The Playboy’s Unexpected Bride Read online

Linc felt the blood drain from his head. Dimly, he heard Marques say something but he ignored him and stepped blindly into the night.

  “No,” he said sharply. “Not Kath.”

  “I’m sorry, Lincoln. Your sister and her husband both. But, miraculously, there was a survivor.”

  One survivor. A baby. A two-month-old little girl.

  A little girl who was Lincoln Aldridge’s niece.

  CHAPTER TWO

  New York City, two months later

  IT TURNED out that some clichés were true.

  Tragedy fell on a man without warning, but life went on. It changed, but it went on.

  Somehow, you kept going. Somehow, you adapted.

  You adapted, Linc thought groggily, as the piercing wail of the gorgeous, brilliant, impossible four-month-old hellion who now ruled his life shot him from sleep.

  He threw out a hand, searched on the bedside table for his watch and peered blearily at the luminescent dial.

  Oh, God!

  It was five-oh-five. Five-oh-five in the a.m. He had a meeting at eight-thirty with his own people, another at eleven with the European clients he’d taken to dinner last night. He had to be sharp and focused and how could a man be either when he hadn’t had a solid night’s sleep?

  He never had a solid night’s sleep anymore. And he rarely had a full day to devote to his work.

  First there’d been the awful, sad details of Kath’s death to handle. When that was over, the baby—Kath’s secret—had taken center stage.

  At first, he’d wondered why his sister had kept the child a secret but simple math had explained it. Kath had reversed the usual order of things. She’d gotten pregnant first, then married. Maybe she’d worried he’d have thought less of her for that reversal, which damned near broke his heart. Or maybe she just hadn’t known how to break the news to him long-distance.

  Whatever the reason, all that mattered now was the baby’s welfare.

  He had met with his attorney and, of course, immediately agreed to provide the baby a proper home. He didn’t know a damned thing about babies—how could he? But he hadn’t known a thing about running a business, either, when he’d started out.

  No problem.

  You didn’t know how to do something, you learned. Or, if it was more expedient, you hired people who did. That was what he’d done, what he’d assured the social worker whose job it was to make sure the baby was properly cared for he would do.

  And he had.

  He’d sent his PA shopping for baby clothes, a crib, a highchair, bottles, formula, diapers and the thousand other things an infant required. He’d had the interior designer who’d done his Fifth Avenue triplex turn the guest suite into a nursery. He’d contacted a nanny agency and interviewed more women eager to clean baby bottoms than he’d have imagined existed in the world, let alone New York.

  And, last week, Kath’s mother-in-law had suddenly come on the scene. Nobody had even known she existed until then.

  Would she ask for custody? If she did, should he fight her for it? Or would his niece be better off in her care?

  Linc couldn’t come to a decision. On the one hand, women knew more about kids than he ever could. Wasn’t it in their DNA? On the other, the child was his blood. She was his only remaining connection to Kathryn.

  What would Kath have wanted? She’d loved him the way he’d loved her. The circumstances of their lives—no father, a mother who drank and forgot they existed most of the time—had made them unusually close. Still, there was no way to know if she’d have wanted her baby raised by him or her mother-in-law. His attorney was checking things out.

  The bottom line was that Kath was gone and a small, squalling stranger had dropped into his life. He’d had to leave increasing responsibility for running Aldridge Inc. in the hands of his people. They were all excellent managers, hand-selected by him, but Aldridge had grown into a multimillion-dollar company and he was integral to that growth.

  He knew it was time to put the turmoil of the past months behind him and get back to the work he loved and maybe to some kind of social life, but you had to sleep nights to do that.

  Right now, the baby’s screams were reaching a crescendo, carrying all the way from the guest-suiteturned-nursery on the second floor of the penthouse to his bedroom on the third.

  Where in hell was the nanny?

  Linc threw back the duvet and started to the door. Halfway there, he remembered he was wearing boxers, his usual sleeping apparel but not what you’d choose for an appearance before Nanny Crispin.

  She was the fifth woman he’d hired and the first that seemed to be working out.

  The first hadn’t lasted a week. Linc had come home an hour early one night and found her rolling on the Aubusson rug in the great room with a guy with studs in his ears, nose and lip and other places he’d glimpsed and tried to forget.

  He’d thrown them both out.

  Nanny Two had lasted ten days. Day eleven, she’d reeked of pot.

  Nanny Three had simply vanished. Her replacement, Nanny Four, had seemed okay until the evening she’d greeted him at the door wearing one of his Thomas Pink handmade shirts, spiked heels and a smile.

  Then the agency sent him Nanny Crispin.

  She was sixtyish, tall and skinny. Her hair was steelgray, her small, wire-framed eyeglasses sat squarely on the bridge of a high, narrow nose. Linc doubted if she knew how to smile but she’d come highly recommended and, he supposed, whether or not she ever smiled was immaterial.

  It couldn’t possibly matter to a four-month-old infant. A baby’s needs were purely physical. Food. Warmth. Cleanliness. This baby was getting all that. He’d made sure of it by hiring Nanny Crispin.

  Sighing, Linc grabbed the trousers he’d worn last night. The baby’s howls had reached earsplitting proportions. Nanny Crispin would have to endure the sight of his bare chest—and what the hell was she doing, anyway, letting the kid scream?

  He marched down the hall and went down the steel and oiled teak spiral staircase.

  The door to the nursery stood open. All the lights were on, illuminating the crib where the baby was screeching like a wind-up toy gone berserk. Nanny Crispin, wrapped like a mummy in a flannel robe the same color as her hair, sat in a straight-backed chair beside the crib, arms folded over her flat chest.

  Linc cleared his throat. Pointless. Nobody could have heard the roar of a jet engine over the wails of the baby.

  “Nanny Crispin?”

  As always, he felt like an idiot addressing a woman twice his age that way but she’d made it clear that she expected his housekeeper, his driver and him to call her by her title.

  He walked to the crib and waited for her to notice him. When she didn’t, he tapped her on the shoulder. She reacted as if she’d been scalded, leaping to her feet, spinning to face him, her mouth forming a perfect O.

  “I didn’t meant to startle you.”

  Nanny Crispin stared at his chest.

  “I said, I didn’t mean to—” Hell. He took a breath, fought back the urge to grab something to cover his naked chest and decided to get to the point. “What’s wrong with the baby?”

  “Do you not own a robe, Mr. Aldridge?”

  “Do I not…?” Linc flushed. Suddenly, he was six years old. “Well, sure, but I heard the baby and—”

  “Your attire is inappropriate. I am a single woman and you are a man.”

  “Yes, but—”

  But one of them was crazy. He was indeed a man. She was about as sexually appealing as a stick, never mind the age difference or the fact that she was his employee. If she’d looked like the reincarnation of Marilyn Monroe, that last fact would have been enough to keep him at arm’s length.

  Linc jerked his chin toward the crib. “I’m not worried about decorum right now, Nanny Crispin. I want to know why the baby is screaming.”

  “She is screaming because she is undisciplined.”

  “Undisciplined. Well, then, of course she…”

  His voi
ce faded away. Undisciplined? He frowned. True, he knew nothing about babies, but did four-month-old infants cry because they were undisciplined?

  “Are you sure?”

  “I have been taking care of babies for forty years, Mr. Aldridge. I know an undisciplined child when I see one.”

  Linc looked at the baby. Her face was purple. Her arms and legs were pumping. His frown deepened.

  “Maybe she’s hungry.”

  “I gave her eight ounces of formula four hours ago. Eight ounces is the proper amount.”

  “What about her diaper? Does it need changing?”

  “No.”

  “Well, is she too warm? Too cold? Could something be hurting her?”

  Nanny Crispin’s thin mouth narrowed until it all but disappeared. “She is simply in need of discipline, as I said.”

  “And that means?”

  “It means I shall outlast her temper tantrum. Goodnight, sir.”

  Linc nodded. “Okay. Sure. Goodnight.”

  He turned, walked away, got halfway up the stairs and paused. The baby was still crying but her screams had become sobs. Somehow, that was even worse.

  Would Kath have let her daughter weep? Would she have called this a temper tantrum?

  He swung around, went back to the nursery, ignored the scowl of disapproval and the pursed lips.

  “How about picking her up?” Nanny Crispin looked at him as if he’d spoken in Urdu. “You know, take her out of the crib. Hold her, walk around with her.”

  “One does not reward poor behavior.”

  “No. Of course not. I mean…”

  What in hell did he mean? Suddenly, Linc plunged back in time. He remembered coming home from football practice, finding Kath sobbing her heart out in the corner of the kitchen that had been her bedroom. He’d been maybe seventeen, so she’d have been seven. She’d been crying because some kid had made fun of her, the way she’d looked in the too-big winter coat he’d gotten her at the Salvation Army, and she hadn’t stopped weeping until he’d scooped her up, rocked her, told her everything would be all right.

  Linc walked slowly to the crib. Looked in. Hesitated. Then he reached down and picked up the baby. It was the first time he’d held her since the day a social worker had placed her in his arms.

  This is your sister’s daughter, she’d said.

  Those simple words, the unfamiliar feel of the kid in his arms, and he’d finally had to accept that Kath was gone.

  Now, he stared at the red, unhappy face of Kath’s child. His niece. Funny how he never thought of her that way. Awkwardly, he cupped her head with one hand, her bottom with the other, and rocked her back and forth.

  A little bubble of spit appeared in the corner of her mouth.

  The kid was cute, he thought grudgingly. He hadn’t really noticed before, but she was.

  “Mr. Aldridge, I must protest. You are undermining my authority in front of the child.”

  He looked at the baby, then at Nanny Crispin. The look on her face said he was committing a capitol offense.

  “She has a name,” he heard himself say.

  “What has that to do with anything?”

  “She has a name. Jennifer. I’ve never heard you use it.”

  “Her name is irrelevant.”

  It wasn’t irrelevant, nor was the fact that he never used the baby’s name, either. He knew that, deep where it counted.

  “Mr. Aldridge. The child needs to be taught a lesson. Either you put her back in her crib or I’m afraid I will have to tender my resignation.”

  Linc looked down at his niece. Her sobs had stopped. She was staring up at him, her expression solemn.

  “Did you hear me, sir? I said—”

  “I heard you. Consider your resignation accepted.”

  Nanny Crispin gasped. Linc almost did, too. What in hell had he done?

  “Wait a minute,” he started to say, but his cell phone, still in his trouser pocket, beeped. He shifted the baby to the crook of one arm and dug out the phone.

  It was his attorney. At—what was it now?—at six in the damned a.m.?

  “I couldn’t reach you last night, Lincoln.”

  “Well, you’ve reached me now, Charles. This better be good.”

  Kath’s mother-in-law had filed for custody. Linc wondered whether he felt relief or maybe something else.

  “Yeah, well, we kind of figured—”

  “What we didn’t figure,” his lawyer said briskly, “was that the lady basically abandoned her own son—Kathryn’s husband—when he was three. Now she’s claiming to have been a devoted mother who had problems.”

  “Do you buy her story?”

  “What I buy is that she just found out about the trust fund you set up for your sister, and that the money in it now transfers to the baby.”

  Linc’s mouth thinned. “Great.”

  “Indeed.”

  They made an appointment to meet later in the day. Oh, the lawyer added, the social worker wanted a meeting, too. This afternoon, with him and Linc and the baby.

  “She wants to see how the child is doing.”

  “Sir?”

  Linc turned and saw Nanny Crispin, dressed and with her suitcase in her hand.

  “I’ll see you later, Charles,” he said, and ended the call.

  “I phoned for a taxi, Mr. Aldridge. Unless, of course, you’ve changed your mind?”

  Two meetings this morning. Two meetings this afternoon. Linc had always been a logical man. There was still time for a logical man to say he’d changed his mind.

  “I will reconsider my departure if you are prepared to acknowledge my authority.”

  Linc’s jaw tightened. “Send me the bill for the cab.”

  He waited as Nanny Crispin stalked from the room. Then he looked down at his niece.

  “Well, kid, it looks like it’s just you and me.”

  Jennifer gave a huge yawn. Her eyelids drooped. A second later, she was asleep.

  An excellent idea, Linc thought, but there wasn’t much point in going back to bed, not anymore.

  Okay, then. Time for a plan. When his housekeeper showed up, he’d ask her to do him a favor and watch the baby for the day. He’d go to his office, hold his meetings, contact the nanny agency—again. This time tomorrow he’d have nanny number six and life could return to whatever level of normalcy was possible.

  Carefully, he lowered the sleeping baby into the crib.

  “Waaaah!”

  Linc hoisted her up. She screamed. He rocked her. She roared. Finally, gingerly, he brought her against his chest. Hot drool fell against his naked flesh. The baby gave a shuddering sigh and promptly fell asleep.

  Linc waited. Then, very slowly, he sank into the straight-backed chair Nanny Crispin had vacated.

  The baby slept on.

  Half an hour later, he heard his housekeeper in the kitchen. He rose stiffly from a chair that had surely been designed by a sadist, lowered the baby inch by slow inch into her crib, hobbled to the shower and stepped gratefully under a blast of hot water.

  * * *

  Mrs. Hollowell couldn’t babysit.

  Her daughter was in the city for the day and she was taking the afternoon off to spend with her. Had Mr. Aldridge forgotten?

  Mr. Aldridge had. He’d come close to forgetting his own name. Three hours of sleep could do that to a man.

  He told her not to worry.

  At eight, he strode into his office. His PA’s eyes widened at the sight of Jennifer in his arms.

  “I fired the nanny,” he said brusquely. “Phone the agency, please. And take care of the kid for the next hour.”

  Another nod, but when he tried to hand the baby over those tiny lungs contracted and the baby began to scream. Linc rolled his eyes and reached for her. His PA started to grin but one glance put an end to that.

  Frowning, Linc plunked Jennifer against his shoulder again and vanished into his office.

  He took his eight-thirty meeting with Jennifer still plastered against
him. His people pretended not to notice.

  By nine-thirty, she’d drifted off to sleep. After a quick survey of the Italian leather, smoked glass and cherrywood furnishings of his office, Linc sent his PA on another shopping expedition. In short order a thing that looked kind of like a tilted basket stood on the conference table along with diapers, baby bottles and formula.

  The basket thing was pink and padded. Linc put the baby into it and breathed a sigh of relief when she didn’t object.

  His PA had phoned his European clients at the Waldorf. They were not in their rooms but, at Linc’s direction, she’d left a message changing the location of their meeting to Peacock Alley, the hotel’s posh dining venue.

  The trouble with messages was they didn’t always get where they were meant to go.

  Midmorning, just as Linc was getting ready to leave for the Waldorf, his clients walked in. So sorry, they said, they knew they were early, but…

  The baby chose that moment to wake up.

  Her face turned pink. Her rosebud mouth pursed. Linc snatched her from her sleeping place before she could shriek.

  She smiled, drooled, and—there was a God after all—his clients melted. The meeting went on, the baby gurgled and smiled. Finally, mercifully, his clients left.

  Linc started to put the baby in the crib. She began to whimper.

  “She’s hungry,” his PA said helpfully.

  Linc looked at her. Looked at the baby. Then he handed the kid over.

  “Feed her,” he commanded.

  His PA started to say something, thought better of it, turned away, opened the door…

  Someone brushed by her and walked in. Strode in, was more like it.

  A blonde. Tall. Slender. Wearing a black suit, black spiked heels and with a sleek black leather attaché case hanging from a strap across her shoulder. The look on her face meant trouble as she marched toward him, stopped a foot from his desk and slapped her hands on her hips.

  Linc’s green eyes narrowed. His temper was hot, his patience shredded, his exhaustion a black cloud waiting to burst loose with thunder and lightning…

  Holy hell!

  The blonde was Ana Maria Marques.

  Linc scraped back his chair and jumped to his feet. “What are you doing here?”