Page 99 of The Strawberry Patch Pancake House

She cringed. ‘Sorry about that.’

‘I’m not saying I didn’t enjoy it.’

She smirked and shook her head at him.

‘Look, Iris, I’m on unfamiliar ground here, too. With everything. With Olive, with the diner, with you.’ He swallowed hard, refusing to let this conversation get too far ahead of him. ‘I didn’t really do relationships in the past either. I didn’t have time for them. So maybe we just take this slow. See how it goes.’

‘See how it goes?’

‘Yeah, we see how it goes. We figure it out together.’

‘And what about the whole custody thing?’

‘I’m allowed to date, Iris. I just need to provide a good home life for Olive. If and when we decide we’re going to do this for real, we’ll deal with the lawyers and the town’s busybodies then. But us dating isn’t going to harm Olive.’

She didn’t look convinced, and maybe he’d been unsure of that fact at first, too. He didn’t think it was a good idea to have a fling with the nanny. But this wasn’t a fling. He knew Iris’s heart now. He knew she wouldn’t hurt Olive.

She glanced at him from the corner of her eye as they walked and he held his breath as he waited for her to respond. Had he said too much, pushed her too far already?

‘And what about the fact that you’re still my boss?’ she asked.

‘Are you going to report me to HR, Iris?’ he teased, nudging her gently, but the look on her face was serious. ‘Do you want to stop being Olive’s nanny?’ She had a right to say no, of course she did, but still he hoped she’d stay.

Iris made a humming sound in the back of her throat as she thought. ‘Well, if the goal is to disrupt Olive’s life as little as possible, then I should probably stay on as her nanny.’

‘Are you sure? I really don’t want you to be uncomfortable with this whole thing.’

‘I know you don’t. So let’s just take it slow and see how it goes. Like you said.’

Her hesitant smile had him breathing a sigh of relief.

‘Okay, good.’

‘But we still don’t tell Olive,’ she said, her brows drawing together in concern, and he saw it then, her love for Olive. It just reinforced his faith in her. She didn’t want to disappoint his little girl. And he didn’t want to either. He wanted to be able to tell Olive and the lawyers when this whole thing was on more solid ground. But he understood that Iris needed more time.

‘Agreed.’

‘And she’s like a little detective so we need to be discreet.’

Archer laughed. ‘Definitely.’

They’d come to the end of a dead-end street and the harbor stretched out ahead of them. Iris walked out onto one of the big rocks that separated a small beach from the residential street they’d just come from. She sat and he followed suit.

The waves lapped quietly at the shore, the moon hanging low over the water.

‘This is one of my favorite spots,’ she said, tipping her head onto his shoulder.

‘It’s a good spot.’ Any place where Iris rested her head on him was a good spot.

‘Did you know that Olive wants a bunny now? She’s moved on from puppies,’ she said.

‘She’s mentioned that to me several hundred times, yes.’

Iris laughed, and he felt the sound down to his toes. ‘So are you going to get her one?’

‘A bunny? Hell, no.’

‘We’ll see. I predict she talks you into it.’