“And you’ve settled into the apartment?”
“Well, no. We only just got here. I was told to come straight to you when we arrived. So you could meet me.”
Check her out, his sister had said, although he hated the way saying the words made him feel. His sister had said she was perfect for the job, but that didn’t mean he would think so, too. He’d agreed to hire her as a favor. He’d been telling himself for the past two weeks that he should trust his sister’s judgment, but as Naomi stood in front of him he wondered what the hell he’d gotten himself into.
“Why don’t we go talk in my office?” He motioned that she should follow him past the sunken living room that overlooked the front of the property and up some stairs to his left. He’d had very few people to his private retreat. He could probably count the number on one hand, but he wasn’t surprised by her reaction to the vaulted ceilings and the wrought-iron balustrade as she followed him up the wooden steps. It’d taken a year to build the place, and another three months to build the massive covered arena and apartments out back. He’d spent those last several months flying back and forth between his corporate offices in San Francisco, interviewing hippotherapists and psychotherapists, and securing the purchase of the livestock for his ranch. It’d been a hell of an endeavor, but he’d gotten it done.
“My sister tells me you’ve done this before?”
“Well, not quite,” she said, taking a seat opposite his desk. He watched as she immediately shifted first left and then right, solidifying his own thoughts about his new furniture. Not comfortable. He’d hired a decorator, and he’d begun to suspect that she valued form over function. He liked things the opposite way, something he’d clearly neglected to convey. In his line of work, things needed to be efficient. Someone’s life might depend on it.
“I used to work as an event planner, and before that, I worked for a hotel doing the same thing. But I started out in housekeeping. Worked my way up while I attended college, that sort of thing.”
He’d known that. He’d read her résumé a time or two. “Why do you want to move all the way out to California?”
She stared into her lap for a moment, resting her hands on her jean-clad legs, sunlight from the tall windows in front of her emphasizing the red of her hair. “The kids’ grandparents are moving out here.” She looked up and met his gaze. “My kids love them. I didn’t want Sam and T.J. to be that far away.”
“So you chucked it all?”
He didn’t mean to sound critical, but he could tell by the way she furrowed her brow that she took it that way. “We don’t have anybody else. No other family, no aunts or uncles, and life in Georgia is...challenging.”
“More challenging than moving all the way to California?”
There went that chin again. “We needed a change.”
A big change. At least from the sound of things.
He leaned back. He sat opposite her since he didn’t need to see the view. “This job won’t just be about housekeeping. I know that’s what my sister told you, but it’s going to be way more than that.”
She tipped her head, leaned forward a bit. Her body language told him she didn’t mind this change of plans.
“You’ll still be keeping house to some degree,” he explained, “and managing my household—buying groceries and whatnot—but whoever works here needs to be flexible, too. They need to understand that one day they might be asked to cook for me when I’m in town, or clean a guest apartment, or help one of our guests in some way. It won’t be easy, but it’ll be interesting. You do know how to cook, don’t you?”
“You wouldn’t ask me that if you’d tasted my Southern pecan pie.” She beamed, and he had to admit she didn’t look a thing like he’d expected. He’d expected older. More...harried-looking. She had two kids and he knew that couldn’t be easy.
Drop-dead gorgeous, that’s what she was.
Even in an off-white long-sleeved T-shirt as plain as day. He didn’t normally notice such things, not when all he cared about was if someone could do a job properly, but the visual image in his head was so far from the reality that it startled him.
“What about you?” he said. “Do you have any questions?”
“Yes.” She pinned him down with a stare like an entomologist would a cricket. “You won’t be bothered by two kids and a dog, will you?” She looked around her as if envisioning two terrors inside his home.
“I would expect them to stay out of the way.”
And suddenly she appeared amused, her blue eyes lighting up from within, her whole face transforming, and if he’d thought her beautiful before, that was nothing like the way she looked with a smile on her face.
“I can’t keep my kids in a kennel.”
“No, of course not, but kids are always off doing things, at least in my experience. As far as your dog, I would appreciate you keeping him on a leash, at least until we know how he’ll react around horses.”
“You don’t think your dog will mind having a new dog on the property.”
“What dog?”
Her brows drew together. “The one on your porch. Or it was. It ran off when the alarm sounded.”
“What?”
“By the front door. But like I said, it ran off.”
“I don’t have a dog.”
“No?”
He shook his head. “If you see it, please let me know. I’ll have to call someone to catch it.”
“No. Don’t do that. It’s better to try to re-home a stray.”
“We don’t know it’s a stray.”
She frowned. “I think it is. It looked skinny.”
And she cared. With concern clouding her eyes, she looked younger. She couldn’t be much older than thirty.
Younger than you.
Much younger.
“Let me know if you catch it and we’ll go from there.”
She nodded. “Anything else?”
“One last question.”
She waited quietly. He admired the way the sunlight set strands of her hair afire before he admitted he shouldn’t be noticing that type of thing.
“What if you change your mind?”
“About what?”
“The move. Working as a housekeeper. Living on the ranch.”
She lifted her chin a tiny fraction, but enough for him to realize she was sensitive about the issue. “I won’t. We even drove my old Ford truck all the way out here. And I’ve started the school enrollment process for my kids. They’ll be all set to start at their new school in the fall.”
He studied the woman in front of him. Lauren had told him Naomi worried that her husband’s death had affected her kids far more deeply than she’d surmised. That they were having problems in school and that a move all the way across country would be good for them. He couldn’t say he agreed. Then again, he didn’t have kids, so who was he to judge?
“All right then. I guess we’ll see what happens.”
“Terrific.”
“And your first task will be helping to organize a party I’m having here in a couple of weeks. Local military brass. Short notice, but I’m sure I can easily pull strings and get people here. You’ll have an unlimited budget to make it an affair people will remember. I want to make a big splash.”
Her