In this Billionaires & Babies novel, USA TODAY bestselling author Catherine Mann gives new meaning to the words “Merry Christmas, Baby”

’Tis the season to be jolly? It isn’t for Dr. Rowan Boothe when a princess on the run from the photo-hungry press invades his hotel room. He and Mariama Mandara had their professional clashes in the past, and Rowan has no desire to become involved in her latest predicament—until they discover an abandoned baby. Now he needs Mari’s help and soon discovers she’s no pampered royal but a desirable woman. Yet how long can their Christmas escape really last?

“Do you really think people are going to believe we went from professional adversaries to lovers in a heartbeat?”

“Lovers, huh? I like the sound of that.”

“This isn’t a plan.” Mariama pulled free, inching her chair back. “It’s insanity.”

“It’s a plan that will work. Everyone will want to hear more about the aloof princess finding romance and playing Good Samaritan at Christmastime.”

Her eyes went wide with panic, but she stayed in her seat. She wasn’t running. Yet.

Rowan shoved to his feet. “Time for bed.”

“Bed?” she squeaked, standing, as well.

He could see in her eyes that she’d envisioned them sharing a bed before this moment. And it gave him a surge of victory.

* * *

Yuletide Baby Surprise is a Billionaires and Babies novel:

Powerful men…wrapped around

their babies’ little fingers

Dear Reader,

I love to write baby stories because, well, I love babies! As a mother of four, I savored each child’s precious milestones, moments that flew by in a flurry of years. I’ve enjoyed drawing on those experiences to create the little ones in my stories.

Writing this book with a baby, however, marked a very special milestone in my life. I started this book shortly before the birth of my first grandchild and finished writing Yuletide Baby Surprise as we celebrated Christmas with a visit from our granddaughter. Needless to say, it was our best Christmas ever!

May the joy of the season be with each of you as you savor making memories with those dearest to you!

Happy Holidays,

Cathy

Website: catherinemann.com Facebook: www.facebook.com/CatherineMannAuthor Twitter: twitter.com/#!/CatherineMann1 Pinterest: pinterest.com/catherinemann/

Yuletide Baby Surprise

Catherine Mann

www.millsandboon.co.uk

USA TODAY bestselling author CATHERINE MANN lives on a sunny Florida beach with her flyboy husband and their four children. With more than forty books in print in over twenty countries, she has also celebrated wins for both a RITA® Award and a Booksellers’ Best Award. Catherine enjoys chatting with readers online—thanks to the wonders of the internet, which allows her to network with her laptop by the water! Contact Catherine through her website, www.catherinemann.com, find her on Facebook and Twitter (@CatherineMann1) or reach her by snail mail at PO Box 6065, Navarre, FL 32566, USA.

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To Savannah

Contents

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

One

Dr. Mariama Mandara had always been the last picked for a team in gym class. With good reason. Athletics? Not her thing. But when it came to spelling bees, debate squads and math competitions, she’d racked up requests by the dozens.

Too bad her academic skills couldn’t help her sprint faster down the posh hotel corridor.

More than ever, she needed speed to escape the royal watchers tracking her at the Cape Verde beachside resort off the coast of West Africa, which was like a North Atlantic Hawaii, a horseshoe grouping of ten islands. They were staying on the largest island, Santiago.

No matter where she hid, determined legions were all too eager for a photo with a princess. Why couldn’t they accept she was here for a business conference, not socializing?

Panting, Mari braced a hand against the wall as she stumbled past a potted areca silk palm strung with twinkling Christmas lights. Evading relentless pursuers wasn’t as easy as it appeared in the movies, especially if you weren’t inclined to blow things up or leap from windows. The nearest stairwell door was blocked by two tourists poring over some sightseeing pamphlet. A cleaning cart blocked another escape route. She could only keep moving forward.

Regaining her balance, she power-walked, since running would draw even more attention or send her tripping over her own feet. Her low-heeled pumps thud-thud-thudded along the plush carpet in time with a polyrhythmic version of “Hark! The Herald Angels Sing” wafting from the sound system. She just wanted to finish this medical conference and return to her research lab, where she could ride out the holiday madness in peace, crunching data rather than candy canes.

For most people, Christmas meant love, joy and family. But for her, the “season to be jolly” brought epic family battles even twenty years after her parents’ divorce. If her mom and dad had lived next door to each other—or even on the same continent—the holidays would not have been so painful. But they’d played transcontinental tug-of-war over their only child for decades. Growing up, she’d spent more time in the Atlanta airport and on planes with her nanny than actually celebrating by a fireside with cocoa. She’d even spent one Christmas in a hotel, her connecting flight canceled for snow.

The occasional cart in the hall now reminded her of that year’s room-service Christmas meal. Call her crazy, but once she had gained more control over her world, she preferred a simpler Christmas.

Although simple wasn’t always possible for someone born into royalty. Her mother had crumbled under the pressure of the constant spotlight, divorced her Prince Charming in Western Africa and returned to her Atlanta, Georgia, home. Mari, however, couldn’t divorce herself from her heritage.

If only her father and his subjects understood she could best serve their small region through her research at the university lab using her clinical brain, rather than smiling endlessly through the status quo of ribbon-cutting ceremonies. She craved her comfy, shapeless clothes, instead of worrying about keeping herself neat as a pin for photo ops.

Finally, she spotted an unguarded stairwell. Peering inside, she found it empty but for the echo of “Hark! The Herald Angels Sing” segueing into “Away in a Manger.” She just needed to make it from the ground level to her fifth-floor room, where she could hole up for the night before facing the rest of the week’s symposiums. Exhausted from a fourteen-hour day of presentations about her research on antiviral medications, she was a rumpled mess and just didn’t have it in her to smile pretty for the camera or field questions that would be captured on video phone. Especially since anything she said could gain a life of its own on the internet in seconds these days.

She grasped the rail and all but hauled herself up step after step. Urgency pumped her pulse in her ears. Gasping, she paused for a second at the third floor to catch her breath before trudging up the last flights. Shoving through the fifth-floor door, she almost slammed into a mother and teenage daughter leaving their room. The teen did a double take and Mari turned away quickly, adrenaline surging through her exhaustion and powering her down the hall. Except now she was going in the opposite direction, damn it.

Simply strolling back into the hall wasn’t an option until she could be sure the path was clear. But she couldn’t simply stand here indefinitely, either. If only she had a disguise, something to throw people off the scent. Head tucked down, she searched the hall through her eyelashes, taking in a brass luggage rack and monstrously big pots of African feather grass.

Her gaze landed on the perfect answer—a roomservice cart. Apparently abandoned. She scanned for anyone in a hotel uniform, but saw only the retreating back of a woman walking away quickly, a cell phone pressed to her ear. Mari chewed her lip for half a second then sprinted forward and stopped just short of the cloth-draped trolley.

She peeked under the silver tray. The mouth-watering scent of saffron-braised karoo lamb made her stomach rumble. And the tiramisu particularly tempted her to find the nearest closet and feast after a long day of talking without a break for more than coffee and water. She shook off indulgent thoughts. The sooner she worked her way back to her room, the sooner she could end this crazy day with a hot shower, her own tray of food and a soft bed.

Delivering the room-service cart now offered her best means of disguise. A hotel jacket was even draped over the handle and a slip of paper clearly listed Suite 5A as the recipient.

The sound of the elevator doors opening spurred her into action.

Mari shrugged the voluminous forest-green jacket over her rumpled black suit. A red Father Christmas hat slipped from underneath the hotel uniform. All the better for extra camouflaging. She yanked on the hat over her upswept hair and started pushing the heavily laden cart toward the suite at the end of the hall, just as voices swelled behind her.

“Do you see her?” a female teen asked in Portuguese, her squeaky tones drifting down the corridor. “I thought you said she ran up the stairs to the fifth floor.”

“Are you sure it wasn’t the fourth?” another high-pitched girl answered.

“I’m certain,” a third voice snapped. “Get your phone ready. We can sell these for a fortune.”

Not a chance.

Mari shoved the cart. China rattled and the wheels creaked. Damn, this thing was heavier than it looked. She dug her heels in deeper and pushed harder. Step by step, past carved masks and a pottery elephant planter, she walked closer to suite 5A.

The conspiring trio drew closer. “Maybe we can ask that lady with the cart if she’s seen her....”

Apprehension lifted the hair on the back of Mari’s neck. The photos would be all the more mortifying if they caught her in this disguise. She needed to get inside suite 5A. Now. The numbered brass plaque told her she was at the right place.

Mari jabbed the buzzer, twice, fast.

“Room service,” she called, keeping her head low.

Seconds ticked by. The risk of stepping inside and hiding her identity from one person seemed far less daunting than hanging out here with the determined group and heaven only knew who else.

Just when she started to panic that time would run out, the door opened, thank God. She rushed past, her arms straining at the weight of the cart and her nose catching a whiff of manly soap. Her favorite scent—clean and crisp rather than cloying and obvious. Her feet tangled for a second.

Tripping over her own feet as she shoved the cart was far from dignified. But she’d always been too gangly to be a glamour girl. She was more of a cerebral type, a proud nerd, much to the frustration of her family’s press secretary, who expected her to present herself in a more dignified manner.

Still, even in her rush to get inside, curiosity nipped at her. What type of man would choose such a simple smell while staying in such opulence? But she didn’t dare risk a peek at him.

She eyed the suite for other occupants, even though the room-service cart only held one meal. One very weighty meal. She shoved the rattling cart past a teak lion. The room appeared empty, the lighting low. Fat leather sofas and a thick wooden table filled the main space. Floor-to-ceiling shutters had been slid aside to reveal the moonlit beach outside a panoramic window. Lights from stars and yachts dotted the horizon. Palms and fruit trees with lanterns illuminated the shore. On a distant islet, a stone church perched on a hill.

She cleared her throat and started toward the table by the window. “I’ll set everything up on the table for you.”

“Thanks,” rumbled a hauntingly familiar voice that froze her in her tracks. “But you can just leave it there by the fireplace.”

Her brain needed less than a second to identify those deep bass tones. Ice trickled down her spine as if snow had hit her African Christmas after all.

She didn’t have to turn around to confirm that fate was having a big laugh at her expense. She’d run from an irritation straight into a major frustration. Out of all the hotel suites she could have entered, somehow she’d landed in the room of Dr. Rowan Boothe.

Her professional nemesis.

A physician whose inventions she’d all but ridiculed in public.

What the hell was he doing here? She’d reviewed the entire program of speakers and she could have sworn he wasn’t listed on the docket until the end of the week.

The door clicked shut behind her. The tread of his footsteps closed in, steady, deliberate, bringing the scent of him drifting her way. She kept her face down, studying his loafers and the well-washed hem of his faded jeans.

She held on to the hope that he wouldn’t recognize her. “I’ll leave your meal right here then,” she said softly. “Have a nice evening.”

His tall, solid body blocked her path. God, she was caught between a rock and a hard place. Her eyes skated to his chest.

A very hard, muscle-bound place encased in a white button-down with the sleeves rolled up and the tail untucked. She remembered well every muscular—annoying—inch of him.

She just prayed he wouldn’t recognize her from their last encounter five months ago at a conference in London. Already the heat of embarrassment flamed over her.

Even with her face averted, she didn’t need to look further to refresh her memory of that too handsome face of his. Weathered by the sun, his Brad Pitt–level good looks only increased. His sandy blond hair would have been too shaggy for any other medical professional to carry off. But somehow he simply appeared too immersed in philanthropic deeds to be bothered with anything as mundane as a trip to the barber.

The world thought he was Dr. Hot Perfection but she simply couldn’t condone the way he circumvented rules.

“Ma’am,” he said, ducking his head as if to catch her attention, “is there a problem?”

Just keep calm. There was no way for him to identify her from the back. She would rather brave a few pictures in the press than face this man while she wore a flipping Santa Claus hat.

A broad hand slid into view with cash folded over into a tip. “Merry Christmas.”

If she didn’t take the money, that would appear suspicious. She pinched the edge of the folded bills, doing her best to avoid touching him. She plucked the cash free and made a mental note to donate the tip to charity. “Thank you for your generosity.”

“You’re very welcome.” His smooth bass was too appealing coming from such an obnoxiously perfect man.

Exhaling hard, she angled past him. Almost home free. Her hand closed around the cool brass door handle.

“Dr. Mandara, are you really going so soon?” he asked with unmistakable sarcasm. He’d recognized her. Damn. He was probably smirking, too, the bastard.

He took a step closer, the heat of his breath caressing her cheek. “And here I thought you’d gone to all this trouble to sneak into my room so you could seduce me.”

* * *

Dr. Rowan Boothe waited for his words to sink in, the possibility of sparring with the sexy princess/research scientist already pumping excitement through his veins. He didn’t know what it was about Mariama Mandara that turned him inside out, but he’d given up analyzing the why of it long ago. His attraction to Mari was simply a fact of life now.

Her disdain for him was an equally undeniable fact, and to be honest, it was quite possibly part of her allure.

He grew weary with the whole notion of the world painting him as some kind of saint just because he’d rejected the offer of a lucrative practice in North Carolina and opened a clinic in Africa. These days, he had money to burn after his invention of a computerized medical diagnostics program—a program Mari missed no opportunity to dismiss as faux, shortcut medicine. Funding the clinic hadn’t even put a dent in his portfolio so he didn’t see it as worthy of hoopla. Real philanthropy involved sacrifice. And he wasn’t particularly adept at denying himself things he wanted.

Right now, he wanted Mari.

Although from the look of horror on her face, his half-joking come-on line hadn’t struck gold.

She opened and closed her mouth twice, for once at a loss for words. Fine by him. He was cool with just soaking up the sight of her. He leaned back against the wet bar, taking in her long, elegant lines. Others might miss the fine-boned grace beneath the bulky clothes she wore, but he’d studied her often enough to catch the brush of every subtle curve. He could almost feel her, ached to peel her clothes away and taste every inch of her café-au-lait skin.

Some of the heat must have shown on his face because she snapped out of her shock. “You have got to be joking. You can’t honestly believe I would ever make a move on you, much less one so incredibly blatant.”

Damn, but her indignation was so sexy and yeah, even cute with the incongruity of that Santa hat perched on her head. He couldn’t stop himself from grinning.

She stomped her foot. “Don’t you dare laugh at me.”

He tapped his head lightly. “Nice hat.”

Growling, she flung aside the hat and shrugged out of the hotel jacket. “Believe me, if I’d known you were in here, I wouldn’t have chosen this room to hide out.”

“Hide out?” he said absently, half following her words.

As she pulled her arms free of the jacket to review a rumpled black suit, the tug of her white business shirt against her breasts sent an unwelcome surge of arousal through him. He’d been fighting a damned inconvenient arousal around this woman for more than two years, ever since she’d stepped behind a podium in front of an auditorium full of people and proceeded to shoot holes in his work. She thought his computerized diagnostics tool was too simplistic. She’d accused him of taking the human element out of medicine. His jaw flexed, any urge to smile fading.

If anyone was too impersonal, it was her. And, God, how he ached to rattle her composure, to see her tawny eyes go sleepy with all-consuming passion.

Crap.

He was five seconds away from an obvious erection. He reined himself in and faced the problem at hand—the woman—as a more likely reason for her arrival smoked through his brain. “Is this some sort of professional espionage?”

“What in the hell are you talking about?” She fidgeted with the loose waistband on her tweedy skirt.

Who would have thought tweed would turn him inside out? Yet he found himself fantasizing about pulling those practical clunky shoes off her feet. He would kiss his way up under her skirt, discover the silken inside of her calf...

He cleared his throat and brought his focus up to her heart-shaped face. “Playing dumb does not suit you.” He knew full well she had a genius IQ. “But if that’s the way you want this to roll, then okay. Were you hoping to obtain insider information on the latest upgrade to my computerized diagnostics tool?”

“Not likely.” She smoothed a hand over her swept-back hair. “I never would have pegged you as the conspiracy theorist sort since you’re a man of science. Sort of.”

He cocked an eyebrow. “So you’re not here for information, Mari.” If he’d wanted distance he should have called her Dr. Mandara, but too late to go back. “Then why are you sneaking into my suite?”

Sighing, she crossed her arms over her chest. “Fine. I’ll tell you, but you have to promise not to laugh.”

“Scout’s honor.” He crossed his heart.

“You were a Boy Scout? Figures.”

Before he’d been sent to a military reform school, but he didn’t like to talk about those days and the things he’d done. Things he could never atone for even if he opened free clinics on every continent, every year for the rest of his life. But he kept trying, by saving one life at a time, to make up for the past.

“You were going to tell me how you ended up in my suite.”

She glanced at the door, then sat gingerly on the arm of the leather sofa. “Royal watchers have been trailing me with their phones to take photos and videos for their five seconds of fame. A group of them followed me out the back exit after my last seminar.”

Protective instincts flamed to life inside him. “Doesn’t your father provide you with bodyguards?”

“I choose not to use them,” she said without explanation, her chin tipping regally in a way that shouted the subject wasn’t open for discussion. “My attempt to slip away wasn’t going well. The lady pushing this room-service cart was distracted by a phone call. I saw my chance to go incognito and I took it.”

The thought of her alone out there had him biting back the urge to chew out someone—namely her father. So what if she rejected guards? Her dad should have insisted.

Mari continued, “I know I should probably just grin for the camera and move on, but the images they capture aren’t...professional. I have serious work to do, a reputation to maintain.” She tipped her head back, her mouth pursed tight in frustration for a telling moment before she rambled on with a weary shake of her head. “I didn’t sign on for this.”

Her exhaustion pulled at him, made him want to rest his hands on her drooping shoulders and ease those tense muscles. Except she would likely clobber him with the silver chafing dish on the serving cart. He opted for the surefire way to take her mind off the stress.

Shoving away from the bar, he strode past the cart toward her again. “Poor little rich princess.”

Mari’s cat eyes narrowed. “You’re not very nice.”

“You’re the only one who seems to think so.” He stopped twelve inches shy of touching her.

Slowly, she stood, facing him. “Well, pardon me for not being a member of your fan club.”

“You genuinely didn’t know this was my room?” he asked again, even though he could see the truth in her eyes.

“No. I didn’t.” She shook her head, the heartbeat throbbing faster in her elegant neck. “The cart only had your room number. Not your name.”

“If you’d realized ahead of time that this was my room, my meal—” he scooped up the hotel jacket and Santa hat “—would you have surrendered yourself to the camera-toting brigade out there rather than ask me for help?”

Her lips quivered with the first hint of a smile. “I guess we’ll never know the answer to that, will we?” She tugged at the jacket. “Enjoy your supper.”

He didn’t let go. “There’s plenty of food here. You could join me, hide out for a while longer.”

“Did you just invite me to dinner?” The light of humor in her eyes animated her face until the air damn near crackled between them. “Or are you secretly trying to poison me?”

She nibbled her bottom lip and he could have sworn she swayed toward him. If he hooked a finger in the vee of her shirt and pulled, she would be in his arms.

Instead, he simply reached out and skimmed back the stray lock of sleek black hair curving just under her chin. “Mari, there are a lot of things I would like to do to you, but I can assure you that poisoning you is nowhere on that list.”

Confusion chased across her face, but she wasn’t running from the room or laughing. In fact, he could swear he saw reluctant interest. Enough to make him wonder what might happen if...

A whimper snapped him out of his passion fog.

The sound wasn’t coming from Mari. She looked over his shoulder and he turned toward the sound. The cry swelled louder, into a full-out wail, swelling from across the room.

From under the room-service cart?

He glanced at Mari. “What the hell?”

She shook her head, her hands up. “Don’t look at me.”

He charged across the room, sweeping aside the linen cloth covering the service cart to reveal a squalling infant.

Two

The infant’s wail echoed in the hotel suite. Shock resounded just as loudly inside of Mari as she stared at the screaming baby in a plastic carrier wedged inside the room-service trolley. No wonder the cart had felt heavier than normal. If only she’d investigated she might have found the baby right away. Her brain had been tapping her with the logic that something was off, and she’d been too caught up in her own selfish fears about a few photos to notice.

To think that poor little one had been under there all this time. So tiny. So defenseless. The child, maybe two or three months old, wore a diaper and a plain white T-shirt, a green blanket tangled around its tiny, kicking feet.

Mari swallowed hard, her brain not making connections as she was too dumbstruck to think. “Oh, my God, is that a baby?”

“It’s not a puppy.” Rowan washed his hands at the wet-bar sink then knelt beside the lower rack holding the infant seat. He visibly went into doctor mode as he checked the squalling tyke over, sliding his hands under and scooping the child up in his large, confident hands. Chubby little mocha-brown arms and legs flailed before the baby settled against Rowan’s chest with a hiccupping sigh.

“What in the world is it doing under there?” She stepped away, clearing a path for him to walk over to the sofa.

“I’m not the one who brought the room service in,” he countered offhandedly, sliding a finger into the baby’s tiny bow mouth. Checking for a cleft palate perhaps?

“Well, I didn’t put the baby there.”

A boy or girl? She couldn’t tell. The wriggling bundle wore no distinguishing pink or blue. There wasn’t even a hair bow in the cap of black curls.

Rowan elbowed aside an animal-print throw pillow and sat on the leather couch, resting the baby on his knees while he continued assessing.

She tucked her hands behind her back. “Is it okay? He or she?”

“Her,” he said, closing the cloth diaper. “She’s a girl, approximately three months old, but that’s just a guess.”

“We should call the authorities. What if whoever abandoned her is still in the building?” Unlikely given how long she’d hung out in here flirting with Rowan. “There was a woman walking away from the cart earlier. I assumed she was just taking a cell phone call, but maybe that was the baby’s mother?”

“Definitely something to investigate. Hopefully there will be security footage of her. You need to think through what you’re going to tell the authorities, review every detail in your mind while it’s fresh.” He sounded more like a detective than a doctor. “Did you see anyone else around the cart before you took it?”

“Are you blaming this on me?”

“Of course not.”

Still, she couldn’t help but feel guilty. “What if this is my fault for taking that cart? Maybe the baby wasn’t abandoned at all. What if some mother was just trying to bring her child to work? She must be frantic looking for her daughter.”

“Or frantic she’s going to be in trouble,” he replied dryly.

“Or he. The parent could be a father.” She reached for the phone on the marble bar. “I really need to ring the front desk now.”

“Before you call, could you pass over her seat? It may hold some clues to her family. Or at least some supplies to take care of her while we settle this.”

“Sure, hold on.”

She eased the battered plastic seat from under the cart, winging a quick prayer of thankfulness that the child hadn’t come to some harm out there alone in the hall. The thought that someone would so recklessly care for a precious life made her grind her teeth in frustration. She set the gray carrier beside Rowan on the sofa, the green blanket trailing off the side.

Finally, she could call for help. Without taking her eyes off Rowan and the baby, she dialed the front desk.

The phone rang four times before someone picked up. “Could you hold, please? Thank you,” a harried-sounding hotel operator said without giving Mari a chance to shout “No!” The line went straight to Christmas carols, “O Holy Night” lulling in her ear.

Sighing, she sagged a hip against the garland-draped wet bar. “They put me on hold.”

Rowan glanced up, his pure blue eyes darkened with an answering frustration. “Whoever decided to schedule a conference at this time of year needs to have his head examined. The hotel was already jam-packed with holiday tourists, now conventioneers, too. Insane.”

“For once, you and I agree on something one hundred percent.” The music on the phone transitioned to “The Little Drummer Boy” as she watched Rowan cradle the infant in a way that made him even more handsome. Unwilling to get distracted by traveling down that mental path again, she shifted to look out the window at the scenic view. Multicolored lights blinked from the sailboats and ferries.

The Christmas spirit was definitely in full swing on the resort island. Back on the mainland, her father’s country included more of a blend of religions than many realized. Christmas wasn’t as elaborate as in the States, but still celebrated. Cape Verde had an especially deep-rooted Christmas tradition, having been originally settled by the Portuguese.

Since moving out on her own, she’d been more than happy to downplay the holiday mayhem personally, but she couldn’t ignore the importance, the message of hope that should come this time of year. That a parent could abandon a child at the holidays seemed somehow especially tragic.

Her arms suddenly ached to scoop up the baby, but she had no experience and heaven forbid she did something wrong. The little girl was clearly in better hands with Rowan.

He cursed softly and she turned back to face him. He held the baby in the crook of his arm while he searched the infant seat with the other.

“What?” she asked, covering the phone’s mouthpiece. “Is something the matter with the baby?”

“No, something’s the matter with the parents. You can stop worrying that some mom or dad brought their baby to work.” He held up a slip of paper, baby cradled in the other arm. “I found this note tucked under the liner in the carrier.”

He held up a piece of hotel stationary.

Mari rushed to sit beside him on the sofa, phone still in hand. “What does it say?”

“The baby’s mother intended for her to be in this cart, in my room.” He passed the note. “Read this.”

Dr. Boothe, you are known for your charity and generosity. Please look over my baby girl, Issa. My husband died in a border battle and I cannot give Issa what she needs. Tell her I love her and will think of her always.

Mari reread the note in disbelief, barely able to process that someone could give away their child so easily, with no guarantees that she would be safe. “Do people dump babies on your doorstep on a regular basis?”

“It’s happened a couple of times at my clinic, but never anything remotely like this.” He held out the baby toward her. “Take Issa. I have some contacts I can reach out to with extra resources. They can look into this while we’re waiting for the damn hotel operator to take you off hold.”

Mari stepped back sharply. “I don’t have much experience with babies. No experience actually, other than kissing them on the forehead in crowds during photo ops.”

“Didn’t you ever babysit in high school?” He cradled the infant in one arm while fishing out his cell phone with his other hand. “Or do princesses not babysit?”

“I skipped secondary education and went straight to college.” As a result, her social skills sucked as much as her fashion sense, but that had never mattered much. Until now. Mari smoothed a hand down her wrinkled, baggy skirt. “Looks to me like you have Issa and your phone well in hand.”

Competently—enticingly so. No wonder he’d been featured in magazines around the globe as one of the world’s most eligible bachelors. Intellectually, she’d understood he was an attractive—albeit irritating—man. But until this moment, she hadn’t comprehended the full impact of his appeal.

Her body flamed to life, her senses homing in on this moment, on him. Rowan. The last man on the planet she should be swept away by or attracted to.

This must be some sort of primal, hormonal thing. Her ticking biological clock was playing tricks on her mind because he held a baby. She could have felt this way about any man.

Right?

God, she hoped so. Because she couldn’t wrap her brain around the notion that she could be this drawn to a man so totally wrong for her.

The music ended on the phone a second before the operator returned. “May I help you?”

Heaven yes, she wanted to shout. She needed Issa safe and settled. She also needed to put space between herself and the increasingly intriguing man in front of her.

She couldn’t get out of this suite soon enough.

“Yes, you can help. There’s been a baby abandoned just outside Suite 5A, the room of Dr. Rowan Boothe.”

* * *

Rowan didn’t foresee a speedy conclusion to the baby mystery. Not tonight, anyway. The kind of person who threw away their child and trusted her to a man based solely on his professional reputation was probably long gone by now.

Walking the floor with the infant, he patted her back for a burp after the bottle she’d downed. Mari was reading a formula can, her forehead furrowed, her shirt half-untucked. Fresh baby supplies had been sent up by the hotel’s concierge since Rowan didn’t trust anything in the diaper bag.

There were no reports from hotel security or authorities of a missing child that matched this baby’s description. So far security hadn’t found any helpful footage, just images of a woman’s back as she walked away from the cart as Mari stepped up to take it. Mari had called the police next, but they hadn’t seemed to be in any hurry since no one’s life was in danger and even the fact that a princess was involved didn’t have them moving faster. Delays like this only made it more probable the press would grab hold of information about the situation. He needed to keep this under control. His connections could help him with that, but they couldn’t fix the entire system here.

Eventually, the police would make their way over with someone from child services. Thoughts of this baby getting lost in an overburdened, underfunded network tore at him. On a realistic level, he understood he couldn’t save everyone who crossed his path, but something about this vulnerable child abandoned at Christmas tore at his heart all the more.

Had to be because the kid was a baby, his weak spot.

He shrugged off distracting thoughts of how badly he’d screwed up as a teenager and focused on the present. Issa burped, then cooed. But Rowan wasn’t fooled into thinking she was full. As fast as the kid had downed that first small bottle, he suspected she still needed more. “Issa’s ready for the extra couple of ounces if you’re ready.”

Mari shook the measured powder and distilled water together, her pretty face still stressed. “I think I have it right. But maybe you should double-check.”

“Seriously, I’m certain you can handle a two-to-one mixture.” He grinned at seeing her flustered for the first time ever. Did she have any idea how cute she looked? Not that she would be happy with the “cute” label. “Just think of it as a lab experiment.”

She swiped a wrist over the beads of sweat on her forehead, a simple watch sliding down her slim arm. “If I got the proportions wrong—”

“You didn’t.” He held out a hand for the fresh bottle. “Trust me.”

Reluctantly, she passed it over. “She just looks so fragile.”

“Actually, she appears healthy, well fed and clean.” Her mother may have dumped her off, but someone had taken good care of the baby before that. Was the woman already regretting her decision? God, he hoped so. There were already far too few homes for orphans here. “There are no signs she’s been mistreated.”

“She seems cuddly,” Mari said with a wistful smile.

“Are you sure you wouldn’t like to hold her while I make a call?”

She shook her head quickly, tucking a stray strand of hair back into the loose knot at her neck. “Your special contacts?”

He almost smiled at her weak attempt to distract him from passing over the baby. And he definitely wasn’t in a position to share much of anything about his unorthodox contacts with her. “It would be easier if I didn’t have to juggle the kid and the bottle while I talk.”

“Okay, if you’re sure I won’t break her.” She chewed her bottom lip. “But let me sit down first.”

Seeing Mari unsure of herself was strange, to say the least. She always commanded the room with her confidence and knowledge, even when he didn’t agree with her conclusions. There was something vulnerable, approachable even, about her now.

He set the baby into her arms, catching a whiff of Mari’s perfume, something flowery and surprisingly whimsical for such a practical woman. “Just be careful to support her head and hold the bottle up enough that she isn’t drinking air.”

Mari eyed the bottle skeptically before popping it into Issa’s mouth. “Someone really should invent a more precise way to do this. There’s too much room for human error.”

“But babies like the human touch. Notice how she’s pressing her ear against your heart?” Still leaning in, he could see Mari’s pulse throbbing in her neck. The steady throb made him burn to kiss her right there, to taste her, inhale her scent. “That heartbeat is a constant in a baby’s life in utero. They find comfort in it after birth, as well.”

Her deep golden gaze held his and he could swear something, an awareness, flashed in her eyes as they played out this little family tableau.

“Um, Rowan—” her voice came out a hint breathier than normal “—make your call, please.”

Yeah, probably a good idea to retreat and regroup while he figured out what to do about the baby—and about having Mari show up unexpectedly in his suite.

He stepped into his bedroom and opened the French door onto the balcony. The night air was that perfect temperature—not too hot or cold. Decembers in Cape Verde usually maxed out at between seventy-five and eighty degrees Fahrenheit. A hint of salt clung to the air and on a normal night he would find sitting out here with a drink the closest thing to a vacation he’d had in... He’d lost count of the years.

But tonight he had other things on his mind.

Fishing out his phone, he leaned on the balcony rail so he could still see Mari through the picture window in the sitting area. His gaze roved over her lithe body, which was almost completely hidden under her ill-fitting suit. At least she wouldn’t be able to hear him. His contacts were out of the normal scale and the fewer people who knew about them, the better. Those ties traced back far, all the way to high school.

After he’d derailed his life in a drunk-driving accident as a teen, he’d landed in a military reform school with a bunch of screwups like himself. He’d formed lifetime friendships there with the group that had dubbed themselves the Alpha Brotherhood. Years later after college graduation, they’d all been stunned to learn their headmaster had connections with Interpol. He’d recruited a handful of them as freelance agents. Their troubled pasts—and large bank accounts—gave them a cover story to move freely in powerful and sometimes seedy circles.

Rowan was only tapped for missions maybe once a year, but it felt damn good to help clean up underworld crime. He saw the fallout too often in the battles between warlords that erupted in regions neighboring his clinic.

The phone stopped ringing and a familiar voice said, “Speak to me, Boothe.”

“Colonel, I need your help.”

The Colonel laughed softly. “Tell me something new. Which one of your patients is in trouble? Or is it another cause you’ve taken on? Or—”

“Sir, it’s a baby.”

The sound of a chair squeaking echoed over the phone lines and Rowan could envision his old headmaster sitting up straighter, his full attention on the moment. “You have a baby?”

“Not my baby. A baby.” He didn’t expect to ever have children. His life was too consumed with his work, his mission. It wouldn’t be fair to a child to have to compete with third-world problems for his father’s attention. Still, Rowan’s eyes locked in on Mari holding Issa so fiercely, as if still afraid she might drop her. “Someone abandoned an infant in my suite along with a note asking me to care for her.”

“A little girl. I always wanted a little girl.” The nostalgia in the Colonel’s voice was at odds with the stern exterior he presented to the world. Even his clothes said stark long after he’d stopped wearing a uniform. These days, in his Interpol life, Salvatore wore nothing but gray suits with a red tie. “But back to your problem at hand. What do the authorities say?”

“No one has reported a child missing to the hotel security or to local authorities. Surveillance footage hasn’t shown anything, but there are reports of a woman walking away from the cart where the baby was abandoned. The police are dragging their feet on showing up here to investigate further. So I need to get ahead of the curve here.”

“In what way?”

“You and I both know the child welfare system here is overburdened to the crumbling point.” Rowan found a plan forming in his mind, a crazy plan, but one that felt somehow right. Hell, there wasn’t any option that sat completely right with his conscience. “I want to have temporary custody of the child while the authorities look into finding the mother or placing her in a home.”

He might not be the best parental candidate for the baby, but he was a helluva lot better than an overflowing orphanage. If he had help...

His gaze zeroed in on the endearing tableau in his hotel sitting room. The plan came into sharper focus as he thought of spending more time with Mari.

Yet as soon as he considered the idea, obstacles piled in his path. How would he sell her on such an unconventional solution? She freaked out over feeding the kid a bottle.

“Excuse me for asking the obvious, Boothe, but how in the hell do you intend to play papa and save the world at the same time?”

“It’s only temporary.” He definitely couldn’t see himself doing the family gig long-term. Even thinking of growing up with his own family sent his stomach roiling. Mari made it clear her work consumed her, as well. So a temporary arrangement could suit them both well. “And I’ll have help...from someone.”

“Ah, now I understand.”

“How do you understand from a continent away?” Rowan hated to think he was that transparent.

“After my wife wised up and left me, when I had our son for the weekend, I always had trouble matching up outfits for him to wear. So she would send everything paired up for me.” He paused, the sound of clinking ice carrying over the phone line.

Where was Salvatore going with this story? Rowan wasn’t sure, but he’d learned long ago that the man had more wisdom in one thumb that most people had in their entire brain. God knows, he’d saved and redirected dozens of misfit teenagers at the military high school.

Salvatore continued, “This one time, my son flipped his suitcase and mixed his clothes up. I did the best I could, but apparently, green plaid shorts, an orange striped shirt and cowboy boots don’t match.”

“You don’t say.” The image of Salvatore in his uniform or one of those generic suits of his, walking beside a mismatched kid, made Rowan grin. Salvatore didn’t offer personal insights often. This was a golden moment and Rowan just let him keep talking.

“Sure, I knew the outfit didn’t match, although I didn’t know how to fix it. In the end, I learned a valuable lesson. When you’re in the grocery store with the kid, that outfit shouts ‘single dad’ to a bevy of interested women.”

“You used your son to pick up women?”

“Not intentionally. But that’s what happened. Sounds to me like you may be partaking of the same strategy with this ‘someone’ who’s helping you.”

Busted. Although he felt compelled to defend himself. “I would be asking for help with the kid even if Mari wasn’t here.”

“Mariama Mandara?” Salvatore’s stunned voice reverberated. “You have a thing for a local princess?”

Funny how Rowan sometimes forgot about the princess part. He thought of her as a research scientist. A professional colleague—and sometimes adversary. But most of all, he thought of her as a desirable woman, someone he suddenly didn’t feel comfortable discussing with Salvatore. “Could we get back on topic here? Can you help me investigate the baby’s parents or not?”

“Of course I can handle that.” The Colonel’s tone returned to all business, story time over.

“Thank you, sir. I can’t tell you how much I appreciate this.” Regardless of his attraction to Mari, Rowan couldn’t lose sight of the fact that a defenseless child’s future hung in the balance here.

“Just send me photos, fingerprints, footprints and any other data you’ve picked up.”

“Roger. I know the drill.”

“And good luck with the princess,” Salvatore said, chuckling softly before he hung up.

Rowan drew in a deep breath of salty sea air before returning to the suite. He hated being confined. He missed his clinic, the wide-open spaces around it and the people he helped in a tangible way rather than by giving speeches.

Except once he returned home in a week to prepare for Christmas, his window of time with Mari would be done. Back to business.

He walked across the balcony and entered the door by the picture window, stepping into the sitting room. Mari didn’t look up, her focus totally on the baby.

Seeing Mari in an unguarded moment was rare. The woman kept major walls up, giving off a prickly air. Right now, she sat on the sofa with her arms cradling the baby—even her body seemed to wrap inward protectively around this child. Mari might think she knew nothing about children, but her instincts were good. He’d watched enough new moms in his career to identify the ones who would have trouble versus the ones who sensed the kid’s needs.

The tableau had a Madonna-and-child air. Maybe it was just the holidays messing with his head. If he wanted his half-baked plan to work, he needed to keep his head on straight and figure out how to get her on board with helping him.

“How’s Issa doing?”

Mari looked up quickly, as if startled. She held up the empty bottle. “All done with her feeding.”

“I’m surprised you’re still sticking around. Your fans must have given up by now. The coast will be clear back to your room.”

Saying that, he realized he should have mentioned those overzealous royal watchers to Salvatore. Perhaps some private security might be in order. There was a time he didn’t have the funds for things like that, back in the days when he was buried in the debt of school loans, before he’d gone into partnership with a computer-whiz classmate of his.

“Mari? Are you going back to your room?” he repeated.

“I still feel responsible for her.” Mari smoothed a finger along the baby’s chubby cheek. “And the police will want to speak to me. If I’m here, it will move things along faster.”

“You do realize the odds are low that her parents will be found tonight,” he said, laying the groundwork for getting her to stick around.

“Of course, I understand.” She thumbed aside a hint of milk in the corner of the infant’s mouth. “That doesn’t stop me from hoping she’ll have good news soon.”

“You sure seem like a natural with her. Earlier, you said you never babysat.”

She shrugged self-consciously. “I was always busy studying.”

“There were no children in your world at all?” He sat beside her, drawing in the scent of her flowery perfume. Curiosity consumed him, a desperate need to know exactly what flower she smelled like, what she preferred.

“My mother and father don’t have siblings. I’m the only child of only children.”

This was the closest to a real conversation they’d ever exchanged, talk that didn’t involve work or bickering. He couldn’t make a move on her, not with the baby right here in the room. But he could feel her relaxing around him. He wanted more of that, more of her, this exciting woman who kept him on his toes.

What would she do if he casually stretched his arm along the back of the sofa? Her eyes held his and instead of moving, he stayed stock-still, looking back at her, unwilling to risk breaking the connection—

The phone jangled harshly across the room.

Mari jolted. The baby squawked.

And Rowan smiled. This particular moment to get closer to Mari may have ended. But make no mistake, he wasn’t giving up. He finally had a chance to explore the tenacious desire that had been dogging him since he’d first seen her.

Anticipation ramped through him at the thought of persuading her to see this connection through to its natural—and satisfying—conclusion.

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