﻿Baby Bonanza by Maureen Child

“I’ll want a DNA test.”

“Of course,” she said.

“I’ll take care of it tomorrow.”

“What?” She shook her head, looked at him and asked, “Don’t you have to wait until we’re back in San Pedro?”

“No, I’m not going to wait. I want this question settled as quickly as possible.” He continued to eat, as though what they were discussing wasn’t affecting him in the slightest. “We dock at Cabo in the morning. You and I will go ashore, find a lab and have them fax the findings to the lab in San Pedro.”

“We will?” She hadn’t planned on spending a lot of time with Nick, after all. She’d only come on board to tell him about the twins and, frankly, she’d thought he wouldn’t want anything more to do with her after that. Instead, he’d moved her into his suite and now was proposing that they spend even more time together.

“Until this is taken care of to my satisfaction,” Nick told her softly, “I’m not letting you out of my sight. The two of us are going to be joined at the hip. So you might as well start getting used to it.”

For Blackmail…or Pleasure by Robyn Grady

“I hate you.”

His jaw tensed. “Then I’m no worse off.”

She despised giving in. She’d much rather tell him to go straight to hell. But that had never been an option. “Where and when?”

Tate’s chest inflated. Battle won.

“At my television studios. Monday at ten. Don’t be late.” So unforgettable and debonair in that tux. “One more thing.”

His kiss was swift, overwhelming – the same skill she remembered, yet strangely so much more. Her mind hurtled back and the years slipped away. In this surreal moment she was Tate’s again and, incredibly, nothing else mattered.

Brutal reality – where they were, what she’d done – finally kicked in. Shoving at his rock-hard chest, she managed to break free.

The dimple she’d once adored appeared as he genuinely smiled. He was so damn superior. “Just wanted to let you know how sexy you are when you’re mad.”

Baby Bonanza

MAUREEN CHILD

For Blackmail…or Pleasure

ROBYN GRADY

www.millsandboon.co.uk

BABY BONANZA

by

Maureen Child

MAUREEN CHILD

is a California native who loves to travel. Every chance they get, she and her husband are taking off on another research trip. The author of more than sixty books, Maureen loves a happy ending and still swears that she has the best job in the world. She lives in Southern California with her husband, two children and a golden retriever with delusions of grandeur.

Dear Reader,

Is there anything sweeter than watching a strong man be completely befuddled by a baby? Just as there’s something elemental about seeing a father meet his child for the first time. Something powerful and touching.

In Baby Bonanza, Nick Falco does just that. He finds out he’s a father and meets his twin sons for the first time. Everything changes for him – and because it does, everything also changes for the mother of his babies, Jenna Baker.

I hope you enjoy reading their story as much as I enjoyed writing it!

Happy reading,

Maureen

To the ladies at Long Beach Care Center –

Christabel, Barbara and all of the others who

give such loving care to the patients – including

my uncle – who need it the most. You really

are amazing.

One

“Ow!” Jenna Baker hopped on her right foot and clutched at the bruised toes on her left one. Shooting a furious glare at the bolted-down table in her so-tiny-that-claustrophobics-would-die cabin, she called down silent curses on the head of the man who was the reason for this cruise from hell.

Nick Falco.

His image rose up in her mind, and just for a second Jenna enjoyed the nearly instant wash of heat that whipped through her. But the heat was gone a moment later, to be replaced by a cold fury.

Better all around if she concentrated on that particular emotion. After all, unlike every other passenger aboard Falcon’s Pride, she hadn’t come aboard the floating orgy to party. She was here for a reason. A damn good one.

While her aching toes throbbed in concert with her heartbeat, Jenna cautiously stood on both feet and took the step and a half that brought her to a minuscule closet. She’d already hung up her clothes, and the few outfits she’d brought with her looked crowded in the narrow wardrobe. Snatching a pale yellow blouse off the attached-to-the-rod hanger, she carried it to the bathroom, just another step away.

It was the size of an airplane bathroom, only it also contained a shower stall designed to fit pygmies. In fact, the opening of the sliding door was so slender, Jenna had slapped one arm across her breasts when leaving the shower, half-afraid she’d scrape her nipples off.

“Really nice, Nick,” she muttered, “when you upgraded this old boat and turned it into your flagship, you might have put a little extra thought into those people who aren’t living in the owner’s penthouse on the top deck.”

But she told herself that was typical enough. She’d known what Nick was like even before she’d met him on that sultry summer night more than a year ago. He was a man devoted to seeing his cruise line become the premier one in the world. He did what he had to do when he had to do it. And he didn’t make apologies for it.

She’d been working for him when she met him. An assistant cruise director on one of the other cruise ships in the Falcon line. She’d loved the job, loved the idea of travel and stupidly, had fallen in love with the boss. All because of a romantic moonlight encounter and Nick’s undeniable charm.

Jenna had known darn well that the boss would never get involved with an employee. So when the sexy, gorgeous Nick Falco had stumbled across her on the Pavilion Deck and assumed she was a guest, she hadn’t corrected him. She should have and she knew it, but what woman wouldn’t have been swept away by a chiseled jaw, ice-blue eyes and thick black hair that just tempted a woman to tangle her fingers in it?

She sighed a little, set her hands on the sides of the soapdish-size sink and remembered how it had been from the first moment he’d touched her. Magic. Pure and simple. Her skin had sizzled, her blood had sung and her heart had beaten so frantically, it had been hard to breathe. He’d swept her into a dance, there in the starlight, with the Hawaiian breeze caressing them and the music from the deck below floating on the air like a sigh.

One dance became two, and the feel of his arms around her had seduced Jenna into a lie that had come back to haunt her not a week later. She fell into an affair. A blistering, over-the-top sexual affair that had rocked her soul even as it battered her heart.

And when, one week into that affair, Nick had discovered from someone else that she actually worked for him, he’d broken it off, refused to hear her out, and once they were back in port, he’d fired her.

The sting of that…dismissal felt as fresh as the day it had happened.

“Oh, God. What am I doing here?” She blew out a breath as her stomach began to twist and ripple with the nerves that had been shivering through her for months. If there were any other way to do this, she would have. After all, it wasn’t as if she were looking forward to seeing Nick again.

Gritting her teeth, she lifted her chin, turned sharply and cracked her elbow into the doorjamb. Wincing, she stared into her reflection in the slim rectangular mirror and said, “You’re here because it’s the right thing. The only thing. Besides, it’s not like he left you any choice.”

She had to talk to the man and it wasn’t exactly easy to get access to him. Since he lived aboard the flagship of his cruise line, she couldn’t confront him on dry land. And the few times he was in port in San Pedro, California, he locked himself up in a penthouse apartment with tighter security than the White House. When she couldn’t talk to him in person, she’d tried phone calls. And when they failed, she’d taken to e-mailing him. At least twice a week for the last six months, she’d sent him e-mails that he apparently deleted without opening. The man was being so impossible, Jenna’d finally been forced to make a reservation on Falcon’s Pride and take a cruise she didn’t want and couldn’t afford.

She hadn’t been on board a ship in more than a year and so even the slight rolling sensation of the big cruise liner made her knees a little rubbery. There was a time when she’d loved being on ship. When she’d enjoyed the adventure of a job that was never the same two days in a row. When she’d awakened every morning to a new view out her porthole.

“Of course,” she admitted wryly, “that was when I had a porthole.” Now she was so far belowdecks, in the cheapest cabin she’d been able to find, she had no window at all and it felt as though she’d been sealed up in the bowels of the ship. She was forced to keep a light on at all times, because otherwise, the dark was so complete, it was like being inside a vacuum. No sensory input at all.

Weird and strangely unsettling.

Maybe if she’d been able to get some sleep, she’d feel different. But she’d been jolted out of bed late the night before by the horrific clank and groan of the anchor chain being lifted. It had sounded as if the ship itself was being torn apart by giant hands, and once that image had planted itself in her brain, she hadn’t been able to sleep again.

“All because of Nick,” she told the woman in the glass and was gratified to see her nod in agreement. “Mr. Gazillionaire, too busy, too important to answer his e-mail.” Did he even remember her? Did he look at her name on the e-mail address and wonder who the heck she was? She frowned into the mirror, then shook her head. “No. He didn’t forget. He knows who I am. He’s not reading the e-mails on purpose, just to make me crazy. He couldn’t have forgotten that week.”

Despite the way it had ended, that one week with Nick Falco had turned Jenna’s life around and upside down. It was simply impossible that she was the only one affected that strongly.

“So instead, he’s being Mr. Smooth and Charming,” she said. “Probably romancing some other silly woman, who, like me, won’t notice until it’s too late that he’s nobody’s fantasy.”

Oh, God.

That was a lie.

The truth was, she thought with an inner groan, he actually was any woman’s fantasy. Tall, gorgeous, with thick, black hair, pale blue eyes and a smile that was both charming and wicked, Nick Falco was enough to make a woman’s toes curl even before she knew what kind of lover he was.

Jenna let her forehead thunk against the mirror. “Maybe this wasn’t such a great idea,” she whispered as her insides fisted and other parts of her heated up just on the strength of memories alone.

She closed her eyes as vivid mental images churned through her mind—nights with Nick, dancing on the Pavilion Deck beneath an awning of stars. A late-night picnic, alone on the bow of the ship, with the night crowded close. Dining on his balcony, sipping champagne, spilling a few drops and Nick licking them from the valley between her breasts. Lying in his bed, wrapped in his arms, his whispers promising tantalizing delights.

What did it say about her that simply the memories of that man could still elicit a shiver of want in her, more than a year later? Jenna didn’t think she really wanted an answer to that question. She hadn’t boarded this ship for the sake of lust or for what had once been. Sex wasn’t part of the equation this time and she was just going to have to find a way to deal with her past while fighting for her future. So, deliberately, she dismissed the tantalizing images from her mind in favor of her reality. Opening her eyes, she stared into the mirror and steeled herself for what was to come.

The past had brought her here, but she had no intention of stirring up old passions.

Her life was different now. She wasn’t at loose ends, looking for adventure. She was a woman with a purpose, and Nick was going to listen to her whether he wanted to or not.

“Too busy to answer his e-mail, is he?” she muttered. “Thinks if he ignores me long enough I’ll simply disappear? Well, then, he’s got quite the surprise coming, doesn’t he?”

She brushed her teeth, slapped some makeup on and ran a brush through her long, straight, light brown hair before braiding it into a single thick rope that lay against her back. Inching sideways out the bathroom door, she carefully made her way to the built-in dresser underneath a television bolted high on the wall. She grabbed a pair of white shorts, tugged them on and then tucked the ends of her yellow shirt into the waistband. She stepped into a pair of sandals, grabbed her purse and checked to make sure the sealed, small blue envelope was still inside. Then she took the two steps to her cabin door.

She opened her door, stepped into the stingy hallway and bumped into a room service waiter. “Sorry, sorry!”

“My fault,” he insisted, hoisting the tray he carried high enough that Jenna could duck under it and slip past him. “These older hallways just weren’t made for a lot of foot traffic.” He glanced up and down the short hall, then back to Jenna. “Even with the ship’s refit, there are sections that—” He stopped, as if remembering he was an employee of the Falcon Line and really shouldn’t be dissing the ship.

“Guess not.” Jenna smiled back at the guy. He looked about twenty and had the shine of excitement in his eyes. She was willing to bet this was his first cruise. “So, do you like working for Falcon Cruises?”

He lowered the tray to chest level, shrugged and said, “It’s my first day, but so far, yeah. I really do. But…” He stopped, turned a look over his shoulder at the dimly lit hall as if making sure no one could overhear him.

Jenna could have reassured him. There were only five cabins down here in the belly of the ship and only hers and the one across the hall from her were occupied. “But?” she prompted.

“It’s a little creepy down here, don’t you think? I mean, you can hear the water battering against the hull and it’s so…dark.”

She’d been thinking the same thing only moments before and still she said, “Well, it’s got to be better than crew quarters, right? I mean, I used to work on ships and we were always on the lowest deck.”

“Not us,” he said, “crew quarters are one deck up from here.”

“Fabulous,” Jenna muttered, thinking that even the people who worked for Nick Falco were getting more sleep on this cruise than she was.

The door opened and a fortyish woman in a robe poked her head out and smiled. “Oh, thank God,” the older blonde said. “I heard voices out here and I was half-afraid the ship was haunted.”

“No, ma’am.” The waiter stiffened to attention as if just remembering what he’d come below for. He shot Jenna a hopeful look, clearly asking that she not rat him out for standing around having a conversation. “I’ve got breakfast for two here, as you requested.”

“Great,” the blonde said, opening the door wider. “Just…” She stopped. “I have no idea where you can put it. Find a place, okay?”

While the waiter disappeared into the cabin, the blonde stuck out one hand to Jenna. “Hi, I’m Mary Curran. My husband, Joe, and I are on vacation.”

“Jenna Baker,” she said, shaking the other woman’s hand. “Maybe I’ll see you abovedecks?”

“Won’t see much of me down here, I can tell you,” Mary admitted with a shudder as she tightened the sash on her blue terry-cloth robe. “Way too creepy, but—” she shrugged “—the important thing is, we’re on a cruise. We only have to sleep here, after all, and I intend to get our money’s worth out of this trip.”

“Funny,” Jenna said with a smile. “I was just telling myself the same thing.”

She left Mary to her breakfast and headed for the elevator that would carry her up and out of the darkness. She clutched the envelope that she would have delivered to Nick and steeled herself for the day to come. The elevator lurched into motion and she tapped her foot as she rose from the bowels of the ship. What she needed now was some air, lots of coffee and a pastry or two. Then, later, after Nick had read her letter, she would be ready. Ready to face the beast. To beard the lion in his den. To look into Nick’s pale blue eyes and demand that he do the right thing.

“Or,” Jenna swore as the doors shushed open and she stepped into the sunlight and tipped her face up to the sky, “I will so make him pay.”

“The sound system for the stage on the Calypso Deck has a hiccup or two, but the techs say they’ll have it fixed before showtime.”

“Good.” Nick Falco sat back in his maroon leather chair and folded his hands atop his belly as he listened to his assistant, Teresa Hogan, rattle off her daily report. It was only late morning and together they’d already handled a half-dozen crises. “I don’t want any major issues,” he told her. “I know this is the shakedown cruise, but I don’t want our passengers feeling like they’re guinea pigs.”

“They won’t. The ship’s looking good and you know it,” Teresa said with a confident smile. “We’ve got a few minor glitches, but nothing we can’t handle. If there were real trouble, we never would have left port last night.”

“I know,” he said, glancing over his shoulder at the white caps dancing across the surface of the ocean. “Just make sure we stay one step ahead of any of those glitches.”

“Don’t I always?”

“Yeah,” he said with a nod of approval. “You do.”

Teresa was in her late fifties, had short, dark hair, sharp green eyes and the organizational skills of a field general. She took crap from no one, Nick included, and had the loyalty and tenacity of a hungry pit bull. She’d been with him for eight years—ever since her husband had died and she’d come looking for a job that would give her adventure.

She’d gotten it. And she’d also become Nick’s trusted right arm.

“The master chef on the Paradise Deck is complaining about the new Vikings,” she was saying, flipping through the papers attached to her ever present clipboard.

Nick snorted. “Most expensive stoves on the planet and there’s something wrong with them?”

She smirked a little. “According to Chef Michele,” Teresa said, “ze stove is not hot enough.”

Not a full day out at sea and already he was getting flak from temperamental artistes. “Tell him as long as ze heat is hot, he should do what I’m paying him to do.”

“Already done.”

One of Nick’s eyebrows lifted. “Then why tell me at all?”

“You’re the boss.”

“Nice of you to remember that occasionally,” he said, and sat forward, rolling his chair closer to the desk where a small mountain of personal correspondence waited for his attention.

Ignoring that jibe, Teresa checked her papers again and said, “The captain says the weather outlook is great and we’re making all speed to Cabo. Should be there by ten in the morning tomorrow.”

“That’s good.” Nick picked up the first envelope on the stack in front of him. Idly, he tapped the edge of it against his desk as Teresa talked. And while she ran down the list of problems, complaints and compliments, he let his gaze shift around his office. Here on the Splendor Deck, just one deck below the bridge, the views were tremendous. Which was why he’d wanted both his office and his luxurious owner’s suite on this deck. He’d insisted on lots of glass. He liked the wide spread of the ocean all around him. Gave him a sense of freedom even while he was working.

There were comfortable chairs, low-slung tables and a fully stocked wet bar across the room. The few paintings hanging on the dark blue walls were bright splotches of color, and the gleaming wood floors shone in sunlight that was only partially dimmed by the tinted glass.

This was the ship’s maiden voyage under the Falcon name. Nick had bought it from a competitor who was going out of business, and over the past six months had had it completely refitted and refurbished to be the queen of his own cruise line. Falcon’s Pride, he’d called her, and so far she was living up to her name.

He’d gotten reports from his employees on the reaction from the passengers as they’d boarded the day before in the L.A. port of San Pedro. Though most of the guests on board were young and looking to party, even they had been impressed with the ship’s luxurious decor and overall feel.

Nick had purchased his first ship ten years before, and had quickly built the Falcon Line into the primary party destination in the world. Falcon’s Pride was going to take that reputation and enhance it. His passengers wanted fun. Excitement. A two-week-long party. And he was going to see that they got it.

He hired only the best chefs, the hottest bands and the greatest lounge acts. His employees were young and attractive—his mind shifted tracks around that thought and instantly, he was reminded of one former employee in particular. A woman he’d let get under his skin until the night he’d discovered her lies. He hadn’t seen or spoken to her since, but he was a hell of a lot more careful these days about who he got involved with.

“Are you even listening to me?”

Nick cleared his thoughts instantly, half-irritated that he was still thinking about Jenna Baker more than a year since he’d last seen her. He glanced up at Teresa and gave her a smile that should have charmed her. “Guess not. Why don’t we take care of the rest of this business after lunch.”

“Sure,” she said, and checked her wristwatch. “I’ve got an appointment on the Verandah Deck. One of the cruise directors has a problem with the karaoke machine.”

“Fine. Handle it.” He turned his attention to the stack of hand-delivered correspondence on his desk and just managed to stifle a sigh. Never failed. Every cruise, Nick was inundated with invitations from female passengers to join them for dinner or private parties or for drinks in the moonlight.

“Oh,” Teresa said, handing over a pale blue envelope. “One of the stewards gave me this on my way in.” She smiled as she handed it over. “Yet another lonely lady looking for companionship? Seems you’re still the world’s favorite love god.”

Nick knew she was just giving him a hard time—like always—yet this time her words dug at him. Shifting uncomfortably in his chair, he thought about it, tried to figure out why. He was no monk, God knew. And over the years he’d accepted a lot of invitations from women who didn’t expect anything more than a good time and impersonal sex.

But damned if he could bring himself to get interested in the latest flurry of one-night-stand invitations, either. The cards and letters had been sitting on his desk since early this morning and he hadn’t bothered to open one yet. He knew what he’d find when he started going through them.

Panties. Cabin keys. Sexy photos designed to tempt.

And not a damned one of them would mean anything to him.

Hell, what did that say about him? Laughing silently at himself, Nick acknowledged that he really didn’t want to know. Maybe he’d been spending too much time working lately. Maybe what he needed was just what these ladies were offering. He’d go through the batch of invites, pick out the most intriguing one and spend a few relaxing hours with a willing woman.

Just what the doctor ordered.

Teresa was still holding the envelope out to him and there was confusion in her eyes. He didn’t want her asking any questions, so he took the envelope and idly slid his finger under the seal. Deliberately giving her a grin and a wink, he said, “You think it’s easy being the dream of millions?”

Now Teresa snorted and, shaking her head, muttering something about delusional males, she left the office.

When she was gone, he sat back and thoughtfully looked at the letter in his hand. Pale blue envelope, tidy handwriting. Too small to hold a pair of lacy thong panties. Too narrow to be hiding away a photo. Just the right size for a cabin key card though.

“Well, then,” he said softly, “let’s see who you are. Hope you included a photo of yourself. I don’t do blind dates.”

Chuckling, Nick pulled the card from the envelope and glanced down at it. There was a photo all right. Laughter died instantly as he looked at the picture of two babies with black hair and pale blue eyes.

“What the hell?” Even while his brain started racing and his heartbeat stuttered in his chest, he read the scrawled message beneath the photo:

“Congratulations, Daddy. It’s twins.”

Two

She wasn’t ready to give up the sun.

Jenna set her coffee cup down on the glass-topped table, turned her face to the sky and let the warm, late-morning sunshine pour over her like a blessing. Despite the fact that there were people around her, laughing, talking, diving into the pool, sending walls of water up in splashing waves, she felt alone in the light. And she really wasn’t ready to sink back into the belly of the ship.

But she’d sent her note to Nick. And she’d told him where to find her. In that tiny, less-than-closet-size cabin. So she’d better be there when he arrived. With a sigh, she stood, slung her bag over her left shoulder and threaded her way through the crowds lounging on the Verandah Deck.

Someone touched her arm and Jenna stopped.

“Leaving already?” Mary Curran was smiling at her, and Jenna returned that smile with one of her own.

“Yeah. I have to get back down to my cabin. I um, have to meet someone there.” At least, she was fairly certain Nick would show up. But what if he didn’t? What if he didn’t care about the fact that he was the father of her twin sons? What if he dismissed her note as easily as he’d deleted all of her attempts at e-mail communication?

A small, hard knot formed in the pit of her stomach. She’d like to see him try, that’s all. They were on a ship in the middle of the ocean. How was he going to escape her? Nope. Come what may, she was going to have her say. She was going to face him down, at last, and tell him what she’d come to say.

“Oh God, honey.” Mary grimaced and gave a dramatic shudder. “Do you really want to have a conversation down in the pit?”

Jenna laughed. “The pit?”

“That’s what my husband, Joe, christened it in the middle of the night when he nearly broke his shin trying to get to the bathroom.”

Grinning, Jenna said, “I guess the name fits all right. But yeah. I have to do it there. It’s too private to be done up here.”

Mary’s eyes warmed as she looked at Jenna and said, “Well, then, go do whatever it is you have to do. Maybe I’ll see you back in the sunshine later?”

Jenna nodded. She knew how cruise passengers tended to bond together. She’d seen it herself in the time she’d actually worked for Falcon Cruises. Friendships formed fast and furiously. People who were in relatively tight quarters—stuck on a ship in the middle of the ocean—tended to get to know each other more quickly than they might on dry land.

Shipboard romances happened, sure—just look what had happened to her. But more often, it was other kinds of relationships that bloomed and took hold. And right about now, Jenna decided, she could use a friendly face.

“You bet,” she said, giving Mary a wide smile. “How about margaritas on the Calypso Deck? About five?”

Delighted, Mary beamed at her. “I’ll be there.”

As Jenna walked toward the elevator, she told herself that after her upcoming chat with Nick, she was probably going to need a margarita or two.

Nick jolted to his feet so fast, his desk chair shot backward, the wheels whirring against the wood floor until the chair slammed into the glass wall behind him.

“Is this a joke?”

Nick held the pale blue card in one tight fist and stared down at two tiny faces. The babies were identical except for their expressions. One looked into the camera and grinned, displaying a lot of gum and one deep dimple. The other was watching the picture taker with a serious, almost thoughtful look on his face.

And they both looked a hell of a lot like him.

“Twins?”

In an instant, emotions he could hardly name raced through him. Anger, frustration, confusion and back to anger again. How the hell could he be a father? Nobody he knew had been pregnant. This couldn’t be happening. He glanced up at the empty office as if half expecting someone to jump out, shout, “You’ve just been punk’d,” and let him off the hook. But there were no cameras. There was no joke.

This was someone’s idea of serious.

Well, hell, he told himself, it wasn’t the first time some woman had tried to slap him with a paternity suit. But it was for damn sure the first time the gauntlet had been thrown down in such an imaginative way.

“Who, though?” He grabbed the envelope up, but only his name was scrawled across the front in a small, feminine hand. Turning over the card he still held, he saw more of that writing:

“We need to talk. Come to cabin 2A on the Riviera Deck.”

“Riviera Deck.” Though he hated like hell to admit it, he wasn’t sure which deck that was. He had a lot of ships in his line and this was his first sail on this particular one. Though he meant to make Falcon’s Pride his home, he hadn’t had the chance yet to explore it from stem to stern as he did all the ships that carried his name.

For now, he stalked across the room to the framed set of detailed ship plans hanging on the far wall of his office. He’d had one done for each of the ships in his line. He liked looking at them, liked knowing that he was familiar with every inch of every ship. Liked knowing that he’d succeeded in creating the dream he’d started more than ten years before.

But at the moment, Nick wasn’t thinking of his cruise line or of business at all. Now all he wanted to do was find the woman who’d sent him this card so he could assure himself that this was all some sort of mistake.

Narrowing his pale blue eyes, he ran one finger down the decks until he found the one he was looking for. Then he frowned. According to this, the Riviera Deck was below crew quarters.

“What the hell is going on?” Tucking the card with the pictures of the babies into the breast pocket of his white, short-sleeved shirt, he half turned toward the office door and bellowed, “Teresa!”

The door flew open a few seconds later and his assistant rushed in, eyes wide in stunned surprise. “Geez, what’s wrong? Are we on fire or something?”

He ignored the attempt at humor, as well as the look of puzzlement on her face. Stabbing one finger against the glass-covered ship plans, he said only, “Look at this.”

She hurried across the room, glanced at the plans, then shifted a look at him. “What exactly am I looking at?”

“This.” He tapped his finger against the lowest deck on the diagram. “The Riviera Deck.”

“Uh-huh.”

“There are people staying down there.”

“Oh.”

Pleased that she’d caught on so fast, Nick said, “When the ship came out of refit ready for passengers, I said specifically that those lower cabins weren’t to be used.”

“Yeah, you did, boss.” She actually winced, whipped out her PDA and punched a few keys. “I’ll do some checking. Find out what happened.”

“You do that,” he said, irritated as hell that someone, somewhere, hadn’t paid attention to him. “For right now, though, find out how many of those cabins are occupied.”

“Right.”

While Teresa worked her electronic wizardry, Nick looked back at the framed plans and shook his head. Those lower cabins were too old, too small to be used on one of his ships. Sure, they’d undergone some refurbishing during the refit, but having them and using them were two different things. Those cabins, small and dark and cramped, weren’t the kind of image Nick wanted associated with his cruise line.

“Boss?” Teresa looked at him. “According to the registry, only two of the five cabins are being used.”

“That’s something, anyway. Who’s down there?”

“1A is occupied by a Joe and Mary Curran.”

He didn’t know any Currans and besides, the card had come from whoever was in the only other occupied cabin on that deck.

So he waited.

“2A is…” Teresa’s voice trailed off and Nick watched as his usually unflappable assistant chewed at her bottom lip.

That couldn’t be good.

“What is it?” When she didn’t answer right away, he demanded, “Just tell me who’s in the other cabin.”

“Jenna,” Teresa said and blew out a breath. “Jenna Baker’s in 2A, Nick.”

Nick made record time getting down to the Riviera Deck, and by the time he reached it, he’d already made the decision to close up this deck permanently. Damned if he’d house his paying guests in what amounted to little more than steerage.

Stepping off the elevator, he hit his head on a low cross beam and muttered a curse. The creaks and groans of the big ship as it pushed through the waves echoed through the narrow passageway like ghosts howling. The sound of the water against the hull was a crushing heartbeat and it was so damned dark in the abbreviated hallway, even the lights in the wall sconces barely made a dent in the blackness. And the hall itself was so narrow he practically had to traverse it sideways. True, it was good business to make sure you provided less expensive rooms, but he’d deal with that another way. He’d be damned if his passengers would leave a cruise blinking at the sun like bats.

With his head pounding, his temper straining on a tight leash, he stopped in front of 2A, took a breath and raised his right fist to knock. Before he could, the narrow door was wrenched open and there she stood.

Jenna Baker.

She shouldn’t have still been able to affect him. He’d had her after all. Had her and then let her go more than a year ago. So why then was he suddenly struck by the turquoise-blue of her eyes? Why did that tight, firm mouth make him want to kiss her until her lips eased apart and let him back in? Why did the fact that she looked furious make his blood steam in his veins? What the hell did she have to be mad about?

“I heard you in the hall,” she said.

“Good ears,” he conceded. “Considering all the other noises down here.”

A brief, tight smile curved her mouth. “Yeah, it’s lovely living in the belly of the beast. When they raise anchor it’s like a symphony.”

He hadn’t considered that, but he was willing to bet the noise was horrific. Just another reason to seal up these rooms and never use them again. However, that was for another time. What he wanted now were answers.

“Good one,” he said. “That’s why you’re here, then? To talk about the ship?”

“You know why I’m here.”

He lifted one hand to the doorjamb and leaned in toward her. “I know what you’d like me to think. The question is, why? Why now? What’re you after, Jenna?”

“I’m not going to talk about this in the hall.”

“Fine.” He stepped inside, moving past her, but the quarters were so cramped, their chests brushed together and he could almost feel his skin sizzle.

It had been like that from the beginning. The moment he’d touched her that first night in the moonlight, he’d felt a slam of something that was damn near molten sliding through him. And it seemed that time hadn’t eased it back any.

He got a grip on his hormones, took two steps until he was at the side of a bed built for a sixth-grader, then turned around to glare at her. God, the cabin was so small it felt as though the walls were closing in on him and, truth to tell, they wouldn’t have far to move. He felt as if he should be slouching to avoid skimming the top of his head along the ceiling. Every light in the cabin was on and it still looked like twilight.

But Nick wasn’t here for the ambience and there was nothing he could do about the rooms at the moment. Now all he wanted was an explanation. He waited for her to shut the door, sealing the two of them into the tiny cracker box of a room before he said, “What’s the game this time, Jenna?”

“This isn’t a game, Nick,” she said, folding her arms over her chest. “It wasn’t a game then, either.”

“Right.” He laughed and tried not to breathe deep. The scent of her was already inside him, the tiny room making him even more aware of it than he would have been ordinarily. “You didn’t want to lie to me. You had no choice.”

Her features tightened. “Do we really have to go over the old argument again?”

He thought about it for a moment, then shook his head. He didn’t want to look at the past. Hell. He didn’t want to be here now. “No, we don’t. So why don’t you just say what it is you have to say so we can be done.”

“Always the charmer,” she quipped.

He shifted from one foot to the other and banged his elbow on the wall. “Jenna…”

“Fine. You got my note?”

He reached into the pocket of his shirt, pulled out the card, glanced at the pictures of the babies, then handed it to her. “Yeah. I got it. Now how about you explain it?”

She looked down at those two tiny faces and he saw her lips curve slightly even as her eyes warmed. But that moment passed quickly as she lifted her gaze to him and skewered him with it. “I would have thought the word daddy was fairly self-explanatory.”

“Explain, anyway.”

“Fine.” Jenna walked across the tiny room, bumped Nick out of her way with a nudge from her hip that had him hitting the wall and then bent down to drag a suitcase out from under her bed. The fact that she could actually feel his gaze on her butt while she did it only annoyed her.

She would not pay any attention to the rush of heat she felt just being close to him again. She would certainly not acknowledge the jump and stutter of her heartbeat, and if certain other of her body parts were warm and tingling, she wasn’t going to admit to that, either.

Dragging the suitcase out, she went to lift it, but Nick was there first, pushing her fingers aside to hoist the bag onto the bed. If her skin was humming from that one idle touch, he didn’t have to know it, did he?

She unzipped the bag, pulled out a blue leather scrapbook and handed it to him. “Here. Take a look. Then we’ll talk more.”

The book seemed tiny in his big, tanned hands. He barely glanced at it before shooting a hard look at her again. “What’s this about?”

“Look at it, Nick.”

He did. The moment she’d been waiting so long for stretched out as the seconds ticked past. She held her breath and watched his face, the changing expressions written there as he flipped through the pages of pictures she’d scrapbooked specifically for this purpose. It was a chronicle of sorts. Of her life since losing her job, discovering she was pregnant and then the birth of the twins. In twenty hand-decorated pages, she’d brought him up to speed on the last year and a half of her life.

Up to speed on his sons. The children he’d created and had never met.

The only reason she was here, visiting a man who’d shattered her heart without a backward glance.

When he was finished, his gaze lifted to hers and she could have sworn she saw icicles in his eyes.

“I’m supposed to believe that I’m the father of your babies?”

“Take another look at them, Nick. They both look just like you.”

He did, but his features remained twisted into a cynical expression even while his eyes flashed with banked emotion. “Lots of people have black hair and blue eyes.”

“Not all of them have dimples in their left cheek.” She reached out, flipped to a specific page and pointed. “Both of your sons do. Just like yours.”

He ran one finger over the picture of the boys as if he could somehow touch them with the motion, and that small action touched something in Jenna. For one brief instant, Nick Falco looked almost…vulnerable.

It didn’t last long, though. His mouth worked as if he were trying to bite back words fighting desperately to get out. Finally, as if coming to some inner decision, he nodded, blew out a breath and said, “For the sake of argument, let’s say they are mine.”

“They are.”

“So why didn’t you tell me before? Why the hell would you wait until they’re, what…?”

“Four months old.”

He looked at the pictures again, closed the book and held on to it in one tight fist. “Four months old and you didn’t think I should know?”

So much for the tiny kernel of warmth she’d almost experienced.

“You’re amazing. You ignore me for months and now you’re upset that I didn’t contact you?”

“What’re you talking about?”

Jenna shook her head and silently thanked heaven that she’d been smart enough to not only keep a log of every e-mail she’d ever sent him, but had thought to print them all out and bring them along. Dipping back into the suitcase, she whipped a thick manila envelope out and laid it atop the scrapbook he was still holding. “There. E-mails. Every one I sent you. They’re all dated. You can see that I sent one at least once a week. Sometimes twice. I’ve been trying to get hold of you for more than a year, Nick.”

He opened the envelope as she talked, and flipped quickly through the printouts.

“I—” He frowned down at the stack of papers.

She took advantage of his momentary speechlessness. “I’ve been trying to reach you since I first found out I was pregnant, Nick.”

“How was I supposed to know that this is what you were trying to tell me?”

“You might have read one or two of them,” Jenna pointed out and managed to hide the hurt in her voice.

He scowled at her. “How the hell could I have guessed you were trying to tell me I was a father? I just thought you were after money.”

She hissed in a breath as the insult of that slapped at her. Bubbling with fury, Jenna really had to fight the urge to give him a swift kick. How like Nick to assume that any woman who was with him was only in it for what she could get from him. But then, he’d spent most of the past ten years surrounding himself with the very users he’d suspected her of being. People who wanted to be seen with him because he was one of the world’s most eligible billionaires. Those hangers-on wanted to be in his inner circle because that’s where the excitement was and it made them feel important, to be a part of Nick’s world.

All Jenna had wanted was his arms around her. His kiss. His whispers in the middle of the night. Naturally, he hadn’t believed her.

Now things were different. He had responsibilities that she was here to see he stood up to. After all, she hadn’t come here for herself. She’d come for her kids. For his sons.

“I wasn’t interested in your money back then, Nick. But things have changed and now, I am after money,” she said and saw sparks flare in his icy eyes. “It’s called child support, Nick. And your sons deserve it.”

He stared at her. “Child support.”

“That’s right.” She lifted her chin even higher. “If I only had myself to think about, I wouldn’t be here, believe me. So don’t worry, I’m not here to take advantage of you. I’m not looking for a huge chunk of the Falco bank account.”

“Is that right?”

“That’s right. I started my own business and it’s doing fine,” she said, a hint of pride slipping into her tone while she spoke. “But twins make every expense doubled and I just can’t do it all on my own.” Lifting her gaze to meet his, she said, “When you never responded to my e-mails, I told myself you didn’t deserve to know your babies. And if I weren’t feeling a little desperate I wouldn’t be here at all. Trust me, if you think I’m enjoying being here like this, you’re crazy.”

“So you would have hidden them from me?” His voice was low, soft and just a little dangerous.

Jenna wasn’t worried. Nick might be an arrogant, self-satisfied jerk, but physically dangerous to her or any other woman, he wasn’t. “If you mean would I hide the fact that their father couldn’t care less about them from my sons…then, yes. That’s just what I’ll do.”

“If they are my sons,” he whispered, “no one will keep me from them.”

A flicker of uneasiness sputtered in Jenna’s chest, but she told herself not to react. Physical threats meant nothing, but the thought of him challenging her for custody of their children did. Even as she considered it, though, she let the worry dissipate. Babies weren’t part of Nick’s world, and no matter what he said at the moment, he would never give up the life he had for one that included double diaper duty.

“Nick, we both know you have no interest in being a father.”

“You have no idea what I do or don’t care about, Jenna.” He moved in close, taking that one small step that brought his body flush to hers. Jenna hadn’t been prepared for the move and sucked in a gulp of air as his chest pressed into hers.

She looked up into his eyes and felt her knees wobble a little at the intensity of his stare. He cupped her cheek in one hand, and the heat of his skin seeped into hers, causing a flush of warmth that slid through her like sweet syrup.

“I promise you, though,” he murmured, dipping his head in as if he were going to kiss her and stopping just a breath away from her lips, “you will find out.”

Three

She ducked her head and slapped his hand away and even that contact felt too damn good. Nick stepped back and away from her, which, in that cabin, meant that he was halfway out the door. So once he felt as though he could look at her without wanting to wrap his hands in her hair and pull her mouth to his, he shifted his gaze to hers.

“I don’t have the time to go through this right now.”

She smirked at him, folded her arms over her chest in a classic defensive posture. “Oh, sure, worlds to conquer, women to seduce. Busy, busy.”

“Clever as ever, I see.” He didn’t even want to admit to himself how much he’d missed that smart mouth of hers. Always a retort. Always a dig, putting him in his place, deflating his ego before it had a chance to expand.

There weren’t many people like Jenna in his life. Mostly, those he knew were too busy kissing his ass to argue with him. Everyone but Teresa, that is. And of course, Jenna. But she wasn’t a part of his life anymore.

“We’ll have dinner tonight. My suite.”

“I don’t think so.”

“You came here to talk to me, right?”

“Yes, but—”

“So we’ll talk. Seven o’clock.”

Before she could argue, stall or whatever else might come into her too-quick mind, he opened the door and left her cabin. He took a breath in the dark hall, then headed for the elevator that would take him out of the bowels of the ship back into the light.

By five o’clock, she was more than ready to meet Mary for margaritas.

Jenna’d left her tiny, hideous, airless cabin only a few minutes after Nick had. Frankly, his presence had been practically imprinted on the minuscule space and had made the cabin seem even smaller than it actually was. And she hadn’t thought that would have been possible.

But he’d shaken her more than she’d thought he would. Just being near him again had awakened feelings and emotions she’d trained herself more than a year ago to ignore. Now they were back and she wasn’t sure how to handle them. After all, it wasn’t as if she had a lot of experience with this sort of thing. Before Nick, there’d been only one other man in her life, and he hadn’t come close to affecting her in the way Nick had. Of course, since Nick, the only men in her life preferred drooling on her shoulder to slow dances in the dark.

Just thinking about her boys brought an ache to Jenna’s heart. She’d never left them before, and though she knew the twins were in good hands, she hated not being with them.

“But I’m on this boat for their sakes,” she reminded herself sternly.

With that thought in mind, her gaze swept the interior of Captain Jack’s Bar and Lounge. Like everywhere else on this ship, Nick hadn’t skimped. The walls were pale wood that gleamed in the light glinting down on the crowd from overhead chandeliers shaped like ship’s wheels. The bar was a slinky curve of pale wood with a granite top the color of molten honey.

Conversations flowed in a low rumble of sound that was punctuated by the occasional clink of crystal or a high-pitched laugh. First day at sea and already the party had begun.

Well, for everyone but Jenna. She hadn’t exactly been in celebration mode after Nick left her cabin.

In fact, Jenna’d spent most of the day lying on a chaise on the Verandah Deck, trying to get lost in the book she’d picked up in the gift shop. But she couldn’t concentrate on the words long enough to make any progress. Time and again, her thoughts had returned to Nick. His face. His eyes. The cool dismissal on his face when he’d first seen the pictures of their sons.

She didn’t know what was coming next, and the worry over it had gnawed at her insides all day. Which was why she’d decided to keep her margarita date with Mary. Jenna had spent too much time alone today, with too much time for thinking. What she needed now was some distraction. A little tequila-flavored relaxation sounded great. Especially since she had dinner with Nick to look forward to.

“Oh God,” she whispered as her stomach fisted into knots again.

“Jenna!”

A woman’s voice called out to her, and Jenna turned in that direction. She spotted Mary, standing up at one of the tables along the wall, waving and smiling at her. Gratefully Jenna headed her way, threading a path through the milling crowd. When she reached the table, she slid onto a chair and smiled at the margarita already waiting for her.

“Hope you don’t mind. I ordered one for you as soon as I got here,” Mary told her, taking a big gulp of her own oversize drink.

“Mind?” Jenna said, reaching for her frosty glass, “Are you kidding? This is fabulous.” When she’d taken a long, deep gulp of the icy drink, she sat back and looked at her new friend.

Mary was practically bouncing in her seat, and her eyes were shining with excitement. Her blond hair looked wind tousled and her skin was a pale red, as if she’d had plenty of sun today. “I’ve been looking for you all over this ship,” she said, grinning like a loon. “I had to see you. Find out where they put you.”

Jenna blinked and shook her head. “What do you mean? Put me? Where who put me?”

Mary stretched one hand out and grabbed Jenna’s for a quick squeeze. “Oh my God. You haven’t been back down to the pit all day, have you?”

“No way,” Jenna said on a sigh. “After my meeting, I came topside and I’ve been putting off going back down by hanging out on the Verandah Deck.”

“So you don’t know.”

“Know what?” Jenna was beginning to think that maybe Mary had had a few margaritas too many. “What’re you talking about?”

“It’s the most incredible thing. I really can’t believe it myself and I’ve seen it.” She slapped one hand to her pale blue blouse and groaned like she was in the midst of an orgasm.

“Mary…what is going on?”

“Right, right.” The blonde picked up her drink, took a big gulp and said, “It happened early this afternoon. Joe and I were up on the Promenade, you know, looking at all the shops. Well,” she admitted, “I was looking, Joe was being dragged reluctantly along behind me. And when we came out of the Crystal Candle—which you should really check out, they have some amazing stuff in there—”

Jenna wondered if there was a way to get Mary to stay on track long enough to tell her what was happening. But probably not, so she took a sip of her drink and prepared to wait it out. She didn’t have to wait long.

“When we came out,” Mary was saying, “there was a ship steward waiting for us. He said, ‘Mr. and Mrs. Curran?’ all official-sounding and for a second I wondered what we’d done wrong, but we hadn’t done anything and so Joe says, ‘What’s this about?’ and the steward only told us to go with him.”

“Mary…”

Her new friend grinned. “I’m getting to it. Really. It’s just that it’s all so incredible—right.” She waved one hand to let Jenna know she was back on track, then she went right back to her story. “The steward takes us up to the owner’s suite—you know, Nick Falco?”

“Yeah,” Jenna murmured. “I know who he is.”

“Who in the English-speaking world doesn’t?” Mary said on a laugh, then continued. “So we’re standing there in the middle of a suite that looks like a palace or something and Nick Falco himself comes up to us, introduces himself and apologizes about our cabin in the pit.”

“What?” Jenna just stared at the other woman, not sure what to make of all this.

“I know! I was completely floored, let me tell you. I was almost speechless and Joe can tell you that that almost never happens.” She paused for another gulp of her drink and when she finished it, held up one hand for the waitress to bring another. “So there we are and Mr. Falco’s being so nice and so sincere about how he feels so badly about the state of the rooms on the Riviera Deck—and can you believe how badly misnamed that deck is?—and he insists on upgrading us.”

“Upgrading?”

“Seriously upgrading,” Mary said as she thanked the waitress for her fresh margarita. She waited until the server had disappeared with her empty glass before continuing. “So I’m happy, because hey, that tiny cabin is just so hideous. And I’m expecting a middle-grade cabin with maybe a porthole, which would be great. But that’s not what we got.”

“It’s not?” Jenna set her glass down onto the table and watched as Mary’s eyes actually sparkled even harder than they had been.

“Oh, no. Mr. Falco said that most of the cabins were already full, which is how we got stuck in those tiny ones in the first place. So he moved us into a luxury suite!”

“He did?”

“It’s on the Splendor Deck. The same level as Mr. Falco’s himself. And Jenna, our suite is amazing! It’s bigger than my house. Plus, he said our entire cruise is on him. He’s refunding what we paid for that hideous cabin and insisting that we pay nothing on this trip.”

“Wow.” Nick had always taken great pride in keeping his passengers happy, but this was…well, to use Mary’s word, amazing. Cruise passengers usually looked forward to a bill at the end of a cruise that could amount to several hundred dollars. Oh, the food and accommodations were taken care of when you rented your cabin. But incidentals could really pile up on a person if they weren’t paying attention.

By doing this, Nick had given Mary and her husband a cruising experience that most people would never know. Maybe there was more heart to the man than she’d once believed.

“He’s just so nice,” Mary was saying, stirring her slender straw through the icy confection of her margarita. “Somehow, I thought a man that rich and that famous and that playboylike would be sort of…I don’t know, snotty. But he wasn’t at all. He was really thoughtful and kind, and I can’t believe this is all really happening.”

“It’s terrific, Mary,” Jenna said sincerely. Even if she and Nick had their problems, she could respect and admire him for what he’d done for these people.

“I’m really hoping your upgrade will have you somewhere near us, Jenna. Maybe you should go and see a steward about it, find out where they’re moving you.”

“Oh,” Jenna said with a shake of her head, “I don’t think I’ll be moving.” She couldn’t see Nick doing her any favors. Not with the hostility that had been spilled between them only a few hours ago. And though she was happy for Mary and her husband, Jenna wasn’t looking forward to being the only resident on the lowest deck of the ship. Now it would not only be small and dark, but small and dark and creepy.

“Of course you will,” Mary countered. “They wouldn’t move us and not you. That wouldn’t make any sense at all.”

Jenna just smiled. She wasn’t about to go into her past history with Nick at the moment. So there was nothing she could really say to her new friend, other than, “I’ll find out when I go downstairs to change. I’ve got a dinner appointment in about,” she checked her wristwatch, “an hour and a half. So let’s just have our drinks and you can tell me all about your new suite before I have to leave.”

Mary frowned briefly, then shrugged. “Okay, but if you haven’t been upgraded, I’m going to be really upset.”

“Don’t be.” Jenna smiled and, to distract her, asked, “Do you have a balcony?”

“Two!” Mary crowed a little, grinned like a kid on Christmas morning and said, “Joe and I are going to have dinner on one of them tonight. Out under the stars…mmm. Time for a little romance now that we’re out of the pit!”

Romance.

As Mary talked about the plans she and her husband had made for a night of seduction, Jenna smiled. She wished her friend well, but as for herself, she’d tried romance and had gotten bitten in the butt for her trouble. Nope, she was through with the hearts-and-flowers thing. All she wanted now was Nick’s assurance that he would do the right thing and allow her to raise her sons the way she wanted to.

Her cabin was locked.

“What the—” Jenna slid her key card into the slot, whipped it out again and…nothing. The red light on the lock still shone as if it was taunting her. She knew it wouldn’t do any good, but still, she grabbed the door handle and twisted it hard before shaking it, as if she could somehow convince the damn thing to open for her.

But nothing changed.

She glanced over her shoulder at what had been the Curran cabin, but no help would be found there. The happy couple were comfortably ensconced in their floating palace. “Which is all fine and good for them,” Jenna muttered. “But what about me?”

Giving up, she turned around, leaned back against her closed door and looked up and down the narrow, dark corridor. This was just great. Alone in the pit. No way to call for help. She’d have to go back topside and find a ship phone.

“Perfect. Just perfect.” Her head was a little swimmy from the margaritas and her stomach was twisted in knots of expectation over the upcoming dinner with Nick, and now she couldn’t even take a shower and change clothes. “This is going so well.”

She stabbed the elevator button and when the door opened instantly, she stepped inside. The Muzak pumping through the speakers was a simply hideous orchestral rendition of “Stairway to Heaven” and didn’t do a thing to calm her down.

Jenna exited onto the Promenade Deck and was instantly swallowed by the crowd of passengers wandering around the shops. The lobby area was done in glass and wood with a skylight installed in the domed ceiling overhead that displayed a blue summer sky studded with white, puffy clouds.

But she wasn’t exactly on a sightseeing mission. She plowed through the crowd to a booth where one of Nick’s employees stood ready to help passengers with answers to their questions. The man in the red shirt and white slacks wearing a name tag that read Jeff gave Jenna a welcoming smile as he asked, “How can I help you?”

She tried not to take her frustration out on him. After all, he was trying to help. “Hi, I’m Jenna Baker, and I’m in cabin 2A on the Riviera deck and—”

“Jenna Baker?” he interrupted her quickly, frowned a little, then checked a clipboard on the desk in front of him.

“Yes,” she said, attempting to draw his attention back to her. “I just came from my cabin and my key card didn’t work, so—”

“Ms. Baker,” he said, his attitude changing from flirtatious and friendly to crisp professionalism. “There’s a notation here asking that you be escorted to the Splendor Deck.”

Where Mary’s new cabin was. So Nick had upgraded Jenna, as well? Unexpected and frankly, a relief. A suite would be much more comfortable than the closet she’d been assigned.

But… “All of my things are still in my cabin, so I really need to get in there to pack and—”

“No, ma’am,” Jeff said quickly, smiling again. “Your cabin was packed up by the staff and your luggage has already been moved. If you’ll just take that elevator—” he paused to point at a bank of elevators opposite them “—to the Splendor Deck, you’ll be met and directed to your new cabin.”

Strange. She didn’t know how she felt about someone else rooting through her things, but if it meant she could get into a shower, change clothes and get ready for her meeting with Nick, then she’d go with it. “Okay then, and, um, thanks.”

“It’s a pleasure, Ms. Baker. I hope you enjoy your stay with Falcon Cruises.”

“Uh-huh.” She waved distractedly and headed for the elevators. Not much chance of her enjoying her cruise when she was here to do battle with the King of Cruise Lines. Nope, the most she could hope for was getting out of the pit and into a nicer cabin courtesy of one Mr. Nick Falco.

When the elevator stopped on the Splendor Deck, Jenna stepped out into a wide, lushly carpeted hallway. The ceiling was tinted glass, open to the skies but dark enough to keep people from frying in direct sunlight. The walls were the color of rich cream and dotted with paintings of tropical islands, ships at sea and even simple ocean scenes with whitecaps that looked real enough to wet your fingers if you reached out to touch them.

The one thing she didn’t see was someone to tell her where to go now that she was here. But almost before that thought formed in her mind, Jenna heard the sound of footsteps hurrying toward her. She turned and buried her surprise when she recognized Teresa Hogan, Nick’s assistant.

“Jenna. It’s good to see you,” the older woman said, striding to her with long, determined steps. Her smile looked real, her sharp green eyes were warm and when she reached out a hand in welcome, Jenna was happy to take it.

“Nice to see you, too, Teresa.” They’d met during that magical week with Nick more than a year ago. Ordinarily, as just an assistant to the cruise director, Jenna never would have come into contact with the big boss’s righthand woman. But as the woman having an affair with Nick, Jenna’d met Teresa almost right away.

Teresa had been friendly enough, until the truth about Jenna being one of Nick’s employees had come out. Then the coolly efficient Teresa had drawn a line in the sand, metaphorically speaking. She chose to defend Nick and make sure Jenna never had the chance to get near him again.

At the time, it had made Jenna furious, now she could understand that loyalty. And even appreciate it in a way.

“How’ve you been?” Jenna smiled as she asked, determined to keep the friendly tone that Teresa had begun.

“Busy.” The older woman shrugged. “You know the boss. He keeps us hopping.”

“Yes,” Jenna mused. “He always did.”

A long, uncomfortable moment passed before Teresa said, “So, you know about the cabins on the Riviera Deck being sealed.”

“That’s why I’m here,” Jenna said, shooting a glance up and down the long, empty hallway. “I saw Mary Curran earlier, she told me she and her husband had been upgraded. And then I went to my cabin and couldn’t get in. Jeff at information sent me here.”

“Good.” Teresa nodded and her short, dark hair didn’t so much as dip with the movement. She pointed behind Jenna to the end of the wide, plush hall. “The Currans’ suite is right along there. And now if you’ll come with me, I’ll take you to your new cabin. We can talk as we go.”

They headed off in the opposite direction of the Currans’. Walking toward the bow of the great ship, Jenna casually glanced at the artwork as she passed it and tried to figure out what was going on. Being escorted by the owner’s assistant seemed unusual. Shouldn’t a steward have been put in charge of seeing her to her new accommodations? But did it really matter? Jenna followed along in Teresa’s wake, hurrying to keep up with the woman who seemed always to be in high gear.

“You can imagine,” Teresa said over her shoulder, “that Nick was appalled to find out the cabins on the lowest deck had been rented.”

“Appalled, huh?” Jenna rolled her eyes. Clearly Teresa was still faithful to the boss. “Then why rent them at all?”

Teresa’s steps hitched a little as she acknowledged, “It was a mistake. The cabins below were supposed to have been sealed before leaving port for this maiden voyage. The person responsible for going against the boss’s orders was reprimanded.”

“Shot at dawn? Or just fired without references?” Jenna asked in a low-pitched voice.

Teresa stopped dead and Jenna almost ran right into her.

“Nick doesn’t fire indiscriminately and you know it.” Teresa lifted her chin pointedly as she moved to protect her boss. “You lied to him. That’s why you were fired, Jenna.”

A flush stole through her. Yes, she’d lied. She hadn’t meant to, but that’s what had happened. And she hadn’t been able to find a way out of the lie once it had begun. Still, he might have listened to her once the bag was open and the cat was out.

“He could have let me explain,” Jenna argued and met that cool green stare steadily.

Just for an instant the harsh planes of Teresa’s expression softened a bit. She shook her head and blew out a breath. “Look, Nick’s not perfect—”

“Quite the admission coming from you.”

Teresa smiled tightly. “True. I do defend him. I do what I can to help him. He’s a good boss. And he’s been good to me. I’m not saying that how he handled the… situation with you was right—”

Jenna stopped her, holding up both hands. “You know what? Never mind. It was more than a year ago. It’s over and done. And whatever Nick and I had has ended, too.”

Teresa cocked her head to one side and looked at her thoughtfully. “You really think so, hmm?”

“Trust me on this,” Jenna said as they started walking again. “Nick is so over me.”

“If you say so.” Teresa stopped in front of a set of double doors. Waving one hand at them as if she were a game show hostess displaying a brand-new refrigerator, she said, “Here we are. Your new quarters. I hope you like them.”

“I’m sure they’ll be great. Way better than the Riviera Deck anyway.”

“Oh,” Teresa said with a smile, “that’s certainly a fair statement. You go on in, your things have been unpacked. I’m sure I’ll be seeing you again.”

“Okay.” Jenna stood in the hall and watched as Teresa strode briskly down the long hallway. There was something going on here, she thought, she just couldn’t quite puzzle it out yet.

Then she glanced at her wristwatch, saw she had less than an hour to get ready for her dinner with Nick and opened the door with the key card Teresa had given her.

She walked inside, took a deep breath and almost genuflected.

The room was incredible—huge, and sprawlingly spacious, with glass walls that displayed a view of the ocean that stretched out into infinity. The wide blue sky was splashed with white clouds and the roiling sea reflected that deep blue back up at it.

Pale wood floors shone with an old gold gleam and the furniture scattered around the room looked designed for comfort. There was a fireplace on one wall, a wet bar in the corner and what looked to be priceless works of art dotting the walls. There were vases filled with glorious arrangements of fresh flowers that scented the air until she felt as if she were walking in a garden.

“This can’t be my cabin,” Jenna whispered, whipping her head from side to side as she tried to take in everything at once. “Okay, sure, upgraded to a suite. But this is the Taj Mahal of suites. There has to be a mistake, that’s all.”

“There’s no mistake,” Nick said as he walked easily into the room and gave her a smile that even from across the room was tempting enough to make her gasp. “This is my suite and it’s where you’ll be staying.”

Four

“You can’t be serious.” Jenna took one instinctive step back, but couldn’t go anywhere unless she turned, opened the door and sprinted down that long hallway.

“Damn serious,” he said, and walked toward her like a man with all the time in the world.

He wore a dark blue, long-sleeved shirt, open at the collar, sleeves rolled back to his elbows. His black slacks had a knife-sharp crease in them, and his black shoes shone. But it was his eyes that held her. That pale blue gaze fixed on her as if he could see straight through her. As if he were looking for all of her secrets and wouldn’t give up the quest until he had them.

“Nick, this is a bad idea,” she said, and silently congratulated herself on keeping her tone even.

“Why’s that?” He spread both hands out and shrugged. “You came to my boat. You tell me I’m the father of your children and insist we have to talk. So now you’re here. We can talk.”

Talk. Yeah.

In a floating palace that looked designed for seduction. Meeting Nick in her tiny cabin hadn’t exactly been easy, but at least down there, there’d been no distractions. No easy opulence. No sensory overload of beauty.

This was a bad idea. Jenna knew it. Felt it. And didn’t have a single clue how to get out of it.

“We shouldn’t be staying together,” she said finally, and winced because even to her she sounded like a prissy librarian or something.

“We’ll be staying in the same cabin. Not together. There’s a difference.” He was so close now all he had to do was reach out and he could touch her.

If he did, she’d be a goner though, and she knew it.

“What’s the matter, Jenna?” he asked. “Don’t trust yourself alone with me?”

“Oh, please.” She choked out a half laugh that she desperately hoped sounded convincing. “Could you get over yourself for a minute here?”

He gave her a slow smile that dug out the dimple in his left cheek and lit wicked lights in his eyes. Jenna’s stomach flip-flopped and her mouth went dry.

“I’m not the one having a problem.”

Did he have to smell so good?

“No problem,” she said, lifting her chin and forcing herself to look him dead in the eye. “Trust me when I say all I want from you is what your kids deserve.”

The smile on Nick’s face faded away as her words slammed home. Was he a father? Were those twin boys his? He had to know. To do that, he needed some time with Jenna. He needed to talk to her, figure out what she was after, make a decision about where to go from here.

Funny, Nick had been waiting all afternoon to enjoy that look of stunned disbelief on Jenna’s face when she first walked into his suite and realized that she’d be staying with him. Payback for how he must have looked when he’d first seen the photo of the babies she claimed were his sons. But he hadn’t enjoyed it as much as he’d thought. Because there were other considerations. Bigger considerations.

His sons. Nick’s insides twisted into knots that were beginning to feel almost familiar. Countless times during the day, he’d looked at the photo of the babies he still carried in his shirt pocket. Countless times he’d asked himself if it was really possible that he was a father.

And though he wasn’t prepared to take Jenna’s word for his paternity, he had to admit that it wasn’t likely she’d have come here to the ship, signing up for a cruise if it wasn’t true. Not that he thought she’d have any qualms about lying—she’d lied to him when she first met him after all—but this lie was too easily found out.

So he was willing to accept the possibility. Which left him exactly where? That was the question that had been circling in his mind all afternoon, and he was no closer to an answer now than he had been earlier.

He looked her up and down and could admit at least to himself that she looked damn good to him. Her dark blond hair was a little windblown, stray tendrils pulling away from her braid to lay against her face. Her eyes were wide and gleaming with suspicion, and, strangely enough, that didn’t do a damn thing to mitigate the attraction he felt as he drew in a breath that carried her scent deep into his lungs.

“I’ll stay here, but I’m not sleeping with you,” she announced suddenly.

Nick shook his head and smiled. “Don’t flatter yourself. I said you’re staying in my suite, not my bed. As it happens, there are three bedrooms here besides my own. Your things have been unpacked in one of them.”

She frowned a little and the flush of color in her cheeks faded a bit. “Oh.”

“Disappointed?” Nick asked, feeling a quick jolt of something hot and reckless punch through him.

“Please,” she countered quickly. “You’re not exactly irresistible, Nick.”

He frowned at that, but since he didn’t actually believe her, he let it go.

“I’m actually grateful to be out of that hole at the bottom of the ship,” she added, glancing around at the suite before shifting her gaze back to his. “And if staying here is the price I have to pay for your attention, then I’ll pay.”

One dark eyebrow lifted. “How very brave of you to put up with such appalling conditions as these.”

“Look,” Jenna told him, “if you don’t mind, it’s been a long day. So how about you just tell me which room is mine so I can take a shower. Then we’ll talk.”

“Fine. This way.” He turned, pointed and said, “Down that hall. First door on the left.”

“Thanks.”

“My bedroom’s at the end of the hall on the right.”

She stopped, looked back at him over her shoulder and said, “I’ll make a note.”

“You do that,” he whispered as she left the room, shoulders squared, chin lifted, steps long and slow, as if she were being marched to her death.

His gaze dropped to the curve of her behind and something inside him stirred into life. Something he hadn’t felt since the last time he’d seen Jenna. Something he’d thought he was long past.

He still wanted her.

Spinning around, Nick stalked across the room to the wide bank of windows that displayed an awe-inspiring view of the sea. His gaze locked on the horizon as he fought to control the raging tide of lust rising inside him.

Jenna Baker.

She’d turned him inside out more than a year ago. Ever since, he’d been haunted by memories of their time together until he wasn’t sure if what he was remembering was real or just fevered imaginings offered by a mind that couldn’t seem to let go of the woman who’d lied to him. And Nick wasn’t a man to forget something like that. Now she was back again. Here, trapped on his ship in the middle of the ocean with nowhere to go to escape him.

Yes, they had plenty to talk about—and if her children were indeed his sons, then there were a lot of decisions to be made. But, he told himself as he shoved both hands into his slacks pockets and smiled faintly at the sunlight glinting on the vast expanse of the sea, there would be enough time for him to have her again.

To feel her under him. To lay claim to her body once more. To drive her past the edge of reason. Then, when he was satisfied that he’d gotten her out from under his skin, he’d kick her loose and she’d be out of his life once and for all. He wouldn’t even allow her to be a memory this time.

In Neptune’s Garden, the elegant restaurant on the Splendor Deck, Jenna watched as Nick worked the room.

As the owner of the ship, he wasn’t exactly expected to mingle with the passengers, but Nick was an executive like no other. He not only mingled, he seemed to enjoy himself. And with her arm tucked through his, Jenna felt like a queen moving through an adoring crowd.

Again and again, as they walked to their table, Nick stopped to chat with people sitting at the white linen–covered tables. Making sure they were enjoying the ship, asking if there was anything they needed and didn’t have, if there was anything that the crew could do to make their stay more pleasurable.

Of course the single women on board were more than anxious to meet the gorgeous, wealthy, eligible Nick Falco. And the fact that Jenna was on his arm didn’t dissuade them from flirting desperately.

“It’s a beautiful ship, Mr. Falco,” one woman said with a sigh as she shook his hand. She tossed her thick black hair back over her shoulder and licked her lips.

“Thank you,” he said, smiling at her and the two other women seated with her. “I’m happy you’re enjoying yourselves. If there’s anything you need, please be sure to speak to a steward.”

“Oh,” the brunette cooed, “we will. I promise.”

Jenna just managed to keep from rolling her eyes. All three women were looking at Nick as if he were the first steak they’d stumbled on after leaving a spa dinner of spinach leaves and lemon slices. And he was eating it up, of course.

When he turned to go, he led her on through the crowd and Jenna swore she could feel the death stare from those women boring into her back.

“Well, that was tacky,” she murmured.

“Tacky?”

“The way she practically drooled on you.”

“Ah,” Nick said, flashing a quick grin at her as he opened his right hand—the hand the brunette had shaken and clung to. A cabin key card rested in the center of his palm and the number P230 was scrawled across the top in ink. “So I’m guessing this makes it even tackier.”

“Oh, for God’s sake,” Jenna snapped, wanting to spin around and shoot a few daggers at the brunette with no class. “I was with you. For all she knew I was your girlfriend.”

His pale blue eyes sparkled and his grin widened enough that the dimple in his left cheek was a deep cleft. “Jealous?”

She tried to pull her hand free of the crook of his arm, but he held her tight. Frowning, she said, “No. Not jealous. Just irritated.”

“By her? Or by me?”

“A little of both.” She tipped her head back to look up at him. “Why didn’t you give the key back to her?”

He looked genuinely surprised at the suggestion. “Why would I embarrass her in front of her friends?”

Jenna snorted indelicately. “I’m guessing it’s next to impossible to embarrass a woman like that.”

“This really bothers you.”

It always had, she thought. When she first went to work for Falcon Cruise Lines, she’d heard all the stories. About how on every cruise there were women lining up to take their place in Nick’s bed. He was a player, no doubt. But for some reason, Jenna had allowed herself to be swept up in the magic of the moment. She’d somehow convinced herself that what they’d had together was different from what he found with countless other women.

Apparently, she’d been wrong about a few things.

“One question,” she said, keeping her voice low enough that no one they passed could possibly overhear.

“Okay.”

“Are you planning on using that key?”

He only looked at her for a long moment or two, then sighing, he stopped a waiter, handed over the key card and whispered something Jenna didn’t quite catch. Then he turned to her. “That answer your question?”

“Depends,” she said. “What did you tell him?”

“To return the card to the brunette with my thanks and my regrets.”

A small puddle of warmth settled in Jenna’s chest and even though she knew it was foolish, she couldn’t quite seem to quash it. “Thank you.”

He dipped his head in a faint mockery of a bow. “I find there’s only one woman I’m interested in talking to at the moment.”

“Nick…”

“Here we are,” he said, interrupting whatever she would have said as he seated her in the navy blue leather booth that was kept reserved for him. “Jenna, let’s have some dinner and get started on that talk you wanted.”

Jenna slid behind the linen-draped table and watched him as he moved around to take a seat beside her. “All right, Nick. First let me ask you something, though.”

“What?”

“All the people you talked to as we came through the restaurant…all the women you flirted with…” Jenna shook her head as she looked at him. “You haven’t changed a bit, have you?”

His features tightened as he looked at her, and in the flickering light of the single candle in the middle of their table, his eyes looked just a little dangerous. “Oh, I’ve changed some,” he told her softly, and the tone of his voice rippled across her skin like someone had spilled a glass of ice water on her. “These days I’m a little more careful who I spend time with. I don’t take a woman’s word for it anymore when she tells me who she is. Now I check her out. Don’t want to run across another liar, after all.”

Jenna flushed. She felt the heat of it stain her skin and she was grateful for the dim lighting in the restaurant. Folding her hands together in her lap, she looked at the snowy expanse of the table linen and said, “Okay, I’m going to say this again. I didn’t set out to lie to you back then, Nick.”

“So it just happened?”

“Well,” she said, lifting her gaze reluctantly to his, “yes.”

“Right.” He nodded, gave her a smirk that came nowhere near being a real smile and added, “Couldn’t figure out a way to tell me that you actually worked for me, so you just let it slide. Let me think you were a passenger.”

Yes, she had. She’d been swept away by the moonlight and the most gorgeous man she’d ever seen in her life. “I never said I was. You assumed I was a passenger.”

“And you said nothing to clear that up.”

True. All true. If she’d simply told the truth, then their week together never would have happened. She never would have known what it was like to be in his arms. Never would have imagined a future of some kind between them. Never would have gotten pregnant. Never would have given birth to the two little boys she couldn’t imagine living without.

Because of that, it was hard to feel guilty about what she’d done.

“Nick, let’s not rehash the past, all right? I said I was sorry at the time. I can’t change anything. And you know, you didn’t exactly act like Prince Charming at the time, either.”

“You’re blaming me?”

“You wouldn’t even talk to me,” she reminded him. “You found out the truth and shut me out and down so fast I was half surprised you didn’t have me thrown overboard to swim home.”

He shifted uncomfortably, worked his jaw as if words were clamoring to get out and he was fighting the impulse to shout them. “What did you expect me to do?”

“All I wanted was to explain myself.”

“There was nothing you could have said.”

“Well,” she said softly, “we’ll never know for sure, will we?” Then she sighed and said, “We’re not solving anything here, so let’s just let the past go, okay? What happened, happened. Now we need to talk about what is.”

“Right.” He signaled to a waiter, then looked at her again. “So let’s talk. Tell me about your sons.”

“Your sons,” she corrected, lifting her chin a little as if readying to fight.

“That’s yet to be proved to me.”

“Why would I lie?”

“Hmm. Interesting question,” he said. “I could say you’ve lied before, but then we’ve already agreed not to talk about the past.”

Jenna wasn’t sure if she wanted to sigh in frustration or kick him hard under the table. This was so much more difficult than she’d thought it would be. Somehow, Jenna had convinced herself that Nick would believe her. That he would look at the pictures of the babies and somehow know instinctively that these were his sons. She should have known better.

All around them the clink of fine crystal and the muted conversations of the other diners provided a background swell of sound that was more white noise than anything else. Through the windows lining one side of the restaurant, the night was black and the sea endless. The shimmer of colored lights hanging from the edges of the deck looked almost like a rainbow that only shone at night.

And beside her, the man who’d haunted her dreams and forged a new life for her sat waiting, watchful.

As she started to speak, a waiter approached with a bottle of champagne nestled inside a gleaming silver bucket. Jenna closed her mouth and bit her lip as the waiter poured a sip of the frothy wine into a flute and presented it to Nick for tasting. Approved, the wine was then poured first for her, then for Nick. Once the waiter had disappeared into the throng again, Jenna reached for her champagne and took a sip, hoping to ease the sudden dryness in her throat.

“So?” Nick prodded, his voice a low rumble of sound that seemed to slide inside her. “Tell me about the twins.”

“What do you want to know?”

He shot her a look. “Everything.”

Nodding, Jenna took a breath. Normally, she was more than happy to talk about her sons. She’d even been known to bore complete strangers in the grocery store with tales of their exploits. But tonight was different. Important. This was the father of her children. She had to make him understand that. Believe it. So choosing her words carefully, she started simply and said, “Their names are Jacob and Cooper.”

He frowned a little and took a sip of his own champagne. “Family names?”

“My grandfathers,” she said, just a touch defensively as if she was prepared to go toe to toe with him to guard her right to name her sons whatever she wanted.

“That was nice of you,” he said after a second or two and took the wind out of her sails. “Go on.”

While around them people laughed and talked and relaxed together, a tight knot of tension coiled about their table. Jenna’s voice was soft, Nick leaned in closer to hear her and his nearness made her breath hitch in her chest.

“Jacob’s sunny and happy all the time. He smiles from the minute he wakes up until the moment I put him down for the night.” She smiled, too, just thinking of her babies. “Cooper’s different. He’s more…thoughtful, I guess. His smiles are rarer and all the more precious because of it. He’s always watching. Studying. I’d love to know what he’s thinking most of the time because even at four months, he seems almost a philosopher.”

His gaze was locked on her and Jenna could see both of her sons in Nick’s face. They looked so much like him, she couldn’t understand how he could doubt even for a moment that they were his.

“Where are they now?”

“My sister Maxie’s watching them.” And was probably harried and exhausted. “The boys are crazy about her and she loves them both to death. They’re fine.”

“Then why did you get tense all of a sudden?”

She blew out a breath, slumped back against the booth and admitted, “It’s the first time I’ve been away from them. It feels…wrong, somehow. And I miss them. A lot.”

His eyes narrowed on her and he picked up his glass for a sip of wine. Watching her over the rim of the glass, he swallowed, then set the flute back onto the table. “Can’t be easy, being a single mother.”

“No, it’s not,” she admitted, thinking now about just how tired she was every night by the time she had the boys in bed. It had been so long since she’d been awake past eight o’clock at night that it was odd to her now, sitting here in a restaurant at nine. This was what it had been like before, though. When she’d only had herself to worry about. When she hadn’t had two little boys depending on her.

God, how had she ever been able to stand the quiet? The emptiness in her little house? She couldn’t even imagine being without her sons now.

“But,” she added when he didn’t say anything else, “along with all the work, a single mom gets all the perks to herself, too. I don’t have to share the little moments. I’m the one to see them smile for the first time. To see them waking up to the world around them.”

“So since you’re not looking to share the good moments, that means you’re not interested in having me involved in the twins’ lives,” he said thoughtfully. “All you really want is child support?”

She stiffened a little. Jenna hadn’t even considered that Nick might want to be drawn into their sons’ lives. He wasn’t the hearth-and-home kind of guy. He was the party man. The guy you dated, but didn’t bring home to mom.

“You and I both know you don’t have any interest in being a father, Nick.”

“Is that right? And how would you know that?”

“Well—”

He inclined his head at her speechlessness. “Exactly. You don’t know me any more than I know you.”

“You’re wrong. I know that you’re not the kind of man to tie himself down in one place. That week we were together you told me yourself you had no plans to ever get married and settle down.”

“Who said anything about getting married?”

Jenna sucked in a breath and told herself to slow down. She was walking through a minefield here. “I didn’t mean—”

“Forget it,” he said.

Another waiter appeared, this time delivering a dinner that Nick had clearly ordered earlier. Surprised, Jenna looked down at the serving of breast of chicken and fettucine in mushroom sauce before lifting her gaze to his in question.

“I remembered you liked it,” he said with a shrug.

What was she supposed to do with that? She wondered. He pretended to not care anything about her, yet he remembered more than a year later what her favorite foods were? Why? Why would he recall something so small?

Once the waiter was gone, Nick started talking again. “So answer me this. When you found out you were pregnant, why’d you go through with it?”

“Excuse me?”

He shrugged. “You were alone. A lot of women in that position wouldn’t have done what you did. Giving birth, deciding to raise the babies on her own.”

“They were mine,” she said, as if that explained everything, and in her mind it did. Never for a moment had she considered ending her pregnancy. She’d tried to reach Nick of course, but when she couldn’t, she’d hunkered down and started building a life for her and her children.

“No regrets?”

“Only the one about coming on this ship,” she muttered.

He smiled faintly, laid his napkin across his lap and, picking up his knife and fork, sliced into his filet mignon. “I heard that.”

“I meant you to.” As Jenna used her fork to slide the fettucine noodles around her plate, she said, “Nick, my sons are the most important things in the world to me. I’ll do whatever I have to to make sure they’re safe.”

“Good for you.”

She took a bite of her dinner and, though she could tell it was cooked to perfection, the delicate sauce and chicken tasted like sawdust in her mouth.

“I’ll want a DNA test.”

“Of course,” she said. “I’ve already had the boys’ blood tests done at a local lab. You can send your sample in to them and they’ll do the comparison testing.”

“I’ll take care of it tomorrow.”

“What?” She shook her head, looked at him and said, “Don’t you have to wait until we’re back in San Pedro?”

“No, I’m not going to wait. I want this question settled as quickly as possible.” He continued to eat, as though what they were discussing wasn’t affecting him in the slightest. “We dock at Cabo in the morning. You and I will go ashore, find a lab and have them fax the findings to the lab in San Pedro.”

“We will?” She hadn’t planned on spending a lot of time with Nick, after all. She’d only come on board to tell him about the boys and frankly, she’d thought he wouldn’t want anything more to do with her after that. Instead, he’d moved her into his suite and now was proposing that they spend even more time together.

“Until this is taken care of to my satisfaction,” Nick told her softly, “I’m not letting you out of my sight. The two of us are going to be joined at the hip. So you might as well start getting used to it.”

Five

Once the ship had docked and most of the passengers had disembarked for their day of shopping, sailing and exploring the city of Cabo San Lucas, Nick got busy. He’d already had Teresa make a few calls, and the lab at the local hospital was expecting them.

The sun was hot and bright and the scent of the sea greeted them the moment he and Jenna stepped out on deck. Ordinarily Nick would have been enjoying this. He loved this part of cruising. Docking in a port, exploring the city, revisiting favorite sites, discovering new ones.

But today was different. Today he was on a mission, so he wasn’t going to notice the relaxed, party atmosphere of Cabo. Just as he wasn’t going to notice the way Jenna’s pale green sundress clung to her body or the way her legs looked in those high-heeled sandals. He had no interest in the fact that her dark blond hair looked like spilled honey as it flowed down over her shoulders and he really wasn’t noticing her scent or the way it seemed to waft its way to him on the slightest breeze.

Having her stay in his suite had seemed like a good idea yesterday. But the knowledge that she was so close, that she was just down the hall from him, alone in her bed, had taunted him all night long. Now his eyes felt gritty, his temper was too close to the surface and his body was hard and achy.

Way to go, Falcon, he told himself.

“So where are we going?” she asked as he laid his hand at the small of her back to guide her down the gangplank to shore. Damn, just the tips of his fingers against her spine was enough to make him want to forget all about this appointment and drag her back to his cabin instead.

Gritting his teeth, he pushed that image out of his mind.

“Teresa called the hospital here,” he muttered. “The lab’s expecting us. They’ll take a DNA sample, run it and fax the results to your lab. We should have an answer in a day or two.”

She actually stumbled and he grabbed her arm in an instinctive move. “That fast?”

“Money talks,” he said with a shrug. He’d learned long ago that with enough money, a man could accomplish anything. Way of the world. And for the first time, he was damned glad he was rich enough to demand fast action. Nick wanted this question of paternity settled. Like now. He couldn’t stop thinking about those babies. Couldn’t seem to stop looking at the picture she’d given him of them.

Couldn’t stop wondering how their very existence was going to affect—change—his life. So he needed to know if he was going to be a father or if he was simply going to be suing Jenna Baker for everything she had for lying to him. Again.

Her heels clicked against the gangway and sounded like a frantic heartbeat. He wondered if she was nervous. Wondered if she really was lying and was now worried about being found out. Had she thought he’d simply accept her word that her sons belonged to him? Surely not.

At the bottom of the gangway, a taxi was waiting. Silently blessing Teresa’s efficiency, Nick opened the door for Jenna, and when she was inside, slid in after her. In short, sharp sentences spoken in nearly fluent Spanish, Nick told the driver where to go.

“I didn’t know you spoke Spanish,” she said as he settled onto the bench seat beside her.

“There’s a lot about me you don’t know,” he said.

“I guess so.”

Of course, the same could be said about what he knew of her. He remembered clearly their time together more than a year before. But in those stolen moments, he’d been more intent on burying himself inside her than discovering her thoughts, her hopes, her dreams. He’d told himself then that there would be plenty of time for them to discover each other. He couldn’t have guessed that in one short week he’d find her, want her and then lose her.

Yet, even with the passion simmering between them, Nick could recall brief conversations when she’d talked about her home, her family. He’d thought at the time that she was different from the other women he knew. That she was more sincere. That she was more interested in him, the man, than she was in what he was. How much he had.

Of course, that little fantasy had been exploded pretty quickly.

He dropped into silence again as the cab took off. He didn’t want to talk to her. Didn’t want to think about anything but what he was about to do. With a simple check of his DNA, his life could be altered irrevocably forever. His chest was tight and his mind was racing. Cabo was no more than a colorful blur outside his window as they headed for the lab and a date with destiny.

In a few seconds the cab was swallowed by the bustling port city. At the dock and on the main drive that ran along the ocean, Cabo San Lucas was beautiful. The hotels, the restaurants and bars, everything was new and shone to perfection, the better to tempt the tourists who streamed into the city every year.

But just a few short blocks from the port and Cabo was a big city like any other. The streets were crowded with cars, and pedestrians leaped off the sidewalks and ran across the street with complete abandon, trusting that the drivers would somehow keep from running them down. Narrower, cobblestoned side streets spilled off the bigger avenues and from there came the tantalizing scents of frying onions, spices and grilling meat.

Restaurants and bars crowded together, their chipped stucco facades looking a little tattered as tourists milled up and down the sidewalks, cameras clutched in sunburned fists. As the cab driver steered his car through the maze of traffic, Nick idly glanced out the window and noted the open-air markets gathered together under dark green awnings. Under that umbrella were at least thirty booths where you could buy everything from turquoise jewelry to painted ceramic burros.

Cabo was a tourist town and the locals did everything they could to keep those vacation dollars in the city.

“Strange, isn’t it?” she mused, and Nick turned his head to look at her. She was staring out her window at the city and he half wondered if she was speaking to him or to herself. “All of the opulence on the beach and just a few blocks away…”

“It’s a city, like any other,” he said.

She turned her head to meet his gaze. “It’s just a little disappointing to see the real world beneath the glitz.”

“There’s always a hidden side. To everything. And everyone,” he said, staring into her eyes, wondering what she was feeling. Wondering why he even cared.

“What’s hidden beneath your facade, then?” she asked.

Nick forced a smile. “I’m the exception to the rule,” he told her. “What you see is what you get with me. There are no hidden depths. No mysteries to be solved. No secrets. No lies.”

Her features tightened slightly. “I don’t believe that,” she said. “You’re not as shallow as you pretend to be, Nick. I remember too much to buy into that.”

“Then your memory is wrong. Don’t look for something that isn’t there, Jenna,” he said softly, just in case their driver spoke English. “I’m not a lonely rich boy looking for love.” He leaned in toward her, keeping his gaze locked with hers, and added, “I’m doing this DNA test for my own sake. If those babies are mine, then I need to know. But I’m not the white-picket-fence kind of guy. So don’t go building castles in the air. You’ll get trapped in the rubble when they collapse.”

Jenna felt a chill as she looked into those icy blue eyes of his. All night she’d lain in her bed, thinking about him, wondering if she’d done the right thing by coming to Nick. By telling him about their sons. Now she was faced with the very real possibility that she’d made a huge mistake.

Once he was convinced that the boys were his, then what? Would he really be satisfied with writing out a child support check every month? Or would he demand time with his children? And if he did, how would she fit him into their lives?

Picturing Nick spending time in her tiny house in Seal Beach was almost impossible. His lifestyle was so far removed from hers they might as well be from different planets.

“Nick,” she said, “I know there’s a part of you that thinks I’m lying about all of this. But I’m not.” She paused, watched his reaction and didn’t see a thing that made her feel any better, so she continued. “So, before you take this DNA test, I want you to promise me something.”

He laughed shortly, but there wasn’t a single spark of humor lighting his eyes. “Why would I do that?”

“No reason I can think of, but I’m still asking.”

“What?” he asked, sitting back, dropping one hand to rest on his knee. “What’s this promise?”

She tried again to read his expression, but his features were shuttered, closing her out so completely it was as if she were alone in the cab. But he was listening and that was something, she supposed.

“I want you to promise me that whatever happens, you won’t take out what you feel for me on our sons.”

He tipped his head to one side, studied her for a long moment or two, then as she held her breath, waiting for his response, he finally nodded. “All right. I give you my word. What’s between you and me won’t affect how I treat your sons.”

Jenna gave him a small smile. “Thank you.”

“But if they are my sons,” he added quietly, “you and I have a lot of talking to do.”

The DNA test was done quickly, and before she knew it, Jenna and Nick were back in the cab, heading for the docks again. Her stomach was churning as her mind raced, and being locked inside a car hurtling down a crowded street wasn’t helping. She needed to walk. Needed to breathe. Needed to escape the trapped feeling that held her in a tight grip.

Turning to Nick, she blurted suddenly, “Can we get out? Walk the rest of the way to the dock?”

He glanced at her, and whatever he saw in her face must have convinced him because he nodded, then spoke to the driver in Spanish. A moment later the cab pulled to the curb. Jenna jumped out of the car as if she were on springs and took a deep breath of cool, ocean air while Nick paid their fare.

Tourists and locals alike crowded the sidewalk and streamed past her as if she were a statue. She tucked her purse under her left arm and turned her face into the breeze sliding down the street from the sea.

“It’s still several blocks to the ship,” Nick said as he joined her on the sidewalk. “You going to be able to make it in those shoes?”

Jenna glanced down at the heeled sandals she wore then lifted her gaze back to his. “I’ll make it. I just—needed to get out of that cab and move around a little.”

“I don’t remember you being so anxious,” he said.

She laughed a little and sounded nervous even to herself. “Not anxious, really. It’s just that since the boys were born, I’m not used to being still. They keep me running all day long, and sitting in the back of that cab, I felt like I was in a cage or something and it didn’t help that neither one of us was talking and we’d just come from the lab, so my brain was in overdrive and—”

He interrupted the frantic flow of words by holding up one hand. “I get it. And I could use some air, too. So why don’t we start walking?”

“Good. That’d be good.” God, she hadn’t meant to go on a stream of consciousness there. If he hadn’t stopped her, heaven only knew what would have come out of her mouth. As it was, he was looking at her like she was a stick of dynamite with a burning fuse.

He took her arm to turn her around, and the sizzle of heat that sprang up from his touch was enough to boil her blood and make her gasp for air. So not a good sign.

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