Rafael Balthazar was studying her now. She didn’t let him see anything. “Mr. Balthazar—” she began.
He cut in. “It’s Rafe. After all, if I’m going to hang around for a few weeks, you might as well call me what everyone else does. What would you prefer I call you? Miss McCord?”
Standing here, just a few feet from him, she could see the character lines on his face and figured him to be in his late thirties. She could also see the astuteness and intelligence in his dark brown eyes. Most of all, she could feel the strength and male power that emanated from him. It was tantalizing and quickened her heartbeat. How could that be when she was so disappointed in Miko? How could that be when she didn’t know if she could trust her own judgment? How could that be when Miko had cheated on her because he’d felt that was his right as a man?
“Miss McCord is fine,” she answered, trying to distance herself from any attraction she might feel toward this bodyguard.
Then she turned away from him. “I’ll get a blanket and pillow from my closet. If you’re going to sleep on the couch, you’ll need them.”
Rafe yanked on the pullout bed with much more force than was necessary. He hadn’t heard Gabriella McCord’s conversation with her cousin, but he knew how persuasive Blake could be. He also knew Gabriella had gotten off the phone without getting her way. She wanted him to leave. He was staying.
Because he was staying, he had to stop looking at her as a woman. He’d guarded mostly men since he’d gone out on his own—billionaires who didn’t want to be kidnapped, tycoons in a foreign country, a few movie stars attending high-profile events. There had been that woman CEO he’d protected who’d been testifying in a fraud trial. She’d been beautiful, but he’d merely considered her an assignment. There had been a congresswoman who’d also been a looker. She’d simply been another assignment.
But Gabriella? He had to convince himself she was just an assignment, too. Yet every time he looked into those expressive eyes, he had questions. Why had she become a model? What was the real story behind her relationship with the Greek tycoon? Had they really broken up as the tabloids shouted? If so, why had he been standing over her shoulder as the photographer took a shot of her half-dressed?
Rafe told himself he didn’t care about the answers. He told himself he had no right even to ask the questions. He told himself he still loved Connie and the unborn child they’d lost. Although the grief and sadness had diminished, the missing was still there after five long years.
Gabriella suddenly appeared again, dropping the pillow and blanket onto the bed. His gut tightened as the caftan molded to her whenever she moved, as her partially wet hair brushed her shoulders, as her beautiful face finally showed signs of fatigue.
“I won’t need the blanket,” he said. “I usually sleep without covers.”
Her cheeks pinkened a little and he wondered if she was imagining him without clothes. Maybe Blake could find someone else to take his place.
“Do you have any commitments tomorrow?” he asked in a businesslike tone. “We didn’t go over your schedule.”
“I only have a speaking engagement tomorrow evening unless something else comes up with Blake.”
“All right. Then in the morning we’ll sit down and you can lay out your routine, parties you’ll be attending while you’re here, anything else on your schedule.”
Her chin came up and Rafe was beginning to recognize that sign. When her temper flared, she got that look in her eye.
“I won’t be attending any parties while I’m here,” she told him. “As I said before, you don’t know me so don’t try to predict what you think I’m going to do. I’ll see you in the morning, Mr. Balthazar. Good night.”
She whirled around and left the living room. The sway of her hair across her back led Rafe to rub his hand up and down the back of his neck. He wished to hell he wasn’t sleeping in the living room. He wished to hell he was sleeping in the next county.
Gabby heard the light rap on the door the following morning. Then she heard Rafael Balthazar’s commanding voice, low now, asking, “Miss McCord. Are you awake?”
To her surprise, he didn’t wait for her to answer. The door opened.
Making sure the covers were pulled up to her chin, she yanked off her sleep mask and blinked fuzzily at the tall, fit man who had half entered her room.
After she glanced at the clock on her bedside table, she saw it was only 7:30 a.m. Pulling the sheet up over her face, she mumbled, “Go away. No one sees me like this in the morning.”
“I can’t go away,” he responded.
When he didn’t say more, she pulled the sheet from her face and peered up at him over it.
He hadn’t moved into the room but was standing just inside the door.
Her hair had fallen into her eyes and now she brushed it away. “I know you’re under orders from Blake to watch over me, but not this early in the morning.”
“Blake called. He wants you at the Dallas store at 11:00 a.m. He’s notified the press and he wants to reveal the first step in his new PR campaign, something about a once-in-a-lifetime experience.”
“Already?”
“Blake doesn’t let grass grow under his feet,” her bodyguard acknowledged.
He was certainly right about that. Blake did what he said he was going to do and made sure everybody else did, too.
“He wants customers to e-mail me about their jewelry and wardrobe selections, even make appointments, and do it personally. I’ll have to fit that in with the ad shoots, speaking engagements and everything else I have going on.” She was more or less thinking out loud, figuring out what she could adjust in her schedule and what she couldn’t.
Rafe’s eyebrows arched. “Maybe no one will want an appointment.” After that succinct assessment, he turned and tossed over his shoulder, “I’ll put the coffee on,” and was gone.
Gabby didn’t know why he annoyed her so. He just did.
She made a face at his back.
Maybe he wanted to get fired.
No maybe about it. Rafe wanted to go back to being an independent security consultant, contracted to safeguard the McCord stores, not McCord’s model and spokesperson.
He hadn’t slept last night and he could blame his disgruntled attitude on that. Granted, he hadn’t heard Gabriella moving about, turning over in bed, switching a light on and off but he’d been well aware she was there. Too well aware.
He filled the coffee filter and started the coffee. Rummaging through the cupboards, he found stocked shelves. Pancake mix was among the offerings. When he went to the refrigerator, he discovered eggs, milk, juice, yogurt, cottage cheese, fresh fruit and the makings for salad. He secured a griddle from a bottom cupboard and decided to start breakfast. Gabriella could either eat or not eat, call room service or not. It was all the same to him.
He’d just finished stirring the pancake batter when he got a wisp of a womanly scent—flowers and spices—the same scent he’d smelled on Gabriella last night…a scent that affected him as much as everything else about her. To his surprise, she was dressed in a knit lounging outfit. She was fresh-faced with her hair wet as though she’d just stepped out of the shower. Maybe he expected her to be primping for the next three hours before they left. He’d never expected her to look this…vulnerable.
He pointed to the stack of mail on the table that security had brought up. “Someone brought this stack over from the jewelry store. Apparently the public at large knew you were going to arrive in town this week.”
“Last weekend there was an article in the Style section about me. It mentioned I was coming to town.”
She went to the counter, found a mug and poured herself a cup of coffee. Rafe couldn’t keep from watching her. She was slim, but not too slim, rounded in all the right places. Her golden-blond hair was darker wet. Unstyled, without makeup, she looked like the girl next door. Yet he knew better than that.
She crossed to the refrigerator, took out the milk and poured some into her
coffee.
He motioned to the letters on the table. “Do you answer any of them?”
Gabby tasted her coffee and then peered at him over her mug. “I try to.”
She couldn’t seem to look away from him and he was having trouble finding another topic of conversation. Why wasn’t his brain working this morning?
Then he remembered what he had been about to do. “I’m making pancakes. Would you like some?”
“Maybe one.”
“One? You are kidding. No one eats one pancake.”
“I do, and if I put butter and syrup on it, that means lunch is going to be sparse.” She glanced at the batter. “But it might be worth it.”
She was a model, a model who made her living being photographed. He studied her more carefully. “You are serious, aren’t you?”
She took her coffee to the table, pulled out a chair and sat. “Very serious. And I have to have some protein with the pancake or I’ll crash in the middle of the morning.”
“I can fry a few eggs.”
She laughed. “You’re determined to raise my cholesterol. No, I think I saw some low-fat cottage cheese in there. I’ll have a spoonful of that. But don’t worry about me. I can make my own.”
“I’ll make your one to my four. Sunny-side-up eggs do sound good with that.”
She just shook her head at him and pulled a few letters in front of her.
The aroma of pancakes and fried eggs filled the kitchen as Rafe flipped the last pancake onto a plate and took it to Gabby. She was deeply engrossed in a letter and to his astonishment, he saw she had tears in her eyes! He set his own plate of pancakes and eggs on the table and rounded the corner to peer over her shoulder.
He read:
Dear Miss McCord—I read in the newspaper that you were coming to town and I just had to write to you. I’m eleven. My mom died last year and since then I’ve been so unhappy. My dad really tries but he doesn’t understand me or what I need. My nose is too long and so are my legs. I don’t know how to dress. The other kids make fun of me. I’m spending days at a summer camp until school starts and I hate it. But Dad won’t let me stay alone.
Can you write back and tell me what I should do? I was thinking maybe I should get a nose job, but I don’t know if my dad will let me, so I might have to wait until I’m eighteen. How can I make the other kids like me? How can I figure out how to dress right? What would you do?
Libby Dalton
As Gabby realized Rafe was reading the letter too, she murmured, “This just breaks my heart.”
He wondered why. Certainly she didn’t identify with this girl, did she? How could she? Gabby was beautiful, accomplished and still had both parents.
“Are you going to write back to her?”
“I’m going to do something. I just have to consider what.”
“Right now you’d better eat or your pancake will get cold.”
“Thanks,” she said, with a small smile, her eyes still shimmering.
Rafe quickly moved away from her to the other end of the table, sat and began his breakfast. He didn’t have to worry about small talk, though. Gabby was quiet as she went to the refrigerator, found the cottage cheese and put a spoonful on her plate.
He had just taken a few bites, after which he was going to discuss their schedule for the day, when his cell phone rang. He excused himself. “It’s one of the store managers. I have to take this.”
She nodded as if she were preoccupied, and soon he was deeply involved in the conversation. When he looked up again, she’d finished the breakfast on her plate and disappeared from the kitchen. A few minutes later, he heard the sound of the hair dryer.
A half hour later, Rafe was stacking the dishes in the sink when Gabby entered the kitchen. She was wearing a red-and-white plaid halter top, white jeans and sandals. She’d styled her hair in the fluffy, wavy, trademark tumbled mass that encouraged a man to think about running his fingers through it. Although she wasn’t wearing much makeup, what she had on was effective. In fact, the red on her lips—
He felt drawn toward her and shouldn’t be. He felt irritated by her and shouldn’t be. He felt a combination of awe at her beauty and denial that it affected him.
“There’s someplace I want to go before we attend the Dallas store’s PR campaign opening,” Gabby told him.
She really wasn’t dressed for an appearance at McCord’s, more like she was attending a picnic.
“Where do you want to go?”
“To Libby Dalton’s day camp.”
He was about to laugh, and then saw she was deadly serious.
His mind clicked into gear. “I’ll have to make arrangements, go in and find her, clear an area where you can meet her.”
“No. I don’t want it done that way.”
“I’m your bodyguard, Miss McCord. It has to be done that way. I want to make sure you’re safe.”
“This is a day camp, Mr. Balthazar.”
“It’s Rafe,” he snapped, tired of formality.
She eyed him for a moment. “Okay, Rafe. I want to make an impression, but not that kind of impression. I want to help Libby, not hurt her. I’d like this to be a surprise to the people at the camp and to her and her friends.”
“That’s not wise, Miss McCord.”
“Gabby,” she said softly. So softly, he took a few steps toward her.
“I want to do this incognito until we get there,” she explained. “I don’t want press. I don’t want any outside influences affecting the visit. Blake asked you to protect me for a reason. Can you make this happen?”
He had a feeling the next few weeks were not going to be ordinary in any sense of the word. Gabby McCord was not going to be an acquiescent client. He supposed he might as well get used to it.
He might as well just make this work.
She came a few steps closer to him now. The scent of flowers and spice was stronger. The wavy tendrils of her hair were within reach. If he lifted his hand and touched her face—
“Rafe, I want to do this for a lonely eleven-year-old who doesn’t seem to have any friends. Can you please make it happen?”
Was she flirting with him? Did she know the power of her golden-brown eyes, the hint of her perfume, the sensual look of her body? Was she using it all to convince him to do what she wanted him to do? Or was she just making a plea, one person to another?
Was he being played?
He thought about what she was asking, the logistics involved, what he’d have to do to get them there without being followed.
“Are you going to the store like that?” he asked.
“No. I have to come back here to change.”
“It’s going to be tight.”
“I’m a fast changer.”
Now he did want to touch her. More than that, he wanted to taste her.
But he was her bodyguard. He had her reputation to protect, as well as his. Most of all, he had his own self-respect to deal with when he woke up each morning.
He took a step back. “I can make it happen, but you can’t stay long.”
“I only need fifteen or twenty minutes.”
If they could get in and out of there before anybody knew they were there…
“All right, twenty minutes tops. Then I drag you out of there whether you’re ready or not.”
“Deal,” she replied with a small smile that sealed his fate.
He was going to regret this. He just knew it.
Chapter Three
Gabby waited in a darkened corner near a back exit to the hotel. Rafe had warned her to stay put. The expression in his eyes and the tone of his voice had warned her she’d better do it or he wouldn’t be doing her any favors again.
Favors from Rafe Balthazar? Did she want them?
Then she remembered those moments he’d stepped closer to her and she’d stepped closer to him. Something other than hard neutrality had glimmered in his eyes. Their deep brown depths had flickered with…desire? Had he wanted to touch her? Wanted to kis
s her?
If she were honest with herself—and she usually was—she had wanted him to do both. How silly was that? How insane was that? He was her bodyguard. What did she think? That she was in some kind of movie? No good could come of getting involved with him.
Yet an inner voice was telling her he was not like Miko.
Some inner voice. Where had it been when she was infatuated with Miko? She should know better than to listen to it again.
She adjusted the sheer white scarf over her head and tossed it over her shoulder. Her hair was going to be smashed to bits. She’d just have to fluff it out again. Adjusting the dark glasses that covered half her face, she was sure she wouldn’t be recognized. Hotel security was good. Leaving by a back exit this hour of the morning, no one should be within camera shot. At least she hoped not.
The door suddenly opened and Rafe beckoned to her. “Come on. This way. The coast is clear for the moment.”
“Where’s your car?” she asked as she tried to keep up with him in the platform sandals.
He took her elbow as if he was afraid she couldn’t see in those sunglasses. Her body went on alert. There were calluses on his fingers. From hard work? A tremor rippled through her and she realized how much she liked his touch…how much he made her feel safe as he guided her along.
Abruptly he stopped in the service driveway in front of a small green hybrid vehicle.
“This is it? Did you rent it?”
“This is mine. No one would be expecting you to be riding in a car like this. They expect a black sedan or a limo.”
“Yours? Really? Do you live in Dallas?”
“We can have this conversation now, but someone might see us if we do. Hop in. Let’s get going. We can talk as we drive.”
He was right, of course. If someone caught them out here in the open, they could get cornered or surrounded. Still, she was sad that she couldn’t have a conversation like anyone else. She’d been living like this for a long time now. When she’d been with Miko, he had kept her separated from family and from regular people doing regular things. It had taken her a while to catch on. She wished she could just do what normal people did, drive herself around, have a house, a garden, a dog. That inner voice was gnawing at her again and a longing tugged at her with it. Someday she wanted children.
The Texas Bodyguard’s Proposal Page 3
