Kids Included. Caroline Anderson

ate out.

      Molly, who cooked for a living, thought it sounded a very good idea all of a sudden. ‘Fine. I’ll put this lot in the fridge and we’ll go and swim, sort out where we all have to be and then have supper.’

      The pool was wonderful. There was a wave machine, a flume, wild water rapids, a swirly river thing that swept you round an island, and, best of all, a hot whirlpool tub. The kids were strong swimmers, and sensible, so after they’d explored the pool complex together, she sent them off with strict instructions to keep an eye on each other and wallowed in the hot tub, watching out for them as they climbed the steps to the top of the flume.

      ‘Mind if I join you?’

      Her heart jolted wildly, and she looked up to be treated to acres of muscular, hairy thigh and lean washboard abs that made her want to moan out loud.

      ‘Feel free,’ she croaked, shuffling up a little, and he squeezed in beside her. They were hardly alone, there were two other couples in the big round tub, and Molly was intensely grateful for them. Safety in numbers, she thought a little hysterically, and then wondered what on earth she was worried about. He thought she was a complete twit. Who wouldn’t, after the way she’d performed?

      He settled in beside her with a big sigh, and she was enormously aware of him just inches away. His foot brushed hers, and she jumped as if she’d been bitten and shuffled a little further away.

      He smiled knowingly. ‘Sorry,’ he murmured, but she knew he wasn’t. Damn.

      They sat in silence, cosseted by the bubbles, while she tried not to think about his lean and very masculine body, so close she could reach out and touch it—and then the other couples climbed out and left them.

      Molly scooted round a bit, not quite opposite him but not so close, either. ‘Where are the children?’ she asked to fill the silence and to quell the riot in her mind.

      ‘Seb’s keeping an eye on them. They all swim like fish, even Nicky, but he’s got her in the paddling pool and the others are going on the flume. I thought I’d take five, and Seb knows where I am.’ He propped his head back and closed his eyes with a sigh. ‘Are you here on your own?’ he asked lazily.

      ‘No—I’ve got the children with me.’

      His eyes flew open. ‘Children?’

      ‘Yes, children. You know, those little bits of DNA that grow up to persecute us?’

      He chuckled. ‘Them,’ he said with a smile, and studied her searchingly. ‘I didn’t realise you had children. You look too young. Are they in the crèche?’

      She laughed a little wildly. ‘You have to be kidding. They’d skin me alive before they let me put them in there.’

      He glanced around. ‘So are they with your husband?’

      ‘Um—no. I—ah—we’re here alone. They’re swimming.’

      His eyes widened. ‘They can’t be old enough! Not unless you started at ten.’

      Her laugh was getting a little hysterical. ‘You are too kind. I think you also need your eyes checked. I have grey hairs, and bald bits where I’ve yanked the grey out, and wrinkles you could hide inside!’

      ‘And I’ve parked my Zimmer just round that rock.’

      She laughed again, softly this time. ‘I’m thirty-one—and you’re a million miles from needing a walking frame.’

      He grinned. ‘At the moment, but I have a hideous feeling that’s all going to change. I’m doing a mountain-bike ride with Nicky on the back tomorrow morning that will probably kill me, even though it’s supposed to be gentle, and then in the afternoon for my sins I’m abseiling with Seb while the others do canoeing and finger painting variously.’

      ‘Let me guess—the baby’s finger painting.’

      ‘Yup. I hate to think what state she’ll come back in.’

      ‘She’ll be fine—send her in something old and tatty.’ Molly shifted a little so she could see him better. ‘So, where’s your wife while all this is going on?’

      He met her eyes with a clear, level gaze. ‘I don’t have a wife. Where’s your husband?’

      And that was direct! She filed the information about his wife and answered him frankly. ‘Australia—dodging the maintenance payments.’

      ‘Ah. Hence the magic act.’

      ‘No, not at all. That was to help out a friend.’

      ‘You were good.’

      ‘I was awful.’

      ‘I thought you were very funny.’

      She gave a strangled laugh. ‘It was meant to be slick and fast and magical—not a take-off of Tommy Cooper.’

      He tipped his head and grinned. ‘I could see you in a fez. I don’t suppose you want to do a repeat performance—?’

      She laughed and shook her head. ‘Oh, no. It was definitely a one-off. Never again.’

      He stretched, and she tucked her feet up just to be on the safe side.

      ‘So, what do you do, then?’

      ‘I’m a nursery nurse—except I’m not. I used to run a crèche but I needed to be around in the school holidays after they grew up a bit, so I did a cookery course and now I’ve got a catering business. I make sandwiches and deliver them to various outlets every day, and I do the odd bit of catering for dinner parties and wedding buffets.’ She tipped her head a little and studied him. ‘So what do you do? Apart from keeping up with the children?’

      He grinned, a lop-sided tilt of his mouth that creased his eyes and softened the angular planes of his face and made her heart hiccup. ‘I write crime novels—detective stories about people perpetrating convoluted and bizarre crimes on unsuspecting members of the public.’

      She chuckled. ‘Like me, you mean?’

      ‘Absolutely. My current heroine is a little like you. She’s small and feisty—she’s a victim, but she escapes the final thrust and lives to tell the tale.’

      ‘I’m so glad,’ she said with a smile, and wondered if his heroine was like her, or if he was just being flattering. ‘Where do you get your ideas?’

      His face closed a little. ‘I was a cop,’ he said lightly, but his eyes were suddenly shielded.

      I was a cop. Just that, but it told her so much—and asked a million more questions. Like, had it been the end of his marriage—?

      ‘Did she walk out?’

      He blinked. ‘She?’

      ‘Your wife.’

      His mouth hardened, and she flushed and sat up in a flurry of bubbles and arms and legs. ‘Sorry, that was intrusive.’

      To her surprise he answered. ‘Yes, it was—and yes, she did. She found it all too much.’

      ‘And left you with the kids.’

      He looked down into the water. ‘Not exactly. Look, I have to go. I’ll see you around.’ He sat forward. ‘Where’s your cabin?’

      ‘Area B—by the lake.’ What did not exactly mean?

      ‘So’s ours. What number?’

      ‘B15.’

      ‘We’re B19—I’ll look out for you. Perhaps we can get together—it would make a change to talk to another adult. Talking to a strand of mutant DNA gets a little tedious at times.’

      His mouth quirked, taking the edge off his words, and he stood up. Water streamed off his body, running in rivulets down his arms and legs and that fascinating chest with the little vee of hair between the nipples—