“I’d like to know how you can be a virgin and have a baby.”

The embers of her passion died, leaving her drained. Why hadn’t she stopped him before he found out the truth? The answer was as blinding as the joy he had made her feel. Until he knew everything, she had no chance of a future with him. Against all reason, she yearned for one.

“Joel isn’t my baby.”

His cold tone sliced to her heart. “Obviously not. So who does he belong to?”

She took a deep breath to subdue the anguish threatening to consume her. “You,” she said softly. “You’re Joel’s father, Sam.”

Dear Reader,

As senior editor for the Silhouette Romance line, I’m lucky enough to get first peek at the stories we offer you each month. Each editor searches for stories with an emotional impact, that make us laugh or cry or feel tenderness and hope for a loving future. And we do this with you, the reader, in mind. We hope you continue to enjoy the variety each month as we take you from first love to forever….

Susan Meier’s wonderful story of a hardworking single mom and the man who sweeps her off her feet is Cinderella and the CEO. In The Boss’s Baby Mistake, Raye Morgan tells of a heroine who accidentally gets inseminated with her new boss’s child! The fantasy stays alive with Carol Grace’s Fit for a Sheik as a wedding planner’s new client is more than she bargained for….

Valerie Parv always creates a strong alpha hero. In Booties and the Beast, Sam’s the strong yet tender man. Julianna Morris’s lighthearted yet emotional story Meeting Megan Again reunites two people who only seem mismatched. And finally Carolyn Greene’s An Eligible Bachelor has a very special secondary character—along with a delightful hero and heroine!

Happy reading!

Mary-Theresa Hussey

Senior Editor

Booties and the Beast
Valerie Parv

www.millsandboon.co.uk

For my sisters Maureen and Leigh, with love

Books by Valerie Parv

Silhouette Romance

The Leopard Tree #507

The Billionaire’s Baby Chase #1270

Baby Wishes and Bachelor Kisses #1313

*The Monarch’s Son #1459

*The Prince’s Bride-To-Be #1465

*The Princess’s Proposal #1471

Booties and the Beast #1501

VALERIE PARV

lives and breathes romance and has even written a guide to being romantic, crediting her cartoonist husband of nearly thirty years as her inspiration. As a former buffalo and crocodile hunter in Australia’s Northern Territory, he’s ready-made hero material, she says.

When not writing her novels and nonfiction books, or speaking about romance on Australian radio and television, Valerie enjoys dollhouses, being a Star Trek fan and playing with food (in cooking, that is). Valerie agrees with actor Nichelle Nichols, who said, “The difference between fantasy and fact is that fantasy simply hasn’t happened yet.”

Contents

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Epilogue

Chapter One

Now that Haley Glen was actually standing at the gates of Sam Winton’s mansion she wasn’t sure she could go through with her plan. Everything in her wanted to grab him by the throat and not let go until he admitted that he was the father of her sister’s baby boy.

Joel was six months old now and Ellen had been gone for five of those months, but this was Haley’s first chance to get near the man. She hadn’t anticipated being gripped by a wave of last-minute nerves that threatened to paralyze her.

She reminded herself that it had taken all her powers of persuasion to get her friend, Miranda Holt, to send her to this interview. If she chickened out now, she would be letting her friend down as well as Ellen and the baby, so she had no choice but to see it through.

If it killed her.

On a heavy sigh, she reached for the intercom button and took out some of her frustration by punching it savagely and holding it down longer than was polite. From somewhere in the grounds of the mansion, she heard the howl of what sounded like a very large dog.

Moments later an angry voice boomed through the speaker, “No need to ram it through the fence. State your name and business.”

She bit back a suggestion of her own about where he could ram the intercom and said as sweetly as she could, “I’m Haley Glen from the HomeBody Agency to see Sam Winton about your house sitter.” She was gambling that the voice belonged to Sam himself but something in his tone made her think she was right.

She was. “I’m Winton. What’s wrong with Miranda?”

Miranda was the owner of the HomeBody Agency. Normally she would see a client as important as Sam herself and Winton was obviously well aware of it. “She’s tied up with…” As her annoyance grew, Haley swallowed the rest of her apology for Miranda’s absence. “Do you think we could discuss this face-to-face, Mr. Winton? Or would you rather conduct the entire meeting by intercom?”

A buzz like a swarm of angry bees drowned out his reply as the tall, iron gates swung gracefully inward. Haley got back into her car and drove through. As soon as she had cleared the gates they closed behind her. Common sense told her they were triggered by some kind of sensor mechanism, but she felt an uncomfortable sensation of prison doors clanging shut.

She pulled up outside the imposing Federation-style house and got out but was stopped by a blur of movement she caught out of the corner of her eye. The owner of the Baskerville howl came tearing around the side of the house, churning gravel under its floor mop feet. Haley barely had time to scramble back into the car and pull the door shut, before a dog the size of a small pony threw itself at the window. Her heart pounded as she stared down a throat rimmed by teeth that would have done a shark proud.

“Down, Dougal. Heel.”

The command was given with all the authority of a major general, so Haley wasn’t surprised when the dog bolted away from her car window as if shot. Had the command been directed at her, she would probably have obeyed it, too. She shivered and wondered if it was from reaction to the sudden appearance of the dog—or its master.

Haley was relieved when the dog settled itself meekly at the heels of the man waiting at the foot of the front steps. It was Sam Winton himself, she saw, recognizing him from the photograph on his books. Except that her first sight of him in the flesh destroyed most of her preconceptions in one go.

She didn’t know what she had expected the children’s writer to look like, but it wasn’t this vibrant man who exuded energy the way high-voltage wires hum with power. His skin was burnished with healthy color, and his hair was as black as baby Joel’s only a lot thicker. It curled almost to his collar, it was in a style that reminded her of medieval knights in old movies, though instead of armor this knight was poised in an ivory polo shirt and chinos as black as his hair.

She was used to thinking of him as The Beast, her sister’s nickname for him, but he didn’t look in the least beastly. He was taller than she had imagined, perhaps half a head taller than Haley herself. He was also well built, but not with the showy musculature of an athlete as much as someone who simply took care of himself.

Right now, the most beastly thing about him was the deep vee of a frown that cut a swathe between two of the bluest eyes she had ever seen. His frown deepened as she looked warily at the dog. “You can get out now. He won’t hurt you.”

When she did so, the man reached for her hand and a jolt like electricity surged along her arm, affirming the high-voltage impression she’d already formed. She tried to pull away but his grip was like steel. Alarm shrilled through her. “What are you…”

He offered her hand to Dougal, who sniffed it, making her wonder if the dog’s next move would be to swallow her hand up to the wrist. He looked more than capable of it. But Sam said, “Friend, Dougal. Friend.”

At first the dog’s tail moved listlessly then waved like a banner in a stiff breeze and he gave her hand in Sam’s a mighty lick. Relief coursed through her and she rubbed the dog’s shaggy chest with her free hand. His wiry coat teased her palm and he lowered his great head and butted her gently. She smiled, wondering how she could have been afraid of the shaggy animal for a minute. “Good dog.”

Sam nodded approvingly, obviously noting that she hadn’t made the elementary mistake of trying to pat the dog on the head. “You know dogs?”

“I love them. When I was a child, I had an Australian kelpie called Buddy.” The feel of her hand in his distracted her, making it hard to think straight.

He didn’t seem to notice her discomfort, keeping his fingers threaded through hers as he straightened. “You bolted as soon as Dougal appeared.”

Naturally, he’d seen her undignified scramble back into the car. It put her at a further disadvantage and she drew herself up defensively. “For all I knew, he was a guard dog, trained to eat intruders.” She didn’t add, “like his owner,” but it must have been in her voice.

When he released her hand, she chased away a surprising sensation of disappointment. “Dougal is supposed to be a guard dog, but he’s more likely to lick an intruder to death in his joy at having company.”

A feeling not shared by his owner, she thought, not sure where the certainty came from. “Do you get many intruders?”

“Not with Dougal around. Off you go. Finish your bone.” At the magic word, the dog’s ears twitched and he loped back the way he’d come. Sam gestured toward the steps. “Shall we go inside?”

His sudden switch to a businesslike tone chilled the atmosphere as effectively as a stiff breeze shredding a mist. For a moment she wondered if he could possibly know who she was, then realized that his anger was in response to hers. This would never do if she was to get to know him better. “I’m sorry if I sounded rude down the intercom when I arrived,” she said, biting back any hint of self-justification by reminding herself that Miranda trusted her to behave herself.

“You did,” he agreed, “But you also had a point.”

His response told her it was as close to an apology as she was going to get so she followed him into the rambling old house. He led the way down a wide arched hallway past a double living room furnished with wonderful antique furniture, past the partially open door of a bedroom that looked recently vacated. Had he been sleeping in the middle of the afternoon? she wondered. But then he was a writer. He probably worked unconventional hours.

He pulled the bedroom door shut before she could do more than glimpse a vast four-poster bed covered in rumpled bedclothes that suggested he was either the world’s most restless sleeper or did some of his entertaining in bed.

The thought troubled her, making her wonder why it was harder to think of him as a beast, lonely and unloved, than as a sexual athlete for whom her sister had been one of many conquests. Both images took her into territory she resisted exploring. His personal life had nothing to do with her reason for wanting to meet him.

He opened another door on a vast library with floor-to-ceiling shelves crammed with books. Many of them were reference books on a wide variety of subjects, she saw when she scanned them with instinctive curiosity. Off the library, another door led to what looked like an office, judging by the computers, printers and other paraphernalia visible through the opening. His work space looked chaotic. Surprising, she thought, since he appeared to be the kind of man who liked his life run with military precision.

“Take a seat.” He gestured to a leather-covered couch. Iron-gray hairs scattered over the soft leather suggested that Dougal often kept him company while he worked. The thought almost made her melt until she resolutely drove it away. So he allowed his dog to sleep on an obviously expensive piece of furniture. So what? It didn’t make Sam any less The Beast than before.

“Coffee?” Sam asked as she perched on the edge of the sofa. He probably thought she feared getting dog hair on her clothes. If he knew the real reason why she was so on edge, he’d probably command his dog to see her on her way.

“Thank you,” she said. Socializing with Sam Winton wasn’t part of her plan, but the liquid might help to ease the dryness in her throat. “I like it black with no sugar.”

“Sensible woman,” he muttered. When she frowned, he said, “It’s the only way to drink decent coffee. I have mine flown in from the Kona Coast in Hawaii.”

“How nice for you,” she said under her breath, mentally contrasting his freedom to order coffee from halfway across the Pacific with her own need to watch every penny to provide for baby Joel and herself. Most of her savings had been spent easing Ellen’s last months, as well as paying the many medical bills that hadn’t been covered by her sister’s insurance, so being broke was a way of life for her these days.

As a computer consultant, usually she was well paid, but since Ellen’s death, the hours she could work had been restricted by the need to care for Joel. It was one reason why she had jumped at helping Miranda for a couple of weeks. Not only could she take the baby to the office with her, but the salary was helping to cover some of the endless stream of bills.

Haley’s mother and stepfather, Greg, had helped as much as they could, but they were both hopeless with money so most of the burden fell on Haley herself. She hadn’t grudged her sister anything that had eased her final months, but she didn’t appreciate the reminder that Sam Winton could have helped if he’d wanted to.

“I didn’t catch that,” he said, drawing her back to the present. “Don’t you like Hawaiian coffee?”

“I…uh…said it’s very nice,” she improvised. All of a sudden she felt a pressing need to get out of there before she threw something at Sam. What had possessed her to think any good would come of meeting Sam face-to-face? When Ellen had told him she was expecting his baby, he hadn’t exactly welcomed her with open arms. The opposite, in fact. According to Ellen, he had told her in no uncertain terms that he couldn’t possibly be the father of her child and had all but thrown her out of his house.

It tore at Haley to recall that Ellen’s tumor had been in remission for a whole year when she’d started working with Sam as an illustrator for one of his books. They would never know whether the remission would have gone on if not for Ellen falling pregnant—and after seeing him, Haley didn’t doubt that Joel was Sam’s baby—but the strain of pregnancy hadn’t helped. Ellen’s life had ended one short month after giving birth to Joel. Only seeing the joy the baby had given her sister, eased Haley’s grief. She knew that Ellen wouldn’t have wanted anything to be different.

Except Sam’s reaction. Her sister had been devastated by his rejection. After all her medical treatments, Ellen had been so sure she couldn’t become pregnant that she hadn’t taken any precautions. Ellen hadn’t gone into details, but Haley assumed that Sam hadn’t taken any, either. Despite the obvious fact they’d slept together, he couldn’t know Ellen very well if he thought she was the type to have any doubts about who had fathered her child.

He probably thought she had picked on Sam because of his fame and obvious wealth. Only Haley knew that Ellen had given herself to Sam out of a moment of acute loneliness and fear. She had been awaiting the results of her latest checkup.

Haley had heard the whole story late one night, several months after they’d learned that Ellen’s illness was back, when her pain made sleep impossible. Hearing her toss and turn, Haley had gone in to see if she could help, not that there was much she or anyone could do, but talking was one way she could take Ellen’s mind off her suffering for a little while.

After Ellen had been working with Sam for some time, she told Haley, she had arrived to find Sam methodically tearing to shreds the divorce papers he’d received in the mail that morning.

In turmoil herself as she waited for her doctor to call with the results of the checkup, she had been as averse to working as Sam and they had taken comfort in each other’s company. He hadn’t known why Ellen was so distressed but he’d sensed that she’d needed his arms as much as he’d needed hers. Joel had been the result.

Knowing what hell her half sister had gone through before she went into remission, Haley couldn’t blame Ellen for taking what pleasure she could in the moment. She also knew her sister’s instinct would have been to try to help Sam. She had always been a giving person.

Haley didn’t blame The Beast for seeking comfort after receiving the cold, hard proof that his marriage was over. Haley knew only too well how it felt when a relationship blew apart. She had been seeing Richard Cross, a business associate, for a few months, and had thought they were becoming close, when he told her bluntly to choose between him and her sister’s baby. She had felt as if her world had come to an end. There had been no real choice. She didn’t regret choosing the baby. But it still hurt.

She couldn’t do anything to hold Richard, even supposing she wanted to after his cruel ultimatum. But she could and did blame Sam for his coldhearted refusal to accept his share of responsibility for Ellen’s baby. The thought gave Haley the strength to do the job Miranda had trusted her to do. Haley opened her brief case and took out a file. “I’ve changed my mind. I’d rather skip coffee and get on with the purpose of this meeting.”

Sam gave a suit-yourself shrug. “I hope you don’t mind if I have some. I’ve been working since five this morning.” Without waiting for a reply, he disappeared into his office. Her anger notched higher as she heard the hiss of an espresso machine followed by the chink of a spoon against porcelain. Sam definitely didn’t stint himself.

Apart from the luxury of an espresso machine in his office, the room around her screamed affluence from the Cedric Emmanuel etchings on the walls to the designer furnishings. Thinking of Joel back at the office with Miranda, Haley began to seethe. How dare Sam spoil himself while his son had so little?

When Sam returned, cup in hand, the rich aroma of the coffee teased at her nostrils. She wished she hadn’t been so hasty in refusing some. Depriving herself wasn’t going to bring Sam into line, and her prickly behavior just might make him suspicious of her real motives.

“Are you sure you won’t change your mind?” he asked, setting his cup down on a side table.

“No, thank you,” she said, astonished that she could actually speak through clenched teeth. She had known that meeting Sam wouldn’t be a picnic, but she had never expected it to be this much of an ordeal. Nor that it would bring back so much of the past tragic year, when she’d nursed Ellen through her pregnancy, knowing that her illness had recurred.

She had had to put her grief at losing her sister aside to take care of the baby. She had come to look upon Joel as her own child. Her anger at Sam was precisely because she now thought of Joel as her baby, she realized. There was no way she could be as objective as she wanted to be—as Miranda needed her to be—so they’d better get this over with before she said something she would regret. “I’d like to get down to business.”

He prowled to the couch and sat beside her, so close, their thighs were within a whisper of touching. “Not until you tell me why you’re so angry with me,” he insisted. The invasion of her personal space was the last straw.

Yet anger was the last thing she felt when he was practically touching her, she found to her astonishment. What she felt was insanely, vibrantly aroused, and it was not how she wanted to feel around him.

“What makes you think I’m angry?” she asked, managing to keep her voice steady with an effort that made her teeth ache.

“A writer’s instinct for reading people,” he said. “My guess is, you can barely restrain yourself from throwing something at me, and I’d like to know why. It can’t be because I growled at you over the intercom. I was still in midscene and when I’m writing, I can be a real bear. Miranda must have warned you about me.”

She shook her head, taking refuge in the truth. “I got the impression you’re one of her favorite clients.”

He smiled and the change was dramatic. She felt as if someone had turned on a sunlamp in the room, and actually found herself leaning toward him as if to the source of the energy. She pulled back with an effort. “Mine is a personal problem.”

The word “personal” would have been enough to deter most men. But Sam looked interested. “Personal as in a man?”

Without meaning to, she had hooked the writer in him, she saw. She would have to be more careful. “I really don’t think—”

“My point exactly,” he cut in. “You can’t think straight when you’re preoccupied with another matter. Do I remind you of this man who’s on your mind?”

If he only knew. She tried to keep her face impassive. Sam was too intuitive to accept an outright denial. “Perhaps.”

“It would explain the displaced antagonism,” he said as if to himself. “Sorry, analyzing people is a hobby of mine, as it is with most writers.”

“But you’re a children’s writer.”

He looked affronted. “My readers still expect believable characters with convincing motivation. The only difference is that my stories are written at an appropriate level of vocabulary.”

“I didn’t mean to suggest anything else.”

His shoulders lifted. “I’m used to it. Demeaning children’s literature is a spectator sport for some people. Do you have children of your own, Haley?”

“I hardly see—”

“That it’s any of my business?” he finished for her. “You’re probably right, but if we’re to be on the same wavelength, I need to know more about you.”

If it was a line, it was as smooth as silk, Haley thought. No wonder Ellen had found him so easy to fall for. Luckily she wasn’t going to make the same mistake. “All you need to know about me is that Miranda sent me to take care of your staffing needs.”

“Precisely,” he concluded. “So, do you have children?”

He was impossible. “Yes,” she snapped. Anything to get the discussion back on track.

“Boys? Girls?”

How old did he think she was? “Boy, singular. I’m only twenty-three myself. Joel is six months old, so you won’t find him standing in line for your autograph.”

Sam seemed unruffled. “He’s a bit young for my books,” he agreed, “Although hopefully they’ll still be around when he starts reading.”

This wasn’t getting her anywhere. She made herself remember Miranda’s script. “I’m sure they will,” she said in what was supposed to be a flattering tone.

He saw right through it. “This man you’re so mad at, is he Joel’s father?”

This, at least, she could answer truthfully. “Yes, he is.”

She felt his gaze settle on the third finger of her left hand. “You’re not married to him?”

Cursing herself for not thinking to wear a ring as camouflage, she snapped, “I should hope not.”

Her vehemence intrigued him, she saw. “You have a child by him but you don’t want him in your life. Interesting.”

She tried to tell herself it was the writer in him, finding story possibilities in everything, but she didn’t like the way his interest threatened to undermine her anger. “I don’t want to talk about me,” she said shortly. She was alarmed at the way the conversation kept coming back to her, when the whole point was to learn as much as she could about him so she could share it with Joel when he was old enough to ask about his father.

Her body had its own ideas, she found to her dismay. Sam sat so close that her senses were assailed by the woody fragrance of his aftershave lotion, coupled with the indefinable man-scent of Sam himself. The combination was relaxed and outdoorsy, not sophisticated like Richard, she thought, unwillingly comparing Richard with the man beside her. Sam’s aura was so overpoweringly alluring it was in danger of throwing her completely off balance. Richard had never affected her so strongly.

She wasn’t planning on dating Sam, she reminded herself hastily. After Richard, she enjoyed being accountable to no one but herself and Joel. So it hardly mattered whether Sam was the indoor or outdoor type, or given to group orgies behind his impressive wrought-iron gates.

Now where had that thought come from? What was it about him that made her thoughts turn in directions they had no business going? She and Richard had only split up a few weeks ago, so it wasn’t as if she were starved for a man’s attention.

The image of Sam’s savagely rumpled bed returned to her mind. She kept a rein on her runaway thoughts by reminding herself that he had slept with her half sister, made her pregnant then denied that the baby could possibly be his.

Sobering as the reminder was, still she had trouble keeping her mind focused. Was this what he had done to Ellen?

It wasn’t hard to see how it could happen, Haley thought. She pulled herself together with an effort. Sam might well be the kind of man who attracted women as effortlessly as a magnet attracted iron filings, but Haley had no intention of falling prey to his allure.

There was probably a good reason for his divorce, she told herself. Being the kind person she was, Ellen had accepted his explanation that he and his wife were simply incompatible, but Haley would have wanted to dig deeper. Was he a workaholic or a womanizer? Insanely jealous? That the fault could have been on his ex-wife’s side, she didn’t want to think. It brought her dangerously close to feeling compassion for him, and look where that had gotten Ellen!

For Joel’s sake Haley knew she had to keep a clear head and the best way to do that was to remind herself that he was The Beast and he wasn’t about to turn into a handsome prince any time soon. Had it been possible, he would surely have done so when Ellen had told him about the baby. Instead, he had rejected both her and their child. Haley made herself remember that part.

“I’d say your child is highly relevant to our discussion, if you’re to be my house sitter while I’m on tour,” he said, breaking into her thoughts.

“You misunderstand,” she said primly. “I’m only interviewing you about your requirements, not taking the job myself.”

“Why not? You’re not Miranda’s regular assistant. What happened to the pretty redhead with the infectious laugh? Donna—isn’t that her name?”

Telling herself she didn’t care that he obviously found Miranda’s assistant attractive, Haley nevertheless found great satisfaction in saying, “I’m only filling in while Donna’s on her honeymoon. She eloped with a client.”

She had surprised him, she saw, when his dark eyebrows arched upward. Serve him right if he had fancied Donna and she had run off with someone else. It was time he got a taste of his own medicine. At the same time, something uncomfortably like jealousy gripped her. What would it be like to be the object of his passion?

“Is she coming back?” he asked.

Didn’t the man ever give up? “She’ll be back in a few days with her new husband.” She gave the relationship extra emphasis to make sure he got the point.

“What will happen to you when she does?”

Had she misread his concern? For a moment she’d thought he was sufficiently interested in Donna not to care whether or not she was married, as long as she was coming back. Now it sounded as if he was anxious about Haley herself. She didn’t want his concern and she certainly didn’t need it, she told herself, but found it more pleasant than she wanted to. “She’ll return to her job and I’ll go back to my own work.”

“And that is?”

She didn’t want to talk about herself but he gave her little option. “I’m a systems planning consultant for small companies who don’t have full-time support staff. I organize their offices and their computer systems for maximum efficiency. Now can we—”

“Give me a minute to think.” He massaged his chin, looking thoughtful. From the aura of aftershave around him, he had evidently shaved this morning but his hair was so black that a hint of shadow already darkened his jaw, giving him a slightly piratical air. “Organizational skills and Miranda’s recommendation. You could be just the person I need. Last month my personal assistant left for Zimbabwe. I’ve been on a deadline so I haven’t had chance to replace him yet.”

It explained the chaos in the office, she thought. “Miranda understood you needed a house sitter.”

“I do, while I’m on tour with the new book. But it would be a great help if the same person could sort out the office for me while I’m gone.”

This wasn’t going according to Miranda’s script at all. In desperation, Haley pulled a clipboard out of her briefcase and consulted the points listed on it. “All the same, the decision isn’t up to me.”

“But it is up to me and if I decide you’re right for this job, Miranda won’t argue. She knows I pay well.” He named a fee that Haley knew was in excess of Miranda’s usual rates. Even taking out Miranda’s commission, the amount left would solve a lot of Haley’s problems.

It wouldn’t solve the main one, that he was Joel’s father, she told herself. All the same she couldn’t help thinking that working for him would give her a heaven-sent chance to find out more about him so she could tell her child when the time came. Knowing his father and having regular contact with him would have been preferable, but that wasn’t going to happen as long as Sam denied fathering Joel.

Haley knew only too well how it felt to grow up without really knowing your father. She still couldn’t fathom how her mother, the most scatterbrained woman on earth, had managed to marry a straitlaced history professor and have his child. They had parted when Haley was six, and her mother had re-married an entomologist who was as eccentric as his wife. Currently the two of them were somewhere in the Amazon jungle collecting butterflies for his work. She had last seen Greg and her mother when they’d come back to Australia to attend their daughter’s funeral.

Afterward her mother had stayed behind to help Haley, but within a couple of weeks she had created such chaos that Haley had decided she would cope better alone. Lovingly but firmly, she’d encouraged her mother to return to Greg in the jungle. She had suspected her mother was only too happy to comply. They loved each other but they had completely different ways of managing their lives.

Haley knew she took after her real father, who was the organized one in the family. Ellen had teased Haley about being able to put her hand on whatever she needed, while Ellen had inherited Greg’s talent for creating disorder. Haley had tried to help her sister get organized, but it had never worked for long. “Let’s face it, I take after my Dad and you take after yours,” Ellen had conceded, throwing up her hands.

Haley had to agree. She’d seen little of her father while she was growing up but she had seen enough to know how finicky he was. In her teens, she had attempted to get to know him, but even she found his fussiness daunting. Arriving so much as five minutes late earned her his disapproval. She could only imagine his reaction if she had, say, spilled her food or used the wrong cutlery. She had been careful to do neither, but it hadn’t exactly made for relaxing parent-child interactions.

To be fair, her father had tried to live up to her expectations, but their meetings always felt stilted and uncomfortable. It hurt to think her father knew more about Bess Tudor than Haley Glen and that he wasn’t going to change. It seemed their orderliness was about all they had in common.

After one such outing, he had said, “I’m truly sorry I can’t give you what you want, or know what to say to you. I don’t know the first thing about being a good father. You’re better off without me.”

She had cried for two days afterward, then decided to accept the situation and get on with her life. She was proud of what she’d achieved, putting a down-payment on a her own apartment and setting herself up as her own boss. But it didn’t stop the black moments, when she wondered what it was about her that her father had found so difficult to love, from coming. She wanted better for Joel, she thought fiercely. He wasn’t going to have the same black moments in his life if she could do something about it. Even if it meant taking Sam’s assignment herself.

She had seen enough of him already to be fairly sure that his mind wasn’t easily changed once he had made it up. It sounded as if he wasn’t about to budge about having her as his house sitter. Since she couldn’t do much about it without letting Miranda down, she decided she might as well make the most of the chance to fulfill her mission. But first she needed to be sure that he wouldn’t consider any other option.

“Can we at least go through the formalities?” she asked.

He looked pleased with himself. “Go ahead, as long as the name at the foot of that impressive checklist turns out to be yours.”

She started to ask questions and tick boxes, uncomfortably aware that she was as interested in him as much for herself as for her baby.

When she closed the file, he grinned at her and she crumbled inside. It was easier to remember him as The Beast when he scowled at her. Then she didn’t have this strange sensation of being swept out of her depth by a king tide.

“I was right, wasn’t I?” he asked.

Her confusion was genuine. “About what?”

“After filling in all those little boxes, you’re still perfect for the job.”

“How can you possibly know? You know nothing about me.” And he wouldn’t, if she had anything to do with it. Her blood ran cold at the prospect of him linking her with Ellen and treating her—and her sister’s baby—as cruelly.

“I don’t need to know any more. By the time you move in, I’ll be heading off on the tour. So we’ll only be together long enough for me to brief you on what needs doing, then you’ll have the place to yourself.”

She could swear he sounded disappointed, but told herself the strain of the meeting was making her imagine things. “You don’t have a problem with a baby staying in your house.”

His expression darkened. “My sister, Jessie, has two small children so the house is equipped for a baby. And in my line of work, I’m unlikely to have a problem with children.”

Only with Joel, she thought, quelling her reaction. “I could refuse to take the assignment.”

“But you won’t.”

She met his penetrating blue gaze with an equally direct one of her own. “What makes you so sure?”

“Because you don’t want to lose Miranda one of her best clients.”

With sinking heart, Haley knew that he had won.

Chapter Two

As she drove between the gates to Sam’s house, a curious feeling of homecoming overcame Haley. She told herself it was because this was her second visit, but knew it had more to do with the suitcases packed around the baby seat. They made her feel as if she was staying longer than the couple of weeks Sam required.

This time she didn’t get out of the car right away, but waited until Sam emerged and spoke to Dougal, although the dog was wagging its tail furiously, rather than barking a warning.

“Good morning,” she said, annoyed at the heat she felt surge into her face at the sight of Sam. Dressed in dark blue pants and a white summer-weight sweater, he looked less like The Beast of her sister’s experience and more like the kind of man Haley herself could be attracted to if she was crazy enough to let it happen.

He looked as uncomfortable as she felt. Maybe he just didn’t like babies, she thought as she unstrapped Joel from his baby seat. If so, he should have thought about that before getting Ellen pregnant.

“You’re late,” he said.

Haley frowned at him, stung by his tone. “I understood from Miranda that you don’t have to leave until this afternoon, so there’s plenty of time for you to brief me.” She was late because Joel had burbled strained turkey all over her best blouse, forcing her to change into a T-shirt before she could set off, but she didn’t say so. She felt unprofessional enough, arriving for a job with a baby and a mountain of possessions in tow, most of them to do with Joel’s care. “If you’ll show me my room, I’ll settle the baby down for a nap, then you can give me my instructions.”

He bounded down the front steps and picked up her largest suitcase as if it weighed nothing at all, then loaded his other arm with an assortment of possessions. His eyebrows rose. “What do you pack when you’re going away for a month?”

“Babies need a lot of things.”

His smile vanished as if a lightbulb had been switched off. “I wouldn’t know,” he said shortly, and started back up the steps.

She stared after his rigid back in consternation. What had she said? He couldn’t be upset because she’d arrived with the baby. He’d known from the beginning that they were a package, but he obviously didn’t want to have anything to do with Joel. He hadn’t even acknowledged the baby’s presence, she thought furiously. “He is a person, you know,” she snapped.

Sam froze on the top step, regarding her with an expression like thunder. “Excuse me?”

It was too late to close her fool mouth now, so she said, “Sam, this is Joel. Joel, this is Sam. Say hello to Joel, Sam.”

He looked as if he would rather strip naked on the step, an image that startled her because of the vivid way it sprang into her mind. Not somewhere she had any business going, she told herself as he said through clenched teeth, “Hello, Joel.”

“See? That wasn’t so hard, was it?”

Harder than she knew, Sam thought. Everything in him protested at the sight of the baby waving chubby arms at him, a living reminder of Sam’s own inadequacy. When he’d hired Haley, he’d been sure he could cope with her child living under his roof. He hadn’t expected the baby’s arrival to trigger a rush of paternal longing so strong it was like a physical pain.

Suddenly Haley thrust the child at him. “Now you’ve been introduced, would you mind holding Joel while I fetch his favorite toy? I just remembered I left it in the car.”

Before Sam could say a word she bounded back down the steps, leaving him with the baby. As the child’s scents engulfed him and the small hands clutched at him, Sam felt his stomach muscles twist. Joel looked exactly how Sam had imagined his own son would look before he discovered that it would never happen, and his heart felt as if it was being crushed in a giant hand.

Joel opened his mouth to protest. Instinctively Sam jiggled the baby up and down in his arms, and the child’s cry dropped to a whimper. “Hey now, she’ll be back in a minute,” Sam assured Joel. “We men can cope on our own for a short time, can’t we?”

Sam’s serious tone caught Joel’s attention. The whimpers faded altogether and the baby fixed Sam with huge, luminous eyes. Then he reached for the top button of Sam’s shirt and tugged on it.

Immediately Sam felt an answering tug deep inside, and his hold on the baby tightened as regret speared through him. He’d held babies before. His sister, Jessie, had two. But when they were born, Sam had still believed he would father children of his own someday. Now he knew it was impossible, and holding Joel heightened the aching sense of loss that was never far from Sam’s mind.

“Not your fault, cute stuff,” Sam said, hearing his voice sound husky with emotion. “You’re just the sort of kid I always hoped I’d have.”

Sam had Joel’s full attention. The baby hung onto Sam’s shirt and gave every sign of listening intently. “Yep, I wanted one just like you and one just like…” Sam caught himself about to say “your mother” and substituted, “…well, a little girl.”

At the word “girl,” Joel made muttering noises. Sam felt a smile start. “Don’t like girls, huh? You’ll change your tune one day, when you meet that special lady you can’t live without. I thought I’d found her in my ex-wife, Christine,” he explained to the baby. Joel’s head bobbed as if he understood every word, although Sam knew he couldn’t possibly. “Not that we’re the best example. She was a cover model I met at my publishers’ Christmas party. ‘Course it doesn’t have to turn out the way it did for us,” Sam went on, wondering if he’d gone completely crazy. Why was he telling this to a baby, for goodness sake? But Joel made a good listener, and Sam’s monologue was keeping the baby calm, so he decided it didn’t matter what he said, as long as he used a soothing tone.

“She said she didn’t mind that I couldn’t father children,” he went on in a monotone. “Even had her big shot doctor brother do the tests so we could keep the news in the family. Never did like me, her brother. Thought a writer wasn’t good enough for his sister. Medically speaking, he was right.”

Joel smacked him in the chest. “Bab-bab.”

“Yeah, pretty bad,” Sam agreed. “But then I can’t stand my ex’s brother either, so we’re even. But you don’t want to hear this. Heck, I don’t want to hear this.”

“Hear what?” Haley asked, bounding up the steps. Under her arm she carried a woolly lamb toy. Joel’s eyes lit up at the sight of his plaything and he reached out.

As she took the baby from him, Sam felt a twinge of remorse. “Men’s business,” he said gruffly, annoyed with himself for letting the baby get to him.

He hadn’t been prepared for the way Haley made him feel, either. Watching her settle the child on one hip, Sam felt flames leap inside him.

His sister, Jessie, claimed that the only good thing about being pregnant was the way her breasts filled out. Despite her recent motherhood, Haley’s breasts were still small, but they were in scale with the rest of her trim figure, Sam decided. She wore a wraparound skirt of Oriental-looking material in black and gold, with a black T-shirt that clung to her curves as if poured on. In her arms, the baby fisted a handful of the T-shirt and held on. Sam almost groaned aloud.

Joining them on the steps, Dougal barked and the baby’s eyes widened. Haley bent down, allowing the dog to sniff the infant. “Friend, Dougal,” she said firmly. The dog’s tail bannered and he gave the baby’s hand a gentle lick. Joel gurgled with delight, a smile breaking out on his chubby face. He caught a handful of the dog’s fur and pulled, but Dougal seemed to sense that he wasn’t to respond and stood like a statue. Carefully, Haley untangled the baby’s hand and straightened. Dougal glued himself to her side as if he had every intention of staying there for the next two weeks.

“Much more of that and he won’t want to know me,” Sam said, telling himself he wasn’t bothered by the dog’s apparent defection. Sure, he wasn’t. Any more than he was bothered by the Madonna-and-child image in front of him. Or the empty way his arms felt when Haley took the baby from him.

She looked up and smiled, and the sun came out. “Dogs have plenty of affection to go around. I’m just glad that Joel isn’t scared of him.”

Sam had promised himself he wouldn’t get involved with either Haley or her child, but would settle them in their quarters, brief her on what she was to do while he was away, then get the dickens out of here. Suddenly he felt a powerful urge to stick around. “Joel doesn’t look as if he’s scared of anything,” he said.

“Thunderstorms,” she admitted, jiggling the baby on her hip. “You don’t like bad old storms, do you, pumpkin?”

“He’s scared of storms?”

She nodded. A thunderstorm had been raging the night Ellen passed away and Haley couldn’t help wondering if the baby associated storms with the loss of his mother. She told herself he was far too young and, anyway, most babies disliked loud noises, but she found the connection curious.

Sam used the heavy case to wedge the front door open so she could carry the baby inside. As she passed him in the narrow opening, her hip brushed his. It was the slightest contact, nothing really, but awareness of him vibrated through her, leaving her breathless. This would have to stop. He was The Beast, remember? The baby in her arms ought to remind her, if she needed it.

Sam followed her inside and put her possessions down on the polished parquet floor while he closed the door. “Joel isn’t the only one. I was scared of thunderstorms when I was a boy.”

She knew her expression betrayed her surprise. He looked too overwhelmingly masculine and sure of himself to be scared of anything. “You were?”

He nodded. “When I was four, lightning struck a tree outside my bedroom window, severing a branch that crashed into my room, missing my bed by inches. I hated storms for years afterwards.”

The image of a terrified little boy lying in his bed while a storm raged around him filled her mind. Much as she hated to feel compassion for him, it was impossible not to. “Anyone would feel the same after that.”

“I outgrew it. Joel probably will, too.”

Suddenly she became aware of how close they were standing, almost within kissing distance, she thought, astonishing herself. How would it feel to have his generously proportioned mouth covering hers? Feathers of sensation whispered along her spine and she closed her eyes, the feel of his lips so palpable that her own parted in response.

She opened her eyes in amazement. What was going on here? She was suddenly glad that the baby in her arms provided a tangible barrier between them. Sam was the last man in the world she should fantasize about kissing.

She became aware that he was speaking to her. “I’ve put you in my room.”

“You’ve what?”

“Your room while I’m away,” he said, heading off her objection. “It has a separate dressing room large enough to make a nursery for Joel.”

“Oh, thanks.” How much more foolish could one woman feel? For a minute she’d thought…She drove the idea away by reminding herself that she was here to do a job. Perhaps not the one that Sam had hired her to do, but a job nonetheless.

If Sam suspected her real agenda, he wouldn’t offer her any hospitality, far less the use of his own room for herself and Joel, she knew. Reminding herself that Sam had left her no alternative if she was to obtain justice for Joel didn’t entirely appease her conscience. The sight of the baby’s angelic features helped Haley to harden her heart. Sam had not only rejected his son, but in profiting from Ellen’s idea for the Cosmic Panda character, Sam had robbed Joel of his birthright as well. All Haley needed was proof, and she meant to find it while Sam was away.

Her sister had told Haley the bare bones of the story. As a book illustrator, Ellen had met Sam at a publishing dinner three years before, and she had ended up sketching ideas on the back of a menu. According to Ellen, that was when Cosmic Panda was born.

Haley didn’t know what would have happened if Ellen hadn’t become ill six months after giving Sam the idea for the character. Ellen hadn’t wanted anyone to know how ill she was, and Sam had promised to let her work with him on future Panda books as soon as she recovered. Being Ellen, she had put the work before her own welfare, and had urged Sam to hire another artist in the meantime. The first book had been published to great acclaim. The only name on it was Sam’s.

He had kept his word about hiring Ellen to illustrate the second Panda book when she let him know she was working again. But Haley had read all the publicity, looking in vain for him to give her sister any of the credit. Although plainly disappointed, Ellen had insisted she didn’t want a fuss made. While Ellen lived, Haley had felt bound to abide by her sister’s wishes. Now she was free of that obligation.

As soon as she had evidence that the character had been Ellen’s creation, Haley intended to confront Sam with what she knew. The price Haley wanted for keeping the news to herself was Sam’s acknowledgment of Joel as his son. A fair exchange, really. If Haley had to wrestle her conscience over how she brought it about, so be it.

Her thoughts were interrupted when Sam opened a door off the wide corridor and gestured for her to enter. It was the bedroom she had glimpsed the day she came for the interview, but it looked far neater today. The massive four-poster was made and every surface gleamed.

There was a walk-in closet with several railings cleared so she could hang her own clothes. Another door led to a smaller, light-filled room set up as the nursery, she saw when she went inside. She ran a hand over the glowing timber of the rocking chair. At her touch it moved slightly. Then she caught sight of the hand-carved crib and gave an involuntary gasp of pleasure. “It’s beautiful. I brought Joel’s portable crib but this is much nicer. I’ve never seen one like it. Is it very old?”

“Family heirloom,” he said. “I dug it out of the attic for you.” He didn’t add that his sister had supplied the sheets and blankets and a few other baby things she had to spare, although not without a considerable amount of teasing. She had been convinced that he fancied the baby’s mother.

The trouble was, he did. He had never been so diverted by a woman before. Yet for some reason, she didn’t like him. He knew it as well as he knew his own name. Occasionally she smiled at him in a way that turned his insides to jelly, then she seemed to remind herself that she wasn’t supposed to like him, and the sun would go in. It was a mystery, and he didn’t like mysteries.

The baby was another mystery, reminding him of someone he couldn’t quite place. Telling himself that all babies looked alike didn’t help.

Haley shot him a concerned glance. “You’ve gone to a lot of trouble.”

“I could hardly let Joel sleep in the bottom drawer of a chest.”

But he could deny fathering the baby, the thought tempering her pleasure at the preparations he had made. She placed the baby into the crib while she got herself organized. “It’s time for Joel’s nap,” she said. “I’ll have to change him first and I warn you, it’s not a pretty sight.”

She was doing it again, he saw, freezing him out for no good reason he could fathom. He also resented her assumption that he couldn’t handle a baby’s basic needs. Hadn’t he rustled up the crib and other necessities?

“For your information, I’ve had some practice taking care of my sister’s two babies so I’m not likely to be offended by anything that comes out of either end. But since I’m obviously in your way, I’ll leave you to it. When you’re finished, join me in the library and we’ll go over what I want you to do. It’s the last room at the end of the hall.”

“I remember where it is. I won’t be long.”

“Take your time. As you reminded me, I have a couple of hours up my sleeve. You might like to settle in first.”

“Thank you, I would.”

Her tone would have frosted a martini glass, he thought. At the door, he turned back. “What did I do to make you so mad at me?”

Her eyes betrayed her shock as she looked up from digging through a bag of baby things. “I don’t know what you mean.”

“At the interview, you admitted being mad at Joel’s father, and his absence suggests you have a right to be, but is that any reason to take it out on me? Or do you just dislike men in general?”

She unrolled a thick pad on top of a chest and lifted the baby onto it before saying, “I don’t dislike men.”

“Then it must be me.”

In the act of undressing Joel, she paused. “What makes you think I don’t like you?”

“Your attitude hardly makes you a charter member of the Sam Winton Fan Club.”

“I didn’t realize it was a qualification for your house sitter.”

“You’re dodging the question.”

Her hands stilled again as she gave him a look of exasperation. “I don’t know the answer. I hardly know you. ”

“It wouldn’t be hard to remedy.”

He assumed she wanted a remedy, Haley told herself. She didn’t, did she? She only wanted justice for Joel. Thinking of her reaction to the idea of kissing Sam, she knew she would have to be careful not to lose sight of her goal. “I’ll bear it in mind,” she said.

He looked as if he wanted to say more, then seemed to think better of it, closing the door behind him with such exaggerated care that she was sure it was only to stop himself from slamming it.

What was the matter with him, she asked herself as she removed the baby’s clothes, then dabbed and wiped and powdered, so accustomed to the task that she hardly thought about the steps any more. Usually she used the time to play with Joel, but she was too distracted to do more than make reassuring noises. He didn’t seem to mind. He was too fascinated by a mobile of brightly colored circus clowns and animals hanging from the ceiling. Where had Sam found that? It didn’t look like an heirloom from his attic.

He had mentioned that his sister had children. She could have contributed the mobile and some of the other baby items, Haley concluded. It was a lot to do for someone who was only staying for a couple of weeks.

She thought about his question. Did she hate Sam? She had told herself she did, for the way he had treated Ellen. But he was making it surprisingly hard to do. “Why did he have to fix everything up so nicely for us?” she asked Joel.

The baby kicked and cooed, and she sighed. “You don’t know the answer any more than I do, pumpkin.” She glanced at the closed door. “Why can’t your daddy act like the beast he is, then it would be easy to dislike him?”

“Da-da-da,” the baby gurgled.

She looked at him suspiciously. “Are you trying to say daddy? It’s too soon, isn’t it?”

“Da-da-da,” he repeated.

She felt a sudden flash of jealousy and gathered the now sweet-smelling infant into her arms. “Can you say mama?”

The baby blew a bubble at her and thrust his fingers into her mouth. “Ba.”

“Mama,” she repeated patiently around his fingers.

“Ba. Ba.”

“Ma-ma,” she tried again, then realized that her friend had dozed off in midword. It was probably just as well. It had been a busy morning for Joel, and she was sure the tension between herself and Sam wasn’t helping. Joel didn’t stir when she placed him in the crib and tucked a soft blanket around him. She retrieved his woolly lamb toy from the table, and placed it at the foot of the crib where he would see it if he awoke.

“Sweet dreams,” she whispered, kissing the tip of her finger and touching his forehead. She never tired of watching the baby sleep, but she didn’t want to keep Sam waiting. Despite his invitation to take her time, she decided to leave the unpacking until she had the house to herself.

Sam wasn’t in the library when she got there, but the door to his office stood open and she heard furious muttering coming from it. Curious, she walked in. Sam was frowning over his computer. His hair was disheveled where he’d evidently thrust his fingers through it. He looked every inch a writer and he looked gorgeous.

“Problem?” she asked.

He looked up, as if her arrival had startled him. “New scriptwriting program. Darned thing won’t load properly. Cosmic Panda has been optioned as a TV series and I need the program to write the script,” he explained. “That’s privileged information, by the way. My agent plans to announce it publicly after the tour.”

Hearing that the character he had purloined from Ellen was about to become even more profitable helped her to harden her heart against the urge to go to him and smooth away the lines of worry creasing his brow.

Remembering why he had hired her, she asked, “Do you need the program before you go?” When he shook his head, she said, “Then leave it and I’ll load it for you.”

“I knew you were the person I needed.”

His words and electric smile of gratitude undermined her resolve, and her pulse double-timed as his dark gaze rested on her. “What?”

“You have baby powder on your nose.”

She scrubbed at it with the back of her hand then winced. “Some of it went into my eye.”

He uncoiled from the desk and stood up. “Here, let me help.”

With the grace and purpose of a mountain lion, he stalked to her side and put an arm around her shoulder to pull her closer to the window, into the light. Tilting her head back, he studied her eye for a moment, then released the lid. “Your eye looks clear now. You’ve probably scratched it and that’s why it feels as if something’s still there. If you bathe it, the pain will go away.”

“It’s gone now.” The words came out as a strangled whisper, so aware was she of his touch. She tried to shake herself free of his spell and move away, but her legs felt frozen. Only her mind was vibrantly active, processing how much she liked the feel of his arm around her and the brush of his fingers against her face.

So when he bent his head and kissed her, it felt completely natural and right. Her mouth trembled under his, but she couldn’t summon the will to stop him. Sighing softly, she closed her eyes, seeing stars behind her closed lids as he sipped and nuzzled, touched and tasted.

For such a powerful man, he was gentle, never once taking undue advantage of her startled acquiescence. At the slightest objection from her, he would have released her, she sensed. So say something, stop this, her logical brain urged. She kept silent.

Yet inside her ran a riot of responses that made her blood leap and her heart gather speed. His fingers slid along her jaw, gently caressing, until he reached the pulse at her throat. She felt him register it and wished she could stop the betraying hammering. But she could no more control it than she could tear her mouth away from his. If anything, she wanted more, hungered for it, and the shameful whimper of pleasure she couldn’t restrain told him so.

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