“I’m unmarried.”
And incredibly sexy, and likely to be even sexier in a deeply maternal way as your pregnancy progresses…
“You have impressionable children,” she added.
And I’ve had thoughts about kissing you…
He shrugged. “You’re a responsible adult.”
Emily raked her teeth across her soft lower lip. “Not everyone approves of what I’m doing.”
Dan enjoyed the experience of being there with her, the pair of them talking with the familiar intimacy of two people who’ve known each other for years, instead of mere hours. He reassured her with a look. “Not everyone approves of divorce, either. Stuff happens.” Old dreams fade. New ones take their place. “As far as I’m concerned, congratulations are still in order.”
“Thank you.” Emily smiled. “Do you think my pregnancy will bother Walt?”
Dan sidestepped the question as best he could. “He’s crotchety.”
Her eyes glimmered. She knew there was more. “Meaning?” she prompted.
Candor was something he could not provide. Not yet, anyway. “You don’t work for him. You work for me,” Dan said, and left it at that.
Emily surveyed Dan warily. “Is there something else I should know?”
Besides the fact that Walt doesn’t trust anyone until a thorough background check proves that person is trust-worthy? Dan mused. “Not a thing.”
ONCE EMILY HAD fully recovered from her bout of morning sickness, they decided to get right down to business. “There’s a couple ways we could approach this problem,” she told the family gathered around the kitchen table.
“We’re not going to be able to solve it,” Tommy interrupted, evidencing the same lack of teamwork he had the night before.
Dan gave his son a stern look.
“No offense,” Tommy continued, hands raised, “but none of us like the same stuff.”
Emily knew sugarcoating the problems would not solve anything. They needed to examine their differences together before a remedy could be found.
“That’s true, although you all seemed to like last night’s dinner,” Emily said. “Anyway, according to your lists, Kayla prefers mainly breakfast foods like pancakes, French toast, eggs, cereal and so on. Ava’s into coffee, chocolate and salads. Tommy wants high protein and electrolytes. Dan wants anything everyone will eat. And Walt, given his choice, is a meat-and-potatoes man.”
“It doesn’t sound like we have anything in common.” Ava sighed.
“Sure we do,” Dan interrupted sternly. “We’re all Kingslands.”
“Uncle Walt isn’t—his last name is Smith,” Ava pointed out studiously.
Eager to join in, Kayla put her crayon down and piped up with, “Emily isn’t one, either!”
“That’s right.” Emily struggled to contain control of the family meeting. “I’m not. My last name is Stayton. It was good of you to notice that, Kayla.”
Kayla beamed.
“Back to the problem,” Emily said. “I can come up with menus that will please each of you. And I could make enough to feed you for several days if you wanted to eat the same thing every night, reheated.”
“Leftovers?”
“I don’t really like leftovers.”
“Me, neither.”
“Or we could draw straws to go first and take turns by night,” she suggested. “That way everyone would have at least one night a week where their favorite meal was served.”
The kids appeared to be thinking about this option.
“Or I could try to put one thing that everyone likes in each menu. This might make for some odd combinations. Spaghetti and scones, for instance.”
All the kids made faces.
“Or we could do something a little less mundane,” Emily said, more or less making it up as she went. “We could try eating a lot of new dishes from around the world. Maybe make some of the foods that your mom might be eating in her travels. We could even ask her what her favorite dishes are from some of her favorite places and try that.”
The kids looked receptive to that idea. Dan did not.
“I think we should stick to the tried-and-true at first,” Dan said.
The kids’ enthusiasm faded and they went silent.
“If that means meat and potatoes, sounds good to me,” Walt said with a shrug.
“SORRY ABOUT THAT,” Emily said a short time later as Dan walked her to her van. “I didn’t know you had a problem with international cuisine.”
Normally Dan did not discuss his relationship with his ex-wife. Whatever went on between him and Brenda was between him and Brenda. But since Emily was going to be working so closely with his family, he figured she had a right to know. “I don’t encourage the kids to try and keep up with their globe-trotting mother.”
Emily looked shocked. “Why not? Surely she has e-mail and phone service.”
“She does. She’s just not good about using it for personal reasons. Sometimes weeks or months go by without a word from her.”
“Ava knew where she was.”
“Because Brenda put the two older kids on the listserve that alerts her colleagues to her whereabouts. Getting a mass e-mail every time your mother boards a plane is not the same as having personal contact with her.”
Emily appeared to mull that over. “And the lack of personal contact upsets the kids.”
“It’s always hard when a parent lets you down.”
She nodded, for the moment really seeming to understand. Which in turn made Dan wonder what disappointments she had weathered in her life.
“I’m sorry. I didn’t know,” she said finally.
“Anyway,” he said, “Brenda is scheduled to come home between Christmas and New Year’s. Hopefully nothing will get in the way of that. Meanwhile, if we could just work on getting us on track to civilized family meals, I would appreciate it.”
For the first time Emily looked uncertain. “I’m no miracle worker.”
“You wouldn’t have known that last night.”
“Well, just so you know, I’m not here to step in and cater to their every gastronomic whim.”
Dan knew that what he’d asked of her was unusual. In his estimation, that unusualness was what had made that dinner so great. “The thing is, we’re not the kind of family who has servants waiting on us. I don’t want that kind of atmosphere for my kids.”
Emily tucked a strand of hair behind her ear. “Then what do you want?”
“Have you ever taught a cooking class?”
“Yes.”
“Well, you know how, at the end of a cooking class, the chef usually sits down with the class to enjoy the food with the people she’s teaching? I’m interested in creating that same convivial mood for my family during the dinner hour. Unfortunately it’s something they’ve never really had. Even before the divorce, the meals at our house were always catch as catch can. So it’s going to be like working with a group of beginners.”
Sensing she was a woman who liked thinking outside the box as much as he did, Dan continued, “The point is, I’m not