Determined to Protect, Forbidden to Love: Ramirez's Woman / Her Royal Bodyguard / Protecting the Princess

“Señor Ramirez asked me to prepare a breakfast tray for you, señorita,” Ramona told her. “He intended to bring it upstairs to you himself.” The housekeeper smiled warmly at J.J.

“Thank you, Ramona,” J.J. said in Spanish. “Miguel is very thoughtful, is he not?”

“Oh, yes, señorita, he is the most thoughtful man I know.” Ramona blushed. “He will be a good husband.”

Yes, he will. Had that been only an instant thought or a heartfelt knowledge? J.J. asked herself. Here she was once again buying into the fiancée fantasy, something she had to stop doing.

“Ramona, will you ask all the servants to come into my study in half an hour?” Miguel asked the housekeeper. “I need to discuss something with all of you.”

“Do you want Carlos, too? And Pedro, the gardener?”

“Yes, everyone. Please.”

Ramona scurried to do his bidding.

Miguel shoved back his chair and stood. “If you will excuse me, I wish to move forward with my plan to speak to the servants and my family and close friends. I intend to do that this morning. I am going to telephone Roberto and Emilio and Juan right now.”

“You haven’t eaten anything since lunch yesterday,” J.J. reminded him. “Can’t the calls wait until you’ve had breakfast?”

Will rose from his seat. “I should be going. I’ll be in touch soon.” He looked at Dom. “Contact me when a decision has been made and we’ll proceed from there.”

Dom stood. “Let me walk you out.”

Once Dom and Will left the dining room, Miguel turned to J.J. “I will eat if you will eat. Then we will go into my den and I will telephone my family and friends. I cannot make this decision alone, as you so wisely pointed out to me last night.”

“I will not be sent away!” Dolores Lopez planted her hands on her hips and glared back and forth from her husband to her cousin.

“Querida, you must go,” Emilio told her. “Miguel cannot continue in his bid for the presidency unless you cooperate with us. He will do nothing to endanger your life and the life of our child.” Emilio tenderly patted his wife’s protruding belly.

“I agree,” Roberto added. “Once Padilla’s people realize their scare tactics are not working, they could very easily target those of us closest to Miguel.”

“If that is true, then how can I leave you behind, Emilio?” She looked pleadingly at her husband. “And you Miguel?”

“You will do what you know you must,” J.J. said, hoping she could persuade Dolores to do the sensible thing.

“Are you leaving, also, Jennifer?” Dolores asked. “No, you are not. You are staying with your man, not deserting him when he needs you.”

“But I am not pregnant,” J.J. said. “By staying, I am not risking the life of my child.”

Dolores frowned, but she did not continue to argue. She sat there, on the sofa in the living room, and thought for several minutes before replying. “I will leave Nava, but I do not want to leave Mocorito. Send me, with the bodyguard you wish to hire, to Buenaventura. And no one except Emilio will know exactly where in Buenaventura I am. Will that be acceptable?”

A collective sigh of relief reverberated throughout the room.

By early afternoon the decision had been made that Miguel would not withdraw from the presidential race. And plans had been made to send Dolores to the northern seacoast village of Buenaventura with a Dundee bodyguard. J.J. wondered if, when Sawyer McNamara had told Lucie Evans he was sending her to Mocorito to guard Miguel’s cousin, she had pointed out to him that she spoke only “tourist” Spanish. If she had, knowing Sawyer, he’d probably sent along a Learn Spanish Overnight CD and companion workbook on the flight with her from Atlanta to Caracas.

Chuckling softly to herself, J.J. didn’t hear the door to the bedroom suite open. When she sensed someone in the room with her, she whirled around, prepared to defend herself. Then she saw Miguel and immediately relaxed.

“You were so deep in thought that you did not hear me, did you?” he asked.

“You caught me falling down on the job.”

“What an odd expression. You Americans say the strangest things.”

“Yes, I suppose we do.”

“What did you find so amusing in your thoughts?”

J.J. smiled. “Just thinking about Lucie Evans, the agent my boss is sending to guard Dolores.”

“There is something amusing about Señorita Evans?”

“No, not really. It’s just that she and our boss, Sawyer McNamara, have this ongoing feud and have had for as long as I’ve worked at the Dundee Agency. They cannot be in the same room together for more than two minutes without arguing.”

“They have never been lovers?” Miguel asked.

“No. At least not as far as anyone knows. They were both FBI agents before they came to work for Dundee. We figure something must have happened between them way back when.”

“Way back when?”

“Back when they worked for the Bureau. Two people don’t dislike each other that much without a reason.”

“You disliked me before you even met me, did you not?” Miguel walked toward her and looked down at the chaise lounge where she sat. Without even asking her, he sat down beside her.

She sucked in a deep breath, wishing there was room on the chaise for her to scoot away from him, so that his arm wouldn’t brush up against hers.

“I drew some conclusions from the information I was given about you,” she admitted.

“Was the information accurate?”

“Yes, it seems to have been.”

“And were your conclusions also accurate?”

“Partially.”

“Only partially? What have you discovered that tells you you misjudged me?”

“Fishing for compliments?”

He threw up his hands expressively. “Another silly Americanism.”

“You are the old-fashioned, macho type. But I don’t believe you separate women into only two categories—lady or whore.”

“You forget there are also the nuns,” he said.

She smiled. “Yes, of course. I’d forgotten about the nuns.”

“What else?” he asked, as eagerly as a child.