The Heiress's Pregnancy Surprise
Auteur
Donna Alward
Lezers
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Hoofdstukken
16
CHAPTER ONE
JACOB WOLFE WAS used to flying first class. What he wasn’t used to was sitting next to Charlotte Pemberton.
They were on a late-night flight from London to New York, and all around them people were sleeping, or at the very least had their eyes closed and earbuds in their ears. The cabin lighting was dimmed, and in first class, passengers wore eye masks and were covered with blankets to get some rest.
Not Charlotte. She had her laptop open, a glass of wine beside her and glasses perched on her nose as she worked away on...something. Jacob didn’t know what, and didn’t much care. His job was to keep her safe, not worry about whatever nonsense she was working on.
It was no surprise that the fashion world was far departed from his normal life. As a former SAS operative, the last thing on his mind was fashion shows and parties and...whatever else the Pembertons got up to in their fancy, extravagant life.
He was a plain guy with simple pleasures, despite running a top security business for VIPs and dignitaries. Over the next nine days, he expected he’d do a lot of internal eye rolling, but Aurora Inc. was a new and big client, and he was being paid extremely well to spend the week babysitting the Earl of Chatsworth’s sister. And he’d try not to be too resentful of the fact he’d had to cancel his first vacation in three years in order to make it happen. Just his luck that the man originally assigned to the job had picked up some sort of parasite on his last assignment. He’d be fine, but the treatment meant his staying in the Big Smoke while Jacob flew to the Big Apple.
He was no stranger to sacrifice, and Wolfe Security was his company, so here he was. On a plane to New York. In first class.
It still chafed, though. He’d started the company to protect people from real harm. Not babysit spoiled princesses.
Charlotte picked up her wine, took a sip and then looked over at him. “You’re not sleeping?” she whispered.
“Clearly not, miss,” he replied.
She frowned, her brows puckering above her clear frames. “If you call me miss again, we’re going to have a problem.”
“Noted, ma’am.”
She huffed. “Mr. Wolfe. Please just call me Charlotte.”
He said nothing and lifted an eyebrow.
She huffed again and turned back to her laptop. “You should order a beer and relax.”
“No drinking on the job, miss.”
This time she sat back and rested her head against the plush headrest, and then turned so she was looking at him. “This is going to be a very long week if we’re always so formal. Look, I don’t like this any more than you do. I don’t need personal protection. It’s ridiculous. But that was a condition of the trip, so here we are.”
He met her gaze. “It’s not my job to like or dislike anything. It’s just my job to do my job.”
Which was true, but didn’t take into account that Charlotte Pemberton was the most beautiful client he’d ever had. Her eyes were heavily lashed and a unique shade of hazel, leaning toward green but with a gold rim around the iris. Her hair was a smooth and lovely brown and fell just to her jaw, and right now she had the right side tucked behind her ear. Fine cheekbones and the hint of a dimple on one side of her luscious mouth made her seem both refined and with a sense of humor. He surely hoped so. It would be a very long assignment otherwise.
She sighed. “I know. I’m sorry. I’m annoyed with my family for making me do this. I’m not annoyed with you personally.”
“Good to know.” He couldn’t help but smile the tiniest bit. She smiled back, and the awkwardness of the past four hours—from pickup to airport security to the flight—eased just a little bit.
“They’ve taken a few emails and letters too seriously.”
“Better to be safe than sorry.” He knew this to be true. He made his living at it.
“I’m not a child. I’m twenty-eight. I don’t need to have my life dictated.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“Stop ma’aming me.”
He grinned. A flight attendant made her way silently through first class and he requested a glass of water. Charlotte waved off a second glass of wine.
Jacob drank his water; Charlotte finished her wine and went back to clicking the keys on her laptop. She wasn’t going to sleep, but he was. A few hours of shuteye on the plane meant he’d be alert when they landed. He put his head against the headrest and closed his eyes. Maybe New York wasn’t Tenerife, but it could be worse, he supposed. He’d been in some horrible hellholes in his day.
No, New York wasn’t a hardship at all. So why was he feeling so off balance?
Charlotte waited until Jacob Wolfe closed his eyes, then finally let out the sigh she’d been holding for hours. When her mother had announced that she was hiring a bodyguard for Charlotte for the Fashion Week trip, she’d rebelled. Hard. She was finally getting a chance to take the lead on something this big and her mother was making her have a babysitter. It was ridiculous.
Even more ridiculous was how freaking gorgeous Jacob Wolfe was. Gorgeous, not pretty, like so many of the men in her line of work. Not that pretty wasn’t great; it was. She’d enjoyed being on the arm of pretty men in the past, men with perfect hair and skin and who could step into a designer suit and look like a million dollars. Men who required no emotional attachment. She’d been burned by that before, though, and wasn’t in the market to take the leap again.
But Jacob Wolfe was not that kind of man. His suit was perfectly tailored, his tie precisely knotted, even during the long late-night flight. Still, she appreciated his other attributes: well-defined muscles, discernible even beneath the suit jacket; dirty-blond hair long enough on the top to sink her hands into, but clipped super short on the sides; glacial eyes with sandy lashes; and facial hair, the same dirty blond, not quite perfectly trimmed, giving him a rough-and-ready look. All in all, he looked like a man capable of class but ready to go bare knuckle if need be.
It was all quite exciting, really. Except he was probably ten years older than her, barely smiled and was all about the job. Pity.
Ah well, no need to be disappointed; she was going to be busy day and night during the trip and a distraction was not what she needed. Still, he’d smiled at her once, and it might be nice if she were able to make him do that again before they headed back home.
She admired his ability to sleep. She’d never been able to sleep while flying; she was a nervous flier though she hid it well, as frequent travel was a thing with her family. The single glass of wine calmed her nerves a little, and she chose to work so she could focus on something other than the fact they were thirty-odd-thousand feet in the air.
Charlotte looked over at Jacob again. He certainly looked capable enough. She’d had qualms about him going everywhere with her, including parties and galas. She didn’t want people to know she had a bodyguard, and it occurred to her, as she looked at his relaxed face, that he could certainly pass as her date.
She tapped her fingers on the keyboard. Did she want that, though? It would invite a level of speculation, and the family had already found itself in the tabloids recently. She could just see the headline now. “Who is Charlotte’s mystery man?” And then some salacious speculation with no basis at all in fact.
Annoyed, she opened an email from a saved folder and frowned.
New York is the city that never sleeps. You shouldn’t either. #sleepwithoneeyeopen
The messages frustrated her. So far Aurora’s IT department hadn’t been able to trace the source, and Charlotte was sure it wasn’t anything too serious. She’d grown up in the spotlight, and knew that hate mail came with the territory from time to time. This was the third message she’d received in the last two months, but nothing had happened. Nothing personal. She’d been outvoted on the protection front, though, with her sister, Bella, being the only one to think she should be able to decide for herself. The trip was only a little over a week. She could deal.
So she closed the email and opened her calendar for the week. This was the perfect quiet time to make any adjustments to her itinerary that needed to be made. And when they landed, they would make their way to Aurora Inc.’s apartment, where she would finally sleep and wake up ready to take on New York.
Jacob wondered how Charlotte could still look so fresh and bright after being up for the whole flight. He’d slept over an hour on the plane, and when he woke she was still typing away on her laptop. Now they were in a cab heading to the Aurora Inc. apartment.
“Do you ever sleep?” he asked, looking over at her.
“Oh, of course.” She smiled at him. “I just don’t sleep on planes. Once we get settled, I plan to sink into my bed and sleep all morning.” She lifted an eyebrow. “You should, too. You only slept an hour.”
“I’m used to going without sleep,” he replied, looking away and out the window. The city was bright even though the sky was dark.
“And I’m not?” Charlotte laughed a little. “Clearly you’ve not seen me the night before a major PR push. Coffee and chocolate are my fuel and I go, go, go.”
He could just imagine. She seemed full of...youthful energy. His youthful energy was long gone. Maybe it had just disappeared bit by bit, along with his innocence and optimism. All his life he’d made a living counting on humanity being horrible.
Energy, innocence, optimism...he knew exactly where he’d lost them. He was just fooling himself to think they’d been chipped away in increments. He’d left them in South America. And with one woman, in particular.
He shouldn’t resent Charlotte’s charmed life. Of course, he would never want her to experience or see what he had. And while her concerns might seem trivial to him, he shouldn’t judge. After all, he’d spent half his life working to keep the dark underbelly of society at bay precisely so no one had to ever see the things he’d seen.
Her life was very different, and he didn’t fit there. But his job required him to be a chameleon. He’d grown up in scruffy jeans and T-shirts, worn trainers and caps. This week he’d don designer suits and look absolutely like he belonged.
The cab pulled up outside a gray stone building. Charlotte handed over a credit card while Jacob got out and scanned the area, shivering against the February cold. It had a bite to it that seemed to go right through his wool coat and into his skin, and a few snowflakes flitted in the air. The cabbie popped the trunk and Jacob lifted it to retrieve their bags. He had one small rolling case and a garment bag. Charlotte, on the other hand, had her carry-on bag and laptop, and then two large suitcases. She was definitely not a “pack light” kind of woman, but then, she was a Pemberton. Her job required she never be photographed in the same dress twice.
The doorman opened the door and they stepped into the warm lobby. Jacob made his living guarding VIPs, so the opulence wasn’t a surprise. It was the kind of space that had nothing to prove; it was expensive but not ostentatious, a quiet sort of wealth in glass, brass and marble. The elevator was huge and nearly silent as they made their way up to the apartment.
He wheeled his suitcase and one of hers into the foyer of the apartment and paused. “Welcome home?” he asked, looking over at her.
“I guess.” She sighed. “Would it strike you as strange that I wish this place was smaller and more...cozy?”
It did, but he understood. The foyer was bigger than his living room at home, and that was saying something. They walked through into the main area. It was done in mostly white, with accents in pale green and tan. It was...perfect. Show-home perfect. A vase of white lilies sat on a glass table and the perfumed scent filled the air. The windows provided a dim view of Central Park; he turned his head to the left and thought he could make out the Met, though the snow was coming down harder than it had been only minutes before.
A deep sigh came from behind him, and he turned to find Charlotte standing in the middle of the floor, looking a bit lost.
“Are you all right?”
She nodded, gave a small smile. “Yes. But now that I’m here, I’ve run out of steam. I think I need to sleep.”
“Let me check the other rooms first,” Jacob said, slightly annoyed when Charlotte laughed.
“Seriously? I promise no one has been in the apartment and we’re perfectly safe. My mother hired you as a precaution. I’m really not in any danger.”
“I still have a job to do. Stay put.”
He left her in the living room and checked the other rooms—a dining room with a table for eight, a powder room, a massive kitchen that gleamed with stainless steel appliances and two huge bedrooms, each with their own en suite bathroom. Everything was fine, and he went back out to the living room.
Charlotte had sat on the sofa, and her eyes were closed as she breathed deeply. He’d been maybe five minutes, but she was sound asleep.
Did he leave her there? He needed sleep, too, and had no idea which room was meant to be his, though he could sleep in a chair and have no problem. He knelt before her, looking into her peaceful face, and his heart gave a heavy thump. She was beautiful, there was no denying that. And maybe she was pampered but so far she didn’t act spoiled, which was to her credit. He’d read the messages sent to her. Mildly threatening, but not to be discounted.
Maybe she seemed like a spoiled princess, but someone wasn’t happy with her. It should be an easy assignment, but he would still be doing his job to the letter.
He reached out and touched her upper arm. “Miss Pemberton.”
She snuffled and burrowed deeper into the sofa.
“Miss Pemberton,” he said, more firmly. Still nothing, and he gave her arm a little shake. “Charlotte.”
Her eyes opened and she blinked, confusion clearing as she looked into his face. “I fell asleep.”
“Yes, you did. I thought you’d be more comfortable in your room. I just don’t know which one that is.”
“Oh. Right. And you’d probably like to sleep, as well.” She yawned and then sat up, lifting her arms and stretching a bit. The way she moved her body was languorous and sensual, and Jacob sat back on his heels a bit.
This would be much easier if she were a fifty-something man with a paunch and a bald spot. Oh, he’d be professional, but the attraction he felt was a pain in his ass.
“Come on, then. I’ll show you your room first.”
She led him down the hall and gestured to the first room. “This one is yours. I’ve always liked the other one better.”
Either one suited him fine. The room was more like a suite than a simple bedroom. There was a small sofa and chair and a coffee table, where another bouquet of fresh flowers sat. The bed was king-size and covered with a gold-and-green brocade spread, the green the same deep color as the upholstery on the sofa and chair. He didn’t have to go to the window to know that he had a terrific view of the park. “Wow,” he said quietly. “This is very nice.”
“What did you think, I was going to make you sleep in the closet?”
“No, of course not.”
“Your job is VIP security. Surely this isn’t a novelty.”
“Usually my accommodations are a few steps up from a closet. Not my own suite.”
She leaned against the doorframe. “Well, it’s either feast or famine. We don’t have anything in the midrange here at Hotel Aurora.”
He appreciated her sense of humor, especially since she could find humor when she had to be exhausted. “Sorry. Anyway, thank you. I’ll be more than comfortable here.”
She nodded toward another door. “Your bathroom is in there. There’s a shower and a jetted tub if you’re cramped up from sitting in the plane.” Her gaze ran from his toes up to his eyes. “You’re a bit tall to be jammed into those seats. Even the first-class ones.”
He was six three. And apparently she had noticed, because as he held her gaze, her cheeks turned a charming shade of pink.
She pushed away from the doorframe. “Right. I’m next door. I’ll be drawing the curtains and sleeping until about noon. I have a meeting here at three with my assistant, who arrived a few days ago.”
“She’s not staying here?”
“She’s staying at the hotel with the rest of the staff.”
Interesting. “I’ll see you at noon, then.”
Charlotte disappeared from the doorway and he heard her go inside her room and shut the door. A few minutes later, he heard the muffled sound of the shower running, and tried not to think of her long legs and slight curves under the hot spray. He wasn’t a monk, for God’s sake. He could appreciate a beautiful woman and still keep his head for the job.
And to prove it, he opened up his bag, plugged in his laptop and retrieved his file on Charlotte’s assistant, Amelie. Once he’d read it over twice, he was satisfied. He stripped off his suit, jumped in the shower and then crawled into the plush bed.
It was heaven. And if he was in it alone, it was no more than he deserved. It was his last thought before drifting off to sleep.
