A Better Father (Harlequin Super Romance) (14 page)

At least, he didn’t think she knew.

He scowled with all the fake anger he could muster. “Turn
around. I’m going to fix this thing if it kills me.”

She complied, bowed her head, then pulled her fingers away fast
as soon as the ties had been transferred back to him. Her suit hand stayed in
place while the other trailed through the water, softly splashing. Keeping her
balance? Or trying to cover the sound of their breaths, which mingled and mixed
before echoing back around them?

“Hey, Sam. You didn’t hurt yourself, did you?”

He could swear there was a quiver to her voice that hadn’t been
there earlier. If he were a gentleman, he would ignore it.

“I stubbed my toe. I think you need to kiss it and make it
better.”

So much for his gentleman badge.

“I’m not kissing your toe!”

He wasn’t sure if the sudden rise of her shoulders was due to
his words or the fact that a twist of the reluctant straps had sent his knuckles
against her skin.

“Hold still, I’ve almost— The thing that holds it together
broke off. I have to tie it and there’s not a lot of extra... So you’re not a
toe kisser?”

She went very still below his hands. “This is inappropriate.
You’re my boss.”

I’m a lot more than that,
toots.

He yanked the knot tight and made sure his hands were well
clear of her before he added, “How about neck kissing?”

“No. You never told me how Casey’s doing. Are you done
yet?”

“Yes. Last time I checked, he was down for a nap. Belly-button
kissing?”

She dived underwater. He waited patiently, counting in his head
until she reappeared.

“Fifteen seconds. Pitiful. What was your opinion on
belly-button kissing?”

“Sam—”

“Elbow kissing?”

“You can go now. Assuming you can walk on your poor stubbed
toe.”

“Ah, you caught me. My toe is fine. But I think you bit your
lip trying to get away from me.” He reached across the darkness to lay a finger
in the center of that intriguing mouth. “Maybe I need to kiss this and make it
better.”

“There’s nothing wrong with my mouth.” But though she continued
to tread water, she didn’t move away.

“Are you sure? ’Cause you know, it’s a good half hour to the
hospital. A little preventive medicine might be a good idea.”

“Oh, I don’t think...”

“That’s good,” he said, inching himself closer, letting his
finger slip across her lips and down her chin. “Don’t think.”

“But what if— One of us should be out there. You know.” Her
gulp was audible. “The first rule.”

“If they need us, they’ll find us,” and he let his free hand
glide through the water, let it brush against the soft firmness of her shoulder,
let it settle there and urge her toward him. His hand slipped lower, gliding
along the length of arm.

“I—I...”

“Shh. Quiet.” He inched closer, their thighs brushing as he
lowered his mouth to hover over hers. “In fact, maybe we’d better make sure
neither of us can make any noise at—”

His words were pierced by the sound he’d been dreading
most—three long blasts on a whistle. The signal to get out of the water for a
head count. Libby jerked back and groaned.

“They counted you, didn’t they?” she said.

“Yeah. You, too?”

“Of course. We have to go out there.” She sounded about as
thrilled as he was at the thought, though he doubted it was for the same
reason.

“Stay. I’ll go and tell them you can’t come out right now.”

“No. The suit is okay. I can do this. But thanks.”

She smiled then, a real smile that held all the warmth he used
to associate with her. His stomach tightened and heat burst through him and to
hell with the lifeguards, he wasn’t about to let her slip away from him. Not
when he felt like he had just got her back.

But as quick as the girl he remembered had appeared, she
disappeared again with a shake of her head and a quick sigh. “Let’s get this
over with,” she said, and dived beneath the surface, kicking away from him.

Damn, but it would have been nice to keep her with him for a
bit longer.

Sam gave her a few seconds on the off chance no one would put
one and one together. Then he churned through the water, keeping his head down
as long as possible until biology forced him to come up for air. He scanned the
faces of those already on the shore. Most of the kids were too busy whispering
among themselves to have noticed them. Mick elbowed the kid next to him, sealing
his place on Sam’s Most Wanted list.

But it was the counselors and lifeguards that made him want to
dive back under again. Awareness, understanding, barely muffled laughter—he saw
them all. Just like he could already hear the jokes and innuendos that were
undoubtedly going to roll through the camp before nightfall.

It wouldn’t be the first time he was the subject of
rumor-mongering.

But it was probably the first time he’d ever wished it were
true.

CHAPTER ELEVEN

O
NE
THING
BECAME
very clear in the
days after the Raft Incident, as Sam came to think of those moments: Libby was
doing everything in her power to avoid him. It was just like the first days all
over again. Except this time, he was pretty sure that it wasn’t resentment,
anger or plain dislike that was making her turn herself and her schedule inside
out to keep him at arm’s length. It was, however, a definite kind of
discomfort.

And damned if he wasn’t feeling it, too.

It didn’t help that someone had made up new, raft-centered
lyrics to the old “Boy and a Girl in a Little Canoe” camp song and posted a copy
on the staff bulletin board. He ripped it down as soon as he saw it, of course.
But the words stuck in his memory. The line “he groped her and he tugged, and
her suit fell down” seemed to be permanently engraved in his mind. And every
time he turned around, someone was singing or humming the tune.

He wasn’t the only one who heard it, of course. He and Casey
happened to be at the other end of the lunch table when a couple of the guys
began whistling it in fabulous harmony, causing Libby to frown, shake her head
and ask the waterfront director why everyone was fixating on that song. Phoebe
covered her mouth, giggled and shook her head. Beside her, Tanya sighed
heavily.

He had to tell Libby. It was only fair. The logical solution
would be to wait until they were both in the office and then give her the whole
story, but as she was currently setting new speed records for running out of the
room whenever he walked in, that didn’t seem likely.

Instead, he made a point of walking back to her end of the
table after clearing his place. He didn’t sneak. Didn’t try to hide his
movements. Trying to be surreptitious would only make things worse, and no way
did he want to bring more embarrassment on Libby’s head. While Casey toddled
ahead of him, hell-bent on reaching his beloved Bibby, he sauntered down the
aisle between the picnic tables, came to a halt behind Libby and rested his foot
on the bench beside her.

“What the—” She lifted Casey to her lap before glaring at Sam’s
work boot, then transferred the glare to him. “Feet on the floor, Catalano.”

Instead of complying, he leaned forward to rest his elbow on
his knee. No one was going to think he was afraid to get close to her.

“Cosmo needs to talk to us after lunch.” He grabbed Casey’s
hand and wiggled. “Asked us to stick around for a few minutes.”

She rolled her eyes and began to rise. “Is this about the meat
loaf again? I’ll pop in there now and—”

“Not now.” Sam deliberately rested one hand on her shoulder and
shoved her gently into her seat. There. The whole camp was his witness. He could
touch her without turning to a puddle of mush.

Though it was a damned good thing no one could read his
mind—or, more accurately, his fingers, which practically snarled a sign-language
rebuke when he lifted them from her age-softened T-shirt.

“But if there’s a problem—” she began, and he shook his
head.

“No problem. He has some ideas about the menu for Backward Day
and wants to run them past us. Five, ten minutes, tops, but not until he’s done
with serving. Does that work for you?”

She gave him an odd look again, one he realized he’d seen from
her a handful of times since he came back—the one that he was pretty sure meant,
I know the man is hiding something but I can’t figure
it out.
He held his breath and tried to send her a telepathic message
to do as he asked with no questions.

At last, she nodded. Though maybe that was just the side effect
of the little knee bounce she was giving Casey.

“Okay. Twenty minutes should give him enough time. I’ll make
sure I’m here then.”

She snagged her sandwich with the hand that wasn’t around
Casey’s tummy and took a bite. He congratulated himself on a successful covert
mission. No one would suspect he was trying to get her alone, least of all her.
Now all he needed to do was drop a quick word to Cosmo and—

She set her sandwich back down. A stray shred of lettuce clung
to a corner of that mouth he’d been so close to capturing beneath the raft, and
damn but he lost his breath again.

From the corner of his eye he caught movement as Phoebe elbowed
Tanya. Phoebe grinned. Tanya drooped. And though every instinct in his body
urged him to lick Libby’s lips clean—or, at the very least, to wipe them with
his thumb and then continue tracing the line of her mouth until every crease was
forever imprinted in his memory—he settled for snagging a napkin from the table
and handing it over, dancing it just out of Casey’s grasp.

“Mine!”

“Sorry, squirt. Lib, you’ve got something here.” He touched the
matching spot on his own face. She frowned, but dabbed appropriately. He gave a
quick nod of approval before reaching for Casey, who continued to lunge for the
napkin.

“Come on, Case. It’s nap time. See you in twenty,” he said to
her, and wandered away as nonchalantly as he could manage when he knew at least
three pairs of eyes were following his every move.

It was a damned fine thing that he had plenty of experience in
dealing with sneaky paparazzi. Because the slimiest reporter on the planet had
nothing on the eyes and ears of Camp Overlook.

* * *

I
T
TOOK
ABOUT
TEN
MINUTES
to take Casey to the house,
hand him over to Mrs. Collins and scoot back through the woods to the rear of
the dining hall. By the time he knocked on the back door of the kitchen, Cosmo
was slapping a wooden spoon ominously against his thigh.

“Catalano!” the cook growled before the knock had finished
vibrating. “What the hell are you planning against Libby, and why are you
dragging me into it?”

So much for beating the gossip line. Sam had planned to
approach Cosmo as his boss, but since the old man was glaring at him like the
fiercest defenseman he’d ever faced on the ice, he opted for a fast change of
direction.

“Sorry to disappoint you, Cos, but I’m trying to help.”

Cosmo grunted and turned back to the stove. “Hell of a twisted
way to help, getting the whole place talking about her behind her back.”

“That’s why I told her you wanted to talk to us. She knows
people are whispering, but she doesn’t know about that song. I ripped it down
before she could see it. I want to tell her, but she won’t come within ten feet
of me—”

“Smart girl.”

Sam paused, then chose to let it pass. “Anyway, I needed an
excuse to get her to stick around long enough to talk.”

“And I’m your excuse.”

Sam nodded.

Cosmo grunted again and gave the pot a vigorous stir. The scent
of spaghetti sauce wafted out toward Sam, reminding him that he’d been so
preoccupied with the Libby problem and feeding Casey that he’d barely touched
his own lunch.

“Got a better idea,” Cosmo said. “You take yourself off
someplace and I’ll tell Libby why everybody’s singing.”

“No, thanks,” Sam said, though he was pretty sure there was no
charity involved in the offer. “I helped cause this, I’ll make it better.”

Cosmo snorted as he wiped his hands on his apron. “Right. Just
like you made everything else better when you bought the place.”

“Look, Cosmo, I know you didn’t want Myra to sell—”

His words were lost to the dull clang of an oversize bowl being
thunked on the counter. “Damn right I didn’t.”

“For the love of— It’s not gonna change. How about you deal and
move on?”

Cosmo’s shoulders drooped. His jowls shook. For a second he
looked like someone had snapped whatever was holding him upright, and that he
would drop at any moment.

Holy crap.

Sam started to move forward, thoughts of a heart attack or an
apoplectic fit racing through his mind, but Cos shook himself like a giant Saint
Bernard and pulled himself upright.

“Here’s what you need to deal with, smart-ass. This place
shoulda gone to Libby the way My— The way things were intended all along. If you
hadn’t come in here waving your checkbook, she would never—”

“Myra sold so she could help look after her sister. You know
that as well as I do. If it hadn’t been me, she would have found somebody
else.”

The muttered curse as Cosmo turned his back to Sam was pretty
clear evidence of how much he believed that. But Sam was more focused on
something else Cosmo had said.

“What do you mean, Myra intended for the camp to go to
Libby?”

Cosmo sniffed as he grabbed a bowl of tomatoes from the counter
and carried them to the stainless-steel island dominating the kitchen. “Just
what I said.”

“Yeah, well, for the next minute, pretend you know how to
string more than three words together at a time and clue me in, okay?”

Cosmo peered at the knife block in front of him before
selecting a blade that Sam was pretty sure had been chosen more for its ability
to intimidate than its ability to cut.

“What do you think it means, hotshot?”

Sam was about to reply with an epithet of his own, then
stopped. Cosmo wasn’t going to offer up any more details, that was clear, and he
had a feeling Libby would choose a summer’s worth of archery over telling him
the truth. He pulled his phone from his pocket and hit the speed dial to
Myra.

“Who you calling?”

“Sure as hell not the Ghostbusters.”

Cosmo’s face twisted. “You’re not gonna go disturbing—”

“Sam?” Myra sounded surprised and only slightly wary, which he
supposed was a good thing. “How are you?”

“Not to worry, Myra. Everything’s fine. I have a quick
question. Cosmo here just told me that the camp was supposed to be Libby’s, but
he won’t explain what he meant. Could you clue me in? It’s kind of
important.”

More important than he would have expected, actually. Maybe
because he’d screwed things up so badly at first, and if there was something
else that could come between him and Libby, he wanted to know before it blew up
in his face.

Or maybe because he wanted reassurance that he wasn’t the
selfish bastard he suddenly felt he had become.

“Sam, I really don’t think... That was between me and Libby. If
she wanted you to know, I’m sure—”

“Were you planning to leave it to her in your will?”

Silence. The kind of silence that let him know he’d hit pay
dirt.

Unbidden, a scene resurrected itself in Sam’s memory—Libby and
Myra in the office as the news of the sale was broken. Myra had apologized to
Libby, saying something about a promise she’d made, and Libby had jumped in to
cut her off with a look of pure disdain in his direction.

“She knew, didn’t she?”

This time the silence was broken by a soft sigh.

“Okay, Myra. I know you don’t want to say anything, and I
respect that. I think I have all I need. Thanks.” And then, because he couldn’t
resist getting back at Cosmo somehow, he added a quick “Cosmo sends his love”
before ending the call.

Cosmo went as white as his apron, whirled away from Sam and
commenced whacking a knife through a pile of tomatoes. Sam barely noticed. The
implications of his discovery hit him like an elbow to the stomach. He had
bought Libby’s future out from under her.

No wonder she had been so furious.

And now he was helping destroy her reputation. Not on purpose,
of course, and not by himself. But he sure as hell hadn’t taken the high road
with his approach beneath the raft.

He had to make it up to her somehow.

The only question was, how was he supposed to help make things
up to her and prove there was nothing between them when, every time he saw her,
he wanted nothing more than to drag her back beneath the raft and finish what
he’d started?

* * *

L
IBBY
FORCED
HERSELF
to take her time leaving the dining hall. She toyed
with her sandwich and nibbled a couple of carrot sticks and did her level best
to ignore the grin playing around Phoebe’s mouth.

On the other hand, Tanya’s woeful expression was just too
junior high to be ignored. And ignore it Libby had done, for at least a week
now, maybe two. But it was becoming apparent that Tanya had developed a crush on
Sam that wasn’t going to wear itself out without a little help.

She pushed back from the table and scooped up her plate. On her
way she gave Phoebe a quick tap on the shoulder and nodded toward the door. The
girl raised an eyebrow but nodded.

Two minutes later, they were both outside beneath the sugar
maple that provided both shade and an excellent spot from which to see everyone
exiting the hall, thus earning it the camp name of the Sneaky Tree.

“What’s up, oh great and powerful one?” Phoebe’s words were
light and airy, but there was a keen mind beneath that head of beaded
braids.

“I’m worried about Tanya. This infatuation with Sam is getting
ridiculous.”

A quick grin crossed Phoebe’s round face. “Jealous?”

What?

Libby wasn’t sure whether to be embarrassed or enraged, so
after a moment of stupefaction she decided it best to simply ignore the comment
and move on. “Look, I know everyone falls for everyone else over the summers,
but she’s veering into obsession territory. I’ve never seen her like this, and
I’m afraid she’s going to do something she’ll regret.”

Phoebe crossed her arms and leaned back against the tree trunk.
“You think she’s going to throw herself at the Most Valuable Boss?”

“You’re her friend. You tell me.”

Phoebe wound one of her braids around her finger. “I don’t
think so. You know Tanya. She’s a drama queen from way back. She’s all about the
buildup and the excitement, but not so great at the follow-through. Remember a
couple of years ago when she found that bald spot in her hair?”