Blake Matthews is a big city businessman used to getting his way. So when he's stuck without a place to stay in small town Twin Corners, Texas, he insists his way into the boarding house run by Cassie Hawkins, a single mother raising three well mannered kids who could use the money. When Blake learns Cassie is having money troubles and could lose her house, he thinks nothing of offering her a job as the nanny to his 14 yo and 9 yo twin boys – and to help motivate her to accept he'll throw in room and board for free, give her oldest kid (15 yo Jimmy Ray), bring her mortgage payments up to date, and when a renter for her home falls through later, he'll even start making her current payments.
Surprisingly, Blake is doing this primarily because he's jealous of how well-mannered her kids are, rather than the usual romance hero motive of wanting her so badly. He doesn't even discover she's sexually attractive until he sees her in a bathing suit in LA! Anyway, there are some bumps along the way to integrating their families and teaching his about the value of family time, but along the way Blake and Cassie also fall in love.
I found this to be a pretty average series book. I was impressed that the two don't start out lusting for each other, but I was disapointed by other things in the book (SPOILERS) like why make Cassie's secret past that ruined her high school dreams be going to jail for being thought to have been in on stealing from her employers? The prison sentence seemed unlikely to me, and I didn't believe that she would really have left LA in order not to have to expose this truth to Blake when her ex teen boyfriend comes along to blackmail her. I also thought it was strange that Blake thinks Mr. Matthews is less formal than being called sir and that Blake's oldest would plot and superglue Cassie to the bathtub faucet – that didn't strike me as a mild call for attention. Plus, how did Blake's kids get so wild in just the three years since their mother (apparently loving and a great parent) died anyway? But as I said, it read well and was enjoyable enough.
