Heiress for Hire (13 page)

And she'd bet her last forty-three dollars he didn't see ghosts, in mirrors or otherwise.

"I don't suppose she did. But it makes her way more interesting than I am."

Amanda wasn't having any problem finding him interesting. Which was a disaster.

If she was going to take this job and prove to herself, her father, the world, that she was capable of earning a wage, then she couldn't be dallying with her boss like a nineteenth-century British chambermaid.

Not that Danny looked like dallying. He looked like he had far more important things on his mind. Like his daughter and his dinner.

But if he did dally, she'd be damned if she'd dally back.

So maybe the dead people thing was a positive, actually. Dead people would probably serve as a great sexual inhibitor.

God, she needed another cup of coffee.

"Geez, this house is dusty. You should get someone in here to clean it."

For a long second, Danny really thought Amanda was joking. A cute little witticism that seemed right in line with her sense of humor.

But as she continued to survey his living room like she had discovered a three-thousand-strong army of cockroaches marching through a cloud of chemicals, he realized that she was perfectly serious.

Which confirmed that he was out of his ever-lovin' mind to think this could work.

"That's why I hired you, Amanda. To clean the house and keep an eye on Piper." He watched her eyes go wide with astonishment.

"But I thought you said housekeeping. I'm positive that's what you said."

Suddenly, he wanted to laugh. "I did. What did you think housekeeping meant? It means cleaning the house."

Piper had scampered off to her room, so they were alone in the living room, though Amanda's gigantic purse took up two feet between them. Amanda was clutching it, her eyes narrowed, her head tilted slightly like she just wasn't getting it.

"I thought you meant I was going to be your housekeeper, and the housekeeper's job is to hire the people who do the gross stuff. The housekeeper doesn't actually do the gross stuff. You know, like Gosford Park."

Now he did laugh. She looked so confused, and so deliciously sexy standing there in her fancy striped top and her spotless white pencil-shaped pants, he couldn't help but tease her a little. "Princess, maybe that's what a housekeeper does in Gosford Park or in Chicago, but here in Cuttersville, a housekeeper cleans the toilets."

"Oh my God," she said, her cheeks bleaching white under her tan. "You want me to clean the toilets?"

"Well, there's only one. It's a small house."

"But you… use the toilet!"

He grinned. "That's kind of the reason it gets dirty. We use it."

Then he realized maybe his teasing hadn't had the right effect. She looked like she might faint or throw up. "Are you okay?"

"No. I'm seeing spots and the room keeps fading in and out." She clutched her bag like it was the only thing keeping her from sliding to the ground.

"Jesus, I'm sorry, I was kidding, Amanda." He reached out and grabbed her forearms so she wouldn't hit the carpet. "I don't expect you to clean the toilets. Just dust, vacuum, wash the dishes. That sort of thing. Light housekeeping."

She took a deep, shuddering breath. "Okay. Dust, vacuum, wash the dishes. I can do that. And I would have cleaned the toilets, that's not what made me dizzy."

With a stubborn lift of her head, she told him, "I didn't eat lunch, that's all. I could clean the hell out of any toilet. I'd be so good at it that the next time that toilet saw me, it would just clean itself out of fear."

Only by coughing into his hand did he keep from laughing. He could just picture Amanda ordering that toilet to clean itself. "Why didn't you eat lunch?"

"I just didn't get around to it." She waved his question off and dropped her purse onto the coffee table. "Okay, so where's like a rag or something? I'll dust this room, then I'm going to check out Piper's room. She and I can hang while I make like Cinderella."

Amanda's cheeks still looked a little white, and Danny had the sudden sinking feeling that she hadn't eaten because she was out of money. Only he suspected she would never admit that. "Are you trying to impress me? I can give you a tour of everything first."

She snorted. "Just doing my job. It's what you're paying me for. Bring on the dirt."

Though Danny had some real reservations that he'd be getting his money's worth out of this, he went to the coat closet by the front door and pulled out a blue milk crate filled with cleaning supplies. "Here." He plunked it at her feet, still tilted at an unnatural angle in high heels. "Rags, furniture polish, Windex, paper towels. The vacuum is in the closet. I figure it shouldn't take you more than an hour every day to keep the house picked up and clean—I want your focus to be on playing with Piper."

Though he thought things were going well for the most part, it stuck in his craw that Piper still seemed to think living with him was temporary. She didn't want to unpack her clothes into the dresser, and she showed no interest in meeting other kids. It was ridiculous for him to expect her to just move on in with him after eight years—never having met him—and be ready to trust him, but damn it, he wanted it to be that way.

He wanted her to love him right now. He wanted her to throw herself into his arms, not out of fear, but out of joy.

He wanted to turn back time and have her from day one, and give her a proper home, with a family who cared.

Instead, he was giving her Amanda Delmar for a nanny.

God help them all.

Amanda was picking through the crate, pulling out bottles and reading their labels. "Okay, hold twelve inches from object and spray for three seconds. Wipe with cloth. Repeat as necessary."

Danny shook his head, half amused, half horrified. He wasn't going to let her anywhere near the laundry. There were no written directions for separating whites from darks. "I'm going to go fix us all some lunch." He didn't think he could stand around and witness her bumbling her way through dusting.

It would either make him laugh, which would insult her, or he'd wind up grabbing the rag out of her hand and doing it himself.

Not that he was any kind of domestic god. And he had let the house go since Piper had moved in, preferring to spend all his time with her, but he could clean as necessary. His mother wouldn't have had it any other way. Willie Tucker didn't approve of gender roles.

"Yes, sir." Amanda saluted him with the Pledge bottle. "Everything is under control."

That was debatable.

Especially when she pushed the button and shot out a three-foot-long vapor cloud of furniture polish in the general direction of the coffee table. A sprinkling landed on the table—the rest scattered all over the sofa and the carpet.

"Whoa, that stuff has a real kick-back on it."

He moved toward the table, fingers itching to rip the bottle out of her hand. "You like ham?" Sandwiches were probably all he could manage on short notice.

"Sure. What's a little pig between friends?" she said, clearly dis-tracted with swatting the cloth around on the table, holding it at arm's length and being careful not to get her white pants dirty.

Danny skirted the coffee table and went down the hall, hoping to draw Piper out of her room and into the kitchen. She had taken to spending long stretches of time in her room, and it made him nervous, like she didn't want to be with him. Like she wasn't happy with him.

"Nice doily," Amanda said.

Danny looked over to where she was shifting a lace thing on the end table under the lamp. It occurred to him that his house must look a little ridiculous from her point of view. Here she was used to expensive hotels and hiring decorators to create the perfect home, and he had a poky little ranch house with plaid sofas and a few girly touches left over from his marriage to Shelby.

He wondered if Amanda had her own house or apartment or if she lived with her father still. "Shelby used to like those things."

"I should have guessed. They're doily-heavy at their house."

Danny hovered in the doorway that led to his three small bedrooms. "You probably have a house that's five times this size."

She shrugged, moving the rag across the table, then swatting the lampshade with enough force to make him wince. He wasn't emotionally attached to the lamp or anything—it was just an old brass job with a beige shade—but it gave good light and he didn't feel like spending the money to replace it. Cash was tight right now while he tried to get Piper everything she needed.

"My father has a big house in Lake Forest. An appropriately pretentious contemporary wonder, with lots of windows and leather and glass sculptures. I don't live there anymore though. Daddy pays for an apartment in the city for me. It's smaller than this house, but I do like it. I've decorated it with nice cozy furniture, sort of shabby chic meets modern. Lots of color, patterns, some art I picked out in Paris."

Art in Paris. Doilies in Cuttersville. It said all there was to say. Even if he were wildly attracted to Amanda, which he was, the doily spoke volumes. She was out of his league. She was so far out she might as well be on the freaking moon.

"I kind of miss my stuff, but there's something to be said for earning my own money. It makes what I buy matter more."

"That's true. Maybe that's why I'm not all that attached to anything in this house. It's not really mine. I got hand-me-downs from my mom and then Shelby picked out a few things. But we didn't have a lot of money in those days, and she didn't have a lot to work with." He looked around the somewhat sparse, definitely haphazard room. "I didn't buy anything for the house, and it's never really felt quite like home."

He knew what he'd been waiting for. Since Tucker farmers weren't exactly known for their decorating skill, he'd been waiting for a woman. He'd been waiting for a wife, and this time around he'd had the idea that they could shop together, pick some things out.

She'd say things like, I just love this burgundy sofa. What do you think, Danny? And he'd say, Looks good to me. And they'd both be happy.

But he hadn't found a woman he wanted to marry—or hell, any woman who had wanted to marry him—and now" he had Piper. Marriage wasn't going to be in his future, at least not for a long time.

"You just need a jumping point." Amanda pointed to his fishing trophy that adorned the mantle. "Like removing this and putting it in the basement."

"Hey, I caught a nine-pound bass."

"How exciting. But it belongs in a den. Maybe it's time to get a big-boy living room. I can help you."

Oh, no, here was her helping hand again. That kind of assis-tance had almost gotten him kicked out of Wal-Mart. "Yeah, right. You'll have me decked out in flowers or something. And I don't have ten grand to blow on my decor." He gave a fruity little shake of his hand to show her just what he thought about florals.

"As if I would pick florals for you. I would have you so completely styling, on a budget, with a very masculine, very sexy house."

"I don't need my house to be sexy." Damn, did she have to use that word?

"You can't bring women here like this. They'll see that you're a certified bachelor looking for a woman to build his nest. That's too much pressure. And I haven't seen your bedroom or bathroom yet, but if this layer of dust is any indication, you can't be having a woman spend the night."

"It's clean," he said defensively.

Amanda lifted her eyebrow at the same time she lifted the white rag, which was now the color of topsoil.