“You can’t go without her.” Eyes wide, Kayla trotted beside him to his car. “Mama’s going to be mad if you do.”

“We’re going. In the car, come on.”

“How will Ali get to school?”

“She can walk,” Michael said grimly. “In whatever shoes she’s picked out this time.”

He’d solved the crisis of Kayla’s broken barrette, hadn’t he? And her hair looked okay to him tied back with the rubber band he’d pulled out of his own hair. He hadn’t panicked when Ali claimed to have misplaced her book bag but had found it himself, under the kitchen table, where she’d dumped it during her breakfast.

He’d remained the calm mediator when the two girls had fallen into a minor catfight over whose turn it was to feed the pets. And he had not faltered when Bongo had expressed his sorrow that his young mistresses were leaving him by peeing in the foyer.

No, he had stood strong through all of that, Michael thought as he gunned the engine. But he knew when he was being dicked around, and he wasn’t taking it.

Impatience turned to smugness when he saw Ali flying out of the house. Indignation flashed in her eyes as she pulled open the car door. “You were going without me.”

“That’s right, Blondie. Get in.”

Not wanting him to see, under the circumstances, that the nickname delighted her, she angled her chin. “There’s only two seats. Where am I supposed to sit?”

“Beside your sister.”

“But—”

“In. Now.”

At the snapped order, she moved fast, squeezing beside Kayla. Pouting dramatically when Michael reached over to tug the seat belt around both of them, she announced, “I don’t think this is legal.”

It was her best lady-of-the-manor voice, Michael realized. Her mother’s voice. “Call a cop,” he muttered and started down the drive.

For the next fifteen minutes, he was treated to a run of complaints. “She’s pushing me.” “She’s taking all the room.” “She’s sitting on my skirt.”

The muscle behind his eye began to twitch. How did anyone—anyone—tolerate this every morning of their life?

“I need to go over my words,” Kayla wailed. “I’m having a test. Michael, Ali’s pushing her elbow in me again.”

“Ali, get a grip.” He blew away the hair that, thanks to his gift to Kayla, danced in his eyes.

“There’s not enough room,” Ali informed him loftily. “She’s taking up the whole seat.”

“I am not.”

“You are too.”

“I am—”

At the snarl issuing from the man beside them, both girls lapsed into momentary silence.

Satisfied, Michael took a calming breath. “What are the spelling words?”