A/N: Today I was cleaning up some old storage boxes and I came across my notebook for this story. Better yet, a lot of this chapter was already prepared. So if anyone if still into this ship and if anyone is still hoping to read more of this story, well then here it is!

From memory this is longer than usual. I do hope you enjoy. And please alert me to any inconsistencies. I have already begun on the next chapter, but do let me know if you would like me to continue.

THE BACHELOR'S BABY

Chapter Ten

The Third Month: All your baby's organs are now formed and most are beginning to function. Movements develop, such as wriggling toes and pursing lips. You will have probably gained about one kilogram in weight. It's time to visit the dentist.

There was a woman sitting on the small bench in her porch, Marron realised as she got home. Not anyone she knew.

"Hello," she said. "Can I help you?"

"Miss Marron Chestnut?"

"I'm Marron Chestnut," she said, getting out her key and hoping this would not take long. Her feet ached and she was desperate for a cup of tea.

"Roselyn Burns." The comfortably built middle-aged woman offered her hand. She had nice eyes, a warm smile. A motherly look. She also had a much-used suitcase. "How d'you do?"

Marron found such formality from a casual caller on her doorstep slightly unnerving. "Are you selling something?" she asked, glancing at the case.

"What?" Then Roselyn Burns laughed. "Oh, no. The agency sent me."

"What agency? What for?" asked Marron, deciding that it might save time if she doubled up on questions.

"The Whitehall Agency. I've been engaged as your housekeeper."

"Housekeeper?" a housekeeper with a suitcase. The suitcase was beginning to seriously bother her, but she slide the key into the lock and opened the door. She'd been rushed off her feet all day, the bus had been late and crowded, and if she didn't sit down some time soon she was going to crumple up on the floor. "I think there must be some mistake." She glanced up at the small cottage, as if to underline the fact that anyone with half a brain could see that she didn't need a housekeeper. "Are you sure you're in the right place?" she asked. "This is Upper Town. People sometimes confuse it will Lower Town."

"No confusion, Miss Chestnut. I know my Uppers from my Lowers," she said, unoffended by the doubt cast on her navigational skills. "Miss Whitehall called me into the office to brief me herself and she said I was to give you this." She handed Marron an envelope and while she was opening it picked up her suitcase and walked in. "Now, I could do with a cup of tea and I expect you could, too. So why don't you go and put your feet up and I'll see to it?"

"But.." But Mrs Burns had taken herself off to find the kitchen, leaving Marron to deal with the envelope. She was beginning to take a quite irrational dislike to envelopes. Or rather their contents. This, a short note from Trunks, did nothing to improve her opinion of them.

'Marron,

Mrs Roselyn Burns, I am reliably assured, will look after you like a mother hen. She's from the Whitehall Agency; they know her well and totally guarantee her probity. I've put her on my company payroll so you needn't concern yourself with the financial implications, and meanwhile I'd feel happier knowing there was someone on hand to take care of you.

Please don't tear her up into little chunks and send her back by courier.

Trunks'

Trunks. He arrived on her doorstep, did the ministering angel bit and then walked away. She'd heard nothing from him for what seemed like for ever. Then, when she'd managed to convince herself that he'd taken her at her word and gone, he did this.

She wanted to hug him, and yell at him, and tell him he was a fool. Mostly she wanted to weep, because Trunks thought he could distance himself this way, pay someone else to do his worrying for him.

He was wrong. Dead wrong. He stayed or he went. She'd given him the choice, no strings attached. She wasn't offering any in-between, half-way options. He couldn't 'go', then seek to salve a troublesome conscience like this. No way.

Mrs Burns appeared with a tea tray for two and placed it on a low table in front of the sofa. "Sit down, dear. I think we need to have a little chat about how this is going to work. I'll tell you what I do; you tell me how you'd like me to fit around you. I don't want to disturb your routine, or get in your way."

"You won't do that, Mrs Burns." She wouldn't disturb her because, no matter how sweet she was, how trustworthy, she wasn't staying.

But Trunks was right about one thing. Returning the lady minced up in a shephard's pie was not the answer. She had already done 'angry' when she had gotten his cheque.

She'd have to find some other way to make her point.

Trunks regarded the envelope with misgivings. It had been a couple of weeks since he had engaged Mrs Burns. He had checked with the agency and had been assure that she had arrived safely in Upper Town and had reported back to say that she was enjoying her new assignment. It all sounded too good to be true.

After the cheque incident he had been sure that Marron's reaction to the arrival of a housekeeper would be to throw a hissy fit. He was relying on Roselyn Burns to make herself indispensable in double-quick time. She had come highly praised as a woman who could win around even the most testy and uncooperative of women to the joys of live-in help. Maybe she had done just that. Maybe what now he held in his hands was simply a note from Marron to thank him of his thoughtfulness.

Yet somehow he doubted it, which was why he was looking at the envelope as if it was a bomb.

"It's just a letter," his assistant said impatiently. "Give it to me. I'll open it." She twitched it out of his grasp, slit the envelope and held up a neatly typed missive for his inspection. "Not a bloodstain in sight, see." She scanned the contents and began to chuckle.

"I didn't invite you to read it." Then, "What does she say?"

"Basically, thank you. And that she's very happy with the arrangement."

"Why do I suspect that that is not all?" He clicked his fingers irritable, held his hand out for the letter.

She ignored him. " 'Dear Trunks,' " she read – which was a good start, better than he could have hoped for under the circumstances. " 'This is just a quick note to let you know that Roselyn Burns arrived safely last week. I am sorry I haven't written sooner to thank you, but I am decorating the spare room at the moment – ' "

"Decorating?" He had a sickening vision of Marron standing on a wobbly stepladder, struggling with wallpaper. He waved his hand. "Go on."

" 'I'm decorating the spare room at the moment which is why I didn't have room for her at the cottage. I've installed her, temporarily, at the farm down the lane –' "

He rose to his feet. "She's done what?"

"She's put the housekeeper up in a farm down the lane –"

"No! That undermines the whole purpose of the housekeeper. She needs someone with her – "

" '… down the lane, where they do bed and breakfast in the summer. Don't worry, Trunks, this won't cost you any extra, Good help is always hard to get, so they were happy to take her in return for some cooking and cleaning, and my little house wouldn't keep her busy for more than a day a week, She is frighteningly efficient…' "

Trunks spun around, stared out of the window where the city was laid out beneath his feet. At university he had designed a telecommunications program, dropped out to start his own company and built a fortune with single-mindedness that should have warned him he would never escape his own genetic history.

Every day he made decisions involving millions of dollars without raising a sweat.

But this woman… this woman could bring him to his knees with half a dozen words.

"Keep going," he said curtly.

She cleared her throat. " 'She seemed to be enjoying herself helping out with the guests, and after all, she'd get dreadfully bored on her own here all day.' "

"Bored? Why would she get bored? She can read a book, knit a shawl for the baby…' He stopped. He didn't want to think about the baby.

" 'Also,' " his assistant continued, once she was certain he had finished, " 'and I know you won't mind this, I've asked her to keep an eye on Mrs Turner opposite. She broken her leg last week and she's finding life a bit difficult at the moment. She can't afford to pay for help herself, so you'll be glad to know that she's finding Mrs Burns an absolute treasure.' " Matilda looked up expectantly.

He raised his hand in a helpless gesture of surrender. "I'm absolutely delighted that she's an absolute treasure," he said. "Thrilled to bits."

" 'She's been taking care of the twins on the corner, too, after school and helping out at the old folk's club at the church…' " He groaned, let his head fall into his hand. " '… and although I haven't seen much of her myself, she assured me yesterday, when I passed her on my way home from work and met her taking old Mrs Blackwater to see Sandy at the evening surgery, that she really enjoys working in the village. Well, it is a lovely place to live. I'm not sure how long you'll let me keep her, Trunks, but what with Social Services being so stretched…' "

"Enough!" He turned and glared at his assistant, who was doing her best not to laugh out loud. It was plainly something of an effort. "Laugh and you'll be looking for a new job," he warned.

"I'll get on to the agency and have them call Mrs Burns off, shall I?" she spluttered, not in the least bit intimidated.

"Call her off? Have you forgotten Mrs Turner? And what will become of the twins without her?"

"Oh, come on, Trunks. Surely you don't believe any of this nonsense? She's trying to wind you up."

"Then she is succeeding. Dear God, all I want to do is make life a little easier for her, but no. She's up a stepladder papering the ceiling and the housekeeper I'm paying for is now playing Good Samaritan to the entire population of Upper Town." He got up. "Cancel my appointments. I'm going to go settle this once and for all."

"But I thought the whole point was to avoid – " He turned to glare at her and she quickly shook her head. " Nothing, Trunks. Just… take care."

"It's a bit late for that. If I had 'taken care' none of this would be happening."

"I mean on the road. You seem a bit distracted."

I hope you enjoyed that!