Page 3 of The Scrum-Half (Lincoln Knights #3)

Matty

It’d taken me all of ten minutes to decide to hire Harper.

Anyone who could handle me asking pain-in-the-arse questions without losing their shit, while simultaneously calling me out on my bullshit and offering reassurance, had to be a saint. And that wasn’t even considering his impressive list of qualifications.

I wasn’t going to find anyone better. That much was obvious.

Now I just had to stop myself from fucking the whole thing up, leaving Jack and me up shit creek without a paddle.

“Do you need a hand carrying anything?” I asked as Harper carefully stepped through the front door with a couple of large packing boxes in his arms. Each one was carefully labelled with neat, printed lettering across the side and I tried not to be nosy and read them.

I couldn’t believe he was able to start so quickly, but here we were on a Sunday afternoon a little over a week later with him moving in and me suddenly wondering if I was ready for him to be here.

It wasn’t like the situation was different from any of the other nannies I’d hired, though, so I wasn’t sure why I felt weird about it.

Maybe it was because I really needed this to work out and I was already panicking that it wouldn’t.

“I should be fine, thanks,” he said with a cheerful smile as he headed towards the stairs, his colourful shoes squeaking on the wooden floor. “But if you hear crashing, it might be best to come to my rescue.”

“Or you could give me those boxes, and I won’t have to worry about carting you to A&E later.”

“Don’t worry, I won’t break anything. I bounce.”

I chuckled and shook my head as I followed him. “Trust me, nobody bounces. Give them to me and I’ll take them up. Then I’ll give you a hand to get the rest.”

“What about Jack?” Harper asked, pivoting on the spot and using his shoulder to push his glasses up his nose.

They were large and round with bright red frames that reminded me of the toy fire engine Jack had been obsessed with for the last week.

Harper hadn’t been wearing them when he’d come for his interview, so I assumed he normally wore contacts, and I was suddenly struck by how much his glasses suited him.

I couldn’t say that without being weird, though, so I was going to keep my mouth well and truly shut.

“He’s in the playroom,” I said. “He’ll be fine. And we’ll be walking past him every time we go in and out, so I can keep an eye on him.”

“Are you sure? I don’t want to put you out.”

“Trust me, I’d rather you didn’t hurt yourself,” I said as I put my hands out for the boxes.

“That would be awkward considering I’m supposed to start work tomorrow.

” He smiled as he slid them into my arms, and my stomach twisted.

Bollocks. Had he thought I only wanted to help him because of that?

“I’ll go and get another box. Don’t worry, I’ve only got a couple more and a suitcase. I travel pretty light!”

He walked off before I could tell him I didn’t want him to get hurt because I’d suffered enough random injuries in my life not to wish them on other people, disappearing out of sight before I found my tongue and by then it was too late.

God, why was I so fucking awkward? It was like I’d lost all my people skills the moment I’d first answered the door to him.

I wanted to tell myself it was because I wasn’t used to having another adult around to talk to, but I spent all day with the guys at training, so it wasn’t like I was totally isolated.

Then again, I didn’t know if some of the rugby boys counted because they could be childish as fuck.

At least a third of them were still in their laddish, fuckboy stage, and it was hard to think of guys who played flaming asshole and drank dirty pints as sensible adults.

But deep, deep down—to the point where I was actively trying to ignore my feelings—I knew the real reason I was flustered was because Harper was fucking gorgeous.

He was a couple of inches taller than me with long golden hair that was currently tied up in a messy bun, soft grey eyes, and a sunshine smile that made his whole face light up.

I’d noticed he had painted nails too, with little fruits stamped onto colourful backgrounds, and I knew as soon as Jack saw them he’d be obsessed because he loved seeing what people had on their nails.

We’d even taken to painting his to match Hannah’s because hers were always bright and sparkly and it was a way of helping him feel connected to her.

I shouldn’t have been focusing on Harper’s looks because he was here to do a job, but somehow they’d been all I’d managed to think about since his interview.

I needed to get it together before I said something stupid and got myself blacklisted from every nanny agency between here and Land’s End in the blink of an eye. And then I needed to work out how to deal with my painful loneliness.

Maybe I’d have to see if Harper could babysit one evening so I could try dating again.

Of course, I’d actually have to find someone to go out with first and that was more of a mountain than a mild hurdle, but there were plenty of apps I could sign up for.

So what if it had been a long time since I’d been on anything resembling a date—I was sure it wouldn’t be that difficult to get back into the swing of things.

Or maybe I’d skip the dinner part and just find someone to hook up with.

I wasn’t even going to think about the last time I’d had sex.

Safe to say, it had been a while.

“Don’t even think about it,” I muttered to myself as I began heading towards the stairs, striding up them so Harper didn’t catch up with me and realise I’d been loitering. “You know it won’t end well.”

Harper was here to look after Jack, nothing more, nothing less.

My personal problems were none of his business.

“Good morning,” Harper said as I stumbled sleepily into the kitchen on Tuesday morning, wondering why Jack hadn’t woken me up at the crack of dawn with his customary singing or a sharp kick in the ribs. “Sleep well?”

I blinked slowly, staring at the man standing by my oven stirring something in a saucepan while my brain booted up slowly like an ancient nineties computer.

How fucked was I that one night of uninterrupted sleep was apparently enough to wipe my entire memory?

“Er, morning. Yeah, not bad, thanks. How about you?”

“Good. Jack woke up quite early, but I was already awake, so I diverted him from disturbing you and we came downstairs to do some yoga.”

“Yoga?”

“Yes!” Harper’s smile was almost as bright as the sun pouring in through the window.

“I did a course in children’s yoga a couple of years ago.

It’s really good for helping them focus their energy and connect with their body.

Plus I like doing some of the more gentle stretches, and I find they usually want to join in when I start, so it’s a way of letting them do that without hurting themselves. ”

“That’s actually a great idea,” I said slowly as I looked around, trying to work out where my toddler was hiding and mentally preparing myself for another Cheerios disaster.

“Down here,” Harper said, nodding his head in the direction of the floor next to him.

I walked around the kitchen island that had been blocking my view to see Jack, fully dressed in a T-shirt, shorts, and cardigan with his Halloween slippers on, sitting on the floor with his giraffe and flicking through a picture book.

The whole scene was so strange I had to blink twice, hard, just to believe it.

Since when did my two-year-old sit quietly on the floor before breakfast? Had he suddenly been replaced by a changeling child while I slept?

Not that I was complaining. It was just really fucking odd.

A gnawing feeling of guilt and inadequacy rose inside me.

I didn’t know if this was simply a one-off because he was still settling into Harper being here and the new routine, but there was a little voice in the back of my mind whispering that I was a pretty shitty dad for never having managed anything like this. And if Harper could do it in two days…

“Daddy!” Jack spotted me and jumped up, dropping the book on the floor as he ran over to me, Giraffe tucked under one arm.

“Hey, mate,” I said, scooping him up for a kiss and breathing in the scent of his apricot shampoo. “Did you have fun this morning with Harper?”

“Yes! I touched my feet.” He wiggled out of my arms and began to demonstrate touching his toes with great fanfare, waving his arms each time like he was conducting an orchestra, his tongue poking out of the corner of his mouth like he always did when he was concentrating.

“Very good,” I said. “Shall I see if I can do that?”

“No, Daddy. It’s mine.”

“Am I not allowed to touch my toes?” I asked with a wry smile as Jack looked up at me with an adorable glower.

He shook his head firmly. “No.”

“Why am I not allowed to?”

Jack thought for a second, glancing back at Harper, who I realised was still smiling as he dug through the cupboards for some bowls.

I wondered if he was going to get involved, but I wasn’t sure he had a reason to.

This whole morning had thrown me for a loop, and I almost wanted a time machine to go back a couple of hours and reset things, even if it meant Jack crawling into my bed to snore and kick me in the ribs.

“Okay,” Jack said with a dramatic nod. “Touch toes.”

“Thank you.” I stretched my hands above my head and felt a pull somewhere in my back. Please don’t let this go wrong. The last thing I needed was to injure myself trying to impress my child—and the gorgeous new nanny who was watching me with interest.

I leant forward and swooped my arms down, ignoring the stretch in my hamstrings and calves as I reached for my feet.

Despite my overall level of fitness, reaching my toes was not something I was expected to do on a regular basis…

and definitely not without a warm-up. But stubbornness had always been a feature of my personality, even when it was detrimental.

Fuck, the Knights sports therapists were going to have a field day with me.

“There,” I said in a strained voice as I brushed my fingers across the end of my toes and stood up quickly, trying to pretend it hadn’t been as difficult as it actually had been.

Fuck me, since when had touching my toes been that difficult?

I knew rugby had put my body through the wringer but this was ridiculous.

Jack opened his mouth, probably to tell me I hadn’t done it properly, but Harper quickly cut in.

“Jack, shall we have some breakfast?” He looked up at me and smiled as he nudged his glasses up his nose.

“I know you said you sometimes eat at training, but I think I’ve made enough porridge to feed a small army. Do you want some too?”

“Er, thanks, sounds great,” I said as I watched him direct Jack over to his booster seat at the kitchen table, pushing down the rising tide of irritation inside my chest.

Harper was here to make my life easier and stop me from drowning, nothing more. And that was all he was doing.

So why did I suddenly feel like I’d made a mistake?