Bad Girl Bill (Atlantic Divide) Read Free Page B

baby still held secure in the crook of his arm, happy to blow dribble bubbles, they spent the next hour discussing the attributes of the car. Kate wandered back inside the house, and he noticed Bill hesitate for a long moment before she followed her.
    * * * *
    Fascinating though the Ferrari was, she’d needed to remove herself from the blond. He made her itch for something, and she hadn’t a clue what that was.
    It was as though they’d had an invasion from a different planet. Michael burst through the door with his younger sister, Lydia, plastered against his left side, Lydia’s daughter, Rosie wrapped around his neck like a limpet, and Rosie’s twin brother Aaron clung to his right leg like the little monkey he was.
    As Kate joined them for kisses and hugs, Bill stood back and admired the genes that had given this family their good looks. She smiled at Sam, her cousin and Lydia’s new husband, as she watched him handle Kate’s new baby like a pro, obviously comfortable in the kid-zone.
    Personally, she didn’t think she was too good with kids, although as Rosie and Aaron hurtled across the kitchen and flung themselves at her, it occurred to her they seemed to like her good enough. She had no idea why; she didn’t consider herself a kid kind of person, could never see the appeal of tantrums and snotty noses.
    There was something about these two though, she thought as she hung Aaron upside down by his ankle and tickled his belly till he squealed like a piglet. She’d never seen them have a tantrum, and she’d never noticed snotty noses either. It seemed she could always make them laugh. It was quite easy really. You just needed to get down to their level , she thought as she lowered herself to the floor on her hands and knees and let Rosie climb all over her back. Rosie clung tight, her plump, little arms squeezing so hard she almost choked the life out of Bill.
    “Rosie, loosen up, honey.” Her voice came out of her restricted throat like a Donald Duck impression. As the kids shrieked with delight, she emphasized the sound deliberately. “Rosie. You’re choking me. Let me go.” Rosie laughed harder and clung on tighter, and Bill thought the adults would probably rescue her once she blacked out and lay comatose on the floor at their feet. They wouldn’t let her die, and they’d probably be able to resuscitate her in time.
    Rosie’s slight weight was plucked from her back as Jack swooped in to the rescue.
    “Hey, I managed to get away,” he said as he cuddled his niece and gave his wife a kiss on the mouth.
    Bill staggered to her feet, dragged in air, and hoped no one noticed she’d nearly been the victim of kindergarten-induced asphyxiation. No such luck. The blond guy watched from across the other side of the kitchen, his mouth quirked up at one side. How he’d managed to get a cup of coffee in his hand quite so quick, she wasn’t sure. She didn’t think she’d passed out, but maybe he lived in a different time zone. Perhaps she’d simply been occupied longer than she’d realized. Not that she really liked kids.
    At ease in Kate and Jack’s house, Bill opened the fridge and took out beers to hand them around to the guys in the room as Kate opened a bottle of white wine and poured a glass each for herself and Lydia. Bill elected to drink beer straight from the bottle just like the boys, like she always had.
    As Kate shooed everyone out from under her feet into the garden, the kids headed straight for the play area and the four men followed. Torn for a moment, Bill hesitated. As a rule she would have gone with the boys. This time, she decided to hang around inside with Kate and Lydia. She needed to step back from the strange sensation she got around their brother. Although the truth was, she had started to enjoy female companionship for the first time in her life. She felt clumsy and uncouth around these two dainty, little women, but unlike the local girls, they never tried to make her feel