Next Door Daddy (2 page)

Before Nate had time to react she latched on to him and all but yanked him across the threshold.

I
t was pandemonium! Nate registered as he was half dragged across the threshold.

“I'm melting! I'm melting!”

The screaming now became clear and continued frantically from somewhere. Not exactly the words he was expecting, but confusing nonetheless as he scanned the chaos going on around him.

Like Old Faithful, water hissed and spewed up and out from behind the washing machine while the eerie screaming rolled on over and over. “I'm
mel
-ting! I'm
melll
-ting!”

Standing directly in the path of the gusher was the boy, seeming to be having the time of his life. At his knees, the dog that had been romping and playing earlier now hunkered down behind him.

“Hi-ya, mister!” The kid laughed.

Adrenaline pumping, Nate barely took time to nod as he searched for the screamer. His attention was drawn upward, where of all things, a small green bird perched on the top of the curtain rod. It was chanting and screeching its weird little head off as it fluffed its wings out, catching the light spray of water barely reaching it across the room.

Like the kid, the bird was having the time of its life.

“Can you help me?” the woman asked, blinking through the water.

Soaked within moments of entering the room, Nate saw at a glance that the ancient water valve had broken, causing the unforgiving gusher.

The dog howled mournfully as if to say “Please do something.” The kid spun. The bird sang.

Nate raked his hand down his dripping face and looked around the room. “Where's your shutoff valve?” he called over the ruckus.

The woman gulped hard, the panic in her eyes free-falling into despair. “I don't
know.
I didn't think to ask.”

Just what he needed, a crying woman—not that he'd see the tears for all the water. He exited the house in search of the outside shutoff valve. Sadly, everyone followed him.

Except the bird, who could still be heard happily melting in the background.

“Where ya going, mister?” the kid huffed, jogging to match Nate's long stride. His arms pumped back and forth, slinging water in all directions.

“The pump house,” Nate grunted. He could hear the woman behind him clinking and clacking with every step.

“What for?” the kid asked.

“It'll have a shutoff valve,” Nate said, reaching the squat building. Wasting no time he yanked open the door and stepped inside. The kid and the grunting dog followed him into the tiny space. He heard the dog's plastic collar scrape the door frame behind him, followed by a grunt and a thud.

“So that's a shutoff, huh?” the boy said, peering around Nate as clasped the red handle and yanked down.

“Yup,” he muttered. Through the dim light the boy looked up at him, his expression solemn.

“I'm the man of the house. I need to know these things.”

The earnest way he stated this fact twisted Nate's gut. This boy, no more than eight or nine, had lost his dad and was trying to step up to the plate. His sincerity tugged at even Nate's numb, unresponsive heart. “That's the main shutoff,” he explained brusquely, easing around the kid and out the door. He was out of his element here.

The woman was waiting, and to his great relief she wasn't falling apart anymore. “Thank you,” she said, fully composed, her big green eyes clear. “I'm so sorry you had to get soaked, but it just broke in my hand and I couldn't—I didn't know what to do. I panicked.”

He heard the disgust in her voice and he wasn't sure if it was from the valve breaking or that she'd panicked.

He shot Taco a longing glance, only fifteen feet away…All Nate had to do was walk away. “Don't beat yourself up over it,” he said instead. “Let me take a look at it now that the water's off.”

“No. I've already put you through so much. I can handle it from here.”

He'd have to see that to believe it. “I'm happy to do it, ma'am,” he said.
Resigned
to it might be a better word. He'd expected to come over to make his welcome known and head out. But he couldn't very well leave her stranded like this. What if it were Kayla needing a helping hand—not that she ever would have, she'd been an amazing woman. Still, that sealed his fate. “I'm Nate Talbert. Your neighbor,” he offered, feeling off-kilter. He jerked his head toward the direction of his house, though it was well hidden behind a stand of oak and pine.

“You're our neighbor!” the kid exclaimed jumping around him. “And that's your horse! Woo-hoo!”

Nate looked from the freckled-faced kid to the mother. They had matching green eyes.

“It's nice to meet you,” she said. “I'm Pollyanna McDonald and this is my son, Gilly.”

“Aw, Mom, it's Gil.”

“Excuse me, my bad,” she said, rubbing his wet hair. “This is Gil.”

Gil looked serious again. “No man of the house is s'posed to be called
Gilly.
That sounds like a baby.”

Nate caught a shadow in Pollyanna's eyes. The woman was plain, but she had some expressive eyes. “You are exactly right,” she said. “You are growing up on me.”

Nate was distracted, and glad of it, as the dog bumped into him and tried to sniff at his jeans. The cone hindered him from getting his bulb of a nose as close as he wanted. Unable to understand it wasn't going to work, the animal kept trying, repeatedly bumping one side of the cone then the other against Nate's calf. That made the kid laugh and the mother grow flustered.

“Gil, take Bogie around front to play,” she said. As if one too many things were out of her control, she snatched up her long, dripping hair and twisted it nervously. Water poured to the ground.

“But, Mom—”

“No buts. Mr. Talbert doesn't need to be harassed while he's trying to help.”

The kid looked like he was going to protest again, then thought better of it and reached for the dog. “Can I come watch you fix the pipe in a few minutes?” he called, using his knee to hoist the dog securely into his arms as he lumbered under his load toward the house.

Nate couldn't very well say no, so he gave a curt nod, which made the boy light up. “Awesome,” he yelped just as the dog hit him in the chin with its cone. “Hold on, Bogie,” he urged gently, then, shifting his heavy load, he disappeared around the corner of the house.

“You may rue the day we moved in next door,” Pollyanna McDonald said, slinging her hair over her shoulder and planting her hands on her hips. Her tools jingled.

Looking at her, Nate wasn't sure how to react, so he didn't. “I'll take that look now,” was all he said, and strode toward the porch. He was soaked from his knees to his Stetson, but that didn't even compare to the condition of his neighbor. He didn't know how long she'd stood in the spray before he'd arrived, but obviously it had been longer than needed. Even above the jangle of her tools he could hear her shoes and jeans squelching as she trailed behind him.

He felt bad for her, losing her husband and all, but frankly, he wasn't too keen on the idea of a neighbor who didn't even know, so to speak, “how to get out of the rain.” It didn't bode well. Not at all.

 

So that was her new neighbor. Not much of a talker, Polly thought as she watched him stride into her house. Of course, what man would be under the circumstances? She'd yanked the poor guy right into the water—probably ruined his hat. She couldn't be any more mortified. Needing his help was bad enough. That she'd forced him to take a swim was just too much to think about.

She'd really made a mess of things. How could she not have known how to shut the water off? She hadn't even thought to ask the real-estate agent where it was. She'd never needed to turn the main line of water off in her entire life. Still, any ninny should have known how to find a lever and yank!

Taking a calming breath, she pushed away the negative feelings and followed Nate Talbert through the doorway into her house. Not knowing how to turn off a main water valve was a small thing and, though, for a moment she'd let it get to her, she refused to allow it to continue having an upper hand.

The utility room was much calmer. The water had stopped, Gil and Bogie were outside, and Pepper, having had his bath, had flown into another part of the house.

Nate removed his hat and hooked it on the end of the curtain rod vacated by Pepper. He pulled the washing machine farther out from the wall and sloshed through the two inches of water to study the situation.

The man was a good six-three, maybe-four, and his shoulders were broad, making it tough for him to squeeze into the tight space between the wall and the washer. He was a handsome man, a little hard-looking, with a firm mouth below prominent cheekbones and a Gregory Peck nose, a nice nose.

Not that she usually paid much attention to nice noses or how good-looking a man was. The fact that she'd noticed such a thing set her to feeling even more at odds with the entire situation. Grabbing a mop, she attacked the water that had flooded not only the utility room but a good portion of her kitchen. “I could call a plumber,” she offered, really hating that this stranger was dealing with her problem. Not to mention how foolish he must think her.

He leaned forward, studying the pipe. “No need,” he said, his words clipped. “I've got the right part over at my place. I'll just go get it and be back in a few minutes.”

Polly clamped her mouth shut on the protest that begged to come out. He didn't look too happy, but he had offered. “If you're sure it's not too much trouble,” she said instead. Why she bothered was a mystery since he was already striding out the door. He was heading down the steps before she'd set her mop to the side and followed him outside.

In a swift, easy movement of a man used to maneuvering a barbed-wire fence, he bent and gracefully swooped through the middle strands without using his hands to hold the wire apart.

With the same amount of ease he swung into the saddle and rode away. Polly thought of the Lone Ranger and felt like all that was missing was a “High-yo, Silver.”

There was no wasted energy about Nate Talbert. In movements or in words.

Actually, that suited Polly just fine. It wasn't as if she was going to be asking the man for help on a regular basis.

Spinning away, she hurried to clean up the watery disaster. The least she could do for him if he was going to work in there was make the utility room habitable.

That is, if he came back.

Given a few minutes to digest the circus he'd walked into, he might get home and decide calling a plumber wasn't such a bad idea after all.

 

Thirty minutes later Nate had just started working on the broken valve when the kid tromped into the room. “Hey, Nate—”

“That's Mr. Talbert to you, young man,” rang out from somewhere in the other room, causing the boy's ears to turn pink.

“Mr. Talbert,” he started over, hopping from foot to foot. “Can I watch?”

Nate's first inclination was to say no. He'd already denied the mother's offer to help and been glad when she hadn't given him any argument about it. The last thing he needed was her hovering over him while he tried to work. It was a little too personal for his taste. But the kid. He was a different story. His earlier statement hung in the air between them. He was the man of the house.

“That'd be fine,” Nate said tersely, immediately going back to work.

Gil scooted right in there, plopped his elbows on the washing machine and leaned in as far as he could, watching Nate over the control panel. He wasn't terribly tall, but tall enough.

The kid asked what everything was and why it needed to be done the way he was doing it. Nate explained on a need-to-know basis, figuring if the kid had the wherewithal to come up with the question, then he would retain the information better. Because, Nate agreed with Gil, the kid did need to know these things.

Twenty minutes later, almost finished, Nate started tightening the new connections, when he met the kid's longing gaze. “You want to give this a tug and finish it off? It's your house.” The offer lit Gil's eyes like a Roman candle. Struck by the intense will he saw in the boy's eyes, Nate knew he couldn't turn away from the fact that they were his neighbors and it wouldn't hurt him to give the boy some encouragement and direction.

“All right!” he whooped, and scrambled to squeeze between Nate and the washing machine. Grabbing hold of the wrench, he pulled, then pushed it around. Nate gave him a little help with the final tightening.

“It's good to go,” Nate said when it wouldn't go any farther.

“Yep, it's good to go,” Gil echoed, puffing his chest out and looking up at him.

Nate had an urge to squeeze the boy's thin shoulder. But he didn't. Instead he gave him room to move away. “Are you going to wash the first load?”

Gil spun around. “Me? That's girl stuff.”