Single Father Seeks...

He looked at his daughter and his entire body softened. He moved closer, touching Carolina’s hair. “You think so?”

“Yeah.”

He met her gaze and their close proximity made his thoughts skip and stall on her, made him imagine what she looked like naked. What she felt like in his arms. This was going to be tough if he couldn’t even look at her without remembering that night. He wanted to call Wife Incorporated and ask for someone less…beautiful and exotic. But he needed help now. Besides, he could handle this, he thought. He wasn’t going to get involved with the nanny, no matter who she was. However, just seeing his baby cuddled in her arms did something to him.

“So Mr. Ashland, are we going to stand in this tornado of a room all day or are you going to show me this house and tell me what I’ll be doing?”

Bryce watched her stroke Carolina’s arm, then press her lips to the top of his daughter’s head. As if she’d known his child from the day she was born. But household duties were not what he was thinking about right now. He couldn’t take his eyes off Ciara. She hadn’t changed. She was still a classic beauty, and though she looked a little thinner than before, she was still curved and womanly. The thought of putting his hands on her bare skin again made him hard, and he instantly knew he could get into real trouble with her around. He reminded himself she was his employee and old fantasies were just that. Old and buried. Well, he thought with a long look at her, not quite buried.

Before his imagination took off to parts unknown, he cleared his throat and gestured to the room. “The kitchen obviously,” he tossed a thumb back over his shoulder. “The garage, laundry room and back door are that way. There’s an old servants staircase there, too.”

Servant. That’s what she was to him. Even if he was looking at her like they’d made love last night instead of five years ago. And despite that and the fantasies floating through her mind when she looked at him, she had to keep that in mind, remember why she was here and that she’d be leaving soon. It wouldn’t take the agency long to nab Mark.

Needing a distraction, Ciara looked around the huge peach, green and white kitchen. It was decorated like something out of a magazine, with all the latest appliances and an island counter with a sink. A chef’s dream. She couldn’t wait to see the rest of this place.

“Can you cook?”

“Sure.” She frowned a bit. “With Wife Incorporated, it’s a requirement. Why would you ask?”

“Home cooking is the last thing I’d expect from you,” he said with a sly glance.

Ciara’s heart skipped an entire beat at the sound of his voice and she looked him over. “Being a dad is the last I’d have expected of you.”

He gave her a velvety look. “No expectations, remember?”

She smirked. How could she not remember?

Bryce walked ahead and with the baby in her arms, Ciara followed him into the living room. “Front parlor,” he said, then pointed out the dining room beyond before walking into the main hall. The foyer was wide, a staircase on the right sweeping to the second floor. He pointed to it. “Bedrooms and baths upstairs, den and library there,” he said, gesturing to the left as he walked down the hall.

Carolina made noises, adding her own input.

Now that she’d had the chance to really look, Ciara was floored. The carved ceiling panels and wainscoting were works of art. Paintings hung on the walls and the hall was wide enough to fit a settee. When she’d driven up the long oak tree-lined driveway and had first seen the two-story house with double porches, she wondered how she was supposed to take care of this place when it went on forever. White with green plantation shutters, it spoke of old charm and grace, and she admitted it gave her a strange sense of home.

Odd, when she hadn’t had a real home since joining the CIA.

He led her back through the kitchen, then into a large Carolina room banked with windows and filled with casual furniture, the TV, a stereo. He crossed to a pair of French doors and threw them open, letting her step out onto the back deck first.

And as she passed he whispered softly, “Welcome, Ciara, to River Bend.”

Two

Ciara stilled for a second. His tone made it seem as if he’d waited a lifetime to say that. And he meant it. She didn’t dare look back over her shoulder at him. She could already feel the heat of his muscled body behind her like the sweet warmth of the sun. The urge to stop and sink back into him was nearly overpowering.

She mentally shook herself. Fantasy ends here, she thought. She hated that just his presence gave her ideas she’d no business having. She stepped farther onto the back deck and said, “Thank you. So, you named your house?”

He eyed her. “I take it you’re not from the south.”

Finally, she looked at him. “Well, I could fake a southern accent, if you want.” She couldn’t tell him that yes, she was from the south, born and raised only a couple hundred miles away from here, but she’d taken great pains to lose her southern accent. In the CIA, it didn’t help to have her speech marked so clearly.

They walked farther out onto the deck.

Ciara scanned the landscape and lost her breath. “My God, this is heaven.”

Though they were a good hundred yards from the water, the view was incredible—the river, houses on the other side, the sea toward the inlet. There was an in-ground pool and beyond it a gazebo big enough to house a table and chairs and chaise lounges. Live oaks and palm trees shaded the yard here and there, and even as the sun began its descent, she could see an intricate flower garden off to the left, a wicker sofa and table tucked under the spreading branches dripping with Spanish moss. That same sense of peace swept her again and her gaze landed on a wood swing hanging from a tree limb, and then a babbling fountain resting under the shade trees. Ahead of her, a dock stretched for half the length of a football field over the marsh to the water, a screened porch lay a few yards before the end of the pier. There were two boats anchored at the end, a dinged-up, well-used johnboat and a ritzy gleaming cabin cruiser. The contrast spoke volumes about Bryce.

“All this from the Secret Service?” she said softly.

He chuckled to himself. “Lord no. I barely made the rent working for the government. This house has been in my family for generations. It was my parents’ home.”

“They’re retired?”

“Yes, they live in Florida when they aren’t on a jet heading somewhere else.”

She looked at the baby, rocking her from side to side and noticing her little eyelids drooping. “A lot of house for just the two of you, huh sweetheart?” When she looked at Bryce, he was staring at her oddly. Her brows knit, her look questioning.

Bryce couldn’t say why he was so touched by the gesture. His baby in her arms, the gentle way Ciara touched Carolina. He never expected anything so tender from a woman like her. And he reminded himself that all he knew about her was what it was like to make love to her, to be completely and utterly driven mad by her touch.

Stop looking at me like that, she wanted to say, but she didn’t want to open that can of worms.

“It’s breathtaking,” she said into the silence. “Did you grow up here?”

“Yes. Me and my sister Hope. She lives closer to town.” Bryce looked off at the marsh. “There are gators in there occasionally. If you go near, be careful.”

“I understand.” She kept her gaze on the landscape as they strolled around the pool deck. “The décor is lovely, Bryce. Who did it? Your wife?”

He looked at her sharply. “No, my mother. I didn’t live here with Diana.”

She propped Carolina on her hip and said, “Diana, huh?”

The mention of his wife’s name set him suddenly on edge. “I wasn’t married to her when you and I met.”

Her brows shot up. “I didn’t think you were.” A pause and then, “So what happened to her?”

A surge of guilt pounded through Bryce at the thought of his late wife, and what he’d done to her life. He didn’t want to talk about Diana. Especially not with Ciara. Somehow, if he did, it felt as if he were hurting Diana more than he already had.

At his hesitation she added, “If it’s too painful and you’d rather not…”

“Yes, it is painful, but—” He gave Ciara the minimum. “She died when Carolina was born. She had gestational diabetes. The pregnancy was very difficult. Toxemia and the diabetes caused her death.”

Ciara heard the anger building in his voice. And the torment in his features. He must have loved his wife deeply, she thought. To lose his wife and then be forced to care for a newborn alone, how hard it must have been for him.

In the ensuing silence, she watched him stare out over the marsh, his handsome features twisted with anger and the echo of old pain.

“And while we are on the subject, let’s get one thing straight right now,” he said, grinding the words past clenched teeth. He faced her, his hands on his hips, his entire stance as belligerent as a man about to do battle. Something had changed in him in those few seconds, with those few words. Gone was the sexy man she knew, the man needing help with his child, and before her stood a guardian. Guarding what, she didn’t know.

“I’m listening.”

“I’m not looking for a replacement.”