Chapter 9
Maybe this wasn’t such a good idea.
The dog pound was not a particularly cheery place, with its rows and rows of small cages that reminded Katherine of a jail for animals. The lights overhead were glaring and fluorescent, the worn tile underfoot cheap, industrial and forty years old.
The supervisor giving them a quick tour of the facility was clearly overworked, obviously rushed as she explained their jobs as volunteer dog walkers.
“The nearest park is five blocks away, I’m afraid. But a quick tour around the block is really all the dogs expect. Head south, though. North, the neighborhood gets a little…intense. Unless, of course, you’re with one of the bigger dogs. Any questions?”
Katherine looked at Doug.
He looked back at her, eyes wide.
“Does it matter which dogs we walk first?” she asked.
“Check the sign-out sheet for each animal.” The supervisor was already walking away, her friendly face apologetic as a coworker waved frantically for her attention on the other side of the big room. “If they’ve been walked within the past day or two, try to choose one who hasn’t been out recently.”
Doug had moved across to the rows of cages, and he crouched in front of one, his hands on the chain links, nearly nose to nose with the dog inside.
It was an older dog of indistinguishable breeding. A mutt. It was a big dog, with big floppy ears and very gentle, very wise old eyes in a pointy, friendly face.
“This guy here doesn’t have a sign-out sheet,” Katherine called after the supervisor.
“Oh, those don’t need to be walked,” she called back. “That entire area is, well, it’s our version of death row, I’m afraid. The puppies, against the other wall—they need the most attention. They’re the ones most likely to wind up being adopted.”
Death row.
Oh, dear.
Katherine could tell from Doug’s face that he didn’t understand. That was probably a good thing.
“Mrs. Freeman asked us to walk the puppies,” Katherine told him, “instead of these adult dogs. Puppies need more exercise because they’re growing.”
Doug looked back at the old dog, who rather creakily rose to his feet. He wagged his tail very slightly, reaching out to touch the boy’s fingers with his nose.
Doug laughed. The dog’s tail wagged harder.
“Great,” Stacy said. “He falls in love with one of the ones who’re about to be killed.”
Doug went very still, his eyes wide.
Katherine tried to intervene. “Stacy—”
She crouched down next to her brother. “Don’t you know what death row is?”
He shook his head.
“Thank you, Stacy,” Katherine started again. “But I think—”
“Don’t you think he should know?” She turned back to her brother. “It’s awful, Doug. All of these dogs in this part of the room are scheduled to be killed. They call it ‘put to sleep,’ or ‘put down’ so that it doesn’t sound so bad, but it doesn’t have anything to do with sleeping. They never wake up again. The dogs are killed because nobody wants to take care of them anymore.”
Doug looked up at Katherine with horror in his eyes. “Oh, Kathy,” he said. “Oh, please, we can’t let him die.”
It was a sentence. A complete sentence. Even Stacy was so surprised, she sat back on her heels.
And Katherine knew—even though she hadn’t planned it this way—that she was going to bring home more than one surprise for Trey this afternoon.
Trey wasn’t getting anything done.
He was sitting in his tower office, staring at his computer screen, thinking of…
Thinking of things he shouldn’t be thinking of.
He’d purposely stayed upstairs this morning until he’d heard Kathy and the kids leave the house.
He stood up and stretched his legs, crossing to look out the window. As long as he wasn’t getting any work done, he might as well work out a plan of action—figure out what he was going to do about the fact that he had it bad for Kathy Wind.
The thought still made him laugh out loud.
How the hell had that happened?
What the hell was he going to do?
Kathy wasn’t the kind of woman who had sex purely for the sake of having sex. If he let her know that he was attracted, she would expect more from him than just a few brief, explosive weeks of passion.
But maybe—if they became lovers—she would stay past January.
The thought was a ridiculous one, and Trey pushed it aside. There was no way he would use her—or anyone—that way. He hated the way women like Diana St. Vincent had such obvious motives for wanting to be with him. They wanted his wealth, his power, his social standing. It didn’t matter who he really was, just as long as he had Trey Sutherland’s wallet in his back pocket.
No, his motives for wanting to sleep with Kathy had nothing to do with the fact that she was the best nanny he’d ever known, or the fact that he would do damn near anything to make her stay.
Anything within reason.
The truth was that he wanted Kathy Wind because he wanted Kathy Wind. The only thing he’d be using her for was the sex.
Of course, that was bad enough, wasn’t it?
But Trey knew he couldn’t give her anything more than that. And he knew she’d end up getting hurt.
The dead last thing he wanted to do was to hurt her.
What he had to do was simply enjoy his attraction to her. Acknowledge it as something that was forbidden, and enjoy the time he spent near her, letting himself look but not touch. God knows it had been forever since he’d wanted to touch a woman. It was nice knowing his libido was finally starting to thaw.
But like all things, defrosting took time. Going from the freezer to the oven worked for Anita’s favorite Corning Ware, but emotionally, he could very well shatter from such extremes.
Unless, of course, Kathy knocked on his door and announced that she wanted pure, raw, screaming sex from him, with absolutely no strings attached, just genuine, mutual physical pleasure with no exchange of words, no chance of miscommunication.
If she did that, he would immediately lock his office door behind her and start taking off her clothes with his teeth.
He rolled his eyes. Yeah, like hell he was going to “enjoy” sitting back and simply letting himself look at her.
But what else could he do?
Rat-tat.
The sudden knock on the door made him nearly jump into the air.
He had to laugh at himself. There was no way that was Kathy. It was probably Anita with the mail. Or the gardener with a question about the tree that had died out back. Or…
He opened the door.
It was Kathy.
Her red flannel shirt was buttoned nearly to her neck and tucked into her jeans. She looked neat and efficient. And sexy as hell. God, he wasn’t going to be able to look at her ever again without a picture of how she’d looked in that nightgown flashing into his mind.
“May we come in?” she asked.
We. Trey realized Doug was standing next to Kathy, Stacy right behind them.
“Sure,” he said. He cleared his throat, then stepped back to let them enter. “Please. Hey, Doug. Stace. What’s up?”
“Actually,” Kathy said, leading his son into the room, “Doug has something to say.”
Something to say. Yeah, right. Trey had been on the phone with a specialist just this morning. He’d finally given in and made arrangements to test the boy, see if he was in some way autistic, to cancel that possibility out before they tested him for various and frightening kinds of mental illness.
Kathy squeezed Doug’s shoulder and he stepped toward Trey.
“Daddy, Kathy took us to the dog pound today.”
Oh my God. The kid actually spoke. An entire sentence, clearly ennunciated, not just his usual mumbled single-syllable answers to yes-no questions. Trey reached for the chair behind him. He had to sit down.
> Somehow the meaning of Doug’s words penetrated, and he laughed slightly. “The dog pound. Wow.” He looked up at Kathy. He knew everything he was feeling was splattered across his face, but he couldn’t have hidden it if he’d tried. “Wow.”
She nodded, smiling at him, her eyes luminous.
Trey looked back at Doug. “Did you have a good time?”
The boy shook his head vehemently. “No. It was awful. They have a death row, and we found out that Poindexter was going to be put to sleep tomorrow.”
Poindexter. He looked up at Kathy, but she was watching Doug.
“And Kathy told me that Dex was very, very old, and might not live very long,” Doug continued, “but I said I didn’t care, and she told me that if I got to keep him then I would need to be a boy most of the time and not a dog the way I like to pretend, because Dex would need me to be a boy so I could take care of him.”
Brilliant. Kathy was incredibly, amazingly brilliant. Trey wanted to laugh. He wanted to cry. And he wanted to hug Kathy, but Doug was standing there so seriously, so intensely, that all Trey did was nod. “Well, yeah,” he said. “She’s certainly right about that.”
“And Kathy said that even if Dex couldn’t stay here with us, she’d pay for him to live happily ever after in a kennel and that we could find one nearby so I could see him every day, and that I had to ask and make sure that was okay with you, but oh, please, Daddy, he’s so lovely, can’t I keep him here instead?”
A dog. Here at Sutherland estate.
Doug was looking at him so hopefully. Even Stacy was leaning in the open door, waiting to see what he had to say.
“What kind is he?” he asked.
“A butt-ugly one,” Stacy said.
“A mixed breed,” Doug told him earnestly. “I think he’s got at least a little German shepherd and a little Irish setter and a whole lot of everything else including yellow lab.”
Trey stared at his son. What kind of six-year-old knew the different breeds of dogs?
“He’s pretty big,” Doug admitted.
Trey couldn’t believe he was actually sitting here having a conversation with his son. The kid had said more in the past two minutes than he’d said in the past two years. “Friendly, though?” he asked.
Doug nodded. “Oh, yes.”
Trey looked at Kathy. “No history of aggressive behavior?”
She shook her head. “None. His owner was a little old lady who had a massive stroke and went into a nursing home four months ago. There was no one to care for the dog and no money for a kennel. It was, literally, only hours before he was scheduled to be destroyed. I couldn’t see leaving him there. And I meant what I said to Doug. If you don’t want a dog in the house, I’ll gladly foot the bill—”
“What, are you kidding?” Trey said. “He sounds great.” He looked at Doug. “Is he as great as he sounds?”
Doug nodded, his eyes enormous.
“I’ve always wanted a dog,” Trey continued, “A real dog. And it looks like we’ve got ourselves an excellent one.”
Doug launched himself into Trey’s arms and hugged him fiercely. “Oh, thank you, Daddy.” He lifted his head. “Can I go tell him that he can stay?”
“Yeah.” Trey had to laugh, imagining his once-silent son talking—nonstop—to a dog named Poindexter.
“Come on, Stacy!” Doug nearly knocked Katherine over on his way out of the room, but she didn’t mind. After all, he was running on two feet.
Trey still sat back in one of his leather chairs, looking as if he weren’t sure which direction was up. As Katherine gazed at him, he lifted one hand to his forehead, covering his eyes, rubbing slightly as if he had an enormous headache.
Oh, dear. As much as he liked that his son was talking again—and Katherine knew how very much he liked that—it was possible that he hated having a dog in the house.
She moved toward him. “I’m really sorry I didn’t call you first. I realize what an imposition this must seem and—”
“Imposition?” He looked up at her, disbelief in his eyes. “You’ve got to be kidding.” In one graceful movement, he stood, heading toward the window. “I was so afraid….” His voice shook and he stopped. “When he came in and actually told me that you took him to the dog pound…” He laughed, but it was more a burst of emotion. “I was floored. I was completely blown away. I’d pretty much given up on him, Kathy. God, I’d honestly thought I’d lost him.”
He turned to face her, and she realized with a jolt of shock that he had tears in his eyes. “And then, to have him back, just out of the blue like that…”
He laughed again and one of his tears escaped. He wiped it away with the heel of his hand and Katherine couldn’t stand it. She went toward him and wrapped herself around him, ignoring the fact that in general, employees did not hug their bosses.
But he held her just as tightly. His arms felt heavenly around her, and she knew the truth—this was as much for her as it was for him. She was tremendously close to weeping herself.
He smelled impossibly good—his cologne, the soft laundry smell of his shirt, his own unmistakable, subtle yet undeniably male scent. It was dizzying. She could hear his heart pounding, hear his ragged breathing as he both laughed and cried.
“How can I thank you?” he said hoarsely, his breath hot against her ear. “You haven’t even been here a week, and I’ve got my kid back. How the hell am I ever going to be able to pay you enough for that?”
“It was really just luck—”
“Luck, my ass.” He pulled back to look at her. “If that chair hadn’t been there, I would have fallen over. God, I’d almost forgotten what his voice sounds like.”
Katherine couldn’t move. At six feet away, Trey Sutherland was impossibly handsome. At six inches, with tears in his gorgeous eyes, he was capable of triggering serious heart failure.
“Just a little bit of your magic,” he said, his husky voice catching, as he lifted her chin to look into her eyes, “and he’s back. Are you some kind of sorceress, Kathy Wind? Somehow you’ve managed to put us all completely under your spell. What am I going to do about you?”
She laughed. It was either that or kiss him, and she knew she shouldn’t do that. Still, the way he was looking down at her, the way his arms seemed to tighten around her, the way his gaze seemed to caress her face made her sway toward him and lift her mouth and—
He whispered an exorbitantly high number into her ear.
Katherine froze. “Excuse me?”
“A year,” he said. “If you’ll stay past January. With a twenty percent raise at years three and six.”
She stepped back, pulling out of his arms, understanding flooding her. He was talking salary. That incredibly high number was a yearly salary. “You can’t be serious!”
“I am. What do you say?”
Her mouth was hanging open, and she closed it. She laughed in amazement. She shrugged somewhat inanely. “I say…no.”
It was his turn to be completely stunned. “No?”
“I’m flattered,” she said. “Of course. But—”
“Double it,” he said.
Katherine turned away. Good grief. This was getting out of hand.
“My offer still stands about the apartment,” he continued. “I’ll get you a car, too. Medical insurance. All your living expenses will be handled. You can invest the money and after seven years, you’ll be able to retire.”
She turned back to face him. He was serious. He was actually dead serious. “There’s just no way anyone in their right mind would pay a nanny that much.”
“So maybe I’m out of my mind.” Trey looked completely sane, standing there backlit by the window that overlooked the courtyard. “If double’s not enough, name your price,” he said.
“Stop! You’re making me extremely uncomfortable!” It was almost absurd. She’d been standing there, in his arms, ready to surrender to the onslaught of his kisses. But that hadn’t made her uncomfortable. Not one bit. Not like this.
&
nbsp; “I don’t have a price,” she told him more gently. “Don’t misunderstand me—I love your children.” And, God help her, despite this outrageous financial attack, she knew it wouldn’t take much for her to start falling in love with Trey, as well. The sheer joy she’d seen on his face when Doug had spoken to him, when Doug had told him they’d gone to the pound, was something she’d carry with her to her dying day. “But money just isn’t important to me.”
“Obviously not.” He held out his hands beseechingly. “There’s got to be something that would make you stay. There’s got to be something you want.”
She’d wanted him to kiss her. She’d wanted that enough to nearly initiate it herself. And, good grief, wouldn’t that have been embarrassing. Here he was, trying to keep their relationship to that of employee-boss for another seven years, and she had been about to lay one on him.
He probably hadn’t even really noticed that for a few long moments, he had held her tightly in his arms. Yes, he had given her all the signals that a kiss was coming, but that was probably instinctive on his part. Somewhere in the remote recesses of his mind, he’d realized that she was female.
But when his eyes had finally focused, he hadn’t thought twice about turning their embrace into a business meeting.
She was not in his league, she reminded herself. She wasn’t even playing the same game. She turned away. “I should go see where Doug and Stacy have gone.”
“Kathy, I’m sorry if I offended you. That wasn’t my intention.” Trey cleared his throat. “Thank you so much for what you did today. I’d like it if you could at least consider my offer. And I’ll, um…I’ll see you at dinner?”
“You’ll be at dinner tonight?” She couldn’t keep the pleasure from her voice. “The children will be so pleased,” she added quickly. Oh, dear, she should be wearing a shirt that said Loser. She gestured toward the door. “I should…go…”
She nearly tripped over her own feet as she hastily went out Trey’s office. She closed the door behind her, kicking herself. Could she have sounded any more eager?
Of course, it could have been worse.
She might actually have drooled.
Chapter 10
Undercover Princess Page 12
