The Lemon Sisters Read online

  And sure enough, Mason leapt to his feet. Gaze glued to the vacuum, the whites of his eyes showing, he squeezed in between Brooke and the vacuum in a protective stance against the beast, every limb trembling as he held off the evil monster.

  Heart. Melted. “Oh, baby.” Brooke picked Mason up and hugged him. “You’re my hero.”

  Brittney pulled out a broom to sweep up the Cheerios.

  “Best nanny on the planet,” Brooke said to Mason.

  “Oh, I know,” Brittney said, not at all flustered by the chaos. “I’m pretty great.”

  “Brittney’s girlfriend loves Brittney, too,” Millie said.

  Brittney smiled in agreement at the little girl. “She does.”

  Brooke kissed Mason and set him back down. She looked for peanut butter to spread on the pancakes Brittney had made. “I hope your girlfriend knows how lucky she is to have you,” she said, struggling to get the jar open.

  The nanny blushed, but took the peanut butter and used a vinyl potholder to open it. “My mom once tried to talk me out of being gay by telling me I’d have to go through life without having someone to open jars for me. In hindsight, I kind of love that the only use for a man she could think of was opening jars.”

  Brooke nearly snorted her coffee out her nose.

  “My daddy can do more than open a pickle jar,” Millie said in defense of men. “He and Uncle Garrett make a really great Slip ’N Slide.”

  “That’s cuz he’s one of the good ones,” Brooke told her. “So about our field trip. It’s not really warm enough today for the beach—”

  Garrett appeared in the kitchen doorway, looking disturbingly yummy in faded jeans, hiking boots, a hoodie, and black mirrored sunglasses. He flashed a smile at everyone except Brooke, whom he looked at last, holding her gaze the longest. Then he pushed the glasses to the top of his head and revealed those see-all hazel eyes, filled with equal parts heat and irritation.

  Felt about right. Every time she thought about their hot-tub kiss, heat rushed through her, leaving her aching and hungry for him. That’s when she remembered he’d backed off, and the irritation kicked in.

  “We’re going on a field trip!” Millie told Garrett at high decibels.

  “Beach!” Mason yelled.

  Maddox tipped his head back and howled in what Brooke assumed was delight.

  “Not the beach,” Brooke said. “It’s too cold—”

  Her phone rang. Of course it was her mom again. “It’s Grandma,” she told the kids, and made the mistake of answering on speaker. “Hi, Mom—”

  “Honey, listen, I know you don’t want to discuss this, but after I talked to you last night, I called my dear friend Nancy Garrison, who still lives in Wildstone. Her son’s single, too, and we think you’d be perfect for each other.”

  Oh, for God’s sake. “Did Mindy put you up to this?”

  “No, of course not. She just mentioned that if we found someone for you, you might stay longer . . .”

  Brooke groaned and then remembered she had an avid audience. “Look, I was just trying to keep it to myself, but . . . I am seeing someone.”

  “So you do have a boyfriend! I had a feeling! Is he tall? What does he do for a living?”

  Her mom’s two measurements of a good man: height and employment. “Yes, he’s tall. And he’s a . . .” Her gaze caught on Garrett and her mind went completely blank. “Um . . .”

  “How can you have a boyfriend and not know what he does?” her mom asked, distressed. “Oh God. He’s unemployed, isn’t he? Honey, if he can’t hold down a job, he’s not the one.”

  “He renovates homes,” her mouth said.

  Garrett’s brows went so high they vanished beneath his hair.

  Shit! “Gotta go now, Mom.” She slid her phone in her pocket and refused to look up at Garrett ever again. “Obviously, that was just to get her off my back,” she said, to the kids’ collective confusion. “Never mind, it’s a grown-up thing.”

  “What’s it like to be a grown-up?” Mason wanted to know.

  “Well . . .” Brooke tried to think of something positive. “You get to eat ice cream whenever and wherever you want.”

  His face lit up.

  “But you have to buy it yourself.”

  He went from delighted to devastated. Aaaaannnnnd her work here was done.

  Garrett just gave her a long, amused look.

  She gave him a don’t-mess-with-me glance. He didn’t seem bothered by it in the least.

  “Field trip time!” Mason called out. “Hey,” he said, and tugged on Garrett’s hand. “Will you come, too?”

  Garrett looked at Brooke.

  “Yay!” Millie said. “We’re all going to the beach!”

  It was like the worst game of telephone Brooke had ever played. “No,” she said. “There’s no ‘we’ here.”

  “Momma says we’re always a ‘we’!” Millie said exuberantly.

  “How about we hike the bluffs?” Garrett said, apparently on board with the “we.”

  “No,” she said. Hell no. “That’s too high for them.” This actually wasn’t true, but she hadn’t done anything other than sit in front of a computer screen in a very long time, and just the thought of doing more made her start to sweat.

  Garrett studied her for a moment. “The trail’s wide,” he said. “They’ll be safe.” He paused meaningfully and held her gaze with steady purpose. “We’ll all be safe.”

  Okay, she got that he had no fears, but she was not in the mood for this. Not today. And maybe not any day soon, either.

  “We could bundle them up and walk the beach?” Garrett said. “That’s safe enough, right?”

  Blowing out a breath, she caved, and went about packing a picnic while trying to wrestle her growing anxiety. When she pulled out celery to go with the peanut butter, everyone moaned and groaned.

  “We don’t like green food,” Millie said.

  “It’s not green food,” Brooke said, swiftly knifing peanut butter onto the celery and then topping each piece with four raisins. “It’s ants on a log.”

  “I love ants on a log!” Mason declared.

  Maddox barked.

  “So does Mad Dog,” Mason translated.

  Even Princess Millie gave it a go, while Brooke hunted for more food to bring. She found carrots and the last of the fresh broccoli. “Trees,” she told the kids when they groaned. Tofu became “rocks.”

  “Crafty,” Garrett said.

  “That’s me,” she said. “Master of craftiness. Everyone to the car.”

  Garrett put his hand on Brooke’s lower back to get her attention. “Want me to drive?”

  “Uncle Garrett, you can’t touch a girl unless you ask first,” Millie said. “My teacher says.”

  “You’re absolutely correct,” Garrett said, and turned to Brooke, a small twitch on his lips, his tone benign enough, but she heard the sarcasm. “Is it okay if I touch you?”

  “Sure. If it’s okay that I touch you back,” she said, because the next time she touched him, it would be to sock him one.

  He smiled knowingly.

  “I’ll drive,” she said. “I’ve got the car seats.”

  They hadn’t even gotten out of the driveway before Mason had to make a pit stop. When he was finished and buckled back in, they actually made it to the end of the street before Maddox had to go.

  “You, too, Millie,” Brooke said, as she freed Mason from his seat belt.

  Nothing from Millie.

  Brooke sighed. “Princess Millie. You, too.”

  “But I don’t have to go.”

  “But by my count, you’ll have to go in about two minutes,” Brooke said, and that’s when she looked up.

  Maddox was in the middle of the grass on the front lawn, wearing absolutely nothing, peeing on a tree.

  Brooke just leaned forward and banged her head on the dashboard. And then again to make it an even number.

  Garrett laughed. “Come on, you’d do it if you could.”

&