Winning The Nanny's Heart

Adding Up To Family

Figures, not families, were her forte. Yet somehow CPA Katie Williams found herself accepting single dad Sam Millwright’s desperate job offer to help care for his two young children. She took the job...temporarily. Because losing her heart to this love-starved family was definitely off the books.

Sam knew Katie was different from her first day on the job. In just a short while, the new nanny had coaxed a smile from his sullen daughter and got his silent son to speak. And she awakened a part of the widower’s heart he’d long since locked away. Still, Katie planned to leave—and Sam knew if he stood any chance of convincing her to stay, he had to show the temporary nanny that they could have a permanent future...together!

“Would you consider...being the nanny?”

“I don’t have much experience,” Katie said.

“I’ve got some flexibility in my schedule, and the kids are gone half the day at school, so it won’t be much time. I know they can be...overwhelming sometimes. Especially when they’re armed with finger paint and a hose.” He grinned.

Sam’s smile was a little lopsided, with a slight dimple in his left cheek. She liked his smile. Liked it a lot. Wouldn’t mind seeing it more often. And if he was going to be around to help with the kids... Was she seriously considering this job?

Her gaze traveled again to Libby, then to Henry, dwarfed by an oversize chair in the living room.

A feeling tugged at something deep inside of Katie, something she hadn’t even been sure existed until she’d walked into this house and met these children. This man.

“Okay,” she said. “I’ll do it.”

* * *

The Barlow Brothers: Nothing tames a Southern man faster… than true love!

Winning the Nanny’s Heart

Shirley Jump

www.millsandboon.co.uk

New York Times and USA TODAY bestselling author SHIRLEY JUMP spends her days writing romance so she can avoid the towering stack of dirty dishes, eat copious amounts of chocolate and reward herself with trips to the mall. Visit her website at www.shirleyjump.com for author news and a booklist, and follow her at Facebook.com/shirleyjump.author for giveaways and deep discussions about important things like chocolate and shoes.

To my awesome, supersmart editor Susan Litman, who has made every one of The Barlow Brothers books better and stronger.

Working with her has been an honor and a pleasure.

Contents

Cover

Back Cover Text

Introduction

Title Page

About the Author

Dedication

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Epilogue

Extract

Copyright

Chapter One

The first time Katie Williams ran away from home, she was eight years old.

She packed her Barbie backpack with a clean T-shirt, a handful of granola bars and three stuffed animals (because she couldn’t possibly choose between Rabbit, Harvey and Willard), then set out into the world. Well, not the world, really, just the end of Seventh Street, where the alley met the back of the park. She’d settled into the dark, tight space under the stairs for the slide, and told herself she wasn’t scared.

Her brother, Colton, found her an hour later, hungry and weepy and cold. “I was gonna make pancakes for breakfast tomorrow, Piglet,” he’d said, as if it were just another ordinary Tuesday. “And nobody wants to miss out on pancakes.” He wrapped her in the thick fleeced comfort of his sweatshirt, then carried her home piggyback. While he walked, his back hunched under her weight, he told her a story about a brave princess who lived in a castle high on a hill, with an ogre for a friend. Colton had carried her straight to her room, deposited Katie in her squeaky twin bed and bundled her under the thin blankets. He paused, then let out a sigh.

She did it again, Colton had said.

It wasn’t even a question. Katie nodded, afraid to say the words out loud. To tell her brother how their mother had lashed out at Katie again, for a sin no more egregious than asking if there was anything for supper. In those days, their mother drank more than she ate, and for whatever reason, had taken her anger out on Katie more than Colton.

Colton had given her a nod of understanding, a hug and a whisper in her ear, You’re a good kid. Don’t ever forget that. He’d talked to her until her tears dried up and then he’d tucked her into her bed, and left her with a sandwich he’d sneaked out of the kitchen.

She supposed it was kind of ironic that almost twenty years later, she was running away from home again, but this time toward her brother. And once again, he didn’t ask a single question when she showed up on his doorstep late in the afternoon in a tiny quaint town in North Carolina.

“Hey,” she said, when she walked into the Stone Gap Fire Department and found Colton standing by Engine No. 1, polishing the chrome. “I’m here.”

He stopped working, tossed the rag onto the counter and grinned at her. “Hey yourself, Piglet.” She’d never escaped his childhood nickname for her, but that was okay. “’Bout time you showed up.”