May 2017
On Sale: May 1, 2017
Featuring: Brad Sinclair; Cara DuMont
364 pages ISBN: 1503943542 EAN: 9781503943544 Kindle: B01L1CEZ6U Trade Size / e-Book Add to Wish List
“Your daughter is doing great,” I continued, trying to focus on
Nicole and not the way his hand curved around his iced tea. “There’s a school in
Santa Monica called Crossroads. It’s a great school, academically, but one of
their core directives is the emotional health of the student. They have a
grade-bearing course that focuses on each child’s emotions.”
He smiled that award-winning smile. “Ma’am, I’m from the South. That hippy-dippy
shit ain’t gonna fly.”
“And when your daughter breaks down because she never dealt with losing her
mother, your good-old-boy shit ain’t gonna fly neither.”
I heard his foot tap, but didn’t look at it. We were eye-locked, measuring each
other.
Thank God I wasn’t working for him. He was melting me from the inside out, and I
had a feeling it was on purpose.
“You play nine-ball?” he asked.
“Sure do.”
“You win and I’ll go see your hippy-dippy school. I win and you go see the one
on Wilshire.”
“I don’t see why it matters what school I see. It’s your decision.”
“You consulting or not?”
I hadn’t considered seeing him after that meeting, but he had a point. A real
consult on how to manage his daughter would take more than one meeting, and the
pay was excellent. But I wasn’t here for me. I was here for Blakely.
I stood up. “You break.”
He handed me a cue. “Ladies first.”
I took it and placed the cue ball in the middle of the table, about six inches
from the headrail and lined with the center diamond. I had a break method shown
to me by a hustler I’d dated in Paris. I always sank something in nine-ball.
I placed the cue on the rail wood and slid it back and forth, bridging high with
my left hand.
“What the hell is that?” he asked.
“It’s me breaking.” I stood straight, getting the power from my hips. “Laura
says you won’t meet any other nannies.”
“I don’t want any other nannies.”
I broke. Clack tic tic tic pup pup pup . . . the three threatened the
side but bounced on the cushions. Nothing went in. That was a first.
“What’s the problem with them?”
“Nicole doesn’t like them, or I don’t like them.” He set up a one-three and sank
it.
“Too hippy-dippy?”
“I don’t like a woman who flirts on an interview to watch my kid.” One-seven.
Sunk. He was just going to run the one ball all over the table.
“I think you’re seeing things.” He must have been. We were professionals, every
one of us. Laura was damned serious about this sort of thing.
“I know women.” One-five. Sunk. He was set up for the seven, and if he played it
right, the nine would be next. I should have made a better break.
“I have someone,” I said. “A friend. She’s had some bad luck, but she’s got
experience and she loves kids.”
“Really.” He looked up at me from setting up his shot. “Where’s she worked
before?”
I didn’t pause. Pausing was death.
“The Trudeaus.”
He missed the seven. Stood.
“I’m not looking for that kind of help.”
“It’s not what you think.” I leaned down and set up the one-nine.
“It never is. Take your shot.”
“She’s really great.” I pocketed the nine. Game over. “So is Crossroads. I’ll
set up the appointment. Please don’t use the phrase ‘hippy-dippy’ in the
interview. The school doesn’t need your money or the trouble.”
“Good advice.” He leaned down and retrieved the rack.
“You really should take my advice on this and just about everything.”
I smiled at him and leaned on my cue. He popped the balls back in the nine-ball
diamond. “I don’t want Josh Trudeau’s nanny. Even without the extra services. I
want you.”
This is the kind of thing a single girl wanted to hear from a beautiful man. I
was there as a professional. Despite that, I went a little jelly. I tightened my
mouth into a line I couldn’t let him see.
“So does Nicole,” he continued, popping the balls into the shape. “She asks
about the lady in the bathroom all the time.”
“That’s very nice.”
“I’m not going to pretend I know what she’s going through. I don’t know too many
five-year-olds in the first place. But you do know. Or you pretend well enough.
Both your parents around?”
“They live in Fiji.”
“Where the hell is Fiji?”
“Far.”
“Do you visit?”
“No.”
I dropped my voice an octave. I hadn’t spoken to my parents in years, and I
wasn’t in the mood to describe the slow, tidal drift that separated us.
“Knowing what’s going on with Nicole is a matter of human compassion, not
pretending.”
“And your friend? That human compassion too? Why are you coming around trying to
place her?”
I felt trapped. Dug in deeper than I should be. I didn’t know how it happened,
but I never intended to tell him Blakely’s problems. Now I felt as if I had to,
or lie. I didn’t want to lie.
“She’s great. And she’s not making the same mistakes again. She was devastated.”
He lifted the rack off the diamond-shaped configuration of balls.
“Good rack,” I said.
“You break. You sink the nine before my turn, I’ll hire the two of you. You
miss, you come work with Nicole for a month.”
CD Reiss shot up the New York Times bestseller list with sizzling
works like Hardball and Shuttergirl, but she still has to chop
wood and carry water, which was buried in the fine print. Her lawyer is working
it out with God, but in the meantime, if you call and she doesn’t answer, she’s
at the well hauling buckets.
Born in New York City, Reiss moved to
Hollywood to get her master’s degree in screenwriting from the University of
Southern California. Unfortunately, her screenwriting went nowhere, but it did
give her enough confidence to write novels.
Today she’s adoringly referred
to as the “Shakespeare of Smut,” which she thinks is flattering, but it hasn’t
gotten her out of chopping a single piece of wood.
Hollywood bad boy Brad Sinclair always gets his way, whether it’s the role he
wants or the bikini-clad model he has to have. But when a bombshell gets dropped
in his lap in the form of a dimpled five-year-old from a forgotten relationship,
he knows his life is about to change forever.
Cara DuMont isn’t exactly thrilled when she gets assigned to be the nanny for
the latest box-office king. She has one rule: no celebrity fathers, especially
single ones with devilish good looks and rock-hard abs.
But as soon as Cara meets Brad and his adorable little girl, she knows she’s in
for a world of trouble. Because there’s something about the way Brad looks at
her that makes her believe that some rules are meant to be broken…
Romance Contemporary
[Montlake Romance, On Sale: May 1, 2017, Trade Size
/ e-Book, ISBN: 9781503943544 / ]
An
a-list romance in the making
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