The Daddy Wish

Which was definitely not something she should be thinking about right now—especially when the man himself was standing in front of her desk.

He was the only man she’d ever met who managed to make her feel all weak-kneed and tongue-tied in his presence. She hadn’t worked at Garrett Furniture long before she’d recognized that the family had won some kind of genetic sweepstakes. The three brothers who ran the company were of her parents’ generation but still undeniably handsome, and all of their children—most of whom were employed at the company in one capacity or another—were unbelievably attractive.

It had been an impartial observation—nothing more. She’d been too busy trying to settle into her new job, put her life back together and be a good mother to her toddler son to be attracted to anyone. And then, in her second year of employment in John Garrett’s office, his nephew Nathan moved back to Charisma.

By then, Allison’s wounded heart had healed and her long-dormant hormones were ready to be awakened again. And they had jolted to full awareness when Nathan walked into the office and found her struggling to fix a paper jam in the photocopier.

He’d come over to help, and just his proximity was enough to make her skin prickle. When he’d reached around her, his chest had bumped her shoulder, and the incidental contact had made her nipples tingle and tighten. He’d dislodged the paper, she’d stammered out a breathless “thank you” and then he’d gone in to see his uncle.

Four years later, she still wasn’t immune to him. She’d learned to hold her own in conversations with him, but she hadn’t learned to control her body’s involuntary response to his nearness. Even now, even with him standing on the other side of her desk, her blood was pulsing in her veins.

She forced a smile and desperately hoped that her cheeks weren’t as red as they felt. “Good morning, Mr. Garrett.”

His answering smile didn’t seem forced. It was effortless and easy and so potent; she was grateful that she was sitting down because it practically melted her bones. “Good morning, Allison.”

She forced herself to glance away, down at the calendar on her desk. “Your uncle is free, if you want to go in.”

“I will,” he said, but eased a hip onto the edge of her desk. “But first I wanted to apologize for not calling you when I got back from my ski trip.”

“Oh, well.” She kept her gaze focused on the papers on her desk, because his proximity was wreaking enough havoc on her hormones without looking at him and remembering how his mouth—somehow both soft and strong, and utterly delicious—had mastered hers, or how those wickedly talented hands had moved so smoothly and confidently over her body. “I know the holidays are a busy time for everyone.”

“And then Uncle John had his heart attack the day after Christmas.” She glanced up and could tell, by the seriousness of his tone and the bleakness in his eyes, that he was still worried about his uncle.

“So it was more than a minor blip,” she remarked.

“Is that what he told you?”

She nodded.

“The doctors did say it was minor, but it was definitely a heart attack.”

“That must have come as a shock to all of you,” she said.

He nodded. “Aside from smoking the occasional cigar, he didn’t have any of the usual risk factors, but the doctors strongly urged him to make some lifestyle changes.”

“He’s already asked me to look into that cruise he’s been promising your aunt for the past few years.”

“Retirement is going to be a big adjustment for him, so it will be good for him to have something to look forward to.”

“It’s going to be a big adjustment for the whole office,” Allison agreed.

“And not exactly the adjustment I was hoping to make in our relationship,” Nate said.

Our relationship.

She wasn’t exactly sure what that was supposed to mean, but her heart gave a funny little jump anyway—before she ruthlessly strapped it down. “Mr. Garrett—”

“Really?” His brows rose and his lips curved in a slow, sexy smile that made her want to melt into a puddle at his feet. “Are you really going to ‘Mr. Garrett’ me after the—”

“There you are, Nate.”

She exhaled gratefully when John poked his head out of his office and interrupted his nephew. Because whatever he’d been about to say, she didn’t want to hear it.

Nathan held her gaze for another moment before he turned his attention to his uncle. “I didn’t mean to keep you waiting.”

“Normally I wouldn’t mind,” John told him. “But we’ve got a lot of ground to cover in the next twenty-five days.”

Nate nodded. “I’ll look forward to catching up with you later,” he said to Allison, already moving toward the CFO’s office.

She didn’t bother to respond, because as far as she was concerned, there wasn’t anything to catch up on.

Whatever might have started between her and her soon-to-be boss under the mistletoe was over when he flew off to Vail with Melanie Hedley the next day. And that was for the best. Not only because she didn’t want to make a fool of herself—again—where Nathan Garrett was concerned, but because any fantasy she might have had about getting naked with the VP of Finance was inappropriate enough, but the same fantasy with the company CFO could be fatal to her employment.

And that was a risk she wasn’t willing to take.

* * *

“How was your first day back?” Allison asked when she picked her son up from his after-school program.

Dylan made a face as he buckled up in the backseat.

“Do you have any homework?”

“Yeah. I’ve gotta write a stupid journal entry about my holiday.”

“Why do you think it’s stupid?”

“Because it’s the same thing Miss Cabrera made us do last year. And because I didn’t do anything really exciting. Not like Marcus, who went to Disney World. Or Cassie, who got a puppy.”

His tone was matter-of-fact, but she was as disappointed for him as he obviously was. Unfortunately, peak-season trips weren’t anywhere in her budget, and pets—especially dogs—weren’t allowed by the condominium corporation. “But we had a nice holiday, anyway, didn’t we?” she prompted.

“I guess.”

“What was your favorite part?” she asked, hoping to help him focus on the highlights.

“Not being at school.”

She held back a sigh. Her son’s extreme shyness made it difficult for him to make friends, but she didn’t understand how he could prefer to be alone playing video games rather than interacting with other kids his own age. At the first parent-teacher meeting of the year, Miss Aberdeen had suggested that he was bored because the work was too easy for him, but when she offered to give him more advanced assignments, Dylan had been appalled by the prospect of being singled out. So he continued to do the same work as his classmates and continued to be bored at school. “What was your favorite part aside from not being at school?” she prompted.

“I had fun at the cartooning class at the art gallery,” he finally said.

“So why don’t you draw a comic strip about your holiday?”

His brow furrowed as he considered this suggestion. “Do you think that would be okay?”

“I think Miss Aberdeen would love it.”

So once they got home, Dylan sat at the table, carefully drawing the boxes for his comic strip while she made spaghetti with meat sauce for dinner. As she stirred the sauce, she kept an eye on her son, pleased by the intense concentration on his face as he worked.

If she’d told him he had to write a paragraph, he would have scribbled the first thing that came to mind and been done with it. But he was obviously having fun with the cartooning, and she was pleased that he didn’t just want to draw a comic strip but wanted to draw a good one.

When the outlining was done, he opened his package of colored pencils, and she felt a wave of nostalgia as she remembered when he used to sit at that same table with a box of fat crayons and scribble all over the pictures in a book. He’d been a fan of single-color pictures and would cover the page with blue or green or red or brown, but rarely would he use a variety of colors.

She’d always loved him with her whole heart, but she couldn’t deny that there were times when she missed her little boy. The one who would crawl into her lap for a story at bedtime, who looked to her as the authority of all things and whose boo-boos could be made better with a hug and a kiss. He was so independent now—in his thoughts and his actions. Her little boy was growing up, and he didn’t need her in all the ways that he used to.

She was proud of the person he was becoming, and more than a little uncertain about her own future. Being a mother had been such a huge part of her identity for so long, she’d almost forgotten that there were other parts. Being with Nathan Garrett made her remember those parts. He made her think and feel and want like a woman, and she wasn’t sure that was a good thing.

Chapter Two

Allison was avoiding him.

It was a fact that baffled Nate more than anything, but he couldn’t deny it was true.

Over the next few days, their paths continued to cross in the office. But every time he walked past her desk on the way to see his uncle, she seemed to be on the phone. And every time he walked out again, she scurried away from her desk to retrieve something from the printer or the photocopier or to water the plants on the window ledge.

At first he was amused by her obvious efforts to avoid any continuation of the conversation that had been aborted on their first day back after the holiday, but his amusement soon gave way to exasperation. As a Garrett and VP of Finance in the company, he was accustomed to being treated with respect, even deference.

He was not accustomed to being ignored. Especially not by a woman who had been sighing with pleasure in his arms only a few weeks earlier.

She was acting as if the kiss they’d shared had never happened, and maybe she wished it hadn’t. But he could still remember the taste of her lips, somehow tangy and sweet and incredibly responsive; he could still remember the heady joy of her slender curves pressed against him; and he could still remember wishing that he didn’t have to be on a plane at six fifteen the next morning, because he could think of all kinds of wicked and wonderful things they might do if they spent the night—and maybe several more—together.

For just a minute, maybe two, he’d considered forgetting about the trip with his buddies. Because the warm softness of Allison’s body was a hell of a lot more tempting than the promise of fresh powder on the black diamond trails.

But then she’d pulled away. When she looked at him, he saw in her melted chocolate–colored eyes a reflection of the same desire that was churning through his veins, but there was something else there, too. Surprise, which he could definitely relate to, not having expected a minor spark of chemistry to ignite such a blaze of passion, and maybe even a hint of confusion, as if she wasn’t quite sure how to respond to what was suddenly between them—yet another emotion he could relate to.

Even after more than three weeks, he couldn’t forget about that kiss and he couldn’t stop wanting her. And he wasn’t prepared to pretend that nothing had happened. Had he taken advantage of the situation? Undoubtedly. But he hadn’t taken advantage of her. In fact, she’d met him more than halfway.

And when he got out of his Friday afternoon meeting with his uncle, Nate was going to hang around her desk until Allison had no choice but to acknowledge him. Except that it was after six o’clock when he finally left the CFO’s office, and she was already gone.

He caught up with his older brother instead.

“Don’t you have a wife and a daughter waiting for you at home?” Nate asked, surprised to find him fiddling with design plans on a tablet.

Andrew shook his head. “They’ve decided that the first Friday of every month is girls’ night out. Tonight the plan was for pedicures, dinner and a movie. And they dragged Mom along, too.”

“I doubt much dragging was required,” Nate commented, well aware of how much Jane Garrett doted on all of her family—and especially her grandchildren.

“Probably not,” his brother allowed. “But since no one’s at home, I decided to take the time to polish up the details on the new occasional tables that should hit the market before next Christmas.”

“You do realize it’s the ninth of January?”

“Product development takes time and attention to detail,” Andrew reminded him.

Nate shrugged. “Right now, I’m more interested in dinner. Did you want to grab a burger and a beer at the Bar Down?”

Andrew saved his progress and shut down the tablet.

* * *

“So you know why I was working late on a Friday night,” Andrew said, when they were settled into a booth and waiting for their food. “But why were you hanging around the office?”

“I had a meeting with Uncle John that went late.”

“I imagine you’ll have a lot of those meetings over the next few weeks.”

Nate nodded. “He’s been in charge for a long time— I know it’s not going to be easy for him to let go.”

Their uncle had been talking, mostly in vague terms, about retirement for a couple of years now. Now Nate would be sitting behind the big desk in the CFO’s office by the end of the month. And from behind that desk, he would have a prime view of the CFO’s undeniably sexy executive assistant.

“So why don’t you seem thrilled that your promotion is coming through sooner than you’d anticipated?”

“I’m happy about the promotion,” Nate said. “I just wish it wasn’t happening for the reasons it is.” Although he’d frequently lamented the fact that his uncle kept pushing back his retirement, he never wanted it to be forced upon him.

“Now he can finally take Aunt Ellen on that cruise he’s been promising since their fortieth anniversary.”

“How long ago was that?”

“Almost four years.” Andrew sipped his beer. “But somehow I don’t think you’re thinking about their vacation plans.”

“I was just wondering why Uncle John was so insistent that Allison Caldwell stay on as my executive assistant.”

“Probably because she’s been doing the job for more than six years and knows the ins and outs of the office better than anyone else,” his brother pointed out. “Do you have a problem with Allison?”

“No,” he said quickly.

Maybe too quickly.

His brother’s eyes narrowed. “Tell me you haven’t slept with her.”

“I haven’t slept with her.” Nate thanked the waitress who set his plate in front of him and immediately picked up his burger, grateful for the interruption as much as the food.

“Keep it that way,” Andrew advised when the server was gone. “She’s a valuable employee of the company.”

“I’m aware of the code of conduct in the employee handbook,” Nate reminded his brother. “I helped write it.”

“Along with Sabrina Barton from Human Resources.”

Nate bit into his burger.

“Tell me,” Andrew said, dipping his spoon into his Guinness stew. “Did you sleep with her before or after the handbook went to the printer?”

“It was a brief fling more than three years ago, after she gave notice that she was leaving the company,” he pointed out. “And she threw herself at me.”

“The curse of being a Garrett,” his brother acknowledged sarcastically. “But you could exercise some discretion and not catch every woman who throws herself at you.”

“It’s basic supply and demand—and with the number of single Garrett men rapidly dwindling, the unmarried ones are in greater demand.” And he very much enjoyed being in demand.

Andrew shook his head as he scooped up more stew. Nate focused on his own plate, and conversation shifted to the hockey game playing out on the wide TV screen over the bar.

The waitress had cleared their empty plates and offered refills of their drinks. They both opted for coffee.

Andrew’s cup was halfway to his lips when his cell phone chimed. He read the message on the display, then looked up.

“Problem?” Nate asked.

His brother glanced past him and smiled. “Not at all.”

Over his shoulder, Nate saw that Andrew wasn’t looking at something but someone. Rachel Ellis—now Rachel Garrett—his wife of four months.

She slid onto the bench seat beside her husband and brushed her lips over his. “Hi,” she said, her tone soft and intimate.

“Hi, yourself,” he said. “How was girls’ night?”

“Fabulous.” She snuggled close. “We got our toenails painted, then had dinner at Valentino’s—with triple-chocolate truffle cake for dessert. But there weren’t any good movies playing, so Maura went to your parents’ house for a sleepover.”

Andrew gestured for the waitress to bring the bill.

Nate sighed. “Whatever happened to bros before—” he caught Rachel’s narrowed gaze and chose his words carefully “—sisters-in-law?”

“I’d say sorry, bro, but I’m not,” Andrew told him.

“I know you’re not.”

And Nate was happy for his brother. Before he met Rachel, Andrew had spent a lot of years grieving the loss of his first wife and trying to raise his daughter on his own. With Rachel, Andrew and Maura were a family again.

“Why are you hanging out with your brother tonight instead of seducing a beautiful woman?” Rachel asked him.

“I’ve given up any hope of finding a woman as beautiful as you,” Nate replied smoothly.

“Which is the same thing you’d say if Kenna was here instead of me,” Rachel guessed.

“Because both of my brothers have impeccable taste.”

Andrew signed the credit card receipt and tucked his card back into his wallet.

“What happened to the girl you were with at the Christmas party?”

The mischievous glint in his sister-in-law’s eyes made him suspect that she wasn’t just fishing for information but had actually seen something that night. “I wasn’t with anyone.”

“I know you didn’t take a date,” Rachel acknowledged. “But I definitely saw you come out of the cloakroom with someone.”

Nate sipped his coffee and pretended not to know who she was talking about.

Huffing out a breath, she turned to Andrew. “You must have seen her. Pretty blonde in a green dress.”

“Sorry,” he said. “I didn’t notice anyone but you.”

“That’s so sappy,” she said, but she was smiling.

“And true,” her husband assured her.

Nate rolled his eyes. “Don’t you guys have an empty house waiting for you?”

“As a matter of fact,” Andrew said.

“He’s changing the subject,” Rachel pointed out. “Because he doesn’t want you to figure out who she was.”

“I didn’t leave with anyone that night,” Nate said. “I had a six a.m. flight the next morning.”

“I didn’t say you left with her,” she said. “Just that you were in the cloakroom with her.”

“Maybe we both went to get our coats at the same time?” he suggested.

Rachel shook her head, unconvinced, but she let her husband nudge her out of the booth. “If your memory clears, you should bring her to dinner Sunday night.”

Nate knew that wasn’t going to happen. Stealing a kiss from a coworker at the company Christmas party was one thing—inviting his executive assistant to his parents’ house to meet the family was something else entirely.

* * *

Friday nights always loomed long and empty ahead of Allison after she gave Dylan a hug and a kiss goodbye and sent him off to his dad’s house for the weekend.

She tried not to resent the fact that Jefferson and his new wife had a three-bedroom raised ranch on a cute little court in Charisma’s Westdale neighborhood. She’d always wanted her son to have a backyard in which he could run and play, and now he did. She just wished it was something she’d been able to give to him every day and not every other weekend when he was with his father.

But she was grateful that they had a nice two-bedroom apartment on the fifth floor of a well-maintained building with a park across the street. The rent wasn’t cheap, but after she paid the bills each month, she was able to put aside a small amount of money into a vacation fund. Last summer, they’d gone to Washington, DC. This year, she intended to take him camping—to give her city boy a taste of the outdoors. She had some concerns as to whether or not he’d be able to survive a whole week without television or video games, but she wanted to try.

However, it was only January now, which meant she didn’t have to determine their summer plans just yet. In the interim, she should cherish this time on her own: forty-eight hours in which to do whatever she wanted. She could lounge around in her pj’s and eat popcorn for dinner while she watched TV if she wanted. She didn’t have to prepare meals for anyone else or pick up dirty socks that missed the hamper in the bathroom or pull up the covers on a bed that had been left unmade.

But the sad reality was that she had no life outside of work and her son. She could go to the bookstore and lose herself in a good story for a few hours, but lately even her favorite romance novels had left her feeling more depressed than inspired.

She wanted to believe in love and happy-ever-after, but real life hadn’t given her much hope in that direction. And if she let herself give in to her desire for Nathan Garrett, she was more likely to end up unemployed than marrying the boss, and she had no intention of jeopardizing her job for a hot fling with a man who probably wouldn’t remember her name the next day.

Instead, she called her friend Chelsea, thinking that they might be able to catch a movie. As it turned out, her friend was working, but she convinced Allison to come in to the Bar Down for a bite to eat. The sports bar was usually hopping on weekends, so she didn’t think they’d have much time to talk, but her growling stomach and the promise of spinach dip were a stronger lure even than her friend’s company.

To her surprise, there were only a handful of tables in use, and more of the seats at the bar were vacant than occupied.

“I don’t think I’ve ever seen it so quiet in here on a Friday night,” Allison remarked.

Chelsea set a glass of pinot noir on a paper coaster in front of her friend. “It might pick up a little bit later, but the first weekend after the holidays is always slow. Most people are dragging after their first week back at work—or too worried about paying their credit card bills—to want to go out.”

“I can understand that,” Allison acknowledged.

“And I’m guessing the only reason you’re here is that it’s Dylan’s weekend with his dad.”

“Yeah,” she admitted. “I’ve got a thousand things to do at home—with a thousand loads of laundry being at the top of the list—but it just felt too quiet tonight.”

“Did you come in here to see me or in search of some male companionship?”

Allison’s eye roll was the only response she was going to give to that question.

Her friend sighed. “When was the last time you went out on a date—the night Dylan was conceived?”

“I date,” she said.

Chelsea’s brows lifted.

“I do. I even let you set me up on that blind date with your cousin Ivan not too long ago.”

“Evan,” her friend corrected. “And that was more than three years ago.”

“It was not.”

“It was,” Chelsea insisted. “Because he didn’t meet Wendy until a few months after that, and they just celebrated their second wedding anniversary.”

“Oh.” She picked up her glass, sipped. “It really didn’t seem like it was that long ago.”

“You’re a fabulous mother, but you’re also a young and sexy woman hiding behind your responsibilities to your son. There should be more to your life.”

“I don’t have time for anything more.”

“You have to make time,” her friend insisted. “To get out and meet new people.”

“Why can’t I just hang out with the people I already know?”

Chelsea sighed. “How long has it been since you’ve had sex? No—” She shook her head. “Forget that. How long has it been since you’ve even kissed a guy?”