LITMIR.BIZ

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flagstone fireplaces. They do, however, call someone named J.D. to do the same work. This world runs on preconceived notions, Mr. Zabelle. One of those notions is that men are handy, women are not. Your reaction just proved my point. You thought I was here to clean your house, not to renovate it.”

      She was right and he didn’t like it, but he couldn’t come up with a face-saving rebuttal. “Well, I—”

      It wouldn’t have mattered if he had, she wouldn’t let him finish.

      “I’ve been around tools all my life and I know what to do with them.” She folded her arms before her. “Now, are you going to let your prejudice keep you from hiring the best handy-person you’re ever going to come across in your life—at any price—or are you going to be a modern man and show me what exactly you need done around here?” It was a challenge, pure and simple. One she hoped he would rise to.

      Out of the corner of her eye, Janice saw Kelli mimic her actions perfectly, folding her small arms before her.

      Mother and daughter stood united, waiting for a reply.

      Chapter Three

      For what felt like an endless moment, two different reactions warred within Philippe, each striving for the upper hand.

      Ever since he could remember, he’d had it drummed into his head—and had come to truly believe—that the only difference between men and women were that women had softer skin. Usually. His mother had enthusiastically maintained over and over again that women could do anything a man could except go to the bathroom standing up. And even there, she had declared smugly, women had the better method. At the very least, it was neater.

      But there was another, equally strong reaction that beat within his chest. It was based on the deep-seated philosophy that men were the doers, the protectors in this dance of life. This notion had evolved very early in his life and had come from the fact that he’d been the responsible one in the family, the steadfast one. His mother flittered in and out of relationships, fell in and out of love, while he held down the fort, making sure that his brothers stayed out of trouble and went to school. And occasionally, when there was a need for it, his was the shoulder on which his mother would cry or vent.

      He grew up believing that there were certain things that men did. They might be partners with women on a daily basis, but in times of crisis, the partnership tended to go from fifty-fifty to seventy-thirty, with the man taking up the slack.

      And under that heading, but in a much looser sense, came the concept of being handy. Women weren’t supposed to be handy, at least, not handier than the men of the species. Women were not the guardians of the tool belt, they were the nurturers.

      Right now, as he vacillated between giving in to his pride and being fair, Philippe could almost hear his mother whispering in his ear.

      “Damn it, Philippe, I raised you better than this. Give the girl a chance. She has a child, for heaven’s sake. Besides, she’s very easy on the eye. Not a bad little number to have around.”

      At the very least, it wouldn’t hurt to have J.D. give him an estimate. If he didn’t like it, that would be the end of that. Mentally, he crossed his fingers.

      With a barely suppressed sigh, he nodded. “All right. Let me show you the bathroom.”

      Philippe began leading the way to the rear of the house, past the kitchen. Somehow, Kelli managed to wiggle in front of him just as they came to the bathroom that had begun it all, the one with the cracked sink.

      Hands on either side of the doorjamb, Kelli peered into the room before her mother could stop her, then declared in a very adult, very disappointed voice, “Oh, it’s not pretty.” Turning around, she looked up at him with a smile that promised everything was going to be all right. “But don’t worry, Mama can make it pretty for you. She’s very good.”

      Philippe raised an eyebrow. “She your press agent?” he asked, amused despite himself as he nodded toward the little girl.

      For the first time, he saw the woman in the well-fitting faded jeans smile. Janice ruffled her daughter’s silky blond hair with pure affection. “More like my own personal cheering section.”

      An identical smile was mirrored on Kelli’s lips. The resemblance was uncanny.

      Stepping back to grab her mother’s hand, Kelli proceeded to tug her into the small rectangular slightly musty room. “C’mon, Mommy, tell him what you’re gonna do to make it look pretty.”

      Janice glanced over her shoulder toward the man she hoped was going to hire her and allow her to make this month’s mortgage payment. “I don’t think pretty is what Mr. Zabelle has in mind, honey.”

      Kelli pursed her lips together, clearly mulling over her mother’s words. And then she raised her bright blue eyes up to look at his face, studying him intently as if she was trying to decide just what sort of creature he was.

      “Everyone likes pretty,” she finally declared with the firm conviction of the very young.

      Philippe’s experience with children was extremely limited. It really didn’t go beyond his own rather adult childhood and the brothers he’d all but raised. All of that now residing in the distant past.

      Too distant for him to really recall with any amount of clarity.

      But since Kelli made decrees like a short adult, he treated her as such and said, “That all depends on what you mean by pretty.”

      The smile on the rosebud mouth was back, spreading along it generously and banishing her momentary serious expression. This time, she looked up at her mother and giggled. “He’s funny, Mommy.”

      Janice slipped her hand around Kelli’s shoulders, stooping down to do so. “He’s the client, Kel, and we don’t talk about him as if he’s not in the room when he’s standing right beside us.”

      “Good rule to remember,” Philippe approved, then decided to ask a question of his own. “You always bring your daughter along on interviews?”

      Interviews. Janice had gotten to dislike the word. It made her feel as if she was being scrutinized. As if someone was passing judgment on her. There had been more than enough of that when she’d been growing up. Her father was always judging her—and finding her lacking. Besides, she took exception to Zabelle’s question. It wasn’t any of his business if Kelli came along or not as long as everything else was conducted professionally.

      Without meaning to, she squared her shoulders. “My sitter had a date.”

      Philippe supposed that was a reasonable excuse, although the woman could have rescheduled. “Good for her.”

      “Him,” she corrected. “Good for him,” she added when he looked at her quizzically. “My sitter’s my brother, Gordon.”

      Mentally, Philippe came to an abrupt halt. He was getting far more information than he either needed or wanted. If he did wind up hiring this woman to tinker and fix the couple of things that needed fixing, he wanted to keep their exchanges strictly to a business level.

      But that wasn’t going to be easy, he realized in the next moment when the little girl took his hand in hers and brightly informed him, “I don’t have a brother. Do you have one?”

      He expected Kelli’s mother to step in and admonish the little girl for talking so freely to a stranger. But there was nothing forthcoming from J.D. and Kelli was apparently waiting for him to give her an answer.

      “Yes,” he finally said. “Two.”

      “Do they live here, too?” Kelli asked. She seemed ready to go off in search of them.

      He shifted his eyes toward the so-called handy-person. “Don’t you think you should teach her not to be so friendly with strangers?”

      Janice had never liked being told what to do. She struggled now to keep her annoyance out of her voice. The man probably meant well and he was, after all,

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