He saw Kenzie’s gaze flitter nervously to his own and wondered if his expression was as surprised as hers. ‘If Ewan wants to?’ she managed.
‘Sure,’ he said, trying to sound nonchalant. He hadn’t been prepared for the reaction such a small request would spark inside him and cleared his throat. ‘If that’s okay?’
‘Absolutely. I might go and have a shower while you guys do that.’
‘Take your time. We’ll be fine out here,’ he said as Poppy began pulling books out of her backpack willy-nilly, briefly glancing at each before discarding them, until she found one she liked and climbed up on his lap, opening to the front page.
‘Once upon a time there was a princess,’ he started, feeling completely out of his depth. Playing with his nephews hadn’t involved reading. It was more playing football and cricketand riding motorbikes. ‘Each day, she would greet her horse. Good morning, Mabel.’
‘No, you have to do the voices,’ Poppy said, interrupting impatiently. ‘Do it in a princess voice.’
What the actual hell constituted a princess voice?He tried a slightly less male tone.
‘No. Aprincessvoice.’ A small face frowned up at him.
Clearly this bedtime story thing was going to be harder than he’d imagined. He lifted his voice a good six octaves, feeling as though his testicles were lodged in his throat, but seeing the satisfied nod of his daughter’s head before she settled back against his chest made him power on. He just prayed, for the sake of his vocal cords, that this princess didn’t have too many narrative parts.
Seventeen
Kenzie closed the bathroom door behind her and shrugged off that annoying little feeling of having just been replaced.It’s one bedtime story.Get a grip.She’d known it was silly, even as she’d been thinking it, but after being the only one who’d done these little things for her daughter for the last four years, it came as a bit of a shock that she could be so easily replaced.
Bedtime was always a time she looked forward to. No matter how tired she was, the simple act of sitting in the rocking chair with soft lullaby music playing, snuggling with her daughter as they read a story, could erase the stress of the day and bring her instant peace. She wasn’t sure what she was going to do when the day finally came that Poppy wouldn’t want a bedtime story read to her.
This was a good thing. Ewan wanted to get to know his daughter and they were out there, bonding.It’s one lousy story, for goodness’ sake.
She pulled off her clothes and turned the hot water tap on … then shrieked as the tap came off in her hand. Water poured out of the detachable shower head with unbelievable force, sending it writhing about the shower stall like an out-of-control snake. Blinded by the spray, Kenzie tried to catch it, without success.
The door burst open and before Kenzie had time to react to that, the flimsy plastic shower curtain was reefed back and she blinked through dripping hair at Ewan. His gaze zeroed in on the problem and he guided her out of the way.
‘Grab me a towel,’ he ordered without turning to look at her. and Kenzie quickly reached for the one she’d brought in, holding it tightly as he put his hand out. When she didn’t immediately relinquish it, he glanced over his shoulder impatiently. ‘I need to stop the water.’
She could see that it was an emergency, but then again, so was the fact she was standing naked in a shower recess with a man who she barely recalled sleeping with five years ago and all she had to protect herself was this one, pathetically short towel that he wanted her to hand over.
‘Kenzie!’ he said, wiping his face as the water continued gushing out. ‘I swear, I’m not looking at you.’
‘You’re looking right at me!’ she shot back.
‘Fine, I’ll turn away. Just give me the towel.’
‘Don’t look,’ she instructed as she reluctantly handed it to him and tried to slide out of the confined space, her chest pushing against his practically naked back as his T-shirt was plastered against his skin. She could feel his body heat radiating through it like a damn furnace.
Thankfully, the issue with the tap not being in good working order extended to the hot water, so it was lukewarm and they’d avoided being scalded, which was a positive, she supposed. Although the mortification of Ewan having seen her naked was way too fresh to completely write this off as a funny story just yet.
The tiny, mismatched blue-and-gold square tiles were cold and slippery under her feet, and she let out another muffled squeal as she momentarily lost her footing, before regaining it again and racing out the door to snag a fresh towel from the end of the nearest bed, thankfully only two short steps from the bathroom.
‘Mummy?’ Poppy’s little voice came out as a worried whisper from where she was still sitting on the bed.
‘Call reception and tell them to turn off the water!’ Ewan shouted.
‘It’s okay, baby. The shower just broke,’ Kenzie said, cuddling her daughter on her lap as she reached for the phone to call reception.
‘They’re doing it now,’ she shouted back a few moments later after she’d explained the issue with a disgruntled receptionist who sounded like he’d just been woken from a nap.
‘Sometime this week would be good,’ Ewan muttered as he pressed the towel over the water still gushing from where the tap had broken off, and still holding the shower head, unable to let it go while the water pressure continued to surge through it. At least it wasn’t spraying water all over the bathroom anymore. A quick look at the broken tap handle and he realised he wouldn’t be able to bodgie up the job himself. Someone was going to have to come out and replace the whole tap.
He wiped his forearm across his wet face and found his mind took advantage of the lull in action to bring up the image of Kenzie waving her arms in front of her, blinded by the cascade of water. Who knew the only thing this dump of a motel had going for it was excessive water pressure? It had all happened so fast. He’d been out of his seat and racing to the bathroom as soon as he heard the blood-curdling shriek, certain he’d find an intruder with a knife against Kenzie’s throat at the very least. The fact she was standing there naked had momentarily distracted him before common sense kicked in and he’d reacted to the plumbing emergency.
Ever since discovering Poppy’s existence, he’d been thinking back to that night he and Kenzie had spent together, desperately trying to recall any memory. If it had just been a matter of meeting a woman he’d slept with, the hazy memories probably wouldn’t vex him so much. The fact that night had created a child, though … well, he kind of wished that he’d been sober enough to take more notice.
