“You didn’t.”
He took a step closer to her, knowing that he was close to stepping over a line that he shouldn’t but too tempted by this woman to care. “You didn’t think I was propositioning you?”
“Of course not,” she denied, though her blush suggested otherwise.
“Why ‘of course not’?” he asked curiously.
She dropped her gaze. “Because a man like you—a prince—would never be interested in someone like me.”
There was a time when he’d thought he would never be interested in anyone who wasn’t Sam, but the past ten days had proven otherwise. Even when he wasn’t near Hannah, he was thinking about her, wanting her. He knew that he shouldn’t, but that knowledge did nothing to diminish his desire.
“You’re an attractive woman, Hannah. It would be a mistake to assume that any man would not be interested.”
“You’re confusing me,” she admitted. “In one breath, you say that you’re not propositioning me, and in the next, you say that you find me attractive.”
“Actually, my comment was more objective than subjective,” he told her. “But while I do think you’re a very attractive woman, I didn’t hire you in order to pursue a personal relationship with you.”
“Okay,” she said, still sounding wary.
Not that he could blame her. Because even as he was saying one thing, he was thinking something else entirely.
“In fact, I wouldn’t have invited you to spend the summer here if I thought there was any danger of an attraction leading to anything else.”
“Okay,” she said again.
“I just want you to understand that I didn’t intend for this to happen at all,” he said, and slid his arms around her.
“What is happening?” she asked, a little breathlessly.
“This,” he said.
And then he kissed her.
Chapter Eight
She hadn’t anticipated the touch of his lips to hers.
Maybe it was because her head was already spinning, trying to follow the thread of their conversation. Or maybe it was because she would never, in a million years, have anticipated that Prince Michael might kiss her. But whatever the reason, Hannah was caught completely off guard when the prince’s mouth pressed against hers.
Maybe she should have protested. Maybe she should have pushed him away. But the fact was, with the prince’s deliciously firm and undeniably skillful lips moving over hers, she was incapable of coherent thought or rational response. And instead of protesting, she yielded; instead of pushing him away, she pressed closer.
It was instinct that caused her to lift her arms and link them behind his head, and desire—pure and simple—that had her lips parting beneath the coaxing pressure of his. Then his tongue brushed against hers, and everything inside of her quivered.
Had she ever been kissed like this? Wanted like this? She didn’t know; she couldn’t think. Nothing in her limited experience had prepared her for the masterful seduction of his lips. And when his hands skimmed over her, boldly sweeping down her back and over her buttocks, pulling her closer, she nearly melted into a puddle at his feet.
She couldn’t have said how long the kiss lasted.
Minutes? Hours? Days?
It seemed like forever—and not nearly long enough.
When he finally eased his lips from hers, she nearly whimpered with regret.
Then she opened her eyes, and clearly saw the regret in his.
It was like a knife to the heart that only moments before had been bubbling over with joy. Being kissed by Prince Michael was, for Hannah, a dream come true. But for Prince Michael, kissing her had obviously been a mistake, a momentary error in judgment.
Her hand moved to her mouth, her fingertips trembling as they pressed against her still-tingling lips. Everything inside her was trembling, aching, yearning, even as he was visibly withdrawing.
“I’m sorry.” He took another step back. “I shouldn’t have done that.”
He was right. Of course, he was right. What had happened—even if it was just a kiss—should never have happened. He was Riley’s father and her employer. But, even more importantly, he was a prince and she was not a princess. She was nobody.
That was a lesson she should have learned years ago, when Harrison Parker had taken back his ring because she didn’t have a pedigree deemed suitable by his family. But all it had taken was one touch from the prince, and she’d forgotten everything but how much she wanted him.
How had it happened? One minute they’d been arguing and in the next he’d claimed that he was attracted to her. Then he’d kissed her as if he really wanted to. And when he’d held her close, his arms wrapped around her, his body pressed against hers, she’d had no doubt about his desire. But then he’d pulled away, making it clear that he didn’t want to want her.
Proving, once again, that she simply wasn’t good enough.
“Hannah?”
She had to blink away the tears that stung her eyes before she could look at him.
“Are you okay?”
The evident concern in his voice helped her to steel her spine. “I’m fine, Your Highness. It wasn’t a big deal.”
He frowned, and she wondered—for just a moment—if he might dispute her statement. If maybe he, too, felt that it had been a big deal.
But in the end, he only said, “I was way out of line. And I promise that you won’t be subjected to any more unwanted advances.”
“I’m not worried about that, Your Highness,” she said confidently.
And she wasn’t.
What worried her was that his kiss hadn’t been unwanted at all.
He dreamed of her again.
Of course, this time the dream was much more vivid and real. And when Michael finally awakened in the morning with the sheets twisted around him, he knew that it was his own fault.
He never should have kissed her.
Not just because he’d stepped over the line, but because one simple kiss had left him wanting so much more.
It wasn’t a big deal.
Maybe it wasn’t to Hannah, but to Michael—who hadn’t kissed anyone but Sam since their first date so many years before—it was.
He didn’t feel guilty, not really. His wife had been gone for almost four years, and he knew she would never have expected him to live the rest of his life as a monk. But he did feel awkward. If he was going to make a move on anyone, he should have chosen a woman he would not have to interact with on a daily basis from now until the end of the summer, and especially not an employee.
He winced as he imagined the headlines that a sexual harassment suit would generate, then realized he was probably being paranoid. After all, to Hannah the kiss “wasn’t a big deal.”
He would just have to make sure that he kept his promise, that absolutely nothing like that ever happened again. And count down the days until the end of the summer.
After Hannah ensured that Riley was wherever she needed to be for her first lesson of the day, she usually returned to the kitchen to enjoy another cup of Caridad’s fabulous coffee and conversation with the longtime housekeeper of Cielo del Norte.
But when she approached the kitchen Thursday morning, she could hear that the other woman already had company—and from the tone of her voice, she wasn’t too pleased with her visitor.
“This isn’t open for discussion,” Caridad said firmly.
“But it isn’t fair—”
“Whoever said life was supposed to be fair?”
“You never made Jocelyn go to summer school,” the male voice argued.
“Because Jocelyn didn’t struggle with English Lit.”
“She would have if she’d had Mr. Gaffe as her teacher.”
“You complained about the teacher you had last year, now you complain about this teacher—maybe the problem isn’t the teachers but the student. And maybe you should have paid a little more attention to the lessons and a little less to Serik Jouharian last term.”
Based on the dialogue and the tones of their voices, Hannah guessed that Caridad was talking to her son. She knew that the housekeeper and her husband had five children—four girls and, finally, a boy. Kevin was the only one still living at home and, according to Caridad, he was responsible for every single one of her gray hairs.
“The only reason I even passed that course was because Serik was my study partner,” the boy told her now.
“Then you’d better pick your study partner as carefully this time.”
Hannah peeked around the corner in time to see Caridad kiss her son’s cheek, then hand him his backpack. “Now go, so you’re not late.”
“Serik,” Hannah said, as Kevin exited the room. “That’s a beautiful name.”
“Serik was a beautiful girl. An exchange student from Armenia, and I thanked God when school was done and she went back to her own country.” Caridad sighed. “He was so smitten. And so heartbroken when she said goodbye.”
“I guess he’s at that age.”
“The age when hormones lead to stupid?”
Hannah laughed. “He seems like a good kid.”
“He is,” Caridad admitted. “And smart. He’s always got good marks in school, except for English. I thought if he took the next course at summer school, when he only has to focus on one subject, he might do better, but he’s done nothing but complain since the course started.”
“He’s a teenager and it’s the summer,” Hannah said. “Of course he’s going to complain about being stuck in school.”
“He says he’d rather be working, and if I let him get a job, he could help pay for his education. But I worry that a job would take time away from his studies, jeopardizing his chances of getting a scholarship.”
“I could tutor him,” she offered.
“No offense, but I can’t imagine that a nanny knows too much about senior English.”
“You might have noticed that I don’t know too much about being a nanny,” she said. “That’s because I’m a teacher in my real life.”
“Your real life?”
“Well, nothing about this seems real to me.” She looked around at the kitchen that was bigger than her whole apartment in the city. “It’s as if I’ve fallen through the rabbit hole.”
“Should we call you Alice?”
She smiled. “No. Riley’s already confused enough without giving a new name to the new hire.”
“So how did an English teacher end up taking a summer job as a royal nanny?”
“Desperation.”
“Prince Michael’s desperation or your own?”
“Both, I guess. He needed someone who could step in right away while he continues to look for a full-time caregiver, and I needed a job and a place to stay for the summer because I sublet my apartment with the intention of spending the break teaching in China.” She shook her head in response to the lift of Caridad’s brows. “Don’t ask.”
“We can’t afford a tutor,” Caridad admitted. “Prince Michael offered to hire one when he heard that Kevin was struggling, but I couldn’t let him do that when he already does so much for us.”
“I’m already getting a paycheck, and I really do love to teach.”
“I wouldn’t feel right—taking something for nothing.”
“We could exchange services,” Hannah suggested. “Maybe you could teach me to cook?”
“Not likely,” the housekeeper said.
Hannah couldn’t help but feel disappointed by her response. Cooking lessons would at least give her something to do while Riley was busy with her tutors, but unlike her, Caridad probably had more than enough to keep her busy.
“You don’t think you’d have the time?” she guessed.
“I don’t think you could learn,” the older woman admitted bluntly. “You don’t know the difference between browning and burning.”
Hannah couldn’t deny it was true—not when the housekeeper had asked her to keep an eye on the garlic bread while she put a load of laundry in the wash. All Hannah had to do was take the tray out of the oven when the cheese started to brown. But then Riley had come into the kitchen to get a drink and she’d spilled her juice, and while Hannah was busy mopping up the floor, the cheese was turning from brown to black.
“Don’t you think that’s a little unfair?” she asked, because she had explained the extenuating circumstances behind the mishap.
“Maybe,” Caridad agreed. “But not untrue.”
Hannah had to laugh. “No, not untrue,” she admitted as she poured herself a fresh cup of coffee. “But is that any reason to let your son struggle?”
The housekeeper hesitated. “It’s only the first week. I want to see him at least make an effort before you bail him out.”
Hannah and Riley spent the following Saturday afternoon on the beach again, but the prince made no effort to join them. And although the three of them had dinner together, as usual, the prince immediately retreated to his office after the meal was done.
It was Monday before Hannah worked up the nerve to knock on his office door.
She could hear him talking, and she pictured him pacing in front of his desk with his BlackBerry in hand. It seemed as if it was always in hand. His voice rose, as if to emphasize a point, and she took a step back. Maybe she should come back later. Maybe she should forget trying to talk to him at all—or at least choose a different venue for their conversation. The last time she’d been in his office with him was when the prince had kissed her.
Okay, it probably wasn’t a good idea to think about that kiss right now. Except that since Wednesday night, she’d barely been able to think about anything else.
She realized that she couldn’t hear him talking anymore, and knocked again, louder this time.
“Come in.”
She pushed open the door and stepped inside.
He looked up, as if surprised to see her. He probably was. They’d both been tiptoeing around each other for the past several days.
“We never did finish the conversation we started to have about Riley,” she reminded him.
“I assumed if there was cause for concern I would hear about it.”
“Well, actually, I do have some concerns. Primarily about her eating habits.”
“I have lunch and dinner with my daughter almost every day,” he said. “Other than her preference for chicken nuggets, I haven’t observed any problem.”
“I wouldn’t say it’s a problem,” she hedged. “At least not yet.”
His brows lifted. “You came in here to talk about something that isn’t yet a problem?”
She felt her cheeks flush. “Riley seems to eat a lot for such a young child, and she has dessert after lunch and dinner—every day.”
“So?”
“If she continues to eat the way she does now, it won’t be long before she’s battling weight and possibly even health issues.”
“She’s not even four.”
She didn’t disagree with what he was saying, and it wasn’t Riley’s weight that worried her. It was the pattern that she could see. She knew there was an easy fix for the problem, but only if the prince agreed to cooperate.
“She eats too much and exercises too little,” she said bluntly.
“Should I hire a personal trainer for her?”
“No, Your Highness, you should stop hiring people and start spending time with her.”
His brows lifted in silent challenge.
“I know I haven’t been here very long,” Hannah said. “But I’ve noticed that you don’t interact with Riley very much outside of mealtimes.”
“Then maybe you’ve also noticed that I have a lot of work to do and Riley is busy with her own lessons.”
“Yes, I have noticed that, too,” she admitted. “And I think that’s why Riley is overeating.”
“I’m not following.”
She hesitated, torn between reluctance to disturb the status quo that obviously mattered to him and determination to open his eyes to some harsh truths. In the
end, she decided his relationship with Riley was more important than anything else—her job included.
“The only time Riley sees you throughout the day is at lunch and dinner, so she does everything that she can to extend those mealtimes,” she explained. “As soon as her plate is cleared away, you disappear, and I think that she’s asking for second helpings so that you stay at the table with her. It’s not because she’s hungry, but because she’s starving for your attention, Your Highness.”
His gaze narrowed dangerously. “How dare you—”
“I dare,” she interrupted, “because you entrusted Riley into my care and I’m looking out for her best interests, Your Highness.”
“Well, I don’t believe it’s in my daughter’s best interests to put her on a diet.”
She was horrified by the very thought. “That isn’t what I’m suggesting at all.”
“Then what are you suggesting?”
“That you rearrange your schedule to spend a few hours every day with Riley, somewhere other than the dining room.”
“You can’t be serious,” he said, his tone dismissive. “And even if you are, she doesn’t have that much time to spare any more than I do.”
“Which is the other thing I wanted to talk to you about,” she forged ahead before she lost her nerve.
“Go on,” he urged, albeit with a decided lack of enthusiasm.
“A four-year-old needs time to play, Your Highness.”
“Riley has plenty of time to play.”
She shook her head. “She plays the piano, but she doesn’t do anything else that a typical four-year-old does—anything just for fun. She paints with watercolors but doesn’t know what to do with sidewalk chalk. She doesn’t know how to jump rope or hit a shuttlecock, and she’s never even kicked a soccer ball around.”
“Because she isn’t interested in any of those things.”
“How do you know?” Hannah asked softly.
He frowned. “Because she’s never asked to participate in those kinds of activities.”
“Did she ask for piano lessons?”
“No,” he admitted. “Not in so many words. But when she sat down and began to play, it was patently obvious that she had a talent that needed to be nurtured.”
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