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It had been a day out that had ended with a kiss, nothing more.
Certainly, it was nothing worth rocking the boat over.
God knew, there was enough else going on.
* * *
Abe was absent from the kitchen the next morning and again that night.
And he was absent in the two weeks that followed.
His name came up in various conversations, some Naomi was a part of, though most she was not.
‘Abe’s staying over at the hospital tonight,’ she’d heard Ethan tell Barb on the day Ava had come home.
And when Ava was two weeks old, and Naomi and Merida were about to head over to the park, Ethan rang to say that Khalid was flying to NYC to sort out, face to face, the land sale issue.
‘Don’t ask,’ Merida said, and rolled her eyes.
Naomi definitely didn’t.
She was doing her level best to put the elder Devereux brother out of her mind.
And there was more than enough to be getting on with.
Merida was still struggling to feed Ava herself, and the baby was hungry and difficult to settle and liked to sleep the morning away and stay up all night.
Mid-afternoon, rather than have Merida give in and feed her again, they bundled her up in blankets and a hat and she lay screaming in her new pram.
‘Isn’t it too cold?’ Merida checked.
‘She’s as warm as toast,’ Naomi said. ‘And they like the motion of the pram.’
Ava did.
She didn’t sleep, but she did hush as they walked the paths. The snow had let up and it was a crisp, sunny day as Merida told her just how difficult Naomi had been theh previous night.
‘I don’t want to take her into bed with me, but she takes the tiniest feed and then falls asleep. The second I put her down, she starts to cry.’
‘Why don’t you let me have her for the night?’ Naomi suggested. ‘I could bring her in four-hourly for feeds.’
‘I want her with me.’
Abe, damn him, was right.
Business and friendships were best kept apart.
Oh, Naomi didn’t consider her work as business as such, but she was professional in her role.
Usually her employers wanted a nanny.
Merida didn’t.
She wanted her baby with her at night and though she was completely lovely, the fact was most new mothers didn’t want their close friend around twenty-four seven as they stumbled through the first weeks of parenthood.
Had she not been paid to be there, Naomi might have suggested that she check into a hotel, or even just come for a week or two.
Not two months!
