Expecting at Christmas

“Oh, I forgot that he had some sort of a family crisis back home.” Frowning, he cocked his head to the right, causing a lock of tobacco-brown hair to slide across his forehead at a rakish angle. “And you’re somebody’s idea of a joke butler?”

She flushed. “No, sir. I’m fully qualified to—”

“I’ll just bet you are.” He stepped across the threshold, his gaze raking over her with swift, masculine interest until it landed right smack on her midsection. “My God, you’re pregnant!” He choked and began coughing.

“Oh, you poor thing. You must have a terrible cold.” Automatically she placed the back of her hand to his forehead. “A fever, too. You’d better come inside. I’ll brew you a nice herbal toddy and give you some of my rejuvenative hydration pills. You’ll be right as rain in no time, sir.” Hooking her arm through his, Loretta tried to hustle him toward the master bedroom where he could get the rest he obviously needed—and forget he had a pregnant butler working for him. “Winter colds can be so dreadful. Would you like me to draw a nice hot bath for you, sir? Or can you manage for yourself?”

He put on the brakes. “I don’t have a cold, just a little sore throat, and I don’t appreciate my buddies playing a practical joke on me. They know damn well I wouldn’t sleep with a pregnant woman.”

Shock drove her back against the nearest wall. “Sleep? I wouldn‘t—That’s not why—The agency wouldn’t—” Good grief, what had she gotten herself into?

“That’s what this is all about, isn’t it? Ol’ Brainerd set you up, didn’t he? Thought it would be funny to—”

“The employment agency sent me. I needed the job. They didn’t say you’d try to ravish me.”

“I’m not going to do any such—”

Without waiting for his explanation, she made a dash for the kitchen and the connecting servants’ quarters. She’d lock herself in, call the police—

“Wait! What the hell—”

She didn’t stop. But given her portly figure, her fastest run was more like a slow waddle. He caught up with her at the butcher-block island counter in the kitchen and snared her by the arm.

“Don’t hurt the baby. Please don’t—”

“For God’s sake, I’m not going to hurt you. I just want to know what’s going on.”

Her chin trembled. He was a really big man, his shoulders broad beneath his suit jacket, and his penetrating eyes so light a shade of blue they flashed like swords of silver. Loretta would not want to sit across a negotiating table from Griffin Jones. He would intimidate the staunchest foe.

She wasn’t feeling very staunch at the moment

“Look, don’t cry,” he pleaded, loosening his grip on her arm. “I can’t stand a weepy woman.”

“I’m not weepy.” She sniffed.

“Are you saying the employment agency sent you?”

She nodded.

“You sure you didn’t just happen to see the article in Inside Business about me being one of the ten top eligible bachelors, and you thought you’d claim I was your baby’s father—”

“I’d never do such a thing,” she gasped. “Isabella never would have wanted to have your baby.”

He blinked. “Who’s Isabella? I thought your name was Lor—”

“She’s my aunt, or she was. My mother’s youngest sister. I’m having her baby.”

With a shake of his head, Griffin stepped back. Maybe he did have a fever, after all. This woman wasn’t making any sense. “Where’s your husband?”

“I don’t exactly have a husband.”

“Okay, then, your boyfriend.”

“I don’t exactly have one of those, either, not since I got pregnant.”

“You figured you’d get pregnant and your boyfriend would have to marry you, huh?” A woman had tried to do that to Griffin not so long ago. He’d been willing to do the right thing. He’d had to. The death of Griffin’s mother in childbirth had always haunted him. He’d been nagging his parents for a baby brother, and when it turned out she was pregnant with a girl, he hadn’t wanted her. Then, suddenly, his mother was gone and so was his sister. He’d felt guilty ever since and somehow responsible.

And so years later he’d naturally felt responsible for the woman he’d slept with, Amanda Cook—until he discovered she wasn’t pregnant at all. She was nothing more than a gold digger anxious to get her hands on the substantial fortune he’d earned running one of the biggest chains of electronic stores in the country. He wouldn’t fall for a trick like that again anytime soon; he’d sworn off relationships that even hinted at commitment.

“Oh, no, this isn’t Rudy’s baby. It’s Wayne’s.”

Wayne? She definitely had an active love life, more than Griffin had managed lately. “So why didn’t he marry you?”

“He was married to Isabella.”

Now he could see exactly what had happened. “So Isabella caught you playing around with her husband.”

“No, of course not.” She looked honestly offended he’d suggested that possibility. “I wouldn’t do a thing like that. I loved Wayne just like he was my blood uncle.”

“And that’s why you’re having his kid?” Griffin had definitely lost the drift here somewhere.

“Well, Isabella couldn’t do it. Somebody had to help them out. So I said I would. Rudy didn’t like that. He said it made me ‘used goods,’ just because I was having their baby.” Her chin began to tremble again and her doe eyes started to fill with tears. “That wasn’t a very nice thing for him to say, was it?”

Griffin wasn’t sure.

“And that’s why I really, really need this job, Mr. Jones. But there’s no way I’m going to go to bed with you, so you can just forget that idea right now.”

“It wasn’t my idea. I thought—” Ah, hell, he didn’t know what he’d been thinking. “Look, why don’t we just sit down and talk a minute. We can start from the beginning, have a nice cup of coffee—”

“Herbal tea would be much better for your cold.”

“I don’t have a cold.”

“Of course you do. Everybody gets colds during the winter, especially during the holiday season. It’s nothing to be ashamed of. But I can get your ions back in shape in no time at all, if you’ll just give me the chance.”

How could a man argue with a woman whose eyes reminded him of hot chocolate? Particularly a pregnant woman. “Okay, we’ll do tea and you’ll tell me all about Isabella and Rudy—”

“I don’t want to talk about Rudy anymore. I wouldn’t marry him now even if he begged me.”

She scurried to the opposite side of the counter, opened a cupboard and pulled out a can of what Griffin assumed was her magical herbal tea. He hoped he’d be able to gag it down. He suspected Loretta Santana would get that bruised look in her dark eyes if he didn’t drink every last drop. To his everlasting dismay, he’d always been a sucker for a woman with tears in her eyes. Someday he’d learn his lesson.

“So you can start with Wayne and Isabella,” he suggested.

With surprising efficiency, she whipped out a teakettle, filled it with water and placed it on the stove, then retrieved cups and saucers from another cupboard. She wasn’t a large woman, Griffin realized, maybe five foot two. Her features were delicate, her cheeks beautifully sculpted. He’d heard pregnant women took on a special glow. With Loretta, he could believe that. Oddly, he didn’t want to think about the process that had gotten her pregnant or the man who’d had the privilege. Or the risks a small woman ran by carrying a baby, those same risks that had killed his mother.

“I made you a chicken casserole, if you’re hungry. Rodgers wasn’t sure you’d be home for dinner.”

“You talked to Rodgers?”