raamatut: «Operation Mommy»

One
Port Sandy, Washington
July 5

“Hey, Shay!” Brady yelled into the clothes hamper. “Guess what?”

Shay Spenser, wedged tightly in the laundry chute several feet below floor level, winced as the boy’s cheerful voice echoed around her. “I don’t know,” she called back. “What?”

“Nick says he can see an ambulance and a ladder truck!”

Sure enough, now that Shay listened for it, she could hear the rise of two different approaching sirens.

“We never had a ladder truck before!” Brady declared in excitement, as unconcerned about the broader ramifications of her plight as only an eight-year-old could be. “Isn’t it cool?”

Unfortunately, Shay had twenty-two years on the boy and, at the moment, was feeling every one. “Oh, yeah. Cool.” Even as she uttered the words, a horrific vision of hoards of firemen descending on the deluxe, fully remodeled, turn-of-the-century house where she was stuck filled her head. The way her luck was running, her rescuers would probably rappel up the pristine white siding, break out a few leaded-glass windows and use fire axes to chop her free.

Shay stifled a groan. If Alex Morrison, the owner of the house and the boys’ father, ever decided to come home from his marathon Florida business trip, he’d probably have her arrested.

But then, it wasn’t solely her fault that the simple humanitarian act of trying to retrieve the boys’ runaway gerbil from the laundry hamper had landed her in this mess. After all, how could she possibly have known the hamper had a hinged bottom? Or that it opened onto a laundry chute big enough to swallow a person?

She couldn’t. Nor, for that matter, would she be in this fix if Alex Morrison were any sort of responsible father. Not only had he been gone on business for six weeks—an eternity in the lives of his three young sons—but two days ago, when the boys’ nanny had abruptly quit, he’d been too busy to return his own son’s phone call informing him of the fact!

While it was true the agency that supplied the nanny had called to apologize for the woman’s abrupt departure and to arrange for a temporary replacement until Mr. Morrison could be contacted, Shay was far from appeased. What sort of sorry excuse for a father treated his own kids so indifferently?

“Shay? Is it okay if I go look at the trucks?” Brady asked. “I’ll only go as far as the window. I promise.”

“Sure. Go for it.”

“All right!” The hamper door swished shut above her.

Shay shook her head. During her ten years as a journalist, first as an independent, and more recently for WNI magazine, she’d been pinned down by sniper fire in Beirut, had her Land Rover attacked by a bad-tempered rhino in Kitgum, and been held hostage briefly by guerrilla forces in El Salvador. This ought to rate as minor in comparison.

Yet right now it didn’t feel like it. Her shins smarted from where she’d scraped them when she’d slipped, her shoulders ached from being wedged against the metal shaft, and she was starting to get a headache from being upside down for too long.

Adding to her misery was the growing evidence that Brutus, the creature responsible for her predicament, seemed to be getting more agitated as time passed. Although she had a firm grip on the little creature, his pointy toenails were dug into her palm, and any second now she expected to feel the sting of his sharp little teeth, as well. After her years in the news business, Shay could just imagine the headline: “Award-winning journalist savaged by rodent in bizarre accident. Details page 5.”

Her friend Beau would probably laugh himself silly and say this was what happened to misguided journalists who thought they wanted out of the business. Furthermore, he’d probably claim that this was why he’d lent her his cottage on his brother’s Puget Sound estate in the first place—so she could discover for herself how ill-suited she was for “normal” life.

Well, maybe he was right, Shay thought wryly, as a noisy rush of footsteps sounded overhead. A second later Brady, Nick and Mikey began to shout, “Up here! We’re up here!”

She heard a distant cry of acknowledgement, followed by the din of booted feet thundering up the stairs and coming down the hall. She flinched as she pictured the black marks the firemen’s rubber-soled boots would leave on the pale wood floors and thick carpets...a half second before she reminded herself to be grateful for small favors.

At least they weren’t hacking their way through the walls.

Above her, the tromping stopped and a barrage of questions started.

“Did one of you kids call 911?”

“Where’s the injured party?”

“Is your mom or dad home?”

“This better not be a prank!”

“Are you boys here all alone?”

“What’s the problem?”

As Shay could’ve predicted, all three Morrisons tried to answer at once.

“We don’t got a mom,” Mikey volunteered.

“Brady called. He’s the oldest!” Nick declared.

“It’s Shay,” Brady said urgently. “She’s stuck in the laundry chute!”

“Hold on, son. She who?”

“Not she, Shay!” Brady corrected, sounding exasperated.

Shay sighed. “Hang in there, Brutus. From the sound of things, it’s going to be a while before we’re liberated.”

* * *

“Just make sure they’ve initialed those lease-reversion clauses when the contracts show up, Helen,” Alex Morrison said into the car phone, guiding his sleek silver Mercedes into the divided highway’s passing lane to get around a slow-moving tractor-trailer rig. “It’s taken six weeks to get them included—I don’t want any more delays or screw ups. Have the attorneys go over them, and if everything looks all right, messenger them to me at the house.”

“Yes, sir.” Helen O’Connell, Alex’s longtime secretary, sounded crisp and efficient as usual. “Anything else?”

Alex gave a tired sigh. “I hope not. After the past few weeks, I’m ready for some quiet time at home.”

Helen made a commiserating sound. “I trust everything is all right with the boys, then?”

Alex frowned. “Why wouldn’t it be?”

“Oh, it’s only that when Brady called—”

“Hold on. Brady called? When?”

“Why, day before yesterday.” The line crackled briefly as the road dipped. “Don’t tell me Whitset didn’t give you my message?”

“Whitset? Whitset’s wife went into labor two days ago. He fainted in the delivery room and knocked himself silly. When he came to, he barely remembered his name, much less to pass on any messages.”

“Oh, dear,” Helen said.

“Right,” Alex said grimly. “Did Brady mention why he was calling?”

There was a pause before Helen said apologetically, “Well, yes and no. He said there was something about Mrs. Kiltz he needed to tell you.”

For an instant Alex’s mind was blank and then he swore under his breath. Mrs. Kiltz was the nanny he’d hired right before he left. “Great. Did he say what?”

“No, sir. He just asked that you call.”

“You didn’t hear sirens or anyone screaming, did you?”

He was only half joking, and Helen knew it. “Not this time,” she quickly reassured him. “Actually, now that I think about it, he seemed extremely cheerful, so I’m sure it couldn’t have been anything too major. I asked if Mrs. Rosencrantz had left for her vacation on schedule, and he said yes. I asked if things were all right with the temp the agency sent to fill in for her, and he said yes. And when I asked how everything else was, why, he laughed and said it was perfect.”

“Terrific.” Alex’s apprehension shot up a notch. The last time Brady had claimed everything was “perfect” had been right before a Lawrence of Arabia play set, complete with a genuine Bedouin tent and a pair of very cranky camels, had been delivered to the house.

Purchased at great expense through one of the home shopping channels on Alex’s credit card, the play set had been touted as the ultimate educational experience. Heaven knew Alex had certainly learned a lot. He’d learned the true meaning of the phrase “all purchases final.” He’d learned that in Port Sandy County, camels were considered exotic pets and that you were hit with a whopping fine if you didn’t have the proper permit to keep them. He’d learned that when annoyed, the homely creatures spit. But most of all, he’d learned to be on guard when his eldest son started bandying about the word perfect.

“Is that all, sir?”

“Yes. Unless the house has burned down—” he tried to inject a light note into his voice and failed “—I should be in the office sometime next week before I leave for New Mexico. You know the drill—if anything comes up, call.”

“Yes, sir. And don’t worry. I’m sure everything is fine with the boys.”

“Right. See you next week.” Alex disconnected, waited for a dial tone, then punched his home number on the speed dial at the same time he slowed the Mercedes for his exit.

He turned west at the bottom of the ramp and headed into the late-afternoon sun, grateful for the car’s air conditioning. He listened impatiently as the phone began to ring. He was too tired for this right now, he thought. When he had gone to Aristo Cay Resort at the end of May, he’d never expected to be there six weeks. After negotiating its purchase from the Carlyle family for months prior to his arrival, he’d been confident the deal was set and all that was left to do was fine-tune the agreement.

A major miscalculation on his part. But then, there was no way he could have known that Hiram Carlyle’s only daughter, Miranda, had recently divorced. Or that she would take one look at him and get it into her head that a temporary merger should be a condition of the sale.

Alex grimaced. Although he hadn’t lived like a monk in the four years he’d been widowed, he had made it a firm rule not to mix sex with either his business or family life.

Where his family was concerned, his reasoning was simple. His sons had already lost their mother. No matter what it took, he was determined to protect them from such heartbreak in the future. Since he knew he’d never remarry, there was no reason to involve the boys with women he knew would never be more than casual companions.

Professionally, it was simply a sound business practice. He was thirty-five, unmarried, and CEO of Morrison Retreats, which owned and operated five small, exclusive resorts spread across the United States. The business had been his salvation after his wife died, and he wasn’t about to jeopardize it for anything as fleeting as physical pleasure.

Convincing Miranda Carlyle of that, however, had taken a while.

On the other end of the line, the phone continued to ring. Where the heck was everyone? Even if the nanny was tied up with the boys—or the boys had tied her up, which had actually happened a few sitters ago, the housekeeper, temp or not, ought to answer.

Unless something had happened. Unless—

Alex took a deep breath, then slowly exhaled. Knock it off. Just because no one’s answering the phone doesn’t mean something has happened. More likely the housekeeper was vacuuming and didn’t hear the phone, and Mrs. Kiltz and the boys were taking a nature walk or something.

Except that Brady had told Helen there was a problem.

Alex ground his teeth against an urge to curse. He jerked the phone away from his ear, thought for a moment, hit the disconnect button and again pressed the speed dial. Once more the phone began to ring, although a quick glance at the dashboard clock, which read half past five, made it unlikely this call would be answered, either.

Two rings later there was a click on the line, and a recorded voice said cheerfully, “You have reached Aunt Frannie’s Nannys, quality domestic caregivers for young and old. We are not in at the moment, but if you’d like to leave a message, we’ll be happy to return your call.”

Scowling, Alex left his name and number. He turned south onto the dead-end road that led to his house above the coast, switched on the radio and tried to forget about everything but getting home as fast as possible. Pressing on the accelerator, he felt a grim satisfaction as the sleek sedan surged forward, only to have his stomach plummet some ten minutes later when he approached his driveway and found the electronically operated gate wide open.

Gripping the steering wheel so hard his knuckles turned white, he stomped on the gas petal and shot through the opening, oblivious to the bright splashes of magenta, rose and crimson from the late-blooming rhododendrons that lined the long circular drive.

It took what felt like hours before he rounded the final curve. The house rose up in front of him, three stories tall, a glorious sight with its dark green trim and its rows of windows sparkling in the bright summer light.

Alex didn’t notice. He was too busy trying to swallow the fear that choked him as he saw the pair of emergency vehicles parked ahead. His gaze swung wide, taking in the carved double doors that led into the house. They were standing wide open.

He slammed the car to a stop, threw open the door and leapt out. Racing across the manicured lawn, he ducked around a Japanese maple, pelted up the shallow brick steps and slid to a halt in the marble-floored foyer. After the glittering warmth of the sunshine, the vast hall felt cool, dusky—

And quiet. Unnaturally, ominously quiet. “Brady! Nicholas! Michael! Hello—is anybody here?”

Silence. For the space of a heartbeat he didn’t hear a sound but his own labored breathing. Then he detected a faint tapping noise and a murmur of voices coming from overhead.

He bolted up the wide, curved stairway and along the railed balcony that overlooked the foyer, heading toward the children’s wing of the house. Whipping around a corner, he faltered as he approached the boys’ oversize bathroom and spied several uniformed men standing inside.

Oh, no. Had Nick been playing sock hockey, slipped and hit his head? Or maybe it was Mikey. Perhaps his youngest son had tried to wash and blow dry the hamster again, only this time had been electrocuted for his troubles instead of merely nipped. Or what if it was Brady? What if, despite all the warnings, Brady had attempted to put another smoke bomb together and—

He drew a deep breath. Get a grip, Morrison. You aren’t going to be worth zip if you keep this up. Reaching down deep inside, he tapped into the well of icy calm he had discovered when Allison died and shoved aside his panic.

By the time he strode into the bathroom, he had himself frigidly under control. “I’m Alex Morrison. Who’s in charge here? What’s going on?”

For an instant the room fell silent. The three firemen who were clustered around the wall on Alex’s left stopped talking, while a pair of paramedics standing a dozen feet straight ahead turned to stare.

And then the quiet was shattered by a trio of high, young voices. “Daddy!” four-year-old Mikey cried, his face lighting up as he raced around the half wall that separated the bathtub from the rest of the room and launched himself at his father.

“Daddy!” Six-year-old Nick’s voice rang with excitement as he pelted after his little brother.

“Daddy?” Brady popped around the corner to stare at his father in undisguised horror. “What are you doing here!”

Like Alex himself, all three boys had brown eyes and brown-blond hair. Mikey, slight and angular, had his mother’s sweet smile and sensitive nature. Nick was sturdy and round-cheeked, with a sprinkle of freckles across his nose and an easy-to-read expression. But it was Brady who drew the eye. Slim and reedy, with intent brown eyes and an engaging grin, he had more curiosity than a convention of rocket scientists, more energy than a fleet of nuclear submarines and more enthusiasm than a gymnasium of cheerleaders—a combination that attracted trouble the way flowers drew bees.

At the moment, he was staring at his father as if he were an escaped felon caught in a spotlight.

Alex gave the two younger boys a brief awkward hug, then peeled them off his pant legs as he focused on his firstborn son. “We wrapped up the negotiations,” he said slowly. “I wanted to surprise you.”

“But I’m not ready!”

“Ready?” Alex raised one eyebrow. “For what?”

Brady became instantly fascinated with the toe of his sneaker. “Well, you know...” he mumbled. “Stuff.”

Alex’s apprehension grew. He shifted his gaze to his middle son. “Nicholas? You want to tell me what’s going on?”

After a quick sideways glance at his big brother, Nick also developed a sudden infatuation with his feet.

There was a moment’s tense silence. And then Mikey tugged on his father’s sleeve and said clearly, “Shay’s stuck.”

Alex’s gaze softened as he stared down at his youngest child. “She who’s stuck?”

Brady sighed. “Not she, Shay,” he murmured.

“It was a mersion of missy, Daddy,” Mikey said earnestly. “She saved Bwutus.”

Brady sighed again. “Mission of mercy, Mikey.”

“Yeah!” Nick chimed. “Everybody knows that. Besides, it was your fault!”

Mikey’s lower lip trembled. “Was not.”

“Was too! If you’d just holded on to Brutus like you were supposed to, none of this would’ve happened!”

“Who is Brutus?” Alex asked.

Mikey’s eyes flooded with tears. “He’s my g-gerbil. Uncle J-James sended him for my end-of-school pwesent. Brady gots a lizard and Nick got Ike and Spike. I got Bwutus. He’s my bestest fwiend.”

Alex’s mouth tightened. He made a mental note to call his younger brother James and ask him—again—to refrain from sending the boys any more pets.

Which he’d be sure to do after he got to the bottom of the current situation. “So what’s Brutus got to do with—”

“Pardon me, fellows,” a faint, disembodied voice interrupted. “But do you think you could save the discussion for later and get me out of here? Soon?”

Alex jerked around, telling himself the voice couldn’t possibly have come from the floor vent the way he thought it had. “What the—” He stopped in shock as the tallest of the fireman stepped forward, making it possible for Alex to see that the other two men were in the process of lifting the built-in clothes hamper out of the wall. “Is there someone down there?” he exclaimed in disbelief.

“Don’t worry, sir.” The tall fireman stuck out his hand. “Lieutenant Malloy, Port Sandy Fire Department. The lady—your child-care provider, we gathered from the boys?—says she’s fine. As far as we can tell, she only dropped about five feet before the bend in the chute stopped her.”

“I...see,” Alex said, his gaze riveted on the hole on the wall. Truthfully, he didn’t see at all. Try as he might, he not only couldn’t imagine tall, stately Mrs. Kiltz doing something so undignified, but he also found it hard to believe she’d actually been able to fit in such a narrow space....

“Like I said, don’t worry,” the lieutenant repeated, nodding at his men to proceed. “We should have her out in no time.”

Frozen in disbelief, Alex watched as the firemen fed a line with a noose at the end down the now-gaping hole in his wall. They fished for a moment and then Mrs. Kiltz, sounding very unKiltzlike, called out, “Bingo! Nice toss, guys!”

The firemen grinned and began to reel in the line. Moments later a pair of small, sneaker-shod feet appeared. While one fireman leaned back, keeping the line taut, the other reached forward, grabbed the bare, slender ankles attached to the feet, and pulled.

Like a genie emerging from a bottle, a woman popped out of the depths of the wall. Dressed in khaki shorts and a loose navy T-shirt, her back to the room, she was small and slim, with dark glossy hair and a nice, firm fanny.

Alex had never seen her before in his life.

Shock stole his voice. Before he could recover it, the room erupted in a flurry of activity. First, the paramedics rushed past, blocking the stranger from view as she sank to the ground and they moved in to check her out. Next, all three boys darted over, practically trampling Alex in their haste to get close to the stranger. Everyone began to talk.

“Are you all right, ma’am?” Lieutenant Malloy asked.

“I’m fine,” she murmured in a husky alto. “I really appreciate you getting me out.”

“Those are pretty nasty scrapes on your legs,” one of the paramedics stated. “If you’ll just sit still for a minute we can—”

“I’m fine, really,” she insisted.

“She’s tough,” Brady said, a disturbing note of pride in his voice.

“Was it dark?” Nick asked.

“Were you ascared?” Mikey inquired.

“Yes, it was, and no, I wasn’t. I had Brutus to keep me company, remember?”

“Hand me a sterile 9-O pack, would you, Bill? I’m sorry, ma’am, but this is going to sting a little.”

“Well, Mr. Morrison—” Malloy stepped over to Alex, pulled out a small notepad and began to write in it as he talked “—it looks as if everything turned out all right here. I’ll send you a copy of my report, of course, but I might as well tell you right now, I am going to recommend that you close up that chute. In addition to the obvious danger to your children, the thing’s a fire hazard.” He tore the piece of paper from the pad and handed it to Alex.

It was a citation for violating the county fire code. “Now just one minute—” Alex protested.

Malloy held up a hand for silence as the two-way radio hooked to his belt began to squawk. He listened intently as the dispatcher requested assistance at a house fire with possible injuries and rattled off an address. He unclipped the radio and spoke rapidly into it, before saying to the other men, “Gentlemen, that’s only a few miles from here. Let’s move it!”

The men went into high gear. The paramedics quickly finished while the three fireman hurriedly repacked equipment, and then all five began an orderly stampede for the door. Not more than fifteen seconds later a pair of sirens began to shrill as the Port Sandy Fire and Rescue Team departed.

Alex tried to staunch a growing sense of disorientation. It’s just jet lag, he told himself impatiently. Except that he felt as if he’d entered an entire other dimension rather than merely a different time zone—a feeling that intensified tenfold as he got his first frontal view of the stranger.

Under a short, severely cut mop of inky hair, she had dark, intelligent eyes fringed by sooty lashes, a straight little nose and a surprisingly lush mouth that quirked up at the corners, hinting at a dimple in one cheek. Although she wasn’t exactly pretty, her face sparkled with such energy and good humor that it made her extremely compelling. She also had one of the most flawless complexions he’d ever seen.

Like a match being struck, awareness burned a path down his spine and set off a sharp burst of heat inside him.

Would her skin be smooth and creamy...everywhere? Would the generous curve of her mouth feel as good trailing over him as he imagined it would? And what about her eyes? Would they get bigger and darker if he stroked his thumbs across her—

“Hey, Daddy? Aren’t you gonna say something?”

Brady’s cheerful voice poured over Alex like a bucket of cold water.

What the hell was the matter with him? What did he think he was doing, having carnal thoughts about a woman he didn’t even know? In front of his children, for God’s sake?

All the fear and frustration of the day seemed to coalesce. He felt a sudden surge of anger, at himself, at the situation, at her for undermining his control.

“I don’t know who you are,” he said abruptly, blanking the emotion from his face and voice with an effort. “But I’m Alex Morrison. This is my house and those—” he nodded at the boys, who were clustered around her as if she belonged and he was the interloper “—are my sons. And you have exactly ten seconds to tell me who you are, how you came to be in my house and what the heck you were doing in my laundry chute.”

She shoved a strand of dark silky hair off her cheek, her gaze never leaving his face. Her mouth quirked up. “Or?”

He couldn’t believe her nerve. He glowered at her. “Or else I’ll call the police.”