Daddy by Surprise Read Online Free PDF

phone under her ear so she could stuff another load into the washer. How two boys who had to be bribed to bathe could go through so much laundry was beyond her. “I fully expected you to be sick of him by now. Are you a glutton for punishment or what?” She and Char were close-enough friends to know when the other was kidding.
    “He’s having a lot of fun and everything is fine at the shop so I thought we’d stay another day, if you don’t care….”
    “That’s fine, Char. As long as you’re not sick of him, I’m fine with you keeping him another night. I’m a little surprised,” she said. Major understatement. “But…”
    “I know,” Char said. “I expected to be exhausted at the very least, but he’s a great kid, Kat. Really easy to be around, and the other children have sort of adopted him. Like a junior mascot or something.”
    Kat could picture it. Jordie was very good at blending in. Something he got from her, she figured.
    “Hey,” Char said. “I forgot to ask you earlier. How’d you do on tips?”
    Thanks to a certain tipsy R.U.B. she’d made double what she usually took home. “Pretty good. Enough to get my radiator flushed.”
    Char chortled. “Keep talking dirty like that and I’ll kick your kid out of my tent in favor of some young stud.”
    Kat smiled. Big talk from someone who practically qualified as a nun. Their mutual friend Libby theorized that something in Char’s past had caused her to protect her heart with a fierceness that scared away most men.
    “Jordie loves money. Maybe you could hire him to sell raffle tickets for the chance to woo you.”
    “Woo. Sounds closely related to your swoo. No thanks. So, what are you going to do with a night off by yourself?”
    “That depends on whether or not Pete comes back for Tag.”
    “Huh? What happened to the fishing trip? I thought that was supposed to last all weekend.”
    Kat explained about Aiden’s medical emergency.
    “Oh, man, that sucks. Sounds like a trick a big brother who knows what poison ivy looks like might have pulled on a littler kid he isn’t crazy about.”
    Kat hadn’t considered that. “You’re right. If I’d been more outdoorsy as a child, one or more of my half siblings probably could have sucked me into falling for that. I’ll ask, but I hope for Tag’s sake he didn’t. Aiden’s mother would make his life more miserable than usual if she found out.”
    Pete’s second wife, Michelle, tended to be very protective of her two children, Aiden and baby Cassidy, to the exclusion of her stepson. Kat gave Pete credit for including Tag in family outings as much as he did, because she was sure Michelle didn’t make it easy for him. Or Tag.
    She and Char talked a few minutes longer. Char had spoken to Libby the night before and had the latest scoop on another mutual friend and book-club member, Jenna Murphy. Jenna and Libby were in California at the moment but were due back soon.
    “So it looks like we’re still on schedule for our regular meeting,” Char said. “You’re hosting, right? Tell me the title of the book again. I’ll stop by the mall on the way home tomorrow.”
    “ Water for Elephants. You’ll love it. I promise.”
    They hung up a few minutes later without Kat disclosing the fact that she’d scheduled a tattoo at her home. Maybe because she didn’t do impulsive things that involved strange men she met in a bar and her friend would assume Kat was desperate for money—which she usually was. But she preferred to think she didn’t mention the tattoo because more than likely the handsome R.U.B. would be a no-show. He hadn’t called, after all.
    A good thing, she told herself. She didn’t have time for men with potentially lethal swoo. Not when she was so close to finally getting her life on track. And as her mother had proved more than once, nothing could derail a great plan faster than the wrong man.
    Kat had just set down the phone when it rang. Her hand shook slightly as she snatched