Six More Hot Single Dads!. Kate Hardy

line.

      So why did that simple one word acknowledgement make her feel as if someone had just lit a fire inside of her? A fire that was warming up every single part of her at once.

      She had no answer for that.

      Yet.

       Chapter Ten

      The reception gave no indication that it was about to wind down any time soon. Instead, it appeared to have comfortably settled into a rhythm and gave every indication of going on for hours, conversation and wine flowing effortlessly.

      Hired to cater the event, Theresa Manetti made sure that the serving platters on the buffet table were never empty and that all the glasses that were in play were continually being refilled. She had a reputation to maintain.

      But aside from that, being here also allowed her the opportunity to covertly observe the young woman she had “unofficially” made her newest project. Isabelle Sinclair had certainly come a long way from the woman she’d glimpsed just a short while ago. The other one had been pretty in a shy, retiring way. This woman was vivacious. A “knockout” as her father used to say, Theresa thought with a fond smile.

      Seeing Isabelle interacting with Brandon Slade gave Theresa every hope that this particular pairing she had undertaken would turn out to be as successful as the handful of others she, Maizie and Cecilia had gotten involved with. So far, their record was five out of five. This, she thought with a smile, just might be lucky number six.

      Approximately ninety minutes into the reception, Anastasia, with Victoria in tow, made her way over to her son. As always, he was surrounded by a number of women of various ages. This time, he was telling his adoring fans the story of how he’d received the news of his first book making it to the New York Times bestseller list.

      “At first I thought it was one of my friends, making a crank call and pulling my leg. So I hung up. After the person called back a second time, I placed my own call to my agent—and got the same person who very coldly informed me that my agent was in a meeting and she couldn’t be disturbed, but she’d asked him—turns out he was her assistant—to call me with the good news. He sounded very put out. I spent the next fifteen minutes apologizing to him—and then the next forty-eight hours celebrating,” he concluded with a grin.

      It was clear that his audience was eager for another anecdote. But the moment he saw his mother approaching with Victoria, Brandon politely extricated himself from the tight circle of women, promising to return with another story “later.”

      Crossing to his mother, who was clearly going somewhere, he asked, “What’s up?” He looked from his mother to his daughter, waiting for an answer.

      “Brandon, it’s getting late. It might not be a school night, but Victoria and I are going home,” his mother announced.

      He could remember when his mother could party not just all night long but several days running, as well. Back in those days, she’d been unharnessed energy and had given no indication of ever slowing down or growing tired.

      Age was a bear, he thought with a touch of sadness. For form’s sake, because he knew she’d refuse to admit she was tired, he asked his mother, “Is anything wrong?”

      “No, nothing’s wrong. But it’s past Victoria’s bedtime and I don’t want her overdoing it,” Anastasia elaborated.

      The excuse was paper-thin, but he saw no reason to let her know that he saw through it. In order to spare his mother’s pride, Brandon played along. He glanced over his shoulder at the circle of women he’d just left. They were still waiting for him. One of the women waved at him.

      Danger, Will Robinson, Danger, he thought, whimsically calling to mind a famous catch phrase from a bygone era. “Maybe I should go, too,” he said to his mother.

      Anastasia looked genuinely horrified. “No, no, you and Isabelle stay here,” she insisted, patting his hand. “Enjoy yourselves.”

      “Isabelle’s not going with you?” Sexy or not, the woman was his mother’s physical therapist and as such should really be accompanying her, not him, Brandon thought.

      “Why should she?” Anastasia asked, surprised that he would even suggest such a thing. “It only takes one of us to make sure Victoria goes to bed,” she said, draping an arm around the girl’s slender shoulders.

      Brandon noticed that his daughter looked as if she wanted to protest but was prudent enough not to. Wise beyond her years, that girl, he thought with pride.

      Digging into his pocket, he located his keys. Brandon took them out and held them out to his mother. He knew that her surgeon had just cleared her to drive yesterday. He assumed she was eager to get back behind the wheel again. Control was all important to his mother, it always had been. “Take my car, then.”

      She pushed his hand—and the keys—back. “No need. Maura is taking us home,” she told him, referring to his agent. “She was planning on leaving early anyway.” Anastasia waved her hand vaguely. “Something about having to take an early phone call tomorrow. I don’t know,” she confessed. “I wasn’t really listening. You know how she can go on and on.”

      His agent would just drop his mother off at the curb, never leaving her vehicle. He wasn’t sure if he was happy with that. “You’ll be all right, going home by yourself?” he questioned.

      “I won’t be by myself,” Anastasia reminded him, then looked toward her granddaughter. “I have Victoria. What more could I ask for?”

      Brandon smiled. There were indeed times when it felt as if Victoria was the adult and his mother, and occasionally, he supposed, he as well, were the children. His daughter was born with an old soul, which was fortunate for him because he wouldn’t have known what to do with a typical rebellious teenager.

      Walking in at the tail end of the conversation, Isabelle joined Brandon and his family. “I should be going with you,” she told the actress.

      That was exactly what Anastasia didn’t want. She wanted the two of them to be alone together—as alone as was possible in the middle of a packed reception.

      “Nonsense, dear. This is the shank of the evening for you and you’re only young once—trust me on this.” The woman patted Isabelle’s cheek with her heavily ringed hand. “Enjoy yourself. Keep an eye out for Brandon and make sure some overendowed, eager fan doesn’t get it into her head to make off with him,” she requested. “He has trouble saying ‘no.’ To anyone except his poor mother.”

      Brandon laughed. “There’s absolutely nothing ‘poor’ about you, Mother.”

      Anastasia took it as her due. “Thank you, dear.” As she spoke, she looked around for Brandon’s agent. “Ah, there she is. Maura,” she called out, raising her arm and waving from side to side to catch the woman’s attention. “We’re ready to go.”

      His agent, a short, sensible-looking woman wearing a blue sequined dress that transformed her squat torso into a walking blue flame, nodded.

      “Then let’s go.” She put a hand to the small of each of their backs. “I’m parked in the first row,” she informed her charges as she herded them both off.

      Now what? Isabelle wondered.

      She looked after the departing actress, clearly torn between her sense of duty and a very strong streak of desire, a streak that insisted on growing with every breath she took.

      “I really should go with her,” she murmured to Brandon.

      “No, you shouldn’t,” he contradicted. She looked at him, puzzled. “It took me a while to get versed in Anastasia-speak but if she tells you she wants you to stay, then she wants you to stay. Really.”

      Isabelle still had her doubts as she watched the two women and Victoria weave