A Deliberate Father. Kate Kelly

moving in until the house sells. I’m a hands-on kind of guy.” He made sure his smile had a bite to it, just enough to make her wonder whether he was joking or not.

      “But that’s…” Not going to work. Definitely not for him. He wasn’t looking forward to leaving his condo to live in this firetrap. And by the look on Miss Nellie’s face, it wasn’t working for her, either.

      CHAPTER TWO

      “YOU’RE LEAVING ALL THOSE clothes here?” Alex asked as he stared into Jordan’s closet.

      Trying to ignore his headache, Jordan zipped up the suitcase. “I’m only going to be forty minutes away. I’ll be dropping in from time to time.”

      He’d arrived home last night in a black mood to find Alex waiting for him with a bottle of Scotch to celebrate their first joint business venture. As he watched his friend shove his clothes to one end of the closet and start hanging up his own suits, he tried to recall how he’d allowed Alex to convince him to sublet his condo. Alex insisted he was doing him a favor by taking the place off his hands for the next few months, but Jordan had seen him working a deal too many times not to know when he’d been played. Which was exactly why he wanted Alex as a business partner; the guy knew how to work the angles. He wasn’t sure how he felt about him moving in on his personal turf, though.

      “The sooner you clear out the riffraff, the sooner we sell, and you can move back here.” Alex hummed as he hung up one of his suits. “It’s a good idea for you to move in. Sounds like you have a lot of house cleaning to do.”

      Jordan scooped up an armload of books he’d selected a couple days ago and stacked them in an empty box. “You’re working with a real-estate agent to get the house listed, right? And coming up with our own list of potential clients, as well?”

      “I am, but you’d get a higher price if the house showed a profit. It’s the live-in caretaker who’s the worst. She either has to go or start paying market rent.”

      Jordan’s queasiness spiked. Not only was he going to live on Dunstan Lane to monitor the situation and the repairs, but he had to find a way to get rid of Nell and her kids. Yeah, he was really looking forward to the next few months.

      “Just keep your eye on the ball,” Alex cautioned. “In the past year alone there were three businesses we could have bought into if we’d had the capital. Selling the house is going to make it possible for us to branch out on our own. Don’t forget that.”

      “Not going to happen.” Not after he’d worked so hard to get this far. He was often accused of being too focused, but without backup, he couldn’t afford to relax. The consquences were immediate, sometimes permanent. He’d moved on from his poverty-stricken childhood. The only direction he planned to travel now was up—after selling the house.

      “Good. So, any chance Sandra will show up at your door?”

      “No.” Jordan stacked a few more books in the box.

      “I thought things were heating up between you.”

      “They’re not.” And he didn’t understand why. Logically, Sandra was the perfect woman for him. She was a consultant at the same firm as him and Alex, but worked in marketing, while he was a turn-around consultant. Often they worked on the same account. Jordan went in first, assessed the company’s problems, looked for ways to improve efficiency and cut costs and helped the owners write a new business plan. Sandra was all about strengthening the clients’ brand, keeping them in front of their intended audience.

      They worked well together, enjoyed each other’s company, and had the same drive for successs. If that wasn’t enough, she was a beautiful woman, and she’d let him know she wouldn’t mind if they spent more time together outside office hours. It should have added up to the perfect relationship. He couldn’t put his finger on exactly what else he needed, but something held him back from committing to her. It made him uneasy to think about it, so he tried not to. In any case, he wasn’t ready to get involved in anything serious at this point in his life. He had business to attend to.

      “She’s smart, she’s foxy and she wants what you want. Money, success and all the trimmings. You’re nuts, man. Unless you’ve been holding out on me. Should I expect any other girlfriends showing up at the door?”

      “No.” Jordan stalked into the bathroom to escape Alex’s cheerful tone. Bad enought the guy was moving onto his turf while he was stuck at the old Victorian, now he was angling for his woman, too.

      WHEN JORDAN DROVE UP to the side entrance of the Victorian two hours later, dark clouds scudded across the sky, threatening more rain. Everything looked sodden, even the closed-up sunflower that peeked around the corner of the building.

      One of Nell’s projects likely; she seemed like the sunflower type. She’d managed to skinny out of showing him the bedsit yesterday when Mrs. Trembley had started thumping on the second-story floor with her cane. The elderly tenant declared she’d been waiting hours to meet him and wasn’t willing to wait a minute longer. He’d been polite but distant and had cut the interview short, having had a bellyful of 879 Dunstan Lane by then. He couldn’t wait to get back to his condo where he didn’t know his next-door neighbors. Didn’t have to know them, didn’t care to know them. No clutter, no fuss. Just the way he liked it. Except with Alex living there now, the place didn’t feel like his anymore. He’d forgotten how lousy it felt not to know where you belonged.

      Using the key Nell had given him yesterday, he opened the outside door to the room that was to be his home for however long it took to sell the house. At least the bedsit had its own private entrance. The other tenants shared an inside hallway and staircase, but he could come and go without having to talk to anyone.

      He sighed; there wasn’t enough space to breathe, let alone live inside the room. Everything looked too small and drab—the bathroom wedged in one corner, the tiny kitchenette strung along the back wall. Worse, all the complaining in the world wasn’t going to change the fact that he’d elected to stay here.

      He kicked a chrome, sixties-style kitchen chair that didn’t look as if it would hold his weight. Okay, he ate out more nights than not, so the kitchen wasn’t a big deal. And as long as he had lots of hot water and good pressure, he could handle banging his elbows against the sides of the shower. The bed, a lumpy couch that pulled out into a double—or so Nell had assured him—didn’t begin to pass muster. He’d have to buy a new mattress. No telling what was living in this one.

      He dropped his suitcases in front of the only closet as water pipes screeched overhead. He shuddered and shoved open a window. The room smelled of damp clothes and disinfectant; it needed a good scrubbing. That was a caretaker’s job, right?

      His mood brightened until he remembered he had to tell Nell about the rent increases. With the expense of raising two small children, he imagined paying a higher rent was going to put a serious dent in her budget. With that in mind, he’d decided to hold off for a couple more weeks before tackling the issue of her caretaker position. It didn’t make sense to keep her on staff when all he had to do was hire a tradesman from time to time to do repairs. Eventually, he’d have to let her go.

      Best-case scenario, he’d come up with a solution before he had to fire her. He had a lot of contacts and planned to start looking for a better job for her as soon as he found out what skills she had to offer. Who could resist more money and a nicer place to live? He knew at least two people who owned newly renovated apartment buildings. One of them owed him big-time.

      “Anyone home?” A quick rap of knuckles, and the outside door popped open. “Sorry to barge in. It’s started raining again.” A gorgeous redhead burst into the room, followed by a small girl who hung back in the doorway.

      The leggy redhead thrust a bouquet of flowers toward him. “Welcome. I’m Melody from 2B. Close the door, Lacey. You’re letting the rain in.” She strode over to the kitchen and started going through cupboards as if she lived there. “No vase. I was afraid of that. I’ll run upstairs and get one.”

      She