CHAPTER ONE
I let my off-key voice fill the small kitchen in my bedsit as I put the coffee on. Singing always made me feel better. I needed it this morning. This was the morning I would start my job.
I put the kettle on and then went upstairs to dress. This was the bit that always scared me. Ever since Mike, I had thought of myself as frumpy, unattractive and graceless. I had no idea if I could even make a good impression anymore.
Well, if you don’t try, you don’t know.
One thing I still had was my tenacity. I went to my cupboard, opened it and pulled out a pinstripe blouse and some blue slacks. Let’s try this, then.
They were both an almost-identical shade of blue, the blouse from Gant, a present from a friend who always looked cut. I pulled them on. The slacks fit well and the shirt was a nice loose, one that draped beautifully. I shook out my honey-blonde hair over my shoulders—Mike always liked it wild and unbrushed. I glanced at myself in the mirror.
There.
The girl looking back at me was tall, neither super-skinny nor super-anything-else, with a long oval face and hazel eyes. Her lips were a natural brown and her skin was clear, slightly freckled over the nose. The blue actually suits me. A colour somewhere between Slate and Prussian, it was very pretty. I drew on some navy shoes with a slight heel and turned to the mirror, viciously arranging my hair in the mock French roll I thought was suitably severe.
Giving myself a critical squint, I went through to put on makeup and thence to see if the demon coffee-machine could be persuaded to give me a second cup.
Breakfast was hasty—the clock was ticking, and I had agreed to be there by eight-thirty so I could meet my employer before he jetted off somewhere. Then I was on the road.
Life either likes you, or it doesn’t. This morning, it seemed to violently hate me for some reason.
“For pity’s sake!” I shouted out of the window as the traffic backed up in front of me. The workday rush seethed and hooted and gathered round me, hemming me in with the scent of exhaust fumes and the rising pressure of a thousand tempers, loosely-held. I put my head on my steering wheel and practised the ancient art of screaming quietly.
After about a minute of that, I felt better. I looked up and looked around. We were still moving, if just. I let myself roll forward the next inch or so, and decided to turn on the radio. At least if I had to be stuck, and I was destined to be late for my first job in four months, I might as well have music.
“Non…regretted…rien!”
I was shouting along with an Edith Piaff song on the radio as I finally rolled into the car park at my work. The Reliance Au Pair Agency was on the fifth floor of the massive building that reared up ahead of me. Edith Piaff had put me in a great mood, and I was ready to go. I ran up the short flight of steps with perhaps a minute to spare. I could make it. I really could! I collapsed into the lift, panting.
The man in the lift with me insisted on going all the way down to the basement, but I was exactly on time as I fell out of the lift on the top floor. I ran down the hallway, clutching my bag, keeping my balance just on my heeled shoes.
“Watch out!”
I shouted it exactly as I ran into the tall, dark-suited man in the corridor ahead of me. He staggered back, and I went down hard.
I was hissing in agony when I stood up. One of my ankles had twisted, and my shoes insisted on twisting and compressing my little toe wickedly.
“You might have minded out of the way!” I said, quite loudly at the tall man. My hair had fallen loose, too, and it flowed over my shoulders, a mass of honey-dark curls down to my shoulders. “You might not be late, but I am!”
I glared at him and pushed my way past. As I did so, he turned toward me.
“If you are late, I presume you are Miss Blunt?”
I stared at him, mouth open. “What?”
“I am Mr. Carring. You are assigned to work for me?”
Brilliant. I would have passed out. I swear I would have. If my blood pressure was slightly lower, I would have been lying unconscious on the tiles at that moment. Life is what it is, though, so I was left standing upright to face my tormentor.
“Yes,” I said.
“Oh.”
He said it thinly, a thread of a word. If he had been even a fraction ruder, he would have sniffed as he said it. As it was, he looked me up and down. I flinched. I imagined I must have looked a sight, with my slacks now dusty and my hair all loose about my shoulders. I bit my nail and met his gaze.
He was, as I noticed earlier, taller than me. His body lean but well-muscled, his hair cut severely, his eyes a shade paler than his black hair. His face was thin, cheekbones sculpted in a way that would make Michelangelo proud, mouth sensitive and full. I knew I was staring, but I couldn’t help it. I cleared my throat and looked hastily away.
“What?” he asked.
“Nothing.”
I resolutely looked at the wall. He had a beautiful accent—an impeccable British voice. This was the owner of Carring Solutions, an investment bank that had steadily rolled in funds for the last decade or so, making its sole owner— Alexander Carring—a cool billion. Whatever he has in the bank, I told myself, he still doesn’t have the right to look at me like he discovered me in his soup.
“You’re late.”
I glared at him before I realised what I was doing. Realizing it, I looked at the wall, cheeks flaming. “I know that,” I mumbled.
He said nothing. When I looked back at him, I caught a lift of his cheeks, before he hastily rearranged his face to neutrality. Had he been smiling? I swallowed hard.
“Well, then,” he said easily. “If you know that, I suppose there’s no point me pointing it out anymore. I expect you will be more reliable in your care of my children.”
I wanted to glare again. Instead I made my voice so frosty I could use it to set ice cream. “I take my responsibilities extremely seriously, Mr. Carring. I would give my life to keep a child safe.”
I meant it. Being a teacher does that to you. Every one of those twenty-something young lives is in your hands, and you find yourself diving into swimming pools or walking into traffic without even thinking about it, to keep a child unharmed.
He gave me an odd look. “That remains to be seen,” he said, very quietly.
“You have my word.”
He snorted. Whatever that odd expression was disappeared, hidden behind that bland mask again. I felt hurt. My word means everything to me, and he had no right to dismiss it so glibly. I was going to take him up on that, but he was walking again and I followed. We walked the last few paces to my employer’s office together and looked at the receptionist at the same moment. The receptionist looked scared.
“Mrs. Hitchins?”
“Um, yes. Good morning, Mr. Carring.”
I had the momentary pleasure of being just behind his shoulder and seeing, undiluted, the effect he had on other people. It was gratifying. At least I’m not the only person who’s scared of him. If anything, Carla looked more frightened than I was.
“I have just met Miss Blunt,” he continued evenly. “I presume there is some sort of paperwork to be done before she meets the children?”
Children. Not kids. I grinned to myself. He really was British, wasn’t he? It was, if I was honest, quite sexy. I was just not ready to admit that to anyone yet, not even myself.
“Um, yes,” Carla said nervously. “You both need to sign this form. This one is for the agreement, and this one here is an indemnity.”
Carla rummaged behind the desk. She did not see, as I did, the sudden closing of his features.
“I’m not signing it.”
“Mr. Carring?” Carla stared at him, long-lashed eyes blinking. She looked confused.
“The indemnity,” he said. “I am not signing it. If anything happens to my children, I will hold your agency, and Miss Blunt, personally responsible.” His face was starkly empty.
“Now hold on a minute!” I blurted out at that, feeling my cheeks heat with anger.
He swiveled round to stare at me.
Under that cool stare, I felt myself wither. I cleared my throat and continued in a slightly softer tone of voice. “The indemnity doesn’t excuse me if something happens,” I explained. “It is simply a statement from you, to say that you have, to the best of your knowledge, informed me of any dangers or health-risks to your children.”
I kept it as formal as possible, using each inch of my degree in English Literature to its fullest extent. He looked at me. Those dark eyes searched mine and, to my shock, I saw a deep, buried pain there.
“Very well,” he said hoarsely. “But I am telling you, Miss Blunt, that if so much as a single hair on my children’s heads is harmed, I will seek you out. And I will see that justice is done.”
It only occurred to me after he had signed the paper and pushed it back at Carla that he had never said whether or not justice would be carried out in the court or according to his own inner compass. I shuddered.
“Well, then, Miss Blunt,” he said quietly, when both forms were signed. “That seems to be all the formalities. Now all that remains is for me to leave you with my own papers and instructions.”
“Sorry?”
He was already walking to the office door. I struggled to keep up as we headed back down the hallway and to the doorway of the lift where, a few brief minutes earlier, we had just met.
“Here,” he said briefly, passing me a sheaf of printed documents, neatly packed into a slim-line envelope. “I am a busy man. In two hours I should be in Chicago. I cannot take time off simply to show the nanny round my house. In that envelope is everything you need to know. The set of keys assigned to you is here.” He passed them to me, then continued. “I should ask you to sign that you have read it but I am told you are an educated woman and I am sure you do not need me to tell you the basics. Now if you will excuse me, I am late. And for me, time is money.”
He looked at me, lips lifting in what seemed to be a smile or a smirk. Then, before I had fully got to grips with what he had just said, he turned and walked, quickly and silently, into the lift.
“Wait!” I shouted.
The door was already closing, leaving me alone in the hallway with an envelope, keys and no idea at all how to begin.