Secrets, Lies & Lullabies

So she got the bedroom fixed up and cleaned but didn’t resupply the bathroom before moving back into the main sitting room. She ran the vacuum over every inch of the rug, just like she was supposed to, but took her time and even poked the nose of the sweeper into the closet near the hallway door. The only thing she found there, however, was the hotel safe, which she knew she didn’t stand a chance of getting into.

The only place left that might hold something of interest to her cousin was the large desk along the far wall. She’d avoided it until now because she suspected she didn’t really want to find anything. She didn’t want to be put in that spot between a rock and a hard place; didn’t want to hand something over to Erin that might put her cousin in an even more precarious situation; didn’t want to stir up trouble and poke at a sore spot within her family that she’d thought was beginning to heal over. She’d thought they were all moving on.

Apparently, she’d been wrong.

Leaving the vacuum nearby, she did a quick sweep of the top of the desk. There were a few sheets of hotel stationery with random notes written on them, but the rest seemed to be the typical items supplied by the lodge. Hotel directory, room-service menu, et cetera.

Inside the desk, though, she found a heck of a lot more. Namely a small stack of manila folders and a laptop computer.

Jessica licked her lips, breathing in shallow bursts that matched the too-fast beat of her heart against her rib cage.

She was not opening that laptop, she just wasn’t. For one thing, that would be too much breaking and entering, and sticking her nose where it didn’t belong, for her peace of mind. For another, it would take too long. By the time it booted up and she figured out how to explore the different files and documents, her supervisor would surely be kicking in the door demanding to know why she was still in this suite when she should have been done with the entire floor.

She was sticking to her guns on this one. Erin might not like that decision, but she would just have to deal with it.

So she stuck with the folders lying beside the laptop, opening them one at a time and scanning them as quickly as possible.

Nothing jumped out at her as being out of the ordinary—not that she really had a clue what she was looking at or for. It was all just business jargon, and she certainly hadn’t gone to business school.

But there was no mention of Taylor Fine Jewels in any of the papers … not that she’d expected there to be. And there was no indication of anything else that put her instincts on red alert.

She was just letting out a huff of air that was part frustration, part relief when she heard a creak and knew someone was entering the suite behind her. Her eyes flashed wide and she all but slammed the desk drawer shut—but slowly and quietly to keep from looking as guilty as she felt.

Putting her hand on the rag that she’d left on top of the desk, she started to wipe it down, just as she was supposed to. Act natural. Act natural. Try not to hyperventilate. Act natural.

Even though she knew darn well someone was behind her … likely standing there staring at her butt in the unappealing, lifeless gray smock that was her work uniform … she didn’t react. She was alone, simply doing her job, as usual. The trick would be to feign surprise when she turned around and “discovered” that she wasn’t alone.

Schooling her breathing … act natural, act natural … she hoped her cheeks weren’t pink with the guilt of a kid caught with her hand in the cookie jar. Luck was on her side, though, because as she finished wiping down the desktop and twisted toward where she’d left the upright vacuum cleaner, whoever was standing behind her, silently monitoring her every move, cleared his throat.

And it was a he. She could tell by the timbre of that low rumble as it reached her ears and skated straight down her spine.

The air caught in her lungs for a moment, and she chastised herself for having such a gut-level, feminine response to something so simple. This man was a complete stranger. Her family’s sworn enemy. And since he was a guest of Mountain View, and she worked for the lodge, he might as well be her employer.

Those were only the first of many reasons why her breathing should not be shallow, her blood should not be heating, and the clearing of his throat should not cause her to shiver inside her skin.

Doing her best to snap herself out of it, she straightened and twisted around, her hand still on the handle of the vacuum cleaner.

“Oh!” she exclaimed, letting her eyes go wide in mock startlement, praying the man standing in front of her wouldn’t see right through it. “Hello again.”

“Hello there,” Alexander Bajoran returned, his mouth curving up in a small smile.

Jessica’s pulse kicked up a notch.

It was nerves, she told herself. Just nerves.

But the truth was, the man was devilishly handsome. Enemy or no enemy, a blind woman would be able to see that.

His ink-black hair was perfectly styled, yet long enough in places to look relaxed and carefree. Eyes the color of blue ice glittered against skin that was surprisingly tan for a resident of the Pacific Northwest. But she knew for a fact it wasn’t the result of time spent in tanning beds or spray-on booths; the entire Bajoran family leaned toward dark skin, dark hair … and ruthless personalities.

She had to remember that. The ruthless part, anyway.

Never mind how amazing he looked in his black dress slacks and dark blue blazer. Like he belonged on the cover of GQ. Or Forbes, thanks to his ill-gotten millions.

Never mind that if she saw him on the street, she would probably give herself whiplash spinning around to get a second look.

“We seem to have conflicting schedules this week,” he said in a light, amused tone. His voice immediately touched deep, dark places inside of her that she really didn’t want to think about.

He gave her a look, one she’d seen thousands of times in her adult life and had no trouble recognizing. Then his voice dropped a fraction, becoming sensual and suggestive.

“Or maybe they’re matching up just right.”

The heat of his voice was like sunshine on budding little seedlings, making something low in her belly shiver, quiver and begin to unfurl.

Oh, no. No, no, no. No more charming-but-dangerous men for her—and Alexander Bajoran was the most dangerous of all.

She’d been hit on and leered at by any number of male guests in her time at Mountain View. Traveling businessmen, vacationing husbands with a wandering eye, rich but useless playboys with a sense of entitlement.… But whether they’d pinched her on the rear, slipped her hundred-dollar tips or attempted simple flattery, she had never once been attracted to a single one of them.

Yet here she was, face-to-face with the man who had stolen her family’s company and whom she was supposed to be spying on, and caterpillars were crawling around under every inch of her skin.

He took a step toward her, and her hands fisted, one around the handle of the vacuum, the other near her right hip. But all he did was set his briefcase—which was really more of a soft leather messenger bag—on the nearby coffee table before sinking into the overstuffed cushions of the sofa behind it.

Releasing a pent-up breath and sending some of those annoying creepy-crawlies away with it, Jessica reached down to unplug the sweeper and started to coil up the cord. The sooner she got out of there now that he was back, the better.

“I can leave you alone, if you need to work,” she said, because the growing silence in the room was killing her.

But even though he had the brown leather satchel open on the glass-topped table and had pulled out several stacks of paperwork, he shook his head.

“Go ahead and finish what you were doing,” he told her. “I’ve just got a couple of things to look over, but you won’t distract me. In fact, the background noise might do me some good.”

Well, shoot. How was she supposed to make a smooth but timely exit now?

She guessed she wasn’t.

Dragging the vacuum across the sitting room, she set it in the hallway just outside the door of the suite. Then she gathered up an armful of fresh towels and washcloths for the bathroom.

It wasn’t hard to go about her business this far away from Alexander. It was almost as though the air was normal in this tiled, insulated room instead of thick with nerves and guilt and unspoken sexual awareness. From her standpoint, at any rate. From his the air probably seemed absolutely normal. After all, he wasn’t the one snooping, breaking the law, fighting a completely unwanted sexual attraction to someone he was supposed to hate.

She spent an inordinate amount of time making sure the towels hung just right on the towel rods and were perfectly even in their little cubbies under the vanity. Even longer putting out new bottles of shampoo, conditioner, mouthwash and shaving cream.

There were decorative mints and chocolates to go on the pillows in the bedroom, but she didn’t want to go back in there. From the bathroom she could wave a hasty goodbye and get the heck out of Dodge. But if she returned to the bedroom, she would have to pass by Alexander. See him, smile at him, risk having him speak to her again.

That was one corner she was willing to cut today. Even if he complained to her superiors and she got in trouble later, missing mints were easier to apologize for than snooping or blushing herself into heat stroke in front of a valued guest.

Stepping out of the marble-and-gilt bathroom, she rounded the corner and was just congratulating herself on a narrow escape when she lifted her head and almost ran smack into Alexander, who was leaning against the outside wall waiting for her.

She made a tiny eep sound, slapping a hand over her heart as she bounced back on her heels.

“Sorry,” he apologized, reaching out to steady her. “Didn’t mean to scare you, I just wanted to catch you before you took off.”

If ever there was a word she didn’t want to hear pass this man’s lips, it was catch. Was she caught? Had he noticed something out of place? Figured out that she’d rifled through his things?

She held her breath, waiting for the accusations he had every right to fling at her.

Instead, as soon as he was sure she wasn’t going to topple over, he let go of her elbow and went back to leaning negligently against the wall. It was a casual pose, but all Jessica could think was that he was standing between her and the door, blocking her only exit from the suite.

“I know this is probably out of line,” he murmured, “but I was hoping you’d have dinner with me tonight.”

His words caused her heart to stutter and then stall out completely for several long seconds.

“I’m here on business, so after I finish with meetings and such during the day, my evening hours are a bit … empty.”

He shrugged a shoulder, and because he’d taken off the blazer, she could see the play of muscle caused by the movement beneath his crisp white dress shirt. Something so minor shouldn’t make her hormones sit up and take notice, but they did. Boy, howdy, did they ever.

Licking her lips, she cleared her throat and hoped her voice didn’t squeak when she tried to speak. It was bad enough that her face was aflame with nerves; she could feel the heat all but setting her eyelashes on fire. She already looked like a clown, in many people’s estimation—she didn’t need to open her mouth and sound like one, too.

“Thank you, but fraternizing with guests is against resort policy.”

Ooh, that sounded good. Very confident and professional—and squeak-free.

Alexander lifted a brow. “Somehow I find it hard to believe a woman with blue hair is afraid of breaking a few rules.”

She reached up to toy with the strip of chemically altered hair he was referring to. “It’s not all blue,” she muttered.

That bought her a too-handsome grin and flash of very white, perfectly straight teeth. “Just enough to let the world know you’re a rebel, right?”

Wow, he had her pegged, didn’t he? And he wasn’t taking no, thank you, for an answer.

Dropping the hank of hair, Jessica pushed her shoulders back. She was a rebel, as well as a confident, self-reliant woman. But she wasn’t stupid.

“I could lose my job,” she said simply.

He cocked his head. She wasn’t the only self-assured person in the room.

“But you won’t,” he told her matter-of-factly. Then, after a brief pause, he added, “Would it make you feel better if I said I won’t let that happen?”

With anybody else she would have scoffed. But knowing who Alexander Bajoran was and the power he held—even here in Portland—she had no doubt he meant what he said and had enough influence to make it stick.

“You’ll be on your own time, not the resort’s,” he pointed out. “And I’ll let you decide whether we order from room service or go out somewhere else.”

She should say no. Any sensible person would. The entire situation screamed danger with a capital D.

But she had to admit, she was curious. She’d had male guests proposition her before, give her that salacious, skin-crawling look reserved for when they were on out-of-town business trips without their wives and thought they could get away with something.

Alexander was the first, though, to ask her to dinner without the creepy looks or attempts at groping. Which made her wonder why he was interested.

Did he suspect her of snooping around where she didn’t belong, or was he just hitting on a pretty, no-strings-attached maid? Did he recognize her as a Taylor and think she was up to something, or just hope to get lucky?

Of course she was up to something, but now she wanted to know if he was up to something, too.

So even though she knew she should be running a hundred miles an hour in the opposite direction, she opened her mouth and made the biggest mistake of her life.

“All right.”

Three

Jessica didn’t get many opportunities to dress up these days. But she was having dinner this evening with a very wealthy, very handsome man, and even though she knew it was a terrible idea, she wanted to make the most of it. Not so much the man and the dinner but simply the act of going out and feeling special for a little while. Putting on something pretty rather than functional. Taking extra time with her makeup and hair. Wearing heels instead of ratty old tennies.

She even went so far as to dab on a couple drops of what was left of her favorite three-hundred-dollar-an-ounce designer perfume, Fanta C. Alexander Bajoran might not be worth a spritz or two, but she certainly was.

She was wearing a plain black skirt and flowy white blouse with a long, multi-strand necklace and large gold hoop earrings in her primary holes. The others held her usual array of studs and smaller hoops.

As she strode down the carpeted hallway, she fiddled with every part of her outfit. Was her skirt too short? Did her blouse show too much cleavage? Would the necklace draw Alexander’s eye to her breasts? Or worse yet, would the earrings pull too much of his attention to her face?

Flirting—even flirting with danger this way—was one thing. Truly risking being recognized by her family’s greatest enemy, though … No, she didn’t want that.

Which was why she’d chosen to meet him here, in his room at the resort, rather than going out to a public restaurant where they might be seen by someone they—especially she—knew.

Getting caught in a guest’s room after work hours would be bad, but being spotted out on a date with Alexander by one of her relatives or somebody who might tell one of her relatives would be exponentially worse. She would rather be fired than deal with the familial fallout.

Reaching the door of his suite, Jessica stopped and took a deep breath. She straightened her clothes and jewelry for the thousandth time and checked her small clutch purse to be sure she had her cell phone, a lipstick, a few bucks just in case. She didn’t know if she would end up needing any of those things, but wanted to have them, all the same.

When there was nothing left to double-check, no other reason to put off the inevitable, she took another deep, stabilizing breath, held it and let it out slowly as she tapped on the door.

The nerves she’d tamped down started to wiggle back toward the surface as she waited for him to answer. Then suddenly the door swung open, and there he was.

Six foot something of dark, imposing good-looks. Slacks still smooth and pressed, despite being worn all day. Pale, pale lavender dress shirt unbuttoned at his throat and sleeves rolled up to his elbows, but no less distinguished than when he’d been wearing a tie and suit jacket.

He smiled in welcome and a lump formed in her throat, making it hard to swallow. Suddenly she was almost pathologically afraid to be alone with him. It was two mature adults sharing a simple meal, but almost as though she was watching a horror movie, she could see around all the corners to where scary things and maniacal killers waited.

A thousand frightening scenarios and terrible outcomes flitted through her brain in the nanosecond it took him to say hello—or rather, a deep, masculine, “Hi, there”—and step back to let her into the suite.

She could have run. She could have begged off, hurriedly telling him she’d changed her mind, or that something important had come up and she couldn’t stay.

She probably should have.

Instead, a tiny voice in her head whispered, What’s the worst that can happen? and showed her images of a lovely, delicious meal at an establishment where she worked but never got the chance to indulge, with an attractive man the likes of which she probably wouldn’t meet again for a very long time. Not given her current circumstances.

So she didn’t run. She told herself she was here, he was a gentleman, and everything would be fine.

“Thank you,” she murmured, surprised when her voice not only didn’t crack, but came out in a low, almost smoky tone that sounded a lot sexier than she’d intended.

She stepped into the suite, and he closed the door behind her with a soft click. More familiar with these rooms than she cared to admit, she moved down the short hallway and into the sitting room where there was already a table set up with white linens and covered silver serving trays.

“I hope you don’t mind, but I took the liberty of ordering,” Alexander said, coming up behind her. “I thought it would save some time.”

True enough. Mountain View employed one of the best chefs in the country and served some of the best food on the West Coast, but room service was room service. It sometimes took longer than guests might have liked for their meals to arrive, especially if the kitchen was busy trying to get food out to the dining room.

Cupping her elbow, he steered her around the table and pulled out her chair. She tried not to let the heat of his hand do funny things to her pulse. Of course, her pulse had a mind of its own.

He helped her get seated, then began uncovering plates of food. The smells hit her first, and they were divine. Even before she could identify them all, she saw that he’d ordered a sampling of some of the very best culinary creations the resort had to offer.

From the appetizer section of the menu he’d asked for watermelon gazpacho with tomato; cucumber and borage; seafood tomato bisque; eggplant ravioli; and oysters in red wine mignonette.

As entrées, he’d gone with pheasant with green cabbage, port wine-infused pear and black truffle shavings, and something she could rarely resist—crab cakes. Mountain View’s particular recipe consisted of large chunks of Dungeness crab, tiny bits of lobster, corn and faro lightly seared to a golden brown.

He had no way of knowing they were one of her all-time favorites, though. Most likely he’d ordered them because they were nearly world renowned and one of the most popular items on the resort’s menu.

But her stomach rumbled and her mouth began to water at the very sight. She might work here, might have skated past the kitchen or dining room a time or two, but since she couldn’t exactly afford fifty-dollar-a-plate dinners any longer, she’d never been lucky enough to actually taste them.

“I hope there’s something here you’ll like.”

Like? She wanted to take her clothes off and roll around on the table of food, then lick her body clean.

Because she wasn’t certain she could speak past the drool pooling on her tongue, she merely nodded and made an approving mmm-hmm sound.

“I ordered dessert, as well, but let’s wait until we finish this before we dig into that.”

Oh. She’d heard wonderful things about Mountain View’s desserts, too.

“So …” he murmured, “where would you like to start? Or should I just hand over the crab cakes before someone gets hurt?”

The mention of crab cakes and the slight amusement in his tone brought her head up, and she realized she’d been concentrating rather intensely on that particular platter.

“Sorry, they just … smell really good.”

He grinned at her candid response. Reaching to the side and lifting the plate, he set it back down directly in front of her.

“They’re all yours,” he told her. “As long as you don’t mind if I keep the pheasant to myself.”

Well, she would have liked at least a tiny bite—she’d never had the pleasure of trying that particular dish, either—but if the crab cakes were as delicious as they looked, smelled and she’d heard they were, she supposed it was a sacrifice worth making.

Her silence seemed to be answer enough. He moved the pheasant to his place setting, then reached for the bottle of wine in the center of the table and pulled the cork. While she shook out her napkin and laid it across her lap, he poured two glasses of the rich, dark liquid and handed one to her.

She took it with a murmured thank-you and brought it to her nose for a sniff. Mmm. It had been a while since she’d enjoyed a glass of really good, expensive wine. This one was full-bodied, with the scents of fruit, spice and just a hint of chocolate.

She was tempted to take a sip right away, but didn’t want to ruin her first taste of the crab cakes and had also promised herself she would be careful tonight. A little bit of wine with dinner wouldn’t hurt, but she didn’t want to risk drinking too much and forgetting who she was … who he was … and exactly how much was on the line if she accidentally let any part of the truth slip past her lips.

So she set the glass aside and picked up her fork instead.

“At the risk of scaring you off now that you’re already here,” Alexander said, shaking out his own napkin and placing it across his lap, “it occurred to me that I invited you to dinner tonight without even knowing your name. Or introducing myself, for that matter.”

Jessica paused with her first bite of crab cake halfway to her mouth. Uh-oh. She hadn’t been concerned with introducing herself to Alexander because she already knew who he was. And keeping her own identity under wraps was critical, so she hadn’t exactly been eager to share that information, either.

Now, however, she was cornered, and she’d better come up with a response soon or he would start to get suspicious.

To buy herself a little bit of time, she continued the trajectory of her fork and went ahead with that first bite of food she’d so been looking forward to. Her anticipation was dampened slightly by the tension thrumming through her body and causing her mind to race, but that didn’t keep her taste buds from leaping with joy at the exquisite spices and textures filling her mouth.

Oh, this was so worth the stress and subterfuge of pretending to be someone she wasn’t. With luck she would only have to lie to him for one night, and not only would he be none the wiser, but she’d have the experience of a lovely meal with a handsome, wealthy playboy-type tucked away in her memory banks.