Reluctant Father. Diana Palmer

Jane was screaming her head off.

      “Where are you?” he asked with cold patience.

      “Meg Donaldson’s dress shop downtown,” she replied. “This has been going on for five minutes. I wouldn’t let her buy the dress she wanted and I can’t make her stop.”

      “Smack her on the bottom,” Blake said.

      “Hit her in public?” She sounded as if he’d asked her to tie the child to a moving vehicle by her hair. “I won’t!”

      He said something under his breath. “All right, I’m on my way.”

      He hung up. “Tell the board to go ahead without me,” he told Daisy shortly, grabbing his hat off the hat rack. “I have to go administrate a small problem.”

      “When will you be back, sir?” Daisy asked.

      “God knows.”

      He closed the door behind him with a jerk, mentally consigning fatherhood and sissy housekeepers to the netherworld.

      It took him ten minutes to get to the small children’s boutique in town, and as luck would have it, there was one empty space in front that he could slide the Mercedes into. Next to his car was a sporty red Porsche with the top down. He paused for a moment to admire it and wonder about the owner.

      “Oh, thank God.” Mrs. Jackson almost fell on him when he walked into the shop. “Make her stop.”

      Sarah was lying on the floor, her face red and tear stained, her hair damp with sweat, her old dress rumpled from her exertions. She looked up at Blake and the tantrum died abruptly. “She won’t buy me the frilly one,” she moaned, pouting with a demure femininity.

      My God, Blake thought absently, they learn how to do it almost before they can walk.

      “Why won’t you buy her the frilly one?” he asked an astonished Mrs. Jackson, the words slipping out before he could stop them, while Meg Donaldson smothered a smile behind her cupped hands at the counter.

      Mrs. Jackson looked taken aback. She cleared her throat. “Well, it’s expensive.”

      “I’m rich,” he pointed out.

      “Yes, but it’s not suitable for playing in the backyard. She needs some jeans and tops and underthings.”

      “I need a dress to wear to parties,” Sarah sobbed. “I never got to go to a party, but you can have one for me, and I can make friends.”

      He reached down and lifted her to her feet, then knelt in front of her. “I don’t like tantrums,” he said. “Next time Mrs. Jackson will spank you. In public,” he added, glaring at the stoic housekeeper.

      She turned beet red, and Mrs. Donaldson bent down beside the counter as if she were going to look for something and burst out laughing.

      While Mrs. Jackson was searching for words, the shop door opened and two women came in. Elissa Roper was immediately recognizable. She was married to King Roper, a friend of Blake’s.

      “Blake!” Elissa smiled. “We haven’t seen you lately. What are you and Mrs. Jackson doing in here? And who’s this?”

      “This is my daughter, Sarah Jane,” Blake said, introducing the child. “We’ve just been having a tantrum.”

      “Speak for yourself,” Mrs. Jackson sniffed. “I don’t have tantrums. I just resign from jobs that have gotten too big for me.”

      “You’re resigning, Mrs. Jackson? That would be one for the books, wouldn’t it?” a soft, amused voice asked, and Blake’s heart jumped.

      He got slowly to his feet, oblivious to Sarah’s curious stare, to come face to face with a memory.

      Meredith Calhoun looked back at him with gray eyes that gave away nothing except faint humor. She was wearing a blue dress with a white jacket, and she looked expensive and sophisticated and lovely. Her figure had filled out over the years, and she was tall and exquisite, with full, high breasts and a narrow waist flaring to hips that were in exact proportion for her body. She had long legs encased in silk hose, and elegant feet in white sandals. And the sight of her made Blake ache in the most inconvenient way.

      “Merry!” Mrs. Jackson enthused, and hugged her. “It’s been so long!”

      And it had been since Mrs. Jackson had made cake and cookies for her while she visited Blake’s uncle, who was also her godfather.

      She and the housekeeper had grown close. “Long enough, I guess, Amie,” Meredith said as they stepped apart. “You haven’t aged a day.”

      “You have,” Mrs. Jackson said with a smile. “You’re grown up.”

      “And famous,” Elissa put in. “Bess—you remember my sister-in-law—and Meredith were in the same class at school and are still great friends. She’s staying with Bess and Bobby.”

      “They’ve just bought the house next door to me,” Blake replied, for something to say. He couldn’t find the words to express what he felt when he looked at Meredith. So many years, so much pain. But whatever she’d felt for him was gone. That fact registered immediately.

      “Has Nina come back with your daughter?” Elissa asked, trying not to appear poleaxed, which she was.

      “Nina died earlier this year. Sarah Jane is living with me now.” He dragged his eyes away from Meredith to turn his attention to his child. “You look terrible. Go to the rest room and wash your face.”

      “You come, too,” Sarah said mutinously.

      “No.”

      “I won’t go!”

      “I’ll take her,” Mrs. Jackson said in her best martyred tone.

      “No! You won’t let me buy the frilly dress!” Sarah turned her attention to the two curious onlookers. “She’s in the paper,” she said, her eyes on Meredith. “She writes books. My daddy said so.”

      Meredith managed not to look at Blake. The unexpected sight of him after so much time was enough to knock her speechless. Thank God she’d learned to mask her emotions and hadn’t given herself away. The last thing she wanted to do was let Blake Donavan see that she had any vulnerability left.

      Sarah walked over to Meredith, staring up at her with rapt fascination. “Can you tell stories?”

      “Oh, I guess I can,” she said, smiling at the child who was so much like Blake. “You’ve got red eyes, Sarah. You shouldn’t cry.”

      “I want the frilly dress and a party and other little children to play with. It’s very lonely, and they don’t like me.” She indicated Blake and Mrs. Jackson.

      “One day, and she’s advertising to the world that we’re Jekyll and Hyde.” Mrs. Jackson threw up her hands.

      “Which one are you?” Blake returned, glaring at her.

      “Jekyll, of course. I’m prettier than you are,” Mrs. Jackson shot back.

      “Just like old times,” Elissa said with a sigh, “isn’t it, Merry?”

      Meredith wasn’t listening. Sarah Jane had reached up and taken her hand.

      “You can come with me,” the little girl told Meredith. “I like her,” she said to her father belligerently. “She smiles. I’ll let her wash my face.”

      “Do you mind?” Blake asked Meredith, speaking to her for the first time since she’d entered the shop.

      “I don’t mind.” She didn’t look at him fully, then turned and let Sarah lead her into the small bathroom in the back of the shop.

      “She’s changed,” Mrs. Jackson said to Mrs. Donaldson. “I hardly knew her.”

      “It’s been a long time, you know. And she’s