To Wear His Ring (7 page)

Kasie’s seat was separated from Gil’s, Pauline’s and the girls’ by ten rows. Gil didn’t appear pleased and he tried to change seat assignments, but it wasn’t possible. Kasie was rather relieved. She was uncomfortable with Gil since he’d kissed her so passionately.

Pauline was furious that Kasie had been included in the trip. She was doing everything in her power to get Kasie out of Gil’s life, but nothing was going the way she planned. She’d envisioned just the four of them in the exquisite islands, where she could convince Gil that they should get married. He agreed to her suggestion about the trip more easily than she’d hoped, and then he said Kasie would have to come along to take care of the girls. He didn’t even mention boarding school, as if he didn’t believe Kasie had suggested it. Pauline was losing ground with him by the day. She could cheerfully have pushed Kasie out of the terminal window. Well, she was going to get rid of Miss Prim over there, whatever it took. One way or another, she was going to get Kasie out of Gil’s house!

They boarded the plane, and Kasie smiled with false bravado as she passed the girls with a wave and found her window seat. There was only one seat next to hers. She was watching the people file in while she fought her own fear. Seconds later, a tall blond man wearing khakis swung into the seat beside hers and gave her an appreciative smile.

“And I thought this was going to be a boring flight,” he chuckled as he stuffed his one carry-on bag under the seat in front of him and fastened his seat belt. “I’m Zeke Mulligan,” he introduced himself with a smile. “I write freelance travel articles for magazines.”

“I’m Kasie Mayfield,” she replied, offering her small hand with a wan smile. “I’m a governess to two sweet little girls.”

“Where are the sweet little girls?” he asked with a grin.

“Ten rows that way,” she pointed. “With their dad and his venomous secretary.”

“Ouch, the jealousy monster strikes, hmm?” he asked. “Does she see you as competition?”

“That would be one for the books,” she chuckled. “She’s blond and beautiful.”

“What are you, chestnut-haired and repulsive?” he chided. “Looks aren’t everything, fellow adventurer.”

“Adventuress,” she corrected. She glanced out the window and noticed the movement of the motorized carts away from the plane. It was going to take off soon. Sure enough, she heard the rev of the engines and saw the flight attendants take up their positions to demonstrate the life vests even as the plane started to taxi out of its concourse space. “Oh, gosh,” she groaned, tightening her hands on the arms of her seat.

“Afraid of flying?” he asked gently.

“I lost my family in a plane crash,” she said in a rough whisper. “This is the first time I’ve flown, since I lost them. I don’t know if I can…!”

She’d started to pull at her seat belt. He caught her hand and stilled it. “Listen to me,” he said gently,
“air travel is the safest kind. I’ve been knocking around on airplanes for ten years, I’ve been around the world three times. It’s all right,” he stressed, his voice low and deep and comforting. His fingers contracted around hers. “You just hold on to me. I’ll get you through takeoff and landing. Once you’ve conquered the fear, you’ll be fine.”

“Are you sure?” she asked on a choked laugh.

“I walked away from a crash once,” he told her quietly. “A week later I had to get on a plane for Paris. Yes,” he added. “I’m sure. If I could do it, I know you can.”

Her lips parted as she let out the breath she’d been holding. He was nice. He was very nice. He made her feel utterly safe. She clung to his hand as the airplane taxied to the runway and the pilot announced that they were next in line to take off.

“Here we go,” her seat companion said in her ear. “Think of
Star Trek
when the ship goes into light speed,” he added on a chuckle. “Think of it as being flung up into the stars. It’s exciting. It’s great!”

She held on tighter as the plane taxied onto the runway, revved up its engines and began to pick up speed.

“We can even sing the Air Force song as we go,” he said. “I spent four years in it, so I can coach you if you can’t remember the words. Come on, Kasie. Sing!”

Kasie started to hum the words of the well-known song.

The passengers around them noticed Kasie’s terror and her companion’s protective attitude, and suddenly they all started singing the Air Force song. It diverted Kasie with uproarious laughter as the big airplane
shot up into the blue sky, leaving her stomach and her fears far behind.

“I’m very grateful,” she told him when they were comfortably leveled off and the flight attendants were getting the refreshment cart ready to take down the aisle. “You can’t imagine how terrified I was to get on this plane.”

“Yes, I can. I’m glad I was here. Where are you staying in Nassau?” he added.

She laughed. “I’m sorry. I don’t know! I didn’t realize that until just now. My boss will have all the details in hand, and a driver to meet us when we land. I didn’t ask.”

“New Providence is a small island,” he told her. “We’ll see each other again. I’m at the Crystal Palace on Cable Beach. You can phone me if you get a few free minutes and we’ll have lunch.”

“Do you go overseas to do stories?” she asked.

He nodded. “All over the world. It’s a great job, and I actually get paid to do it.” He leaned close to her ear. “And once, I worked for the CIA.”

“You didn’t!” she exclaimed, impressed.

“Just for a year, while I was in South America,” he assured her. “I might have kept it up, but I was married then and she didn’t want me taking chances, especially while she was carrying our son.”

“She doesn’t travel with you?” she asked curiously.

“She died, of a particularly virulent tropical fever,” he said with a sad smile. “My son is six, and I leave him with my parents when I have to go away during his school year. During the summer, he goes places with me. He loves it, too.”

He pulled out his wallet and showed her several
photographs of a child who was his mirror image. “His name’s Daniel, but I call him Dano.”

“He really is cute.”

“Thanks.”

The flight attendant was two rows away, with snack meals and drinks. Kasie settled down to lunch with no more reservations. She’d landed on her feet. She wondered what Gil would think if he saw her with this nice young man. Nothing, probably, she thought bitterly, not when he was so wrapped up in Pauline. Well, she wasn’t going to let that spoil her trip.

Nassau was unexpected. Kasie fell in love with it on first sight. She’d seen postcards of the Bahamas, and she’d always assumed that the vivid turquoise and sapphire color of the waters was exaggerated. But it wasn’t. Those vivid, surreal colors were exactly what the water looked like, and the beaches were as white as sugar. She stared out the window of the hired car with her breath catching in her chest. She’d gone overseas with her parents as a child, but to distant and primitive places. She remembered the terror of those places far better than she remembered the scenery, even at so young an age. Even now, it was hard to think about how she’d lost the parents who’d loved her and Kantor so much. It was harder to think of Kantor…

“Do stop pressing your nose against the glass, Kasie. You look about Jenny’s age!” Pauline chided from her seat beside Gil.

“That’s funny,” Bess said with a giggle, not understanding the words were meant to hurt.

“I’ve never seen anything so beautiful,” Kasie
murmured a little shyly. “It really does look like paradise.”

Pauline yawned. Gil ignored her and watched Kasie a little irritably as she and the girls enthused over the beach.

“When can we go swimming in the ocean, Daddy?” Bess asked excitedly.

“We have to check into the hotel first, baby,” Gil told her. “And even then, the beach is dangerous. Kasie doesn’t swim.”

“Oh, we can take them with us,” Pauline said lazily. “I’ll watch them.”

It occurred to Gil that he never trusted Pauline with his children. She wasn’t malicious, she just didn’t pay attention to what they were doing. She’d be involved in putting on sunscreen and lying in the sun, not watching children who could become reckless. Bess was especially good at getting into trouble.

“That’s Kasie’s job,” Gil said, and put a long arm around Pauline just to see the reaction it got from Kasie. It was a constant source of anger that he couldn’t keep his hands off Kasie when he was within five feet of her, and he still didn’t trust her.

Kasie averted her eyes. Odd, how much it hurt to see Pauline snuggle close to Gil as if she were part of him. Remembering the hungry, masterful way he’d kissed her in the study, Kasie flushed. She knew things about Gil Callister that she shouldn’t know. He made her hungry. But he was showing her that he didn’t feel the same way. It was painfully obvious what his relationship was with Pauline. Even though she’d guessed, it hurt to have it pointed out to her like this.

She knew then that she was going to have to resign
her job when they got back to the States. If he married Pauline, there was no way she could live under the same roof with them.

Gil saw the reaction that Kasie was too young to hide, and it touched him. She felt something. She was jealous. He could have cheered out loud. It didn’t occur to him then why he was so happy that Kasie was attracted to him.

“Who was the man you were talking to on the concourse, Kasie?” Gil asked unexpectedly.

“His name was Zeke,” she replied with a smile. “He had the seat next to mine.”

“I noticed him. He’s good-looking,” Pauline said. “What does he do?”

“He’s a freelance writer for several travel magazines,” Kasie told her. “He’s down here doing a story on a new hotel complex.”

Gil didn’t look pleased. “Apparently you made friends quickly.”

“Well, yes,” she confessed. “I was a little nervous about flying. He talked to me while we got airborne.” She grinned. “Didn’t you hear us all singing the Air Force song?”

“So that’s what it was,” Pauline scoffed. “Good Lord, I thought the plane was full of drunks.”

“Why were you afraid of flying?” Gil persisted.

Kasie averted her eyes to the girls. “My family died in an airplane crash,” she said, without mentioning under what circumstances.

He shifted uncomfortably and looked at his daughters, who were watching for exciting little glimpses of people playing in the surf on the white beaches as they passed them.

“I’m all right now,” she said. “the flight wasn’t so bad.”

“Not with a handsome man to hold your hand,” Pauline teased deliberately.

“He
was
handsome,” Kasie agreed, but without enthusiasm, and without noticing that Gil’s eyes were beginning to glint with anger. He leaned back, glaring at Kasie.

She wondered what she’d done to provoke that anger. It made her uneasy. Pauline obviously didn’t like it, either, and the woman was giving Kasie looks that promised retribution in the near future. Kasie had a feeling that Miss Raines would make a very bad enemy, and deep in her stomach, she felt icy cold.

I
t took an hour to get checked into the luxury hotel. The girls played quietly in the marble-floored lobby with a puzzle book Kasie had brought along for them, while Pauline complained loudly and nonstop about the inconvenience of having to wait for a room to be made ready. By the time the clerk motioned them to the desk, Gil was completely out of humor. He hadn’t smiled since they got off the plane, in fact. When they were given keys to a two-bedroom suite and a single adjoining room, Pauline’s expression lightened.

“Oh, that’s nice of you, darling, letting Miss Mayfield have a room of her own.”

Gil gave her a look that combined exasperation with impatience. “The girls can’t be alone at night in a strange hotel,” he said curtly. “Kasie’s staying in the room with them, and the other bedroom in the suite is mine. You get the single.”

“Why can’t I just share with you, darling?” Pauline purred, enjoying Kasie’s sudden flush.

Gil looked furious. He glared down at her from his superior height. “Maybe you’ve forgotten that I don’t move with the times,” he said quietly.

Pauline laughed a little nervously. “You’re kidding. What’s so bad about two…friends sharing a room?”

“I’m not kidding,” Gil said flatly. He handed Pauline her key and motioned for Kasie and the girls to follow him.

Pauline stomped into the elevator, fuming. She gave Kasie a ferocious glare before she folded her arms over her chest and leaned back against the wall. The bellboy signaled that he’d wait for the next elevator to bring their luggage up, because six other people had jumped into the elevator right behind Pauline.

Gil and Pauline led the way down the hall, with Kasie and the girls following suit.

“At least, you can take me out tonight,” Pauline told Gil, “since Kasie’s along to baby-sit. Come on, darling, please? They have the most beautiful casino over on Paradise Island, and floor shows, too.”

“All right,” he said. “Let me get the girls and Kasie settled first, and find out about room service. You will want to have supper up here, won’t you?” he asked Kasie stiffly.

“Of course,” she said, not wanting to make things worse than they were—if that was possible.

“Good. Kasie can take the girls out to the beach while I check with the concierge about reservations,” he added, watching Pauline’s face beam. “I’ll pick you up at your room at five-thirty.”

“But that only gives me an hour to dress,” she moaned.

“You’d look beautiful in a pillowcase, and you know it,” he chided. “Go on.”

“Okay.” Pauline walked off to her own room without a word to the girls or Kasie.

Gil opened the door, noting that the bellboy was coming down the hall toward them with the luggage on a rolling carrier. He motioned Kasie and the girls inside.

“The bedrooms both have two double beds,” he told Kasie stiffly. “And there’s a balcony off the sitting room, if you want to sit outside and watch the surf after the girls get to sleep,” he added, indicating the French doors that led onto a small balcony with two padded chairs.

“We’ll be fine,” she told him.

“Don’t let them stay up past eight, no matter what they say,” he told her. “And don’t you stay up too late, either.”

“I won’t.”

He hesitated at the door to his own room and looked at Kasie for a long moment, until her heart began to race. “You didn’t tell me that you lost your family in an air crash. Why?”

“The subject didn’t come up,” she said gruffly.

“If it had,” he replied curtly, “you wouldn’t have been sitting alone, despite Pauline’s little machinations with the seat assignments.”

She was taken aback by the anger in his tone. “Oh.”

“You make me feel like a gold-plated heel from time to time, Kasie,” he said irritably. “I don’t like it.”

“I was all right,” she assured him nervously. “Zeke took care of me.”

That set him off again. “You’re getting paid to take care of my children, not to holiday with some refugee from a press room,” he pointed out, his voice arctic.

She stiffened. “I hadn’t forgotten that,
Mr.
Callister,” she added deliberately, aware that the girls had stopped playing and were staring up at the adults with growing disquiet. She turned away. “Come on, babies,” she said with a forced smile. “Let’s go change into our bathing suits, then we can go play on the beach!”

“All of you stay out of the water,” Gil said shortly. “And I want you back up here before I leave with Pauline.”

“Yes, sir,” Kasie said, just because she knew it made him angry.

He said something under his breath and slammed the door to his own room behind him. Kasie had a premonition that it wasn’t going to be much of a holiday.

She and the girls played in the sand near the ocean. On the way outside, Kasie had bought them small plastic buckets and shovels from one of the stores in the arcade. They were happily dumping sand on each other while, around them, other sun-worshipers lay on towel-covered beach chaise lounges or splashed in the water. The hotel was near the harbor, as well, and they watched a huge white ocean liner dock. It was an exciting place to visit.

Kasie, who’d only ever seen the worst part of foreign countries, was like a child herself as she gazed with fascination at rows of other luxury hotels on the
beach, as well as sailboats and cruise ships in port. Nassau was the brightest, most beautiful place she’d ever been. The sand was like sugar under her feet, although hot enough to scorch them, and the color of the water was almost too vivid to believe. Smiling, she drank in the warmth of the sun with her eyes closed.

But it was already time to go back up to the room. She hated telling the girls, who begged to stay on the beach.

“We can’t, babies,” she said gently. “Your dad said we have to be in the room when he leaves. There’s a television,” she added. “They might have cartoons.”

They still looked disappointed. “You could read us stories,” Bess said.

Kasie smiled and hugged her. “Yes, I could. And I will. Come on, now, clean out your pails and shovels, and let’s go.”

“Oh, all right, Kasie, but it’s very sad we have to leave,” Bess replied.

“Don’t want to go.” Jenny pouted.

Kasie picked her up and kissed her sandy cheek. “We’ll come out early in the morning, and look for shells on the beach!”

Jenny’s eyes lit up. She loved seashells. “Truly, Kasie?”

“Honest and truly.”

“Whoopee!” Bess yelled. “I’ll get Jenny’s pail, too. Can we have fish for supper?”

“Anything you like,” Kasie told her as she put Jenny down and refastened her swimsuit strap that had come loose.

Above them, at the window of his room, Gil
watched the byplay, unseen. He sighed with irritation as he watched the girls respond so wholeheartedly to Kasie. They loved her. How were they going to react if she decided to quit? She was very young; too young to think of making a lifelong baby-sitter. Pauline said she’d been very adamant about sending the girls away to school, but that was hard to believe, watching her with them. She was tender with them, as Darlene had been.

He rammed his hands hard into the pockets of his dress slacks. It hurt remembering how happy the two of them had been, especially after the birth of their second little girl. In the Callister family, girls were special, because there hadn’t been a girl in the lineage for over a hundred years. Gil loved having daughters. A son would have been nice, he supposed, but he wouldn’t have traded either of his little jewels down there for anything else.

It wounded him to remember how cold he’d been to Kasie before and after the plane trip. He hadn’t known about her family dying in a plane crash. He could only imagine how difficult it had been for her to get aboard with those memories. And he’d been sitting with Pauline, talking about Broadway shows. Pauline had said that Kasie wanted to sit by herself, so he hadn’t protested.

Then, of course, there was this handsome stranger who’d comforted her on the flight to keep her from being afraid. He could have done that. He could have held her hand tight in his and kissed her eyes shut while he whispered to her…

He groaned out loud and turned away from the window. She was worming her way not only into his life and his girls’ lives, but into his heart as well. He
hadn’t been able to even think about Pauline in any romantic way since Kasie had walked into his living room for the job interview. Up until then, he’d found the gorgeous blonde wonderful company. Now, she was almost an afterthought. He couldn’t imagine why. Kasie wasn’t really pretty. Although, she had a nice figure and a very kisseable mouth and those exquisitely tender eyes…

He jerked up the phone and dialed Pauline’s extension. “Are you ready to go?” he asked.

“Darling, I haven’t finished my makeup. You did say five-thirty,” she reminded him.

“It is five-thirty,” he muttered.

“Give me ten more minutes,” she said. “I’m going to make you notice me tonight, lover,” she teased. “I’m wearing something very risqué!”

“Fine,” he replied, unimpressed. “I’ll see you in ten minutes.”

He hung up on her faint gasp of irritation. He didn’t care if she wore postage stamps, it wasn’t going to cure him of the hunger for Kasie that was tormenting him.

He heard the suite door open and the sound of his children laughing. Strange how often they laughed these days, when they’d been so somber and quiet before. She brought out the best in people. Well, not in himself, he had to admit. She brought out the worst in him, God knew why.

He went out into the big sitting room, still brooding.

“Daddy, you look nice!” Bess said, running to him to be picked up and kissed heartily. “Doesn’t he look nice, Kasie?” she asked.

“Yes,” Kasie said, glancing at him. He was dishy
in a tuxedo, she thought miserably, and Pauline probably looked like uptown New York City in whatever she was wearing. Pauline was like a French pastry, while Kasie was more like a stale doughnut. The thought amused her and she smiled.

“Bess, get the menu off the desk and take it in your room. You and Jenny decide what you want to eat,” Gil told them.

“Yes, Daddy,” Bess said at once, scooping up the menu and her sister’s hand as they left the room.

“Don’t let them fill up on sweets,” he cautioned Kasie. His pale eyes narrowed on her body in the discreet, one-piece blue bathing suit she was wearing with sandals and a sheer cover-up in shades of blue. Her hair was down around her shoulders. She looked good enough to eat.

“I won’t,” she promised, moving awkwardly toward the bathroom with the towel she’d been sunbathing on.

“Next time, get a towel from the caretaker down on the beach,” he said after she’d put the towel in the bathroom. “They keep them there for beach use.”

She flushed. “Sorry. I didn’t know.”

He moved toward her. In flats, she was even shorter than usual. He looked down at her with narrow, stormy eyes. The curves of her pretty breasts were revealed in the suit and he thought for one insane instant of bending and putting his mouth right down on that soft pink skin.

“Mr. Callister,” she began, the name almost choking her as his nearness began to have the usual effect on her shaking knees.

His lean hand moved to her throat and touched it lightly, stroking down to her bare shoulder and then
back to her collarbone. “You’ve got sand on your skin,” he observed.

“We had a little trouble making a sand castle, so the girls covered me up instead,” she said with an unsteady laugh.

His hand flattened on the warm flesh and he looked into her huge, soft eyes, waiting for a reaction. Her pulse became visible in her throat. His blood began to surge, hot and turbulent, in his veins. His fingers spread out deliberately, so that the touch became intimate.

She wasn’t protesting. She hadn’t moved an inch. She didn’t even seem to be breathing as she looked up into his pale, glittery eyes and waited, spellbound, for whatever came next.

Without saying a word, his fingers slid under the strap that held up her bodice. They inched into the suit and traced exquisite patterns on the soft, bare flesh that had never been exposed to the sun, or to a man’s eyes. He watched her lips part, her eyes dilate with fascination and curiosity.

His hand stilled as he realized what he was doing. The girls were right in the next room, for God’s sake. Was he losing his mind?

He jerked his hand back as if he’d scalded it and his expression became icy. “You’d better change,” he said through his teeth.

She didn’t move. Her eyes were wide, curious, apprehensive. She didn’t understand his actions or his obvious anger.

But he was suspicious of her. He didn’t trust her, and he didn’t like his unchecked response to her. She could be anybody, with any motive in mind. She dressed like a repressed woman, but she never resisted
anything physical that he did to her. He began to wonder if she was playing up to him with marriage in mind—or at least some financially beneficial liaison. He knew that she wasn’t wealthy. He was. It put him at a disadvantage when he tried to puzzle out her motives. He knew how treacherous some women could be, and he’d been fooled once in recent months by a woman out for what she could get from him. She’d been kind to the girls, too, and she’d played the innocent with Gil, leading him on until they ended up in her bedroom. Of course, she’d said then, they’d have to get married once they’d been intimate…

He’d left her before the relationship was consummated, and he hadn’t called her again. Not that she’d given up easily. She’d stalked him until he produced an attorney and a warrant, at which point she’d given up the chase.

Now, he was remembering that bad experience and superimposing her image over Kasie’s innocentlooking face. He knew nothing about her. He couldn’t take the risk of believing what he thought he saw in her personality. She could be playing him for a sucker, very easily.

“You don’t hold anything back, do you?” he asked conversationally, and it didn’t show that he’d been affected by her. “Are you like that all the way into the bedroom?” he added softly, so that the girls wouldn’t hear.

Kasie drew in a long breath. “I wouldn’t know,” she said huskily, painfully aware that she’d just made an utter fool of herself. “I’ll get dressed.”