Nanny Next Door Read Free Page B

number on her. Daniel had overheard a few of the mayor’s henchmen bragging about how they’d been harassing her. He’d been half tempted to take his concerns to Sheriff Montgomery, but he knew that as long as Jeff Harris was mayor, no action would be taken.
    Call him old-fashioned, but Daniel believed in the law and the principle of innocent until proven guilty. He also believed that what goes around comes around, and eventually the mayor would get exactly what he deserved. And who knows, maybe Mrs. Harris was getting exactly what she deserved for being stupid enough to marry a man like the mayor.
    Slipping through the front door, Daniel paused. He’d been sure April would have woken from her nap by now. Rousing every fifteen minutes last night had apparently worn her out. He tiptoed down the hall and paused in front of April’s room, pressing his ear to the door.
    Silence.
    In hindsight, he shouldn’t have left her alone in the house, but he was still getting used to taking care of a baby.
    He opened the door a crack and peeked into the room. The sounds of her faint, whispery breathing assured him she was still sound asleep. He should have just enough time to hop into the shower and take a long-overdue shave.
    He crept down the hall to the bathroom. April, however, had some sort of supersonic baby radar, because the second his foot hit the tile floor she started to wail.
    Daniel felt like banging his head against the wall. Something had to be wrong with that kid. She never slept! He just wasn’t cut out for this parenting stuff. What if he screwed her up for life? April was so small and helpless and he didn’t know the first thing about what an infant needed.
    He hurried back down the hall to her room. She was lying on her back, fists balled up tight, legs and arms extended, face purple as she screamed bloody murder. Boy did she have a temper; just like her mother, if memory served. And yet when April wasn’t screaming she was a pint-size heartbreaker.
    When she looked up at him with her big blue eyes, tears rolling down her rosy cheeks, his first instinct was to do something crazy, like run out and buy her a pony. He’d always been good with kids, but usually when they were old enough to toss a football or swing a bat. Like his nephew, Jordan.
    He had no idea what to do with this squirming, demanding bundle of attitude.
    He lifted her up out of her crib and cuddled her to his chest, patting her warm, little back. Her lower lip quivered pathetically and her cheeks were damp with tears. She looked up at him with wide, accusing eyes, then let loose again with another round of ear-piercing screams.
    “Come on, April,” he coaxed, bouncing her gently. “Go back to sleep. Twenty more minutes, kiddo, that’s all I’m asking for.”
    Things would get easier when he found a babysitter, he told himself. Which had better be soon because he’d used up all of his paid leave. The next option would be to take unpaid family leave, but he’d already blown through a chunk of his savings buying baby furniture, diapers, formula and the million other things required to properly care for an infant. She’d been dropped on his doorstep by the social worker with little more than a diaper bag with a dozen or so diapers, a few threadbare sleepers and a couple of bottles.
    It was no wonder the dads on the force never seemed to have a nickel to spare.
    He’d placed an ad in the paper for a sitter, and even put up a flyer at the local high school to find a kid looking for a summer job, but most high school and college students spent their summers working at the resort up the mountain. He couldn’t begin to compete with the hourly rate they paid. So far the ones who had answered the ad either couldn’t work the hours he needed, or were so scary he wouldn’t let them within ten feet of April. The only decent, affordable day-care center in town had a waiting list almost four months long—and he’d still need to find someone else to