Page 22 of Some Like It Royal

“You’re falling for her.” Martin exhaled.

“Don’t be stupid.” Daniel retreated from that line of thinking. “I’m protecting an investment. We’ve discussed the scholarship, what’s next?”

Chapter9

Alyx

Aknock on the door announced the housekeeper. Alyx glanced up as Theresa entered. The older woman looked to be in her mid-forties, short dark hair styled away from her face. She didn’t wear a uniform, exactly, but she wore a variant on the crisp slacks and polo shirt favored by many of the local spas and health clubs.

“Good morning, Miss Dagmar.” Theresa pronounced her last name carefully, but added emphasis to the miss.

“Good morning, Theresa. And, please, call me Alyx.” She’d tried three times to get the woman to call her by her given name and three times she’d been politely rebuffed.

It was still early—she’d sneaked out of the bedroom while Daniel still sprawled. Barely six-thirty, almost too early to be up, but she’d rolled over to see her roommate stretched across the bed, sheet riding low over his hips and a morning erection tenting the jersey cotton.

Escape seemed the better part of valor. She’d slipped back to her own room, showered and changed into one of the myriad of morning suits Victor insisted she buy. The coffeemaker brewed in the kitchen and the scent drew her like a moth to a flame. Theresa had offered her a latte with oat milk and that had been a delightful surprise. Cup in hand, she’d settled in the sitting room and rescued the book on the royal families of Europe. Victor and Daniel both said hers was listed in chapter fourteen.

“Thank you, Miss Dagmar. Would you like some more coffee? I’m going to fix breakfast shortly, if you have any preferences.” Theresa swept around the room, adjusting the blinds, picking up yesterday’s discarded newspaper and emptying trash bins.

Daniel strode into the room on the heels of the statement. “Omelets?” A hopeful note in the request. He turned his devastating smile on her as he circled around Theresa. Alyx’s heart pounded as he came right up to the sofa and bent down. His lips brushed hers, lighter than a butterfly or the caress of a feather. His face hovered close to hers as he murmured, “Good morning.”

Mouth tingling, she could barely muster a smile with him this close. The scent of his aftershave, a light spice, tickled her nostrils. His blue eyes gleamed as though he possessed a secret and she longed to know how he did that—how he woke up cheerful and happy with the world. “Good morning.” The words rode out on a sigh.

“I will make the omelets.” Theresa cleared her throat then slipped back out of the room.

Daniel straightened, his gaze following the housekeeper’s exit before he glanced back at her. He didn’t move away, his warmth like a blanket. He was dressed in his Daniel clothes— business slacks, button-down shirt and loafers—but he’d chosen darker colors today, save for the shirt, which matched his eyes.

“How are you?” He touched her cheek, just a brush really, fingertips gliding over her skin. She could almost forget they weren’t involved.

“I’m good.” Which, surprisingly enough, she meant. “You?”

He smiled wider and walked over to the coffee service and poured his own cup. “Not bad. I hope I didn’t wake you up last night. I had two conference calls with Japan.”

“Nope. Didn’t hear a thing.” That wasn’t entirely true. She’d rolled over to see him backlit from the open bathroom door as he got ready to go to bed. The light caressing his muscles and casting his face into shadow filled her dreams for the rest of the night.

Another good reason to escape when he’d looked deliciously relaxed in bed.

“Good.” He carried his cup over and lifted her feet, sliding onto the sofa beneath them and tucking her feet against his legs. Thank God she’d chosen slacks rather than one of the skirts. She should move her feet, but he leaned back, his gaze riding up to the windows as he took a sip of coffee.

On closer examination, the faint circles beneath his eyes made him look tired.

Forgetting the book in her lap for the time being, she cradled her coffee cup. “Do you often have meetings that late?”

Surprise crossed his expression. “Unfortunately. Well, not really unfortunate. Two of my client companies lost a lot of information when their data center collapsed. I’ve been working on a program that helps them rebuild and restore what was lost. But it takes an immeasurable amount of sifting to make it happen—sifting social media postings about their projects, internal message boards, and access to their employees’ home computers and laptops.”

“I’m not sure what social media would have to do with all of that or why you would be sifting.” Frankly, she’d never been a fan of computers. She’d never owned one, nor had she used them outside of the school library. The cheap laptop she’d used for her classes had strictly been for papers or research. By the time she could afford a better one, it’d seemed pointless. She sipped the coffee. Daniel shifted sideways. He still had her feet, but he faced her and stretched one arm out along the back of the sofa.

“Everything you do on a computer is reflected in the machine’s active memory. When you add the internet, whether it’s a closed intranet or not, it leaves a footprint. Data can be stored in RAM cache—” He paused. “You don’t know what that is, do you?”

She shook her head slowly, but he seemed awfully excited about the “cash” prospects. “Sorry.”

“Okay, you remember how with an old camera you could take a picture and you had to develop the negatives first and then you used the negative to get a picture? If you wanted more prints, all you needed was the negative?”

“Yes.” Digital cameras and the cameras on phones had replaced those, but she’d actually studied photography for one semester at a high school in Woodland. That was her favorite foster home and best school. Unfortunately, when Pete—her foster father—lost his job, she had to move on. Pushing aside that dismal thought, she focused on Daniel’s grin.

“Great. Ram cache is like a negative or snapshot of the information they looked at most recently. If you write the program correctly, it can match parameters—digital edges of one piece of information—with another.” He took a swallow of coffee, then set the cup on the table. “Imagine that my right hand is one computer and my left hand is another.” He snagged her coffee cup and sat it next to his.

She gave him a gimlet eye, but couldn’t suppress a smile at his excitement. “Each of your hands are computers too.” He caught her wrists and held her hands up. “Each of our fingers represents a piece of digital data. Let’s say that on your right hand computer you were reviewing the company’s spreadsheets, available on that intranet, the last page you looked at is your pinkie.”

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