she was a bit miffed that you left Sammy with her.”
A spy who cooked? That was unique…unless she was planning to poison him. But he didn’t think she was here to do away with him, just to see what he knew about the king’s disappearance.
“I know she was upset with me, but I didn’t arrange for yet another baby-sitter because I thought you’d be moved in by noon.”
“I’m sorry. Something came up with Isabel.”
“I understand.”
Jake pressed a thumb into his temple. The strain really was getting to him. Rowena was no spy. She was a lady-in-waiting, a glorified maid who happened to be very good with children. She was here as a nanny, not a spy.
That was why they had him up at the palace the best part of every day. So the ones who were qualified could watch him in the comfort of their own home.
“You don’t have to cook. Why don’t you go get yours and Sammy’s things and we’ll go to a restaurant. Know a good one?”
She stared at him as if he’d turned blue. “You want me to come with you?”
“You don’t want to?”
“It’s not that. It’s just…Why?”
Her amazement surprised him. Surely she’d gone to fancy restaurants on all her high-powered dates. “I don’t know. Because you’re hungry?”
She cocked her face and peered at him sideways. “I’d rather cook, if it’s all the same to you.”
“Fine. I just wanted to save you the trouble. You’ve been with Sammy all afternoon, and I know how exhausting that can be.” He butted Sammy’s knee with a fist. “No offense, little guy.”
Sammy giggled.
“I’m fine,” Rowena insisted. “And don’t worry. I won’t poison you. I cooked all my father’s meals after my mother died when I was twelve. I’m quite a good cook.”
“I didn’t think…” He glanced away guilty. The thought had occurred to him. “Never mind.”
Her words relieved the last vestiges of suspicion, and Jake’s stomach chose that moment to grumble about not eating since breakfast.
Rowena chuckled, and finally relaxed. “It’s not your mind that’s complaining.”
“You really don’t have to cook, you know.”
“Tell that to your stomach.” With a hand on Sammy’s bottom, she pushed him to his feet. “Sammy and I laid out everything in the kitchen. It will only take half an hour.”
Since she was determined, Jake rose and held out a hand.
She paused with both hands on the floor, glanced at his hand, then up at him.
“It won’t poison you,” he said softly.
She didn’t retort, or even smile. After a noticeable hesitation, she gingerly placed her hand in his.
Jake wrapped his long fingers around her slender hand and pulled her to her feet. Her weight was so slight and he was feeling so unnerved, he miscalculated and pulled with enough force to yank her against him.
“Oh,” they said in unison.
She lifted her head, then they both went still.
Her startled golden gaze mesmerized him, narrowing his awareness to the space around them. Her lips could be featured in an ad for collagen injections. They were lusciously moist and slightly parted in surprise. Her breathing was shallow and rapid.
She trembled ever so slightly in his arms. With fear? Desire? Both?
Jake could feel her left fist digging into his chest. Her right hand was still captured in his left. Her slight weight leaned into him, one leg braced between his.
He wanted to do far more than kiss her, and the feeling jarred him back to reality.
He couldn’t touch her. She was too much like Annette.
She stepped back a second before he let her go.
Without glancing up, she murmured, “Sorry. I’ll…I’ll…Oh yes. I’ll go prepare dinner.”
He watched as she fled the room.
Her discomfiture told him two things. She was attracted to him as well, and she was fighting it just as hard.
The only reason for that he could come up with was that he didn’t have a title.
“Daddy, play with me.”
Jake turned his attention to his son, convinced he’d done the right thing.
Rowena knocked softly, then pushed open the door between the dining room and the parlor with the intention of telling Jake and Sammy their dinner was ready.
Instead, she hesitated.
Father and son were sitting together in a burgundy damask wingback chair by a window open to let in a soft spring breeze and the sound of the surf below. The last rays of the sun caught the side of Jake’s face, making the strong lines seem even more angular.
Jake’s long legs were stretched out on an ottoman as he concentrated on a stack of papers in his lap. He’d rolled up his shirtsleeves and tucked his son into the crook of his left arm.
Sammy’s little legs barely reached the end of the chair cushion. His attention was riveted on a book laid open across his own lap. He turned the pages slowly and carefully.
Rowena’s face relaxed into a smile. What a heartwarming picture they made. A loving father and an adoring son.
How could such a man have kidnapped the king? His very own uncle? Family seemed important to Jake. She’d never seen a father as attentive as he was to Sammy. And though his overtures were hesitant, he took every opportunity to spend time with his newfound cousins.
Was that all for show?
Rowena shook away the tender feelings.
Jake was a suspect in the king’s disappearance. That’s what she had to concentrate on—trying to find evidence that would incriminate him, which would exonerate Isabel’s brother, Nicholas.
Rowena had promised Isabel she’d search high and low for evidence…but now that she was here, she found it difficult to believe Jake capable of such a crime—which meant she had to concentrate doubly hard on her purpose in being here.
Even if she hadn’t already known, the incident earlier had proven she was strongly attracted to Jake. She’d almost pushed up on her toes and kissed the man…right there in front of Sammy.
Her stupid attraction was the reason she didn’t believe he was guilty. She didn’t want to believe it. That, and the unhappy realization that finding Jake guilty—a man who loved his son so much—would leave Sammy fatherless.
