He shook his head, getting a sinking feeling that he wasn’t going to like what he found on his doorstep.
Setting his beer bottle on the pine coffee table, he rose from the couch and headed to the front hall. He’d only intended to open the door a crack, but a gust of wind blew it open, almost smashing him in the face. He stopped it just in time, then took a second to gape at the three bedraggled creatures huddled on the front stoop.
Miranda’s dark hair was drenched, wet strands glued to her forehead and whipping around in the wind. In her leggings and T-shirt, which were soaked, she wasn’t dressed for the weather, but the children plastered to her were. Two of them, wearing matching yellow raincoats with the hoods up, clinging to Miranda’s legs and wobbling each time they got blasted by a rainy gust.
“You just going to stand there or are you going to let us in?” Miranda yelled, her voice tinny amidst the persistent drumbeat of the rain.
Seth blinked, recovering fast. He ushered her and the children inside, then struggled to shut the door. He was yet again drenched, and new puddles were forming on the hardwood.
He focused on Miranda, whose hazel eyes looked a tad wild as she pushed hair off her face.
“You okay?” he demanded. “What happened?”
She blinked a few times. Glanced around the small entrance, as if she couldn’t comprehend what she was doing there. Then she opened her mouth and said, “My apartment is…”
Seth waited. When she didn’t finish the sentence, he sighed. “Your apartment is what?” he prompted.
Miranda wasn’t the one to respond. Rather, it was one of the dark-haired imps by her side, a little girl with pigtails and big brown eyes peeking out of that yellow hood.
“Underwater,” the girl announced.
He furrowed his brows. “What?”
“We live underwater now.”
Chapter Four
“Like The Little Mermaid, ’cept it wasn’t like The Little Mermaid at all,” Sophie explained in dismay. “It was cold and wet and icky and—”
Miranda snapped out of her shocked trance and placed a hand on her daughter’s shoulder. “Hush, Soph. I can explain it to Mr. Masterson—”
Seth snorted.
“To Seth,” she amended, meeting his amused gray eyes. “I’m so sorry to just show up like this. I had your address in my phone and I didn’t want to drive all the way back to the school when your house was so much closer. Imperial Beach is closer to Coronado than it is to the city—” Wonderful, now she was giving him a geography lesson. “And I couldn’t call because there was no signal and—” she gulped, trying to collect her composure, “—Ginny and Elsa live in studio apartments and I didn’t want to put them out, but I remember you saying you had a spare room and…”
She was too mortified to keep going, so she stopped talking altogether.
Seth’s voice was oddly gentle. “It’s okay. Tell me what happened when you got home.”
“Our place flooded. I opened the front door to find three feet of water in our hallway.” She gestured to her soaking-wet leggings and ballet flats. “I waded in there to assess the damage…” Her throat closed up, making it hard to continue. “I guess a few sewers overflowed, and there was also something wrong with my building’s gutters—my landlord said something about downspouts draining too close to the foundation.”
Seth’s expression turned grim. “How bad was it?”
“Bad. All four ground-floor apartments flooded, and with the rain not easing up out there, it’s bound to get worse.”
A wave of panic suddenly hit her. Oh God. Their entire life was in that apartment. What the hell was she supposed to do now?
Her landlord, a sweet Italian man named Marco, was already at the building when Miranda and the kids got home. One of the other tenants whose apartment flooded had called him, and although Marco had assured the affected residents that insurance would cover their lost belongings and no one would have to pay for the renovations, that didn’t solve the dilemma of where she and her children were supposed to live for the next week or so. The only people she knew in town were the teachers who worked for her at the dance school, and she didn’t feel comfortable asking any of them for a place to stay.
And she certainly couldn’t stay with Seth. It was bad enough that she was about to ask him to spend the night. But a whole week, maybe more? No way.
Miranda forced herself to gain some control over the panic swirling in her belly and focused on Seth, who was watching her with concern. Funny, he hadn’t made a single smartass remark since she’d showed up. He also hadn’t paid a lick of attention to her kids, who were beginning to whine.
“Mom, my shoes are wet,” Jason said miserably.
“And I want Belinda!” Sophie whimpered.
Miranda stifled a sigh. She wasn’t looking forward to telling Sophie that her favorite doll had been floating in the murky lake that used to be their home.