Kitabı oku: «Falling for the Heiress», sayfa 2
Parker had spent years learning to anticipate people and situations. Little caught him unprepared. Since he inevitably prepared for the worst, even less surprised him. He had not, however, expected the open candor of the woman giving him a cautious, almost hopeful smile or the isolation he sensed about her as she stood waiting for him to confirm or deny what her brother had claimed. He recognized that sense of separation, that sense of no longer being a part of the whole, only because in the past year he’d felt it so much himself.
Dismissing that unwanted thought, not appreciating the reminder, he studied her even more closely.
“You can believe your brother. You and your plans are secure with me.” He was nothing if not honorable. “But he may have misled you on just what I’d be willing to do.” He rarely objected to having a good time, situation permitting. He had the feeling Cord’s little sister wasn’t looking for a good poker game, though, or an escort to the local clubs. He hadn’t read a single report about her doing the party circuit or getting wild and crazy in some trendy hot spot. “I play by the book, Miss Kendrick. I might bend rules, but I won’t break the law.”
Her lovely eyes widened. “I’d never ask you to do that. What I want is perfectly legal.”
“Then what is it exactly that you want me to do?”
“Just set up some appointments.” She replied quickly, as if she wanted her request to sound as if it were nothing of any import at all. “And run errands. And maybe watch Mikey for me. But only for a few minutes at a time,” she hurried to explain, “and only if absolutely necessary.”
Parker stifled a mental groan. He was a bodyguard. Not a personal slave. He most definitely was not a babysitter.
“Due respect, Miss Kendrick, but my duties are laid out in your family’s contract with Bennington’s. I’ll provide surveillance, protection and evacuation if the latter is necessary. But if you need a personal assistant, you’ll have to hire one. Same goes for a nanny.”
His glance shot over the hair she’d smoothed back into place, over her perfectly made-up face, down the buttoned silk jacket that allowed that tantalizing glimpse of soft-looking skin between her breasts.
He would be willing to bet his tickets to the next New England Patriots game that Tess Kendrick was accustomed to getting everything she wanted. And to getting rid of whatever she did not, he reminded himself, thinking of how she’d shed a husband. If she was even half as spoiled as he’d read, he figured he was about to face major attitude.
Yet, rather than offense, all he saw enter her expression was something that looked almost like an apology.
“That’s my problem,” she murmured, pacing again. “Even if I knew who to hire…who I could trust,” she emphasized, “I don’t want more people around. The fewer people who know I’m here, the less the chance of the press finding out that I’m back. It’s taken forever for all talk and speculation to die down, and if they find out I’m here, it’ll just start up again.”
Something pleading crossed the delicate lines of her face. “All I’m asking is for help buying a house. I need you to make appointments under another name,” she explained, because her own would be too easily recognized, “then maybe act as if you’re the one buying when we look at the properties. When I find something that will work for Mikey and me, I’ll turn it over to our lawyers and they can take it from there. And a car,” she said, faint lines of concentration forming in her brow as she checked off items on her mental list. “I need to buy a car, too. I lost mine in the divorce.”
She’d lost everything, actually, except for some personal items, her clothes and Mikey’s things, most of which were stored in her parents’ attic. She didn’t mention that, though. Partly because she desperately wanted to forget the past few years. Mostly because the big man silently considering her wouldn’t be interested in her need to rebuild a life for herself and her son. Or in how ill-equipped she felt to be doing it on her own.
“What about your brothers?”
“Gabe doesn’t have any spare time. Buying a car is the kind of thing he’d staff out anyway.”
Her oldest brother was governor of the state. Yet, more than the demands of the job on his time kept her from seeking his help. He and his press people hadn’t been too happy with her for what the publicity surrounding her divorce had done to his family-values platform. Under the circumstances, asking a favor of him would take more nerve than she wanted to spare right now.
She could only conquer one mountain of ashes at a time.
“Cord knows real estate. And he’s into cars. What about him?”
“He and his wife are in the Florida Keys. Sailing,” she added, to prove just how inaccessible he was for the tasks. “I’d ask Ashley to help me look for a house, but she lives an hour away and is really busy with her kids. The two of us together would attract too much attention anyway.”
Two Kendrick sisters together truly would be like waving a red flag at the press. Even if that hadn’t been the case, Tess wanted to avoid Ashley right now. Long before her ex-husband had started pointing out how miserably Tess had failed to live up to her older sister’s accomplishments, Tess had been aware of how Ashley had always done everything so well, so flawlessly. At least it had seemed so to the little sister who’d followed in her footsteps.
Because of Tess’s place in the hierarchy as the baby of the family, she’d had none of the first-son or-daughter pressure to perform thrust upon her. For as far back as she could remember, everyone had insisted on watching out for her, doing for her, and nothing had been expected of her other than to maintain the integrity of the family name.
Image and integrity were paramount to their parents. The actions of one Kendrick inevitably affected them all. Having a brother who’d possessed an unfortunate tendency to draw embarrassing headlines had proved that often enough.
She hated that the one big choice she’d made on her own had turned out to be an error in judgment that had not only screwed up her own life but done an even more spectacular job than her once-prodigal brother of tainting the family’s good name.
“What I want won’t take long,” she promised, trying desperately to push past feelings of failure and helplessness. “I need to be in my new home before my parents return.” They would arrive right after Labor Day. That gave her roughly six weeks.
Skepticism slashed his broad brow.
“Do you know how long it can take to buy and move into a house?”
“Actually, no,” she admitted. She hadn’t a clue. She’d never had to deal with that particular detail before. “But I can’t let it take long. It will be too uncomfortable living here with Mom and Dad.” Her voice dropped. “Especially with my father. If I have to, I’ll rent or lease something until I find what I want. I’d rather not move Mikey around that much, but I’ll do it if I have to.”
Thoughts of her father put a new face on her pacing. She wasn’t ready to be around William Kendrick yet. She hadn’t dealt well at all with the pictures Brad had shown her.
She didn’t know which had the firmer hold—the disappointment she felt in her dad or her anger over his betrayal of her mom. Both were there, demanding to be dealt with. She just didn’t know how. With no one to confide in, all she could do was jam down the emotions the same way she had the anxiety of everything else she’d had to cope with and force that energy into moving past her…past.
Parker remained discouragingly silent.
“I’ll pay you whatever you ask.”
It wasn’t what she’d requested of him that kept Parker quiet. It was the tension in her body as she spoke and the faint anxiety running just beneath the surface of her practiced composure. Knowing how upset the senior Kendrick had been over Cord’s indiscretions on occasion, he didn’t doubt for a moment that the famously powerful head of the Kendricks’ massive corporate and philanthropic holdings had been less than pleased with the unflattering publicity his daughter had brought. Yet, when she’d mentioned her father, he’d seen more than the embarrassment or discomfort he would have expected. He’d seen hurt.
He didn’t want the bit of empathy that hit him just then. It was simply there as he pushed his hands into the pockets of his slacks, buying himself time as he considered what she wanted. He knew what it was to have lost the approval of a parent. Since he’d left the Marines five years ago, his own father had barely spoken to him. But then, his father was a three-star general and the military was, always had been and always would be his life. The only time the man had ever had time for him was when Parker had been in the military himself.
Frowning at the thought, he dismissed the old resentment that came with the memory as irrelevant. He didn’t appreciate her reminding him of it. He didn’t appreciate the way she’d distracted him either. It wasn’t like him to get sidetracked. Yet, in less than a minute, the woman who’d gone still waiting for him to respond had reminded him of the isolation he’d felt since he’d lost his sister and the father neither one of them had ever really had.
He’d just reminded himself that neither had a thing to do with the requests she’d just made when the pounding of footsteps on the veranda outside had him jerking toward the back door an instant before it flew open.
Chapter Two
The rattle of a key in the lock preceded the thud of the utility room door hitting the wall and the sharp bang of the screen door behind it.
Before Tess could begin to imagine who would be in such a hurry to get in, she found her view of the doorway entirely blocked by her bodyguard. It barely occurred to her that the man’s silence and speed were more unnerving than the commotion when a startled feminine yelp joined the thump of something hitting the floor.
With his broad back to her, Parker signaled for her to stay put. Ignoring him, Tess glanced around his side to see an apple roll through the doorway.
Ina Yeager, her mom’s dark-haired, late-thirty-something maid, had gone as still as Lot’s wife. Her right hand lay splayed over her chest. In her left arm she clutched the bag of groceries she hadn’t dropped as if it might somehow shield her lean frame from the unexpected presence that had nearly stopped her heart.
Tess quickly stepped around the small mountain in navy worsted. “It’s all right. Both of you. Ina, this is Mr. Parker. He’s my driver and bodyguard,” she explained, terribly conscious of him herself. “He’ll be staying for a couple of weeks.
“Parker,” she continued, expecting him to stand down now that he knew he didn’t have to whisk her to safety. The man was only doing what he’d been trained to do, but at some point she obviously needed to explain to him that she was as safe here as she was anywhere. It was beyond the estate she was concerned about. “Ina is one of mom’s housekeeping staff.” With a smile for the woman with the deep dimples and long French braid, she snatched the still-rolling apple off the floor. “Her husband is the stable master.”
Seeing Tess reach for a head of lettuce and a red onion that had also rolled from the dropped sack, the clearly rattled maid bent to pick up the vegetables herself.
“I’m so sorry, Tess,” she began, adding the onion to her bag. “I didn’t think you’d be here. In the kitchen, I mean. Eddy went out front to help with your luggage,” she told her, speaking of her husband. “I thought you’d be in the foyer directing him where to put it.”
“He can just leave it there.”
“I’ll tell him.”
Ina glanced up as she spoke, taking in Parker’s big, shiny black shoes, his long, powerful legs, his impossibly broad shoulders. Stopping short of the strong line of his jaw, she grabbed the only remaining item—a bunch of bananas—and looked to Tess with another apology.
“Your mother called to tell me you and your son will be staying here for a while and asked me to stock the refrigerator. I’d meant to be here before you arrived and have everything put away. I bought enough for your dinner and breakfast, and there’s scones for tea, if you’d like.”
The squeak of her tennis shoes sounded like chattering mice as she hurried to set the vegetables by the sink and grab a bowl from a cabinet. “I remembered some of your preferences but not all,” she rushed on, filling an Italian ceramic bowl with the fruit before unloading milk, butter, bread and eggs. “If you’ll give me your menu for the week, I’ll go back to the market tomorrow.”
The woman easily ten years her senior looked terribly self-conscious as she moved between the pantry and the built-in refrigerator. Tess figured part of the reason for that awkwardness stemmed from being out of uniform. Members of the estate’s staff, everyone from the butler to the cook, maids and gardeners, wore their respective uniforms when on duty. Rarely did any employee appear in or around the main house dressed in anything else. Wearing a cotton shirt and denim capris, Ina seemed painfully conscious of her casual attire. From her furtive glances toward the splendid specimen of masculinity in his uniform of tailored suit and tie, she seemed just as aware of Parker silently watching her every move.
Or so Tess was thinking before she realized that some of those darting glances were aimed at her. She was the daughter who had caused so much gossip and speculation among her parents’ staff. She didn’t doubt for a moment that the maid was more than a little curious about her and her return.
She could only imagine the rumors that had flowed among the staff. At least right now, talk would be kept to a minimum. With most of the staff gone, there were blessedly few people to generate it.
“I’ll prepare your meals for you since Olivia is with your parents. Will you be staying in your old bedroom?”
“Mikey and I both will.” But I’ll take care of it, she would have said, except Ina was already talking.
“Then I’ll freshen it up as soon as I’m finished here.” With a quick and diplomatic glance toward where Tess’s bodyguard remained, wrist clasped, waiting for her to conclude, she dropped her voice and hurried on. “Which room do you want Mr. Parker in? There’s only one extra in the servants’ quarters, but it’s not very big.”
Ina apparently couldn’t picture him in a twin bed, either.
“I’ve already shown him which room he can use. I think Rose’s is best.” It was the largest. The room that belonged to the head housekeeper was also the only one in the servants’ quarters with a double bed.
Considering his sizable frame, even that would be small.
If Ina had any reservations about putting another employee in her immediate boss’s space, she dutifully kept them to herself. “I’ll put fresh towels in his bathroom.”
“Just tell me where they are. I’ll take care of it.”
Ina opened her mouth, closed it again. The faint frown creasing her brow made it look as if she couldn’t possibly have heard correctly. “I need to freshen all the rooms. Nothing has been done in here since your parents left last month. I need to vacuum, dust. You’ll want fresh flowers….”
Tess was already shaking her head. “Don’t worry about any of it. You don’t need to use your vacation time to wait on me. Go on with whatever plans you have and just pretend we aren’t even here. And please,” she requested, old anxieties never far from the surface, “don’t mention to anyone that I’ve returned. No one off the property, I mean. You didn’t say anything to anyone at the market, did you?”
“Not a word,” Ina replied, looking puzzled. “Your mother already asked for our discretion about your presence. I passed on her request to Eddy and to Jackson,” she said, speaking of the groundskeeper. Puzzlement shifted to consternation. “But she specifically asked that I be available to you and her grandson….”
“And I’m asking that you forget we’re here.”
The woman clearly didn’t want to upset her employer. Tess didn’t want to cause problems for Ina either, but having staff wait on her in any way was not part of the plan she’d devised for herself to get on with her life. She had gone from being the protected baby of the family to the wife of a man who’d turned out to be a master at control and manipulation. She’d spent years having people take over, take care of and take charge and done next to nothing to stop the slow erosion of her personal freedom.
It had taken years, the past few in particular, but she had finally realized how much independence all that acquiescence had cost her. It was time she learned to take care of herself and her son on her own.
Preparing to do just that, she gamely offered the only reason she could think of that might override her mother’s orders and ease Ina’s mind.
“I just need time alone. Just me and my son. If I do find I need your help, I’ll call you. I’ll explain to my mother if she says anything,” she promised. “All right?”
Ina looked doubtful. “If you’re sure…”
“I’m positive. Really. Enjoy your time off.”
It was hard to tell which had the firmer hold on the maid at that moment—skepticism at leaving her employer’s daughter to fend for herself or gratitude that her vacation wouldn’t be further interrupted. She glanced uncertainly around the kitchen, looking as if she wanted to be positive there wasn’t something else she should do. Apparently she found nothing.
“Well,” she murmured, “it would be nice to finish redoing our son’s room. He joined the Navy when he graduated from high school a couple of months ago, so I’m turning it into a sewing room. With your mother’s permission, of course.”
“Of course.”
“You’ll call if you need anything at all?”
Tess mentally crossed her fingers. “I will.”
“Well, if that’s the case, I guess I’ll go tell Eddy just to leave your luggage in the foyer.” She hesitated. “We can carry it up if you’d like.”
“It’s fine, Ina. Really. Just tell me where I’ll find clean towels for Mr. Parker’s bathroom.”
The clearly baffled maid showed her a large linen closet inside an even larger laundry room, then disappeared through the door that led to the family breakfast room, which led to the formal dining room and into the foyer. As far back as Tess was in the house, it was impossible for her to hear movements or conversation in those areas, but within a minute she saw both Ina and her rangy husband walk beneath the kitchen windows and cross the cobblestones between the house and the garage on their way back to the stables.
“Can you trust her?”
Tess turned from the window to open one of the drawers beneath a long expanse of counter.
“I hope so. Probably,” she amended, closing that drawer with the clatter of cutlery to open the next one. “Ina has been with the family for at least ten years. I’ve never heard of her saying anything she shouldn’t.” Unlike certain people who used to work for me, she thought. “My mother tends to inspire loyalty better than I do.”
She looked distracted to Parker as she closed that drawer and opened another. She also sounded like a woman who had been betrayed somehow, he thought, only to remind himself again that her personal business was none of his. Not unless it impacted his ability to do his job. He was more interested at the moment in what she was doing, anyway.
She’d turned to the upper cabinets behind her, going through them much as she had the drawers. The way she moved about the room made him think she was looking for something in particular. Or maybe trying to acquaint herself with an unfamiliar space.
“So,” she prefaced, “are you going to help me?”
Parker’s sense of practicality jerked into place. He was already committed to being her driver and bodyguard. Considering that he’d be driving her wherever she wanted to go, he wouldn’t spend any more time looking at houses with her than he would otherwise. Making a few phone calls wouldn’t take that much time either.
“I don’t babysit.”
Her fingers tightened around the knob of a cabinet as she looked toward him. “That means you’ll help me with the house?”
“I’ll make calls,” he agreed.
“And the car?”
One of the things he had in common with her brother was that they both appreciated pretty much anything with wheels and an engine. Helping her buy a car wouldn’t exactly be a hardship.
“Tell me what you want and I’ll help you get it.”
For a moment she looked hesitant, as if she was afraid to believe he’d agreed so easily.
“Thank you,” she murmured, sounding as relieved as she looked. “Thank you very much.”
As if she knew he could see how desperately she’d hoped for his help and how grateful she was for it, she looked away. Preoccupation settled over her again as she continued her search. But it was only when she set a pot on the stove on the island and disappeared into the deep, shelf-lined pantry that he realized what she was doing. It also seemed a good bet from the consternation in her pretty profile that she wasn’t all that certain how to do it.
The way she studied the cooking directions on a box of dried linguine made it look as if the process was a total mystery to her.
He was now confused himself. “Do you mind if I ask why you didn’t let your help cook for you?”
“Because it’s time I learned how to do it myself.” The delicate arches of her eyebrows drew inward. “What do you suppose goes into marinara sauce? It’s Mikey’s favorite.” She clutched the box as she searched the fairly well-stocked shelves, the desperation he’d glimpsed in her overridden by purpose. “If I can figure it out, that’s what we’ll have.”
He offered the obvious. “You need tomatoes.”
She reached for a can. “Like these?”
Taking a step forward, he scanned the label. “Those have chilies in them. You want plain.”
“Thanks,” she murmured, continuing her search. “It’s only five miles into Camelot. You’ll probably be safer trying one of the restaurants there, but you’re welcome to join us if you’re up for an experiment.” She picked up another can. “These?”
Parker wasn’t sure which threw him more just then—her easy invitation for him to join her and her son or her obviously newborn attempt at self-sufficiency. Wondering what he’d gotten himself into, knowing it was too late to get out of it, he gave her a cautious nod.
“Have you ever cooked anything before?”
“I’ve never had to learn,” she admitted. “When I was growing up, Mom always had a cook. In college and after I married, I lived where there were good restaurants, takeout or staff. It wasn’t anything I was interested in pursuing.”
Until now, she might have said.
Parker didn’t ask why she’d chosen to develop the interest on his watch. Her totally matter-of-fact reply resurrected the unflattering impression he had of her before he’d met her—that she was an indulged and discontented socialite who handled boredom however she chose.
Wondering if it was boredom pushing her now and afraid to wonder what else she didn’t know how to do, he stepped back to resume his stance at the end of the island. She was already down a personal assistant and a nanny. No way in Hades would he be her cook.
“You can probably find a recipe in a cookbook,” he informed her, thinking now as good a time as any to get on with what he’d been hired to do. “In the meantime, I’d like to do a security check of the outside of the house. Where’s the main security alarm located?”
Pure apology entered her tone. “I’m sorry. I was only thinking about feeding Mikey,” she replied, setting her ingredients by the pot. “I meant to tell you not to worry about us while we’re here. It’s only when we’re in public that you need to watch out for us.”
“So you have security on-site?”
“There’s the alarm,” she offered, thinking back to when she’d lived there. “It goes to a security service in Camelot. Or maybe,” she said, reconsidering, “it goes right to the police.”
As if calculating how long it would take for a patrol car to arrive from five miles away, Parker narrowed his eyes toward the window. “Any regular security patrols? Any dogs?”
“I don’t know about patrols.” She’d been aware of people in the background of her life as she’d grown up there, but she had no idea who her parents might have contracted with locally since she’d married and moved out. “Mom and Dad have an Irish setter, but Cooper is with them.” The dog she’d grown up with was gone now. But the thought of how much she still missed that old setter was pushed aside when she remembered another resident canine. “Eddy and Ina have a German shepherd.”
“If they do, it isn’t a guard dog. It was nowhere in sight when we drove in.”
“Maybe he was out by the lake.”
“This place is how many acres?”
“Twenty-five or so.”
“And how many rooms in the house?”
“Including bathrooms and the rooms back here?” She shrugged. “Maybe thirty-five.”
“That’s a lot of space to be alone in,” he informed her flatly. “I know you don’t want anyone to find out you’re here, but if someone does, it won’t be long before the press and the paparazzi show up. There could be breaches.”
As anxious as she had been to return, Tess had considered only how safe she’d always felt in and around Camelot. But with his cool, detached conclusion, Parker had just forced her to remember that there had been occasions when the estate’s privacy had indeed been breached. She discounted the time paparazzi had scaled the walls to take pictures of her wedding and the enterprising photographer who’d rented a hot-air balloon to fly over Ashley’s sweet-sixteen party simply because the events were the sort that attracted such intrusions.
There had been unexpected invasions, though, like the time her brother Gabe had been photographed by the lake inches from a kiss with the head housekeeper’s daughter. He and Addie were married now, but the press had had a field day with that one.
Like nearly every security person she’d ever encountered, Parker’s expression remained as matter-of-fact as his voice. “I just want to make sure you’re as secure as you think you are.”
He was doing what he was trained to do, what she’d paid him to do. Yet she didn’t care at all for the way he’d just robbed her of what little bit of security she’d finally felt.
Suddenly feeling vulnerable, she lifted her hand toward the hallway.
“The security system is behind one of the panels in the furnace room. The stairs to the basement are at the end of the hall.”
“And the monitor for the front gate and perimeter cameras?”
“By the computer. Over there,” she said, nodding toward the alcove by the utility room.
“Is that the only one?”
“The stable master has a monitor, too. There’s one there because someone always has to be here with the horses.”
He moved to the alcove where the head housekeeper apparently attended the duties of the household. Above the desk that held a state-of-the-art computer, a built-in television screen displayed rotating views from the various security cameras situated around the property. Integrated into the wall beside it was an intercom connected, presumably, to the front gate and possibly to the stables.
A shot of a lake came into view on the screen, followed by a view of tennis courts, expanses of lawns and gardens, horses grazing, a Roman pool. Then came a series of shots showing nothing but stone walls and foliage. Those were of the property’s perimeter, she told him.
“There’s no one on the property other than Ina, Eddy and…what’s the groundskeeper’s name?”
“Jackson. And no. There’s no one.”
“I need to know what they look like in case they show up on the monitors.”
“I’ll call down and ask Ina to introduce you.”
Parker watched her move past him to pick up the phone on the desk. As she did, the softness of her perfume, something subtle, warm and as elusive as the woman herself, drifted in her wake.
He had first become aware of that disturbing scent when they’d both reached to strap her son into his seat in the car. He’d thought then that the tightening low in his gut had been caused by the purely feminine softness of her skin brushing his. He knew now that he didn’t have to touch her for that unsettling sensation to take hold.
He needed to move.
“She’ll meet you by the hedge arch,” she said, giving him the excuse he needed to head for the door. “Just follow the stones across the lawn.”
“I’ll check out the interior when I get back.”
Tess started to tell him he didn’t need to worry about the inside of the house, only to remember that she’d never been alone in the big and rambling mansion before. When she’d lived there, even with both parents gone for a weekend and all her siblings having moved out, the cook, the head housekeeper, at least one maid and her dad’s butler had been in their respective quarters.
Tonight it would just be her and her son—and the no-nonsense bodyguard who walked out the door as if desperate for fresh air.
Tess leaned past the computer, watching his powerful strides carry him across the expansive deck and along the stone path by the flower beds.
It wasn’t air he was after, she thought. He’d just wanted to use his cell phone.
“I’m sort of in the middle of nowhere at the moment. But it won’t be a problem to keep up from here.”
Parker held the small cell phone to his ear as he angled for the gap in the hedges some twenty yards ahead. The logistics of juggling two jobs at once came easily to him. The admission that Tess Kendrick had a definite effect on him did not.
“The best thing to do is send them to the FedEx office in Camelot, Virginia,” he continued, grateful for the diversion from her. “I’ll pick them up there. Give me a couple of days to compare them to the diagrams we already have and I’ll get back to you.”
