Kids Included. Caroline Anderson

thumped again, and for a ridiculous second he felt as if he’d asked her out on a date.

      Absurd…

      The cabin wasn’t really big enough for eight of them, but he threw open the patio doors and they spilled out onto the short, scrubby grass beside the lake. Ducks came waddling up expectantly, and within moments Nicky was there asking for bread for them.

      He absent-mindedly handed her a slice and searched the fridge. Not enough orange for all of them; not enough of anything. He needed to go shopping again.

      He diluted the juice, used small glasses and watched Molly as discreetly as he could.

      He was watching her. Probably looking for imminent signs of madness. She couldn’t believe that he’d really liked the magic show, and there was no way it was her legs he was studying, so it must be the lunatic tendencies he was waiting for.

      ‘So, what’s on tomorrow?’ she asked.

      ‘Ah—tomorrow. Monday? Let’s see—Seb’s bungee-jumping and doing some commando thing, Amy’s doing the theatre workshop all day and Tom’s skateboarding and trail-biking, I think. How about you?’

      ‘The same, I think. I know Philip’s trail-biking in the afternoon, and Cassie’s certainly doing the theatre workshop. She’ll enjoy that, being with Amy. They seem to get on very well.’

      His eyes tracked to the children. ‘They do. I’m glad. I was wondering how it would work, but finding a holiday that suited all five of us was a nightmare. Usually at least some of us are bored some of the time, but I don’t think we’re going to have time to be bored this week.’

      She chuckled. ‘No. I think we’re going to be pooped instead. I feel tired already! What about the little one?’

      ‘Nicky?’ Again his eyes tracked to her, as they often did, his internal radar keeping tabs on the active youngster, she thought. ‘I think Nicky and I are in the farmyard tomorrow morning, and then in the afternoon she’s in the kindergarten and I’m kart racing.’

      ‘So am I!’ she exclaimed, and then could have bitten her tongue out. Did she have to sound so enthusiastic? He’d think she was following him round! Oh, Lord, her and her big mouth—

      ‘That’s great,’ he said, and he sounded sincere and—interested? No. He was just glad to have company. It was a bit daunting joining new groups every session, having to work with total strangers. It was easier if there was someone there that you’d seen before.

      That was all he meant—surely?

      ‘What about the morning?’ he asked.

      ‘I was going to have a lazy couple of hours with a book,’ she confessed.

      ‘You could always join us in the farmyard,’ he suggested.

      Was that interest in his eyes? Possibly. Oh, lawks. Nobody had looked at her like that for so long she wasn’t even sure!

      ‘Thanks—I’ll think about it,’ she said, vowing to do no such thing. No, she’d lie in the bath, read a book, pamper herself with body lotion and a thorough facial treatment, and lie in the sun.

      ‘I tell you what, if you’re coming, let me know before eight-thirty.’

      ‘I will,’ she agreed, knowing she wouldn’t do any such thing.

      No way was she walking round a farmyard with a man with lazy, sexy eyes and four children. Oh, no!

      CHAPTER TWO

      ‘MOLLY?’

      She jerked up into a sitting position, her lids flying open, and met Jack’s laughing eyes with an inward groan.

      ‘Hi,’ she mumbled through stiff lips. She tried to smile, and felt the skin shatter all over her face. Her hands flew up and covered the hideous mask, and with a moan of anguish she flopped back against the sun lounger and glared at him. ‘I thought you were at the farmyard?’ she wailed, cracking furiously.

      He grinned, quite unabashed at having caught her in such disarray. Damn.

      ‘Seems I wasn’t needed there.’

      You’re not needed here, she nearly retorted, scrambling to her feet and clutching the sides of her dressing gown together. The only good thing about it was that he couldn’t see the flaming colour in her cheeks under the crumbling face pack.

      ‘Give me a minute,’ she muttered, and felt a chunk of the vile green mud flake and fall off. She fled for the sanctuary of her bathroom, trailed by a masculine chuckle that did nothing for her temper—or her equilibrium.

      Ruthlessly she crumbled the face pack and scrubbed it off with warm water, slapped on some moisturiser that made her go all shiny as well as pink, and dragged on her shorts and T-shirt. Hmm. She looked about sixteen—which, come to think of it, had to be an improvement on thirty-one.

      She shoved her feet into sandals, wriggling into them as she walked, and found him sprawled on her sun lounger, face tipped up to the sun, eyes shut, utterly at ease.

      ‘Coffee?’ she snapped, and he opened one eye and squinted at her in the sunlight.

      ‘If you’re sure it’s no trouble.’

      ‘It’s no trouble,’ she said ungraciously, and flounced back into the cabin. Fancy catching her like that! She’d looked a total fright! He might have warned her he was coming! She banged around in the little open-plan kitchen area, smacking mugs down on the worktop, popping the seal on the instant coffee and tapping her foot while the kettle slowly came to the boil.

      ‘You’re mad with me.’

      Her head jerked up and she glared at him over the kettle. ‘Why should I be mad with you?’

      He smiled understandingly. ‘Because I caught you looking like a refugee from a frog pond?’

      She stifled the smile. ‘You have such a way with words.’

      He laughed, propping his arms on the half-wall that surrounded the kitchen area and leaning over towards her with that engaging grin of his. ‘Am I supposed to say you looked ravishing?’

      ‘And add lying to your sins?’

      ‘Maybe it’s not a lie.’

      ‘And maybe you’re a frog. That would explain a lot.’

      He smiled. ‘You could always kiss me and see if I turn into a prince.’

      Her heart unaccountably thumped. ‘In your dreams,’ she shot back, refusing to smile.

      ‘Grouch.’

      ‘You’d better believe it. I’m not my sunny best when I’m caught like that.’

      He straightened up, his mouth twitching. ‘I don’t suppose there’s any point in telling you you’d look wonderful covered in mud from head to foot?’

      She arched a brow. ‘Hardly. I’d only think you had a kink about women mud-wrestlers—either that or you really are a frog.’

      His eyes sparkled with humour and he let the smile out, drawing her attention to the firm fullness of his lips and the hard angle of his beautifully-sculpted jaw. Perhaps she ought to kiss him and find out—?

      ‘Penny for them.’

      She laughed then. ‘No way. Black or white?’

      ‘Black—strong, no sugar.’

      How had she known that? She handed him the mug over the little wall, and scooping up her own she went out into the little sun-trap patio at the back of the cabin. Like his, it looked out over the lake and was open to anyone who chose to walk past it—the last place she should have sat with her face pack on.

      She’d thought she was safe, though, because there hadn’t seemed to be anyone