Page 33 of Temptation at His Door

“Uh-huh.”

“So, is that a yes, a no? A go-straight-to-hell?”

Joa quickly tallied up the pros and cons in her head. She didn’t want to be alone; she didn’t want to go to a hotel or to a furnished apartment. She really enjoyed Aron and Sam and it wasn’t like she was committing herself to a long-term contract. She had to temporarily leave Mounton House, he needed time to find his forever nanny.

All pros.

On the con side, she still wanted to sleep with him. Like, desperately. He, on the other hand, seemed completely unfazed by their explosive sexual encounter.

And that pissed her off. Joa knew she needed to be sensible, that Ronan could mess with her head, mess with her plans. She was so attracted to him, a hundred times more so than she had been to any of her previous bosses. Looking back, and comparing what she felt for Ronan to those tepid feelings for Liam and Johan so long ago, she realized that she hadn’t been physically attracted to any of those men.

Sure, it hurt when she left their employ and she mourned the dream of being part of a family, but her feelings had little, if anything at all, to do with the individual men.

Ronan was different. She liked his boys, sure, but she wasn’t thinking “family” with him.

She was just thinking about having him, in any way she could get him. Preferably naked. And that was bad, very, very bad indeed.

She had to be sensible, she had to protect herself and her battered and bruised heart. Gathering her courage to say no, when she desperately wanted to say yes, Joa shook her head. “I’m sorry, Ronan. I don’t think it’s a good idea.”

“Why not? Because you think I’ll hit on you?”

No, because she was terrified that he wouldn’t.

Joa told herself, once again, that while she might be strong enough to resist Ronan Murphy, she couldn’t resist the voice message, sent from Ronan’s phone, from his oh-so-serious older son.

She might have issues with Sam’s dad but she refused to allow the little boy to think she didn’t like him.

Stepping up to Ronan’s front door, Joa rang the doorbell, stamping her feet and blowing air into her hands as she cursed the icy, snow-tinged wind. Would winter ever end?

Joa heard footsteps and told her excited heart, and ovaries, to calm the hell down. She’d seen Ronan the day before yesterday; there was no need to act like a teenager at a K-pop concert.

The door whipped open and Joa caught her breath, her words deserting her as she drank Ronan in. He was dressed in jeans and an untucked button-down shirt, and stubble covered his jaw. He still looked tired and harassed and so damn sexy.

“Joa. What are you doing here?”

Joa started to reply but a shiver racked her from head to foot and then she felt Ronan tugging her inside his warm house. “Man, you’re an ice block. How long were you standing out there?”

Joa shook her head. “Not long. Stupid weather. I hate the cold.”

“I can tell,” Ronan replied, unwinding her scarf so that he could see her face. He smiled and pushed her knitted cap off her forehead. “There you are.”

“Hi,” Joa said, suddenly tongue-tied. Where had all her words gone?”

“Hi back,” Ronan said, stepping away from her. “So, this is a surprise. I didn’t expect to see you again.”

“I didn’t expect to be here but then I got a voice message from your phone.” Joa pushed her hand into her coat pocket to pull out her phone and waved it at him.

Confusion passed over Ronan’s face. “I didn’t send you a voice message.”

“I know.” Joa pushed buttons and held up the phone. Sam’s serious voice filled the space between them.

“Joa, this is Samuel McKenzie Murphy. My dad said that you can’t be our nanny but he couldn’t tell us why. We like you and we thought you liked us. So, anyway, me and Aron were just wondering what we did wrong.”

Ronan tipped his head back and stared at the ceiling. When he dropped his head again, Joa shrugged. “I couldn’t let them think that I didn’t like them. I do, very much...”

Joa took a deep breath and, before she could change her mind, released the words in a heated rush. “If you haven’t made another plan for them, I’ll do it. I’ll look after them.”

Ronan’s mouth dropped open. “You will?”

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