Daddy on Demand Read online

  He couldn’t bear the raw, naked emotion of need.

  Despite weeks of iron will and brutal lectures to keep his hands to himself, he crushed her to him and hid his face in the fragrance and silkiness of her hair.

  Collin swallowed painfully. “Thank you for being here…for doing this. I couldn’t—”

  He kissed her as he had in a dream, with tenderness and care, and sighed with relief when she opened to him. When his tongue touched hers, she murmured softly and let herself lean against him.

  “Brina…I gotta go potty.”

  It was Sabrina who eased back and called down the hall, “I’ll be right there.” Then she looked at Collin and asked softly, “Are you okay?”

  He could only offer a barely perceptible nod, and then she was off.

  “I don’t know if I’ll ever be okay again,” he finally replied to the empty room.

  Dear Reader,

  Once in a while, a writer comes across a set of characters that truly catch their imagination and don’t let go until the end of the story. Sabrina and Collin did that for me.

  They could have been two ships that pass in the night and then go on their way, never meeting again. But then Collin’s sister needed his help in the most critical way and, well, the rest is history.

  In some ways this is a lighter story than some are used to getting from me, and I enjoyed the snappy conversations between my hero and heroine seasoned by Collin’s sister and her three-year-old twins. Laughter is good for the soul, and heaven knows I was ready for some.

  But as always, the course of true and lasting love is rarely smooth, and that is what I believe is the surprise with this story. Everyone is far more than they seem to be, if one takes the time to discover that.

  Even as I finish this manuscript I am wondering where Sabrina and Collin are going from here. I already miss them. I hope they’ll become your good friends, too.

  As always, thanks for reading!

  With warm regards,

  Helen R. Myers

  DADDY ON DEMAND

  HELEN R. MYERS

  Books by Helen R. Myers

  Silhouette Special Edition

  After That Night…#1066

  Beloved Mercenary #1162

  What Should Have Been #1758

  A Man to Count On #1830

  The Last Man She’d Marry #1914

  Daddy on Demand #2004

  Silhouette Romance

  Donovan’s Mermaid #557

  Someone To Watch Over Me #643

  Confidentially Yours #677

  Invitation to a Wedding #737

  A Fine Arrangement #776

  Through My Eyes #814

  Three Little Chaperones #861

  Forbidden Passion #908

  A Father’s Promise #1002

  To Wed at Christmas #1049

  The Merry Matchmaker #1121

  Baby in a Basket #1169

  Silhouette Books

  Silhouette Shadows Collection 1992

  “Seawitch”

  Montana Mavericks

  The Law is No Lady

  Silhouette Desire

  Partners for Life #370

  Smooth Operator #454

  That Fontaine Woman! #471

  The Pirate O’Keefe #506

  Kiss Me Kate #570

  After You #599

  When Gabriel Called #650

  Navarrone #738

  Jake #797

  Once Upon a Full Moon #857

  The Rebel and the Hero #941

  Just a Memory Away #990

  The Officer and the Renegade #1102

  Silhouette Shadows

  Night Mist #6

  Whispers in the Woods #23

  Watching for Willa #49

  MIRA Books

  Come Sundown

  More Than You Know

  Lost

  Dead End

  Final Stand

  No Sanctuary

  While Others Sleep

  HELEN R. MYERS

  A collector of two- and four-legged strays, Helen R. Myers lives deep in the Piney Woods of East Texas. She cites cello music and bonsai gardening as favorite relaxation pastimes, and still edits in her sleep—an accident, learned while writing her first book. A bestselling author of diverse themes and focus, she is a three-time RITA® Award nominee, winning for Navarrone in 1993.

  To dear friend and former neighbor

  Donna Danley

  of

  Backwoods Farm

  Thank you from the bottom of my heart.

  You know all of the reasons why.

  Contents

  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 One

  “Are you alone?”

  The tender yet suggestive question posed by the female calling on his cell phone would have put a wicked grin on Collin Masters’s face if he didn’t immediately recognize that it was his sister. Watching elevator floor numbers light up as he descended from his high-rise condo, he replied, “Not for long if there’s any justice in this world. I’m in the elevator on my way to meet someone who has legs more fabulous than her red hair and an appetite for champagne and yours truly.”

  “Cancel,” Cassidy Masters replied, all semblance of gentleness vanishing from her voice. “I’m on my way over there.”

  Collin adored his kid sister and only sibling, but he didn’t appreciate her ordering him as though he was a member of her USAF chopper crew. “Not remotely funny, Captain Masters. You stay in San Antonio at—He never could remember which of the Texas bases she was currently stationed at.

  “I’m within ten minutes of your building. I borrowed one of the club planes and flew into Addison Airport.”

  Although it gave him pause that she was only a few miles north of his location in Dallas, Collin opted for humor. “For your information, this is the first date I’ve been on in weeks. Catch my drift? Lonely boy needs some TLC.”

  “Keep Lonely Boy zipped away for another hour or two. This is important.”

  “But—”

  “Darn your hide—don’t make me say this over the phone!” Cassidy sighed. “I’m being deployed, Collin.”

  The news hit him with such a jolt, he thought the elevator had abruptly jerked to a halt between floors. When instead it settled calmly on the ground level and the doors opened, his stomach eased back in place with the rest of his anatomy, but not without aftershocklike jitters.

  “Crap. Sis, I’m sorry.”

  “It comes with the wings…and it’s not like we didn’t know this could happen.”

  A million and one questions flooded Collin’s mind. He allowed only one to be voiced. “When do you leave?”

  “Six weeks. Eight tops. Just long enough to get through the training classes I’m not current on, update my shots and get my personal business in order.”

  Uh-oh, Collin thought, beginning to feel a new queasiness in his belly. Yes, they had covered this subject before, but that was conveniently tucked away in the part of his brain labeled Denial.

  “I take it by your silence that you’re putting two and two together,” Cassidy drawled. “Make the call or calls you need to and I’ll see you at 1850 give or take some traffic.”

  She disconnected, successfully avoiding his complaint about not understanding military counting any better than he remembered base names. No, he amended, she was just guaranteeing that he wouldn’t have a chance to back out of their deal. He loved her with all of his heart—save what portion wasn’t owned by her precocious daughters, his nieces—but how could he do what she was about to ask of him?

  A movement across the lobby caught his attention and he realized that he was standing in the open elevator probably looking like he’d free-fallen down the shaft. Across the lobby, a sweet-faced giant named Sonny—the lobby security guard—watched him with perplexed amusement.

  Offering back a sickly smile and weak wave, Collin shut his phone and hit the button that would return him to his floor.

  It was closer to twenty minutes before Sonny announced Cassidy’s arrival. By then Collin had called Nicole, canceled their dinner reservations and downed a chilled shot of Grey Goose. Scotch would have been the shock absorber of choice, but he knew it would take more than one to see him through this meeting, and then there was the breath test concern. Cass had the olfactory senses of a bloodhound and he didn’t want her thinking she was leaving her precious three-year-olds in the hands of an irresponsible drunk.

  “Oh, who are you kidding?” he muttered catching sight of himself in the hallway mirror with his hair and tie already askew from anxious yanking and raking.

  Deployed…his kid sister was heading off to war. This is what he deserved for assuring her that, “You can be anything you want to be,” some four years ago upon learning that she was pregnant. The lowlife sperm donor that she’d called boyfriend at the time had been urging her to have an abortion because the would-be rock star thought kids would be a turnoff to fans. It sure hadn’t hurt legends like Mick, Ozzie and McCartney, but afraid to test that theory, Dave from Denton had fled to parts unknown.

  By big belly time, Cassie had finished her master’s degree, graduating with honors. By the time the twins were two, she was on her
way to flying Pave Hawk helicopters for the U.S. Air Force. To Collin, who could barely bring himself to fly commercial without one hand on the barf bag, his kid sister was amazing. But sitting in any cockpit in a war zone was an idea he’d been refusing to contemplate. Yes, there were many female pilots these days, but as far as he was concerned, the war was supposed to be over before it was Cassie’s turn to serve her country on the front lines.

  The knock at the door and cheery call, “There’s no use hiding, I know you’re in there,” put an end to his lozenge-size history recap. There was nothing to do but let her in. He did so knowing his slumped shoulders and bowed head was not what she needed to see, but that was the best he could do for the moment.

  The sight of his twinkling-eyed sister with her animated mouth wryly curved in a half “this sucks” twist had him opening his arms. Six years older than her thirty-two, he was big brother on every level but in intelligence and bravery. The other difference was that they looked nothing alike. Each resembled one of their parents. She was the original golden girl complete with willowy figure and natural corkscrew curls that she preferred to hide under a hat or helmet, her eyes blue enough to keep the attention of anyone with a pulse. Tall, thin, and cursed with unruly ash-brown hair, his chief attribute was sad, lost-in-the-fog gray eyes. Back in his school days, they’d saved him from far more punishment than he deserved. When a modicum of maturity stuck to him, he concluded his second asset was his wicked imagination, which he suspected ESP’d women of particularly loose morals and no great need for commitment. The gift for smooth talking—buffered by his lingering British accent—once had their maternal grandmother, who’d finished raising him and Cassie, recommending that he become a minister. “I’d be willing to bet five dollars that before you reach thirty, you’d own your own TV network,” she’d declared. “That is if some jealous husband doesn’t shoot you first.” These days he knew there was no mistaking that Cassie had inherited her spunk and frankness from her.

  “Crap,” he muttered again into his sister’s ear as he hugged her tightly.

  “Not the four letter word I used when I got the news, but close enough,” she replied.

  He pushed her to arm’s length to study her youthful, but somber face. “Are you scared?”

  “Eventually, I’m sure I will be. Probably during the flight over, but hopefully I’ll be so tired from the prep stuff that I pass out ten minutes after we take off. Considering that the government uses charter services whose planes have about the wear and tear of dinosaur bones, sleep may prove a double blessing.”

  That did little to help Collin’s growing dread. “Don’t they realize that you aren’t just a single parent, you have twins?”

  “A contract is a contract. Besides, since I was attending Squadron Officer School, I didn’t get to deploy with the rest of my squadron, so it’s only a four-month tour. That’s nothing compared to the guys who are going for six months or a year.” Hands on her hips, she shook her head. “Collin, surely you’ve paid attention to the news? Some of our guys are doing this for the third, fourth and fifth time.”

  Avoiding a politically correct reply or apology with an indistinguishable mutter, he massaged the growing stiffness at the back of his neck. “Let me make a call or two. I’m sure I can get you infected with hepatitis or something within hours.”

  Cassidy finally laughed and shut the door behind her. “I can see that I have my work cut out for me. I’m sorry, Favorite Brother, but I need you to drop the Hugh Grant or Tom Hanks reluctant-and-awkward-hero act and be my hero.”

  “If only that was possible. Unfortunately, I did everything but sell my soul to a man who makes ten times the ridiculous money I first did with my firm creating advertising campaigns designed to separate people from their hard-earned salaries. The best I can do is promise to have my secretary ship you tons of product samples, few of which you are likely to use in a third world country with severe plumbing problems and little or no electricity.”

  This time there was the hint of tears in her eyes as she again hugged him. “Maybe this whole crazy mess is going to be a gift after all. You’ve been pushing me to let go of fears and reach for my dreams for so long, I think you’ve lost sight of your own.”

  “My accountant would disagree with you in a heartbeat. Unlike you, he goes orgasmic when he sees reports of my seventy-hour workweeks.”

  “You know perfectly well that happiness isn’t about how much money you make. Especially when it comes at the cost of denying yourself someone special to share your success with. Maybe having this time with the girls will finally take off those self-inflicted blinders you wear when it comes to having a real relationship.”

  “Pearls of wisdom coming from—” Collin’s heart did another debilitating plunge and he stepped back against the entryway table pressing his right hand to his chest. “No. Oh, no. I know what I promised, but that was when you were delirious in labor—or I was delirious with fear? At any rate, I can’t keep the girls while you’re gone. You’re looking at a man who has never remotely craved an opportunity to change diapers ”

  “Then you’re in luck. Genie and Addie are well past the diaper stage. They’re in fast-track preschool.”

  “Next stop MIT?” As she lasered him with the infamous Masters’s matriarchal look, he held up both hands and rethought his defense. “What was I thinking with a military mom who names her daughters versions of general and admiral?” He had teased her from day one about Gena and Addison’s names, which he’d turned into those nicknames. But he had little doubt that her three-year-olds were mavericks in the making, the next evolution of all that their gutsy mother was striving to be. That made what she was asking of him all the more insane.

  “Look at you,” he tried to explain with unabashed awe. “You’re a pilot. You navigate thousands of pounds of metal through the air. You’re a walking hero 365 days a year even if you never left the country.” Dropping his hands at his sides, he looked at her helplessly. “What do I have to offer your babies, Cass? On weekends, when there is such a thing on my calendar as downtime, I’ve been known to sleep fourteen hours and wake up in the same position when I first crashed onto the bed.”

  “You’ll adapt. Learn to do what I do. Juggle. Manage. The difference is you’ll be doing it with a seven-figure income.”

  He bent at the waist and lifted his left knee as though she’d thrown him a sucker punch—or kick. “Ouch, girl.”

  Cassidy grimaced. “Sorry. Doesn’t it help that even if you weren’t the next in line to be the kids’ legal guardian that you are the one and only man I adore and trust?”

  “Give me your commanding officer’s phone number.” Collin snatched up his cell phone stationed on the kitchen bar. “There are issues about your judgment he needs to know about.”

  Unperturbed, Cass stood her ground. “If I didn’t think you could rise to this occasion, I would take the offer of one of my fellow pilots’ wives and leave the girls on base with them. I even asked the kids what they would prefer and do you know what they said?”

  “Buy us a suite at Disneyland and sign our guardianship over to the Jonas Brothers?”

  “They want ‘Unca Colon.’ Declared in unison might I add.”

  Collin almost choked. “Please tell me that you’re talking to an orthodontist about that speech impediment?”

  Secretly, however he dealt with a new guilt surge knowing how he’d dropped the ball as “Unca” last Christmas. Instead of spending it with them and Cassie, he’d flown to Tahiti with a redhead whose name he could no longer recall. “Tell them they’ll hate it here. No presents and nothing but oatmeal and algebra. By a tutor who can barely speak English,” he added seeing nothing but advantage in heaping on negatives.