“Oh yeah?” Levi said. “That’s great that you found someone. Does he like her?”
“We both do,” Grayson said without meaning to. “Evangeline is really special.”
“Is that so?” Levi asked, one brow arching and a smile playing at the corners of his mouth, like he already knew Grayson was half in love with the nanny.
“It’s not like that,” Grayson said right away. “She’s my employee. And besides, I need to put my focus on Leo.”
“I get it. When Flora came into my life, I was really glad to have Lily around,” Levi said. “Babies need the best of you, it’s good for them to have a team.”
“A team,” Grayson echoed thoughtfully.
“Maybe Leo would like to have two parents,” Levi said, winking.
“You’re going to shake up everything in my life, huh?” Grayson asked, giving him a friendly shove.
“Being a busybody is like ninety percent of lawyering,” Levi said, chuckling. “That’s why I’m so good at it.”
“Let’s hope so,” Grayson said, thinking again of his son, and the possible complications ahead of them.
I’d give every penny in my accounts for Leo. But like Levi said, there are some things money can’t buy.
16
EVANGELINE
Evangeline looked around the house, feeling really pleased with how the day had gone.
When Grayson left in the morning, she had been feeling a little anxious that maybe Leo would be inconsolable without his daddy.
But she was delighted to find that the sweet boy seemed content for her to take care of him on her own. He squeaked back or panted and smiled when she talked to him, and she carried him all around the house to look out the windows at the winter birds and the trees blowing in the wind.
The rhythm of his feedings and diaper changes started to feel comfortable by midday, so she wound up putting him in the front carrier for a bit while she tidied up the house and took all the tags and things off their Christmas decorations so that they would be ready to put up when Grayson decided it was time.
The tree itself was set up in the family room, the topjust brushing the ceiling. They had removed the netting last night, and today it was full and gorgeous, its generous branches filling the whole house with a rich, evergreen scent.
This is what it’s like to live in a fairytale,she thought to herself more than once.
When she had everything nice and tidy, her eyes kept going back to the empty walls. Surely there was something she could do with them to make the place feel more homey.
She looked through the decorations and found a garland they had planned to hang from the mantel. There was velvet ribbon too, and so many strings of lights.
Standing at the counter, she added bows to the garland, then strung it with a strand of battery-powered twinkle lights. When she was finished, she carried it over to the mantel and draped it where it belonged.
Stepping back to look at it, she had to admire her work. It cheered the place up all by itself. But it was already sagging to one side, threatening to slip off from the weight of the added lights.
“Oh dear,” she said, rushing over to rescue the garland from falling onto the floor. “I think we need some thumbtacks.”
Leo sighed out a little sign of approval as Evangeline headed into the kitchen. She was pretty sure there was a junk drawer to the left of the sink—she had seen Grayson grab a paperclip from it.
She pulled out the drawer to find an assortment ofodd items—paperclips, rubber bands that had probably come off the morning papers, coupons, a multi-tool, a wine opener with the logo of a local sports team, a small hammer, and an old Altoids tin that rattled when she lifted it up.
As she’d hoped, it was full of small nails, screws, and thumbtacks. She took the tin back out to the mantel, where she carefully applied a tack here and there until the garland was secured.
“Perfect,” she said happily, heading back to the junk drawer.
When she put the tin back and tried closing the drawer again, it got stuck on something.
“What in the world?” she said, pulling it open and looking inside.
