Falling for the Heiress

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?”