His mother and sister were barely speaking to him. His brother didn’t seem to be particularly angry with him, but had further distanced himself, saying simply
that he didn’t want to get involved. Nathan’s friends thought he had lost his mind.
“You’re really going to try to raise a kid by yourself?” his most-frequent fishing buddy, Jim Horner, had asked incredulously. “Dude, are you nuts?”
“So what would you have done?” Nathan asked over the gas pump where they had met by accident. “Put your own little sister out into the streets?”
His friend, an unmarried firefighter with notoriously reckless courage and a heart as big as his oversized four-by-four truck, was taken aback by that question. “I don’t know,” he said finally. “But I sure wouldn’t have had the guts to bring her home with me. What is she—five? Six?”
“She’s three. Almost four.”
Jim practically shuddered. “Man, she’s just a baby.”
“Pretty much.”
“So do you have someone to help you with her? Like a nanny or something?”
“I’ve hired a housekeeper who helps with child care during the day, but not a full-time nanny. I don’t need that right now.”
“What about your free time? You still going to be able to go play golf anytime you want? Or head to the coast for a long fishing weekend? Or drive down to N’Awlins for a long party weekend?”
“Obviously not.” Nathan replaced the gas nozzle on the pump and twisted the gas cap back into place. “I can still take the occasional afternoon or Saturday morning for a golf game, but I’ll need to set it up in advance now so I’ll have time to arrange for a baby-sitter.”
Jim digested that information in apparent dismay. “Man.”
Nathan shrugged. “Things change, pal. Guess it’s time for me to grow up and settle down.”
Jim laid a heavy hand on Nathan’s shoulder and gave him an exaggerated soulful look. “Dude, you’re a better man than I am.”
“Knock it off,” Nathan had growled in exasperation. “I did what any big brother would do—you included, whether you admit it or not.”
“So you say. Give me a call someday when you’ve got a baby-sitter, okay? We’ll go play a few holes—see if being a daddy has made you soft.”
The other pals Nathan encountered during that week reacted in similar ways, all of them expressing their shock at his new circumstances. Even the guys he knew who were married with children of their own seemed stunned by his actions, saying they couldn’t picture him as a single parent, especially of such a young child.
As for his women friends…
It was true he hadn’t dated much lately. Specifically since he’d started looking at Caitlin through different eyes several months ago. But he was still rather surprised by the way women reacted to his new responsibilities. It seemed the single ones fell into two camps: those who wanted nothing to do with a man raising a child and those who made it clear that they would be delighted to audition for the position of stepguardian.
The latter group seemed to believe the commitment he had made to his half sister signaled that he was ready to embrace the joys of marriage and fatherhood. He didn’t know how he felt about those things at this point, but he was damned sure he wasn’t interested in sampling them with the few women who so eagerly offered their services.
Married women seemed intent on offering him parenting advice—some of it conflicting. That was mostly what he encountered when he dropped Isabelle off at preschool each morning. Everything from critiques of her wardrobe and hairstyles to questions about whether he was making sure she ate right and brushed her teeth regularly.
He didn’t particularly appreciate being treated like an idiot, but he always managed to answer politely—so far, at least—because he didn’t want to jeopardize Isabelle’s still-precarious standing in the exclusive preschool. He could only hope that it would eventually become apparent that he was managing to take care of her well enough on his own.
The older residents in town were far less supportive. They were the ones who had felt most betrayed by their local political hero’s scandalous behavior four years ago. The ones who had encouraged the longtime community leader to run for governor. Who had contributed to his campaign funds and worked tirelessly in his headquarters. The ones who knew and respected Lenore McCloud and sympathized deeply with the humiliation she had suffered at her profligate husband’s hands.
Those people thought Nathan had been cold and unfeeling to bring the offspring of his father’s affair into the same town where poor, dear Lenore was still living and volunteering so selflessly.
A few of his older acquaintances suggested that he should have found a nice family somewhere else—preferably in California—and paid them a generous monthly stipend to raise Isabelle. That would have been much wiser, they assured him sternly. He had tersely informed them that he did not regret his choice, would not consider changing his mind and that he hoped they—and his mother—would eventually come to terms with his decision and accept Isabelle for the special child she was. All in all, it was an exhausting week.
And then there was Caitlin.
If he had suddenly developed a highly contagious disease, she wouldn’t have avoided him more diligently than she had since he had kissed her. Yes, she was very busy at work—as was he—but she could have made a few extra minutes for some personal time with him. She didn’t. Aside from asking about Isabelle every day, she treated him like a co-worker who was little more than a stranger to her away from the office.
She was beginning to tick him off.
Every time her behavior made him question whether she had been honest about not being personally interested in him, he had only to mentally replay their kiss for reassurance. She was interested, all right. She just didn’t want to be. He had his work cut out for him.