The Good Father

employable. He’d thought her “little art degree” was a joke. Her parents had sent her to college only because a society wife was expected to be educated, not because they expected her to do anything with the degree.

She wanted to prove all of them wrong.

“I’m so glad your job is working out,” Allie said.

“Me, too. So it’s doubly important I don’t mess things up by making this trip to Houston something it isn’t. I’m helping Max to make a good impression on his potential client. And if that means putting Kaylee in the magazine ad, I’ll do that, too. But that’s it. Really.”

Allie sighed.

“What?”

“I just think you and Max would be cute together. Even if he does claim to not like kids.”

That stopped her. “He actually doesn’t like kids?”

“He’s never said so. But he has a policy of not dating women with children,” Allie clarified. “So I gather he’s not that crazy about them.”

Jane thought back to his attitude her first week at the Remington Agency. Maybe he really didn’t like children. Just because he’d playacted for Ellen Lowenstein’s sake didn’t mean anything.

“Well, that does it, then,” Jane said with finality. “I’m not going to even think about hooking up with some guy who doesn’t like kids, even if he were willing, which he apparently isn’t. So stop playing matchmaker. You’ve got romance on the brain.”

“But romance is nice. A lot nicer than I imagined.” She got that dreamy look in her eye, the one she got whenever her thoughts turned to Cooper.

Jane rolled her eyes. “Just because you fell in love with a Remington doesn’t mean everyone has to.”

“Sara did. She had worse odds than you to overcome.”

“I beg to disagree. No, Allie. No, no, no. Get it out of your mind.”

Allie sighed again. “We’ll table this discussion. For now. But when you get back from Houston, I want a full report.”

JANE COULDN’T REMEMBER the last time she’d been to a baseball game. When she was dating Scott, probably, back when he was still trying to impress her as well as his boss. Before the game Scott had critiqued every aspect of her appearance down to the height of her heels and her color of nail polish. Then they’d sat in his company’s box, and Scott had paraded her in front of the company muckety- mucks like so much eye candy.

Which was exactly what she’d been. He’d even told her not to talk too much at the game, not that she’d wanted to because all anyone wanted to talk about was technology and the stock market.

Today’s experience was shaping up to be quite different. For one thing, she wore flip-flops and had her hair pulled back in a ponytail.

For another, they actually watched the game. Ellen Lowenstein was a rabid Astros fan. When they did talk, it was about kids and families and hometowns. Ellen was a widow with no children, as it turned out, but she loved kids and had naturally fallen into designing children’s clothes after a college internship with another kids’ clothing label. She had loads of nieces and nephews, many of whom she’d invited to tonight’s game, so their luxurious skybox was in a constant state of happy uproar.

Max pulled Jane into his conversation with Ellen at every opportunity. But at no time did he mention that he and Jane weren’t married. Kaylee split her time playing with the other kids, eating popcorn, and crawling on whatever adult would pay attention to her. Max was one. He seemed surprisingly natural with Kaylee and the other children. More playacting? Or did he have another reason for staying away from single moms?

After Kaylee referred to Max as “Max” rather than “Daddy” a few times, Jane was sure Ellen would say something. But instead she just laughed. “My niece Dana refuses to call her father ‘Daddy,’ too.”

Jane gave Max a pointed look, but he pretended not to see.

Finally, at the seventh-inning stretch, Jane cornered Max at the cooler, when they both went for bottled water at the same time. “Are you going to tell her?” she whispered.

Max looked pained. “It’s going so well.”

“It’s going to go very badly if she thinks you lied to her. The longer you wait, the worse it will be.”

“Does she really have to know? You won’t even see her again after tonight.”

“Maxwell Remington. You promised. You promised me you would tell her the truth.”

“Okay, okay. Just…not here, in front of all these people. Tomorrow we’ll have more of a business meeting, when we take the tour. I’ll tell her then.”

Jane wasn’t too pleased with his procrastination. But she didn’t feel mean enough to just blurt out the truth to Ellen. She did want Max to get the account, and her decision wasn’t completely unselfish. If Max’s agency went under, she would be without a paycheck.

“All right, but don’t expect me to lie. Not outright.”

“I don’t.”

One of the other children bumped into Max’s leg. Max steadied him with an indulgent smile.

Jane’s heart flipped. Allie was wrong-he was a natural with kids. Every time she saw him with Kaylee, so gentle, really listening to what she had to say and talking to her as if she was as important as any adult, she wanted to cry.

Why couldn’t Scott have been that kind of father? If only he had been decent to Kaylee, Jane could have overlooked all the rest. But he’d ignored her on good days and yelled at her on bad ones. When he was home at all, which was hardly ever.

If she could find a man who would be a good father to Kaylee, she would marry him, even if she didn’t love him. Her remarkable little girl deserved two caring, involved parents.

She cautioned herself not to think of Max that way. If she’d ever met a confirmed bachelor, he was it. She’d seen his “little black book,” so stuffed with names and phone numbers and cross-outs that it threatened to burst its seams. She’d seen the way women threw themselves at him. Even tonight, a couple of single women in the group were flirting with him.

He shot them down, of course. He wouldn’t want Ellen to think he was a philanderer. But if not for that, Jane guessed he would have had himself a conquest.

When the game was over, everyone’s mood was jubilant, celebrating the Astros’ win. Jane pushed her morose thoughts out of her head and joined in the laughter. How often did she get a fun-filled night like this?

Ellen had insisted they take a limo back to their hotel rather than wait in a long taxi line. Now, relaxed in the cool interior, Jane felt a strange lethargy creep over her.

Oh, yes, she could get used to this again. Being poor was a drag. Having to worry about paying the bills, having to weigh every penny she spent and forgo so many of the luxuries that had become habit-it was a lot harder than she’d thought it would be.

Her mother, ever the font of wisdom, had suggested she find herself another rich husband as quickly as she could, and Jane had turned her nose up at the advice.

But, yeah, she could get used to this.

And she could definitely get used to pretending Max was her husband. Especially when Kaylee, exhausted from all the excitement, crawled into his lap and he cuddled her just as if she really were his daughter.

Dangerous, dangerous territory.

MAX THOUGHT HE HAD NEVER seen a more angelic little girl. When she was asleep, at least. Awake, Kaylee could scream and whine and throw things with the best of them. But asleep, she was all sugar-and-spice.

Hannah had been just a little older than Kaylee when Max and her mother, Alicia, had first started dating. Back then, Max had known nothing about children. But Hannah had accepted him readily into her life, and soon the three of them had done everything as a family-pizza nights, kids’ videos. Max had even helped chaperone a slumber party, a situation that had made Cooper and Reece shudder when he told them.

It was only when Alicia had started pushing for marriage that Max had taken a step back and looked long and hard at his life. He’d come to the uncomfortable realization that he didn’t love Alicia.

He loved Hannah. He loved the warm, family feel of being around the little girl and her mother, a feeling that