to Polly, their client was a lawyer. And judging by the real estate surrounding his home, he was a wildly successful one at that. Cara doubted that her yearly earnings could even pay for a building lot in the area.
In the gathering dusk, she caught a glimpse of a pair of wrought-iron gates tipped with brass. The numbers corresponded to those she’d scrawled on her planner.
“Bingo,” she whispered under her breath, rolling to a stop in front of the security monitor and pressing the call button. Within seconds her summons was answered by a baritone, “Yes?”
“Hello, Mr.—” she glanced at her paper “—Mr. Gifford. I’m Cara Wells from the Mom Squad. I believe you were notified that I would be coming to watch your children tonight rather than Melba Wilson.”
There was a soft, nearly imperceptible whirring sound from behind a small glass screen, and Cara resisted the urge to mug for the camera that had probably been focused on her. Ahh, the drawbacks of wealth. Constant security and the constant threat of risk. Cara would take concerned neighbors, dead bolts and peepholes on her doors over high-tech electronic surveillance equipment any day.
“Will you hold your ID up to the camera please.”
Evidently Mr. Gifford was even more paranoid than most, she thought as she retrieved her wallet from her purse and held it up to the lens of the camera. She didn’t think many would-be thieves or kidnappers would be riding around town in such a conspicuous van. Banking on the fact that a company car would help promote some free advertising, the Mom Squad had a small fleet of pink and blue vans complete with huge plastic booties attached to the roofs.
“Drive on in.”
With no more fanfare than that the gates slid open, allowing Cara to roll onto a brick driveway laid in a herringbone pattern.
“Pretty ritzy,” Cara murmured to herself. She grew even more impressed when the driveway began winding through stands of huge evergreens and oaks—the sort of transplanted foliage that had probably been fully grown and transplanted onto the lot within the last few years. Through the trees she caught a glimpse of emerald-green lawns, a pond complete with ducks and swans and…
Was that a deer? Was the place actually home to deer, or had they come down from the mountain and jumped the fence?
“I hope they had ID with them,” she muttered under her breath, then laughed. No, the animals had to have been transplanted onto the grounds, as well. From the encounter she’d had at the gate, she doubted Ross Gifford would ever allow anything so untidy as unwanted deer—especially if the landscaping was any indication. As she continued to wind her way up the hill, she didn’t see a stray leaf, a straggly bush or a withered flower. Everything was theme-park perfect and slightly…unreal.
“Big money,” she murmured to herself. “Big, big money.”
No wonder he was so careful about checking her out. That much money had to make a person paranoid, especially with young children around. Nevertheless, she couldn’t help wondering why Ross didn’t have a full-time nanny and a fleet of governesses. Wasn’t that what wealthy people did with their children?
Realizing she was judging the man and she hadn’t even met him yet, she took a deep breath. Rather than second-guess him, she should be relieved that Ross Gifford was a client of the Mom Squad. And the fact that he was so careful with his children’s welfare should bring him up a notch in her estimation. Cara was just as protective of the twins’ welfare, preferring to use close friends or Mom Squad associates on those rare occasions when she needed a sitter.
Without warning the trees suddenly parted and the road curved to reveal the house. A muted “Wow” burst from her lips, and she unconsciously stopped. If she didn’t know better, she would have thought she had stepped back in time. In front of her lay a modern-day castle complete with field-stone walls, mullioned windows and a pair of round turrets.
“I don’t think we’re in Kansas anymore,” Cara whispered, then, realizing she’d slipped into her habit of talking to herself, she snapped her jaw closed. It wouldn’t do to talk to herself in front of Ross Gifford. Judging by this house, he was an important client to the Mom Squad. A very, very important client.
Cara immediately became conscious of her worn jeans, scuffed sneakers and finger-tossed hair. Then, frantically, she looked for a place to park, knowing the van had a tiny oil leak that she hadn’t seen to yet.
When it became obvious that the entire road was made of the same herringbone brick, she chose an inconspicuous spot next to a flowerbed. “Please, please don’t leak,” she whispered to the car, then offered the van a friendly pat on the steering wheel.
She took a moment to look in the mirror, then grimaced. The heat and her busy day had caused her hair to poke out at all angles. And even though she’d adopted a short pixie-like cut in an effort to tame the natural curls, she didn’t think her hairdresser had intended it to look so…untidy.
“Damn.” Then remembering she’d vowed not to talk to herself, she bit her lip and slid outside.
After slamming the door, Cara slung a duffel bag full of games, storybooks and puppet paraphernalia over her shoulder, then hurried up to the front door.
Even his door was rich and elegant, she decided with a grimace. It looked as if it had been carved from a single span of oak. Wrought-iron studs and huge rings rather than doorknobs carried out the castle theme.
A glance at her watch reassured her that she had arrived on the dot of seven. Since Ross Gifford already knew she had arrived, she debated whether or not to ring the doorbell. With her luck, he wouldn’t have a doorbell. More likely he had Quasimodo sequestered in one of the towers.
When the thought caused a burst of nervous laughter, she turned away to school her features. Almost against her will, her eyes absorbed the pristine landscaping and a house large enough to contain an orphanage. Just as she’d thought, there were deer grazing in the grass near the pond. The docile animals seemed perfectly at ease, and why wouldn’t they be? They must be thinking they were in deer nirvana.
“Amazing. Absolutely amazing.”
Again she pressed her lips together to keep from saying anything more out loud. She might be amazed and she might be impressed, but she had to keep her thoughts to herself. After all, she was merely the hired help for the evening. It didn’t matter that the fieldstone still held a portion of the day’s heat. Or that the colors of the rock made the house look as if it had stood on the site for hundreds of years. Nor was it any of her business that the absolute perfection of the scene gave Cara the willies—as if she were surveying a movie set and everything she saw was an illusion.
The sound of a throat being cleared caused her to jump and she turned.
He did have Quasimodo working for him.
No. Not Quasimodo, she quickly amended. The man who stood in front of her was far too tall, too rigid, too stiff and formal to be the bell-ringing hero of the twins’ favorite cartoon. His dark suit, crisp starched tie and gleaming black shoes bespoke a man who paid attention to details.
“Good evening, Miss Wells.”
The British accent immediately revealed that he wasn’t the same man who’d asked to see her identification.
“I’m from the Mom Squad.”
“Yes.
