The Millionaire's Baby

Caro, feeling redundant, said, ‘I’ll take Sophie for a walk in the park this afternoon.’ It would get her out of here for an hour or two. She was beginning to feel decidedly trapped.

‘Sophie has a nap in the afternoons.’

Was there condemnation in the tone, as if he was telling her, in a roundabout way, that she didn’t know anything? Well, he’d be right.

To cover herself, she remarked repressively, ‘Naturally she does, Mr Helliar. I merely decided she would benefit from taking that nap while out in the fresh air of the park.’ She had noted a folding pushchair in the small entrance lobby of the suite and that was what nannies did, wasn’t it—push their charges endlessly round in the fresh air?

She felt, watching him gently wrap Sophie’s small fingers round the full plastic teaspoon, that she had put herself in a position of control. She had ‘decided’, had neatly sidestepped his suspicions about her ability—had he had any—and put herself firmly in charge.

Until he said, ‘Fine; we’ll go together.’

Her stomach lurched. She put the forkful of grilled Dover sole back down on her plate. She had suggested the outing to escape his company, not get more of it!

She needed the time and space; heaven knew she did. So far she had not had a single moment to herself to even begin to work out how to pay him back for what he had done to Katie.

‘That won’t be necessary, Mr Helliar.’ Said sweetly and, she thought, reasonably, but he glanced across the table at her, his silver eyes probing, and not probing gently, either.

‘The name’s Finn. And I decide what’s necessary.’

That figured. She regrouped and began another attack, cloaked in common sense.

‘You employed me to look after Baby, Mr—Finn. Presumably to free you up to do other things.’ Hadn’t the sultry Sandra gloated that at last he could get himself a life? Caro was frankly surprised he wasn’t doing just that right now, given his track record. ‘If you question my ability to look after my charge more than adequately...’

She left the implication hanging in the air, marvelling at her own temerity. He had been standing over her while she’d been dressing Sophie so he had to have noticed the way she’d put the baby’s nappy on. She’d pulled the sticky tape thing too far on one side, leaving the other side barely connected, and the whole bunchy, lopsided bundle was held in place only by the intelligent choice of minute emerald-green shorts for nether-region wear. So he’d know that ‘adequate’ didn’t get a look in when applied to her non-existent child-care abilities.

He didn’t look up from his meal, which he was enjoying with the air of a man completely at ease with himself. Just told her, ‘No one’s questioning anything. I fancy some fresh air and exercise, in the company of my daughter. OK?’

It would have to be, since she wasn’t in a position to forbid him to do anything. She lifted her fork again and began to wonder if by believing she could force him to acknowledge what he’d done to Katie she was making a complete fool of herself. She was sure of it when he added, replying to her earlier statement, ‘I employed a nanny—you, as it happens—so that Sophie could get used to having someone else look after her while I’m still around, before I start nine-to-five-ing again.’

Not one mention of when his wife might return to take his place. Which didn’t augur well for the innocent poppet. Was her mother so disillusioned with her marriage that she intended to devote herself full-time to re-launching her career, making flying visits to her little daughter when and if she could spare the time?

She wasn’t going to ask, wasn’t going to involve herself in their domestic troubles, because she had enough on her mind without adding to her burdens, and she put the blame for everything firmly at Finn’s feet.

They ended up in the Rose Garden, the beautiful blooms making the warm July afternoon heavy with perfume. Finn noted the rapt expression on Caro’s s face. She had lost that prim and starchy look and it was a revelation. She was beautiful.

The snapshots Elinor Farr had paraded for his inspection had depicted serious, symmetrical features and wide, impatient eyes. He had barely glanced at them, already dismissing the absent, favourite grandchild as a prig, too good to be true, tired of hearing how all-fired wonderful she was in comparison with her mother and sister, both of whom he had felt immediately and instinctively sorry for.

But reality, as she bent to cup a bloom and inhale its heady fragrance, was a softly sensual smile and a gentle curve of glossy hair the colour of burnished chestnuts which fell forward to caress creamy, apricot-tinted skin and reveal the elegant, delicate length and slenderness of her neck above the graceful curve of a body at once fragile yet utterly, gloriously feminine.

Something jerked inside his chest. He wanted to ask her what was wrong, if her business was going downhill, if she was in danger of losing her capital. To tell her right now that he knew who she was and she could trust him. He wanted to help.

He wanted, quite suddenly, to touch, to take her delicate hands in his, to end the subterfuge and offer his considerable financial expertise, quite freely. If she was in some kind of a mess then he could help her get out of it.

But for some reason he couldn’t formulate the words. There was a tightness in the muscles of his throat, a strange constriction. And then it all became academic because Sophie was waking, babbling baby talk and wriggling in her pushchair, wanting out.

So they would go to the boating lake to look at the ducks, and tonight, over dinner, when his daughter was tucked up and asleep, he’d speak to Caro, discover the truth, he promised himself.

It was important that there should be no equivocation between them. Just how important he was yet to realise.

CHAPTER THREE

‘JUST one more spoonful, there’s a good girl!’ Caro registered the pleading whine in her voice and was horrified. Where had her Nanny-knows-best-and-won’ t-be-thwarted voice disappeared to? But Finn had opted for a quick shower and she’d so wanted to give the baby her supper and prove to him that she could do something right.

‘Lovely onion soup!’ she cried more bracingly, remembering how she had doted on the stuff as a child. But she must have had depraved taste buds, she decided glumly as Sophie blew a monster raspberry and showered her with the despised offering.

‘Having trouble?’ Finn, tucking the tails of a crisp white shirt into the waistband of narrow-fitting slate-grey trousers, walked into the sitting room of her suite, eyeing the cross red face of his infant daughter.

Sophie’s mouth went square as soon as she saw her father, and Finn plucked her out of the high chair to take her mind off onion soup and nip the wailing session in the bud. ‘She usually has a boiled egg followed by fruit for her supper.’ He looked unbearably smug, as if he’d given her a test, knowing she’d fail, and felt superior because he’d proved himself right.

Caro wanted to hit him for walking in and discovering her ineptness—for walking in at all when she’d imagined she’d seen the last of him for the evening after their return from the park—quality time, he’d called it. Before disappearing he’d told her, ‘Sophie has supper around now. Ring Room Service. You’ll find the kitchen staff very accommodating.’

At a huge disadvantage, covered in onion soup as she was, Caro tried to salvage something and managed to find some dignity as she told him, ‘Onions cleanse the blood.’ Everyone knew that, didn’t they? And she watched him tuck the baby more securely into the crook of his arm as he went to the phone in the main living room, and wondered whether the snort he gave denoted scorn or amusement at her expense.

Deciding she didn’t give a damn either way, she began to tidy away the mess Sophie had made, making herself stay calm because in the not too distant future he would be the one who was cringing.

He’d showered and changed so he’d be going out for the evening, which was lovely. She’d bath the baby and put her to bed and spend her own evening plotting the best way to hurt his conscience.

But she immediately felt mortified when the waiter carried through the revised supper on a tray. A boiled egg in a cup decorated with rabbits wearing blue bonnets, a similarly decorated bowl of diced fresh fruit and a plate of thinly sliced bread and butter.

It was worse still when Finn followed through with Sophie. She was wearing a fresh bib and her sunniest smile and Caro, feeling ridiculous, just standing there clutching the toast soldiers she’d gathered up from the floor where the baby had flung them, realised that Mary had been right when she’d said she was crazy.

She should never have got herself in so deep. More at home with balance sheets, with interviewing nannies who were anxious to be adopted by the now prestigious Grandes Familles Agency or wealthy parents from the UK and America, as well as France, who wanted only the very best for their offspring, than dealing with offspring, she felt like an idiot.

For the first time in her life she felt like giving up on a project. She could contact Mary and ask her to send that replacement, the one who was probably already on the starting-block. And bow out.

She couldn’t alter the way he was. Nothing she could say to him, no matter how stinging, would make a scrap of difference. He would go on using women all through his life, never giving them a second thought once he had tired of them, never looking back or wondering what had happened to them. How could she hurt his conscience if he didn’t have one?

‘Why don’t you go and freshen up? I can feed this little monster,’ Finn suggested lightly, smiling to show he wasn’t about to put on his outraged employer’s hat.

She looked vulnerable, beaten, her soft mouth drooping, the eyes that had swept momentarily to his as he’d spoken spangled with tears. He found he couldn’t bear that. He hated it. Deeply.

Something was wrong and he wanted to help put it right and he couldn’t do that unless she opened up and talked to him, told him what the problem was. Whatever her grandmother’s opinion, she wasn’t Wonderwoman. His shoulders were broad enough to carry the burden that was so clearly dragging her down. And with a woman as lovely as Caroline Farr that would be no problem. In fact, he decided suddenly, it would be a pleasure.

With Sophie secured in her high chair and munching on bread and butter he moved quickly to the forlorn yet graceful figure in her soup-spattered cotton dress. She was no more a nanny than he was, knew much less about child care—and he was no expert. He just muddled along as best he could, taking his daughter’s happiness as the yardstick and to hell with timetables and theories.

‘Give yourself a break.’ The gruffness of his voice surprised him. So far she hadn’t moved. This close, he could smell the fresh floral fragrance of her—the perfume she used, he supposed. Or was it the essence of the woman herself?

He cleared his throat. ‘Give me that.’ He meant the discarded pieces of toast she held in her hands. His fingers brushed the slender length of hers and something happened. Something wild and sweet and unrestrained.

She felt it, too. He saw the shaft of surprise in the golden gleam between tangled dark lashes and heard the harsh sound of her swiftly sucking in her breath. And then her chin came up, her head turning sharply on the graceful line of her neck and shoulders, small hands decisive as they snatched away from his.

Unrestraint was ruled out of play. Which was probably just as well, he thought, watching the sway of her hips as she went to dispose of the mangled toast in the waste bin. He needed to uncover the truth, find out why she was here, doing a job she was patently untrained for, before—

Before? That implied that something would come after. And that, surely, was nonsense.

Or was it? .

Caro closed the bathroom door behind her and leaned against it, mourning the lack of a lock. She needed a shower. She felt hot and bothered, sticky all over.