been unexpectedly kind to her at the theater when he’d taken her with the girls to see the movie. She still tingled, remembering his hand holding hers. This, however, was much worse. Her breasts were almost bare in the thin blouse, and she felt the hard muscular wall of his chest with wonder and pleasure and a little fear, because she’d never felt such heady sensations in her body before. She wondered if he’d fire her for making a scene at this pool party, to which a lot of very wealthy and prominent cattlemen and their wives had been invited.
To give him credit, she hadn’t exactly inspired confidence on the job in the past few weeks. Two weeks earlier, she tripped on the front steps and landed in a rosebush at the very feet of a visiting cattleman from Texas who’d almost turned purple trying not to laugh. Then there had been the ice-cream incident last week, which still embarrassed her. Bess had threatened Kasie with a big glop of chocolate ice cream. While Kasie was backing away, laughing helplessly, Gil had come into the house in dirty chaps and boots and shirt with his hat jerked low over one blue eye and his mouth a thin line, with blood streaming from a cut on his forehead. Bess had thrown the ice cream at Kasie, who ducked, just in time for it to hit Gil right in the forehead. While he was wiping it off, Kasie grabbed the spoon from Bess and waited for the explosion as her boss wiped the ice cream away and looked at her. Those blue eyes could cut like diamonds. They actually glittered. But he hadn’t said a word. He’d just looked at her, before he turned and continued down the hall to the staircase that led up to his room.
Now, here she was half-drowned from a swimming pool accident, having made a spectacle of herself yet again.
“I wonder if I could get work in Hollywood?” she sputtered as she hung on for dear life. “There must be a market for terminal clumsiness somewhere!”
Gil raised an eyebrow and gave her a slow, speaking glance before he pulled her close against his chest and turned toward the concrete steps at the far end. He walked up out of the pool, streaming water, and started toward the house. “Don’t struggle, Kasie,” he said at her temple, and his voice sounded odd.
“Sorry,” she coughed. “You can put me down, now. I’m okay. I can walk.”
“If I put you down, you’re going to become the entertainment,” he said enigmatically at her ear. He looked over his shoulder. “John, look after the girls until I get back!” he called.
“Oh, I’ll watch them, Gil!” Pauline interrupted lazily. “Come over here, girls!” she called, without even looking in their direction.
“John will watch them,” Gil said emphatically and didn’t move until his lean, lanky brother jumped up and went toward his nieces, grinning.
Gil went up the staircase with Kasie held close to his chest. “Why can’t you swim?” he asked.
His deep, slow voice made her feel funny. So did the close, almost intimate contact with him. She nibbled on her lower lip, feeling soggy and disheveled and embarrassed. “I’m afraid of the water.”
“Why?” he persisted.
She wouldn’t answer him. It would do no good, and she didn’t want to remember. Probably he’d never seen anyone drown. “Sorry I messed up the pool party,” she murmured.
He shook her gently as they passed the landing and paused at her bedroom door. “Stop apologizing every second word,” he said curtly as he put her down. He held her there with two big, lean hands on her upper arms and studied her intently in the dim light of the wall sconces.
The feel of all that warm strength against her made her giddy. She’d never been so close to him before. He was ten years older than Kasie, and he had an authority and maturity that must have been apparent even when he’d been her age. She had tried to think of him as Bess and Jenny’s daddy, but after their closeness at the movie theater, it was almost impossible to think of him as anything but a mature, sexy man.
“I can’t seem to make you understand that the girls are Miss Parsons’ responsibility, not yours!” He saw her faint flush and scowled down at her. “Speaking of Miss Parsons, where in hell is she?”
She cleared her throat and pushed back a soggy strand of dark hair. “She’s in the office.”
“Doing what?”
She shifted, but he didn’t let go of her arms. That unblinking, ferocious blue stare robbed her of a smart retort. “All right,” she said heavily. “She’s doing the withholding on John’s tax readout.” He didn’t speak. She looked up and grimaced. “Well, I’m not up on tax law, and she is.”
“So you traded duties without permission, is that it?”
She hesitated. “Yes. I’m sorry. But it’s just for today! You already know that she doesn’t…well, she doesn’t like children very much, really, and I hate taxes…”
“I know.”
“I shouldn’t have given them the beach ball. I thought they were going into the shallow part of the pool with it. And then Bess threw it…”
“Right at Pauline’s expensive new coiffure,” Gil finished for her. He pursed his sensuous lips and searched her face. “You won’t tell on them, of course. You took the blame for the ice cream, too. And when one of Jenny’s toys tripped you on the front steps and you went into the rosebush, you blamed that on clumsiness.”
“You knew?” she asked, surprised.
“I’ve been a father for five years,” he mused. “I know all sorts of things.” His pale blue eyes slid very slowly down Kasie’s wet dress and narrowed on what was showing. She had the most delicious body. Every line and curve of it was on view where the thin dress was plastered to her body. Her breasts were perfectly shaped and the nipples were dusky. The feel of her against his chest, even through her wet blouse and his cotton shirt, had almost knocked the breath out of him. It upset him that he was noticing these things about her. He was beginning to react to them, too. He had to get out of here. She was so young…
He cursed under his breath. “You’d better change,” he said curtly. He turned on his heel and went toward the staircase.
“About Miss Parsons…!” she called after him, in one last attempt to ward off retribution.
“You might as well consider the girls your job from now on,” he said angrily. “I can see that it’s a losing battle to keep you away from them. I’ll give Miss Parsons to John. He won’t enjoy the view as much, but keeping out of prison because we can’t figure out tax forms might sweeten the deal,” he said, without breaking stride. “When you have some spare time, you can continue giving Pauline computer lessons. That includes Monday morning. Mrs. Charters can watch the girls while you work with Pauline.”
“But I’m not a trained governess. I’m a secretary!” she insisted.
“Great. You can let Bess dictate letters to you for her dolls.”
“But…!”
It was too late. He never argued. He just kept walking. She threw up her hands and went back into her room. She started toward the bathroom to change out of her wet things when she got a look at herself in the mirror. The whole outfit was transparent. She remembered Gil’s intent stare and blushed all the way to her toes. No wonder he’d been looking at her. Everything she had was on view! She wondered how she’d ever be able to look him in the eye again.
She
