The Billionaire’s Handler

Chapter Eight

Well, hell. Maguire fixed things. He was good at fixing things-not to be egotistical, but personally, he thought he was downright outstanding at fixing things.

But he was rotten when fate threw him a curveball that he wasn’t prepared for.

“We’re just going back to Washington for a couple of days,” he told Carolina. The interminable overseas flight was…well, interminable.

“You told me. It’s fine.” Carolina, curled up in the window seat, looked sleepy and content.

Maguire wanted to claw the walls. “That wasn’t the plan.”

“I know. And I get it, you’re stressed about this. But whatever you have to do, just do, Maguire. You told me Tommy was coming over tomorrow. I couldn’t be more delighted to see him.”

He could see she meant it. Her eyes lit up at the idea of seeing his young brother-so unlike the rest of the world, who looked at Tommy and tended to see disabilities.

The change in plans had a good side, he told himself. They were going to be around people for a couple of days, rather than alone together. She’d have a block of time to forget that wild night, to get things back in perspective. He’d keep her way, way too busy to think about…well, to think about sex. At least sex with him.

By the time the jet finally touched down in Seattle, they were both blithering tired. Maguire didn’t usually suffer from jet lag, but he hadn’t slept. How was he supposed to sleep, when the damn woman had put down the barrier between the seats and snuggled next to him?

She made out like his chest was her pillow. Like his arm belonged tucked around her. Like it was okay that her hand had drifted between his legs when she fell asleep. That her hand had been there for ages and ages. That the damn woman had reached up to brush her lips against his neck in her sleep, for Pete’s sake.

Was that fair? Was that reasonable? How much could a man be expected to endure?

He’d arranged a limo to pick them up in Seattle, which saved him having to drive when he was bleary-eyed. Once they got back to the lodge, she poured into bed almost as easily as liquid Jell-O, only spoke up when he took off her sacred red shoes.

He had no memory of stumbling into bed, but he must have, and then woke up early in spite of himself. Maybe he was brain-dead tired, but he still figured the rise-and-shine thing was a good idea-he’d have a chance to mentally prepare before Carolina was up.

The rain started at dawn, beginning as a sleepy drizzle and turning into a silent gush. Even inside, the pines seemed to smell more verdant, the air steamed with freshness. By the time Carolina bounced downstairs, in jeans and an oversize sweatshirt, he had a table loaded with papers and information for her-and he was on the nice, far distance of the other side.

He poured her coffee, urged her to sit and started in. “I’ve got a list for you…”

He had a plan, beyond keeping her busy with coffee and thick slabs of French-bread toast. He was going to give her lots to do. Lots to think about. And no time to think of anything personal about him, or them, for damn sure.

“First, here’s a list of good lawyers. Then another list of financial and bank people. Before going with any, you should interview them, talk to them, make sure you’re comfortable communicating with them. It doesn’t help to have smart, good people if they’re speaking Russian to your French. And then…”

She made several hmm sounds, verifying that she was paying attention, listening. But she didn’t stay sitting long. She got up, pressed a hand on his shoulder, started a fresh pot of coffee.

No one had told her where stuff was in the kitchen, but she seemed to guess that spoons would be in the drawer by the sink, mugs in the cupboard above. Maybe women were born knowing this stuff.

And maybe she’d forgotten about that other night, Maguire thought. It didn’t seem possible, when the sex had been so earth-shattering. But she was walking around the kitchen, her hair a little tangled, her face with no makeup, barefoot, as if she didn’t have a care in the world.

She opened a bottom cupboard in the pantry, found a box of brownie mix, lifted it to read the back.

Her fanny was probably the finest he’d ever seen. The sweatshirt completely concealed her figure, but that was the thing. She moved, with that light lithe grace, and there it was-a hint of her breast when she turned, the curve of her hip when she bent down. Promise. Every damn thing about the woman was a capital P promise.

For the right man.

Not him.

But for the right one.

“Every time I’ve seen you lose your hearing, Carolina, it’s clearly because you hit a stressor. The last couple of times, it seems the stress trigger was seeing someone emotionally hurt, or feeling beat up on, or being yelled at. So that’s what we’re working on next. We’re going to set up life situations where no one can do that to you.”

“Do you like your brownies with nuts or not?”

“I like homemade brownies any way I can get them. Are you listening?”

“Yes, sir.” Another squeeze on his shoulder, just a whisper of contact, but by the time he whipped around, she was fussing around the kitchen again.

So he started talking faster. “One of the things you’ve been clear about is wanting to share your wealth. Wanting to use some of your money to just plain give away-”

“Darned right I do.” Just for a second, there was a flash of fire in those soft blue eyes. “There are so many causes and people with huge needs.”

“I know, buttercup.” The stupid “buttercup” word just slipped out, but Maguire stayed firmly on course. “That’s exactly the point. You need a way to handle that, where people aren’t battering down your door all the time. So here’s what you do. Decide how much you want to give away to worthy causes in a year. Put that money into a type of account or trust. Then hire someone-part-time, you can make it a single mom or someone who needs to work from home, so you’ll get to do your do-gooder thing that way, too. That in-between person hears all the direct requests, studies the causes, then reports to you-you and you alone decide which ones to give to. But you’re able to stay separate from the people making demands of you. No hounders get to you directly. So…”

He’d been lecturing great guns, until she suddenly turned around. She’d been pouring the brownie mix into a pan, was still scraping the bowl with a spoon. But she had chocolate-just a tear-on her cheek.

She walked over, with that dripping spoon and the chocolate kiss on her cheek, and kissed him on the forehead. Just like that. Got chocolate on his brow. On his knee. She didn’t even notice.

Hell. He didn’t either.

“Maguire,” she said gently, “I’m not telling you often enough how much I appreciate all this. You’re teaching me tons. Giving me ideas I would never have had without you. You really get it. That I wasn’t doing a good job of protecting myself. That I didn’t know how. But I keep wondering…”

“What?” His tone came out snappy for no reason at all.

“Do you ever let anyone protect you?”

The question was ridiculous. Why would he need protecting from anyone or anything? He didn’t know what she was getting at, only that she was increasingly starting to…worry him. He felt like a cat in a thunderstorm who couldn’t sit still, just wanted to restlessly prowl and snap and worry.

She was messing with his head. He just wasn’t sure how. Thankfully the strange moment ended abruptly with several exuberant knocks on the front door. Seconds later, Henry-looking beleaguered-piled in along with Tommy, Maguire’s ex-sister-in-law, Shannon, and Tommy’s dog. The dog was named Woofer, a disreputable cross between a St. Bernard and a Newfoundland-which meant that it stood table high, shed hair in buckets every hour, produced ropes of drool, and weighed in somewhere around two hundred pounds.

Tommy and Woofer both galloped straight for Carolina. “Miss Cee! It’s me! Tommy!”

“I can see that! I’m so excited to see you again!” As if she was used to horse-size dogs, she gave Woofer a kiss and Tommy a monster-size hug. The dog aimed promptly for the brownie mix, which Carolina swooped out of reach just in time. The pan went in the oven, and Carolina settled on the floor with Tommy, the dog, and quickly abandoned jacket and gloves and shoes. “I think you’ve grown a foot since last summer.”

“I did! Everybody says. Miss Cee. Do you remember saving my life?”

“I remember being in that big noisy ambulance with you.”

“I remember that, too!”

“I remember your telling me that you didn’t like doctors. Or shots. And I don’t either. So it’s a good thing we could do that together, huh?”

“Yeah. I remember that whole day.”

“Me, too.”

Henry gave a shudder as he passed the dog, honed in on the coffeemaker, filled a mug and retreated to the library, as far away from dog hair and confusion as he could get.

Maguire’s ex-sister-in-law beelined straight for him. “I’m glad you could spare the time,” Shannon said.

Since Shannon only called him about problems with Tommy-and she knew he’d move heaven and earth for his brother-she had no reason to be surprised. He didn’t like interrupting his plans with Carolina, but there was no answer he could have given except “of course.”

Shannon was one of the few things his older brother had done right-and divorcing Jay was one of the things Shannon had done right as well. She looked like an expensive socialite, from the crown of her red head to her designer socks-but she had heart. Staying with Jay any longer could well have killed it. And although she liked living high-which caretaking Tommy enabled her to do-she’d loved the boy from the start and vice versa. “He really wanted to see her,” Shannon said, referring to Carolina. “But I sure didn’t expect this.”

Neither did Maguire. Tommy hung back from people outside his household. Especially in the last few years he’d become aware that he didn’t talk “right,” so in public he tended to keep silent, not wanting others to realize he was different.

With Carolina, he turned into a babbling brook. When he was excited, his speech became more incoherent, but Carolina just slowed the pace of her own conversation, and seemed to understand his excited gibberish just fine.

Tommy had grown ten inches since the summer before, was taller than Carolina now, looked like a normal all-American kid of twelve. His blond hair was styled with cowlicks. He was all arms and legs, with huge blue eyes and a smile that’d win over anyone, anything, any time.

Maguire had known for a long time that he could kill anyone who hurt his vulnerable brother, but he’d never met anyone who related to him as naturally as Carolina.

Shannon said, “I can’t believe it. She’s just great with him.”

In spite of the chilly, rainy afternoon, Tommy wanted to run around outside-with Carolina and Woofer. Maguire thought the idea was insane, but he had business issues to discuss with Shannon, the more private the better.

They both stood at the window, watching Carolina and Tommy in the yard.

“Wow,” Shannon murmured again. “You know what? From what I’d heard about her, she’s exactly what I expected.”

“And what did you expect?”

“A sweetie. A do-gooder teacher. Someone softer than a pansy, real good with kids, nothing cynical or jaded about her.” Shannon pivoted on a high-heeled boot. “Which makes her the last woman in the universe I expected you to fall for.”

“That’s a pretty amazing conclusion to reach, considering you just met her two seconds ago.”

Shannon smelled the brownies, marched over to give them a peek, then reached for a hot pad and pulled the pan out to the stovetop. “There’s nothing wrong with falling, Maguire. It happens to the best of us. I guess I just expected you to fall for…I don’t know…a grad from a fancy East Coast school, maybe a pissy lawyer in stilettos, the kind of woman who’d been breaking glass ceilings from the get-go.”

He didn’t answer. As fond as he was of Shannon-and he was-he didn’t talk about his personal life, with her or anyone else. If and when he got around to marrying, he might have envisioned someone like she’d described. But that was a totally different issue than…falling.

“I’m not sure I really see a need for marriage.”

“You never saw a need for people putting themselves in a trap where they’re likely to strangle each other and cause lasting scars,” Shannon retorted.

“Yeah. Isn’t that what I just said?” Truthfully, he’d always wanted kids. He just never bought into the fairy tale. If children came into the picture, he expected to marry, expected to be a damn good partner, faithful, supportive, that whole experience. He just never wanted to put love in that frame. He’d grown up seeing exactly what “love” could do, how twisted a relationship could become because of money. It never even entered his mind as an option.

“Maguire.” Shannon stood inches from the brownies as if they’d cool faster if she hovered that close. “It’s in your face. The way you look at her. I’ve never seen you before-”

He cut her off. “We really don’t have time for chitchat. Carolina and Tommy’ll be back any minute. When you called, you said there was a financial crisis.”

She looked away. “I’m afraid you’ll yell at me.”

“Have I ever yelled at you? Even once?”

“No, but…”

“Just get it said. We’ll deal with it.” Maguire suspected he didn’t really need to hear the story. The refrain was always the same.

When their father died, Jay had gotten primary custody of Tommy for two reasons-one was that he was the eldest son, and second, because he’d asked his father for it. Jay had wanted the living allowance set up for Tommy in his own pocket… but Jay had never really wanted to give his brother time or attention.

Shannon was no relationship to any of them, but she’d loved Tommy from the day he was born, and Tommy revered her. So she’d taken on the maternal role, by her choice-by everyone’s choice. Maguire had guaranteed a generous allowance to maintain his brother’s housing and welfare in every way, knowing that Jay would run through Tommy’s money faster than a forest fire.

And that was exactly the problem. Jay was forever overspending his trust, and every time, he’d hit up Shannon. He always had the ace card, because he’d threaten to withdraw Tommy from her care if she didn’t fork over the money.

It was the same story this time. The whole thing made Maguire tired. Yeah, of course he immediately stepped in to solve the problem, but the situation underlined why he needed to stop thinking about Carolina in a personal way. Money didn’t change anything that mattered. Life was ugly-at least his life was. Money invariably provoked selfishness and greed-and gave power to those who shouldn’t have it. It wasn’t a life he’d want for Carolina.

It was a life he’d be embarrassed to share, particularly with someone as good as she was.

“Well,” Shannon suddenly murmured. “Will you look at what the cat dragged in.”

He’d already turned his head at the sounds of commotion in the doorway. Carolina, Tommy, and the dog poured through the door, laughing, spraying water like puppies, everybody muddy. “We had a tiny fall,” Carolina called out.

“Yeah. We slid down this long hill!” Tommy said exuberantly.

“Only there was this puddle-”

“Except the puddle turned out big as a lake!”

Carolina held up her hands. “Nobody worry! We’ll fix this! We’re headed straight for showers. Um, Maguire, where’s the washing machine?”

“For you or the dog?”

And yeah, he was laughing. But the sound of laughter in his heart was bittersweet. Mud or no mud, Carolina was pure clean from the inside and out, nothing ugly tainting her life-the way a whole lot of wrong things irrevocably colored his.

By evening, the unflappable Maguire seemed to be in a downright snarly mood. Carolina could see he’d had a great time with Tommy, and the boy loved every minute with his older brother. She liked Tommy’s caretaker, Shannon, even if she hadn’t quite grasped how an ex-wife of Tommy’s brother-someone who wasn’t remotely blood kin-had gotten the parenting job. It didn’t really matter. It was obvious the boy was thriving under Shannon’s care.

When Shannon and Tommy-and the behemoth dog-left after dinner, Maguire’s pretend-upbeat posture sagged. He disappeared in the library for a while. She had dinner with Henry, who groveled for more brownies, and urged her to have patience with Maguire.

There was nothing to have patience about. He was just…unhappy about something, unsettled. He spoke to her, spoke to Henry, had dinner, said the right things. It was in his eyes that something was wrong.

He’d closed up like a clam in a storm.

Both of them still had jet lag. When his eyes closed, watching the news, Carolina thought maybe exhaustion was the only thing going on, and heaven knew, she crashed soon after.

The morning brought sunshine-and an extraordinary surprise out the back door. When she looked out, she found Maguire and Henry both outside, even at this early hour, holding coffee and circling the surprise like lions guarding a hunt.

As fast as she could pile on clothes, she chased downstairs and outside, shrieking all the way, leaving the door open and not wasting time on a coat, no matter what the temperature.

It was a joke. Her asking for a ride in a ’53 MG. Something on that silly list she’d made when she first came-it seemed like years ago-nothing that she remembered or ever expected to be taken seriously.

The baby was candy-apple-red, with fat fenders over her front wheels, a running board, a front hood that gleamed like a mirror. She’d only seen one once before. Didn’t know what a Mark IV was from a TD or any other label like that…she’d just sat in the one car that her grandfather had worked with, and fell in love.

Both men turned at the sound of her screams, and for the first time in a solid twenty-four, she caught Maguire’s real grin. He opened the bitsy door, motioned her inside into the old, black leather seat.

“Where did you guys find this?”

“Don’t ask. Just next time, ask for world peace, or something that’s easy to come by.”

Henry started tsk-tsking at her bare feet and lack of coat, being the fastidious old mother hen that he was, but the car was so one-of-a-kind adorable. Only after another few minutes oohing and aahing did she notice the duffel bag in back.

“We’re going to be gone for twenty-four hours. Not far. Not sure how far we can trust the car-but Henry’ll be here, home, ready to send out the Mounties if she’s not in the mood to run well.”

“You mean I can actually drive it?”

“I don’t know,” Maguire murmured. “Can you? I mean, I’ll be glad to take the wheel if you’re afraid of it-”

“But I can?”

Maguire spun a circle as if searching everywhere in sight. “Do you see anyone stopping her, Henry? Of course, maybe we should have crash helmets before letting her behind the wheel. And a quick course in what a clutch is for-”

“I grew up on jalopies, Maguire. I know what a clutch is. My grandpa used to restore old cars.”

“So that’s how you knew about this baby?”

“Yeah. He found and fixed up an old MG for a neighbor.” She could see both he and Harry were in lust. They should look at women the way they looked at the car. They stroked. Drooled. Looked with reverence. Praised every body part. Revered.

Which gave her plenty of time to yank on clothes and shoes and a jacket and run back outside. Maguire was already installed in the passenger seat.

“I thought maybe you’d let me drive,” he said.

“Maybe in the next life. This was my fantasy. Not yours.”

“But I didn’t know about this car until you brought it up.”

“Not my problem.” She sank into the old leather, savoring the adorable dash, the tiny wheel, the long sleek front.

“What happened to my frugal, unselfish, can’t-accept-anything-for-herself woman I met a week ago?”

“You ruined her, Maguire. Until you, I had no idea being corrupted could be so much fun. Snap on your seat belt. Oh. There are no seat belts. Then just hold on and pray, big boy, while we see what she can do.”

She hadn’t forgotten Maguire’s moodiness the day before. He hadn’t, of course, mentioned that anything was troubling him, because Maguire wouldn’t. Not to her. Not to anyone, as far as she could tell.

Carolina was increasingly aware that her place in Maguire’s life had been carefully, completely, sharply defined by him. Once she was “better,” as he called it, he had every intention of disappearing-back to his life, whatever he did, whoever he did it with. If she felt something more, it was her problem. She’d cracked his armor when they made love, but he hadn’t willingly opened his heart to her. Even an inch.

Possibly that was why she made the first turn on two wheels. She didn’t want to give Maguire a heart attack exactly. More like an attack of the heart.

Within two miles, she’d mastered the four gears and aimed for some nice, steep, curly mountain roads.

“Does the phrase ‘oh, my God’ make you think we should slow down a little?” he asked over the wind.

“Nope.”

“Hey. Where is my shy, softhearted school-teacher?”

“That was then. This is now.” She had to shout to be heard above the wind. “Maybe you don’t find out what a girl’s made of until she has the chance to get behind the wheel, Maguire.” She glanced at him, but only a millisecond of a glance. The steep road had no guardrails, every swinging turn and swerve creating blind spots. Like falling in love with him, she thought. There were unknown dangers behind every turn. Reckless dangers. Worrisome dangers. But damned if her heart wasn’t racing with the thrill of it.

“Carolina.” He was white-knuckled, holding the dash and door. Laughing. But definitely holding on. “Do you think there’s a prayer we could return the car in one piece?”

The car, yes, she thought.

But her heart had already been cracked, hard.

And if streaking mountain roads at breakneck speed was what it took to make him laugh, she wasn’t about to put her sensible shoes back on now.

Whatever time she had left with him, she was determined to give it everything she had.