Page 37 of The Irish Rogue

Grandparents? Was that her concern? “You know, my mother is still alive. As soon as she finds out that she has a grandson, she’s going to be on your doorstep, wanting to help.”

Kennedi’s eyes widened, then turned wary. “Your mother? Is she…a good mother?”

Bingo, he thought. “She’s one of the best,” he assured her.

She seemed to relax with his reassurance and he wanted to find out more. But she didn’t appear inclined to tell him about her mother. “Is your mother still alive?” he asked, hoping to prompt her into telling him the backstory.

“As far as I know, yes.”

Ah! “But you aren’t close?”

She snorted, shaking her head. “No. My mother and I aren’t close.” She pulled Declan closer. “And she’s never going to find out about Declan.” She looked over at him, her eyes hard. “Never! Do you understand?”

“Got it,” he said, lifting a hand as if offering a solemn vow. “In fact, I’ll get my research team on finding her, just so we know exactly where she is and can monitor her. If you say that she’s a danger to our son, she won’t be allowed to get close.”

Kennedi’s eyes widened. “You can do that?”

“Absolutely. I have some of the best researchers in the industry. If there’s something to find out about a company, they’ll find out before I buy it.”

“I thought you bought up troubled companies?”

“I do, but I want to know all of the troubles that a company is struggling with before I’ll buy into it. I can’t fix something I don’t know about. And most owners don’t want anyone to know what they’ve…” he glanced at Declan, obviously changing his word choice, “…messed up. Sometimes, they aren’t even aware of the problems. It’s my research team’s job to find out everything that no one wants to acknowledge. Then I make a decision regarding buying the company. Only if I can fix things.”

“Are there companies that are too badly gone to fix?”

“Sure. If the environment is too toxic, if the employees are jumping ship, then the problems might be too bad to fix.”

“And how do you assess how much it’s going to take to fix a company?”

He shrugged and stood up, walking over to her to stroke Declan’s now sleeping head. “A lot of experience and my gut. Plus some calculations from my finance manager, estimates from my marketing team. I also have an engineer on call that will go in to assess any factory issues.” He looked directly at her. “Can I hold him for a bit before you put him into his crib?”

She was startled by the change in conversation, but nodded. “Absolutely,” she said and stood up, carefully transferring Declan into Sean’s arms. “Go ahead and rock him. He won’t wake up.”

Kennedi watched as Sean sat down in the chair, fascinated by his son. After several moments, she turned and headed into the kitchen. Everything had been cleaned up? When had that happened?

She turned, looking at the hallway. Had Sean cleaned up the dinner stuff? Sure enough, the containers were neatly stacked in the fridge.

“Hmmm…” she muttered, then walked into her bedroom. She wanted to get ready for bed, but she couldn’t start her nighttime routine until Sean was gone. There was something so…intense…about the man. She hadn’t slept much the night she’d conceived their son either.

“Are you okay?”

Kennedi spun around, startled by the deep, male voice. Staring up at him, she backed away, hiding her hands behind her back. “Yes. I’m fine. Perfectly fine!”

He pulled his shirt on over his head. Obviously, he’d grabbed it out of the dryer and she held her breath for a moment. The warmth of the shirt moving against the heat of his body was…intoxicating!

“Ye are acting jumpy,” he commented, moving a bit closer.

She noticed his accent again. Goodness, she’d forgotten how much of an indicator that was for him. And for her! She could tell when his feelings were stronger simply by the return of his Irish accent.

“I’m fine!” she reiterated, even though her fingers were itching to reach out and slide underneath his shirt. She wanted to feel the heat of his skin, to experiment with exploring his bare chest. Would he still groan when she slid her fingers over the hard ridges of his stomach? Did he still like it when she nipped at his neck?

“Stop it!” she hissed.

He froze and she caught the confusion in his eyes.

“I’m sorry, what am I doing?” he asked.

Kennedi closed her eyes and shook her head slightly. When she opened them again, he was still there. “Nothing,” she finally admitted. “You’re not doing anything wrong.”

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