Celeste’s nanny plan was adopted by general consent.
Since Boone had yet to find time in his schedule for a housewarming party, almost everyone wanted the grand tour of his home before the party began wrapping up. By eight, everyone but Hannah had departed. He’d managed to sweet-talk her into hanging around while he unloaded the SUV.
As he carried a stack of boxes into the nursery at ten past the hour, Hannah glanced up from tending to a nearly naked baby on the changing table. “Are you almost done?”
“This is the last of it.”
“Good timing. This little girl is ready for her bath, a bottle, and her bassinet, I believe. I’ll leave you to it.”
Boone stopped abruptly. “A bath? Wait a minute. We skipped that part last night, and I forgot to look it up on YouTube. I’ve never given a baby a bath. I don’t know how to give a baby a bath. Will you teach me?”
“Oh, Boone.”
“Please?” When Hannah sighed heavily, he pressed. “Baths are the most intimidating part of this process. Is there an order you should use when washing body parts? How warm should you have the water? What do you do if she starts squirming? How do you hold her to make sure she doesn’t squirt right out of your arms?”
“Okay. Okay. Okay,” she said. “Here’s what I’m going to do. One time, McBride. I’ll stay and go through the entire bedtime routine this one time if you promise not to ask me again.”
“I promise.”
“I mean it, Boone. No more going lawyer on me. You’re too good at it.”
“Thank you.”
“That wasn’t a compliment.”
“Ouch.”
Hannah wrapped the infant in a blanket and picked her up. “First lesson, leave Bree’s diaper on until you’re ready to put her into the water.”
“Got it.”
She walked into the bathroom and turned on the heater. “The room doesn’t need to be hot, but you’ll want it a little warmer than it is now. I know you said you forgot to buy clothes before you went to Texas, but does that include swaddles? Do you have any sleep swaddles that already have been laundered?”
“I do. The store clerk who helped me order the bassinet suggested it.” He opened one of the dresser drawers, removed a garment, and showed it to Hannah along with a sheepish smile. “Unfortunately, it’s blue with footballs.”
“She’s not going to be traumatized because she wears something that isn’t pink.”
“Hey, I bought quite a few gender-neutral things at that baby shop in Fort Worth,” he grumbled.
Hannah ignored his grousing and continued her lecture, instructing him to set out everything he would need after the bath beforehand. He fixed a bottle of formula and placed it in the warmer. Once he had a washcloth, hooded towel, baby wash, lotion, diaper, and clothes ready to go, she had him add a few inches of warm water to the baby bathtub. He asked, “How warm?”
“Do what you think is right, and I’ll test it.”
He spent a ridiculous amount of time adjusting the water. He got distracted a time or two when their gazes met in the mirror, and sexual awareness sparked between them. The bathroom wasn’t small by any measure, but with all three of them inside the warmed room, it felt tiny, the moment, intimate.
Finally, Brianna emitted a little squawk and brought Boone’s attention back to the business at hand. “What do you think?”
She tested the temperature with the inside of her wrist. “I’m a little warm, I think.”
I’m warm?
“It’s warm,” she quickly corrected. “The water’s too warm.”
“Ah. Yeah. Gotcha. Better cool things off.”
He added some cold water to the bath. Hannah checked the temperature and nodded, “Okay, you’re ready.”
“Not at all sure I am,” Boone said.
“Sure you are. Now take off her diaper and hand her to me. I’ll show you how to hold her, and you can do the honors.”
“I think this will go better if you do it and let me watch. I learn better by watching than by doing.”
“I don’t believe that for a minute,” she replied. “You’re chicken.”
“Cluck cluck.” He removed Brianna’s diaper, then handed the naked baby to Hannah. She demonstrated how to keep the infant’s head and back supported and lowered her gently and expertly into the water.
Boone wasn’t sure what he’d expected, but loud wailing similar to infant baptisms in church probably topped his list. Instead, Brianna took her bath in stride, kicking her little legs and batting her tiny fists around. “I think she likes it.”
“My girls always loved bath time.”
Hannah showed Boone how to wash the baby’s hair and face, smiling and speaking to Bree rather than the man standing next to her. She mentioned something he’d never heard of called cradle cap and cautioned him to use the washcloth to clean Bree’s ears. “Spit-up has a way of finding its way into every crook and cranny, so don’t miss getting behind her ears.”
Boone watched the demonstration attentively, but even as he absorbed the information he needed to care for his daughter properly, his awareness of Hannah continued to hum through his veins.
This woman did it for him. He thought he was falling for her. That was a crazy idea. He’d known her little more than a week. He didn’t fall for women in a week’s time. He didn’t fall for women, period. Not since Mary, anyway, and that process had taken months.
However, he and Hannah had done a lot of living in the past week, sharing big, intense life moments that taught each of them a lot about the other. Standing here watching Hannah bathe his baby, Boone felt like he knew her better than he had known his wife the day they’d married.
The thought stayed with him as Hannah finished the bath, then oversaw Boone’s attempt at drying, diapering, and dressing. The swaddle sack thing didn’t impress him. It seemed cruel to put a baby in a straitjacket, but Hannah assured him that Brianna would be happier and sleep better in it.
“Okay, then. You’re ready for the bottle and bed.” She turned toward the door, saying, “I’ll let myself out. See you around, McBride.”
“Wait. Hannah, please, one more thing.”
“Is it always one more thing with you?”
“I’m thirsty, and I need something to drink. Plus, I’d like to find my phone before I sit down to feed her and rock her to sleep. Knowing my luck, I’ll get her almost asleep, and the phone will ring and I’ll wake her up while I’m trying to find it. Tomorrow night, I’ll make sure I have myself squared away before I start the bath. Please? I just need a few more minutes.”
Hannah gave him a narrow-eyed glare, but she lifted the bottle from the warmer and carried it and Brianna over to the rocker. Wishing to avoid the possibility of Hannah changing her mind, Boone didn’t dawdle.
He tracked down his phone and slipped it into his pocket, drank a tall glass of water, then, because being a father didn’t make him less a man, he decided a nightcap was in order. He took two snifters from his bar cabinet, poured in generous splashes of his favorite cognac, and carried the glasses to the nursery. His steps slowed as he heard Hannah singing a lullaby to Brianna.