Christmas Baby for the Princess Read online

  Definitely not your typical job interview. Or applicant, for that matter. Not too many out-of-work waitresses that he knew walked around wearing cashmere. He might not know women’s fashion labels by name, but he recognized expensive when he saw it. Besides, she moved like money. That posture screamed “private school.”

  A cashmere coat, and she was staying at a rat hole like the Dunphy? New to the country or not, the two did not go together. Women as beautiful as her stayed in five-star suites and not alone. They didn’t apply for temporary waitress positions.

  “You notice the haircut?” Darius asked, returning with the water.

  Yeah, Max had noticed. Right after he noticed the coat. A total home job, and not a very good one at that. “She’s trying to hide from someone.”

  “If she’s thinking that hair will help her blend in, she’s crazy.”

  It wasn’t just her haircut that attracted attention. It was the whole package. “If she wore it up, it’d look okay.” Even if it didn’t, most people would be too distracted by the rest of her to notice.

  “Don’t tell me you’re considering her.”

  “Something tells me she’s in a tough spot.”

  “Great. Another one of your lost puppies.” If his friend rolled his eyes any further, they would see the inside of his head. “Didn’t you learn anything from what happened with Shirley? You can’t save the whole world, you know.”

  “I never said I wanted to save the whole world.” The few desperate souls who crossed his path, is all. And just because some, like his former piano player, chose not to be saved, was no reason to stop. It was definitely not a reason in this case.

  He lowered his voice in case Arianna happened to come back. “She’s staying at the Dunphy.”

  Darius whistled.

  “Exactly.” If that wasn’t enough of a red flag, there was desperation in her eyes. An anxious shadow that said things weren’t as she pretended. Max knew that shadow well. He had seen it in his mother’s eyes all her life. Okay, so maybe Arianna wasn’t running away from an abusive bastard like his father. But she was running away from something. And there was no way in hell he was turning a desperate woman out in the street. His mother’s eyes haunted him enough; he didn’t have to add a second pair.

  “Besides,” he said, shaking off the ghosts, “you’ve got to admit, she would look amazing in the uniform.”

  “Maybe, but can she wait tables? All you did this morning was jaw my ear off about how hard it is to find decent help. Do you really want to take the risk? Christmastime is crazy.”

  “I thought it was the time for goodwill toward men.”

  “Very funny.” A soft cough cut off whatever else Darius was going to say. Arianna had returned to the table. Despite shaking and being white as a sheet, she still managed to look gorgeous and self-possessed. Max felt the stirring of attraction deep in his belly.

  “Everything all right?” he asked.

  Her nod was as wobbly as her legs. “Fine. That is, I was feeling light-headed, but I’m much better now.”

  She was a horrible liar. Better would mean color in her cheeks.

  “Thank you,” she said, noticing the water.

  “No problem. Figured you wouldn’t be looking for the tea.” His coffee had long since grown cold, but he drank it anyway. Wasn’t the first time—wouldn’t be the last. “So,” he said, from over the rim, “you were telling me about where you used to work.”

  Her eyes immediately dropped to her glass. “Right. Where I worked. The thing is...”

  “It was a long time ago?” he suggested.

  “Exactly.” She grabbed the excuse like a lifeline, gratitude in her voice. “I’m not sure they would remember me.”

  Max sat back and took a good look at her, trying to think like the businessman he was. Ten to one, the only experience she had waitressing involved leaving a tip. Darius was right: he had no business offering her a job.

  But then he saw how hard she was struggling to keep her composure and his conscience beat down his common sense.

  “That’s all right,” he said, “I’ll take your word for it. Do you think you will feel well enough to start tomorrow night?”

  Her eyes widened. “I have the job?”

  In a flash, Max understood how every private eye in every mystery movie fell prey to the femme fatale. The way her face lit up was absolutely criminal. He smoothed his tie and did his best to hide his reaction. “You did say you wanted it, didn’t you?”

  “I did. I mean, I do.” She leaned forward, the subtle scent of high-end perfume accompanying her. “Thank you so much,” she said, clasping his hands. “You have no idea how much this means to me.”

  Definitely criminal. Reluctantly, he disentangled himself from her grasp and stood up. “Darius will go over everything you need to know, including where to get your uniform. Welcome to the Fox Club family, Miss Santoro.”

  Out of the corner of his eye, he could see Darius shaking his head. Honestly, sometimes his friend was too much the glass-half-empty kind of guy. They were helping a gorgeous woman out of a tight spot, is all. What was the worst that could happen?

  CHAPTER TWO

  SHE WAS THE worst waitress he’d ever seen. Quite possibly, the worst waitress on the planet.

  “I tried to tell you,” Darius said, sliding Max a cup of coffee. “But you and your white-knight complex wouldn’t listen.”

  Biting back the retort he wanted to give, Max forced his features to remain expressionless. “She’s a bit rusty, I’ll give you that.”

  “Rusty? The past two nights she’s dropped three trays. Not to mention all the orders she’s messed up. Lorenzo and his staff are annoyed—they’re threatening to refuse any order she puts in.”

  “Yeah, well, Lorenzo better think twice about that, considering I’m about to drop a small fortune upgrading the kitchen.”

  “It’s not just Lorenzo. Darlene and the other waitresses are annoyed, too. Apparently she keeps disappearing into the employees’ lounge during her shift.”

  So Max had noticed. In fact, he’d been paying quite a lot of attention to his newest employee the past two days. Enough to realize it wasn’t only his desire to help that had made him hire her. She looked breathtaking in the waitress costume. He’d personally ordered the dress after seeing a photograph of Grace Kelly wearing something similar, the idea being that his waitresses would be smoldering but classy. On Arianna, the concept took on a whole new meaning. Every man in the room had to be cursing how the neckline didn’t dip low enough to reveal anything more than bare shoulders and a hint of cleavage. Max certainly was.

  She’d fixed her hair, too. Pulled it into some fancy twist that showed off a long, graceful neck. Max had dated his share of women—beautiful women—but none as enticing as his new waitress. As a rule, he didn’t get involved with the help—made for an awkward work environment when he moved on—but with Arianna, he was seriously tempted.

  “Darlene asked her if she was sick, and she insisted she wasn’t,” Darius said. “You don’t suppose she’s using, do you?”

  “Nah.” Enough addicts and alcoholics had crossed his path over the years for him to know the signs. “Nervous stomach, more likely.” He’d caught her stealing crackers from the salad bar. “All the same, tell the other waitresses to let me know if they see anything odd.”

  “That mean you’re going to let her keep waiting tables?”

  “How else is she going to get up-to-speed? Another day or two and she’ll be fine.”

  There was a loud crash.

  “Another day or two, huh?” Darius said. “You sure?”

  Across the room, their newest employee had just spilled a salad on... Oh, Lord—was that the deputy mayor?

  Max ran a hand over his face. “Send a couple bottles of Amatucci
reserve to the table, and tell him the entire night is on the house.” He watched as the mayor’s right-hand man slapped away Arianna’s hand before plucking a piece of arugula from the lapel of his gray flannel suit. Hopefully the drink and a few profuse apologies would be enough to soothe the man’s ego.

  “And your new puppy? What about her?”

  “Move her to somewhere where she won’t cause damage for the rest of the night,” he said.

  “You mean you’re not going to let her go?”

  He’d certainly fired employees for less. Only he couldn’t shake the memory of her anxious expression, or that she was in a roach hotel to beat all roach hotels. Attraction to her aside, there remained the fact she was a woman clearly looking for an escape. What kind of man would he be if he cut her loose?

  “Tomorrow we’ll try her at the hostess station.” Now that he thought about it, he should have assigned her that position to begin with. Who wouldn’t want to follow her to their table?

  “You’re the boss,” Darius said, with a look that said he disagreed. “I just hope you know what you’re doing.”

  So did he, thought Max. So did he.

  * * *

  “Arianna, may I speak to you for a moment?”

  The fussy, nasal voice of the maître d’ had the uncanny ability to cut through the restaurant din like an upper-crust trumpet. By itself the tone was enough to make Arianna’s insides cringe. When coupled with the distinct sound of disapproval, it made her feel sick to her stomach. Or sicker, as the case may be. What had she done this time?

  Javier stood at his seating station, impatiently tapping his pen against the wood. His rigid posture reminded her of the music instructor her father had hired when she was twelve. A dictatorial virtuoso who she’d been certain had moonlighted as a prison guard. Come to think of it, she wouldn’t be surprised if Javier moonlighted at the same place.

  Smoothing the front of her waitress dress, which was doubling as a hostess outfit for the evening, she excused herself from the diners with whom she’d been talking and headed toward him. He immediately tilted his gel-slicked head toward a corner away from the crowd. “I thought I asked you to seat the last party in section four,” he said, once they were out of earshot.

  “I did.” At least she thought she had.

  “No, you seated them in section three.”

  Section three, section four...what difference did it make? Four people needed a table, so she gave them a table with four chairs.

  Apparently, from the maître d’s dramatic sigh, it mattered a great deal. “Did I not tell you that restaurant seating is like a mathematical equation? You make a mistake on one side of the dining room, then the entire scheme is thrown off-balance. Now I’m going to have to redo the entire seating chart. Again.”

  Arianna lifted her chin. Perhaps, she wanted to say, if she’d been allowed more than five minutes to study the floor plan before the restaurant opened... Traditionally, memorizing information on quick order wasn’t a problem, but lately it seemed her brain was constantly foggy and sluggish. It did not help that the majority of her energy these days seemed to center on trying not to run to the ladies’ room.

  Apparently, Javier wasn’t done lecturing her. “And did you tell a couple they couldn’t sit in one of the back booths?”

  “They were walk-ins. You told me the booths were reserved.”

  “I also told you customer service is our number-one priority. As the first face they see when they come into the Fox Club, you are in a sense Mr. Brown’s ambassador, and as such, you never tell a customer you cannot accommodate their request.”

  “But I thought I wasn’t supposed to disrupt the seating chart.”

  Javier glared at her. “From now on, come and get me if there’s a special request. I don’t want you making decisions on your own.” He reached for the reservation book while muttering under his breath. Arianna caught the words empty-headed and useless.

  They were enough to make her see red. Raising herself to her fullest height, she stared down her nose at the maître d’. “Listen here, you...”

  “Excuse me.” A tall, elderly woman approached them, preventing Arianna from finishing. The newcomer wore a pale green gown that, while dated, Arianna immediately recognized from the stitching as a designer original. She was carrying a leather tote bag and a large brown canister.

  “Javier,” she said, in an upper-crust voice to rival the maître d’s. Another time, Arianna would find it amusing that she, the actual royal, had the least affected voice. “It’s five past seven. Mr. Riderman and I distinctly requested a seven o’clock reservation. I mentioned it to this young woman, but she told me I had to wait.”

  “The rest of her party hasn’t arrived yet,” Arianna told Javier, figuring that he would appreciate the defense, since he set the rule.

  He didn’t, though. He snapped to even greater attention. “My apologies, Mrs. Riderman. She is a new employee. Had I seen you walk in I would have attended to you personally. May I send you and Mr. Riderman a cocktail with our compliments?”

  The elderly woman’s hand fluttered at the offer, her gigantic cocktail ring spinning on her thin finger as she did. “Mr. Riderman isn’t drinking this evening. I, however, will have an extra dry martini.”

  “Very good.” Arianna had to force herself not to roll her eyes at the bow Javier offered the woman. The palace guards weren’t that effusive. “Now if you follow me, your regular table is ready.”

  There was another exception to his rules? If he was going to allow exceptions, then there should be a list for employees.

  Javier glared at her when he returned. “You are very lucky, Mrs. Riderman is a forgiving person,” he said.

  Oh, no, she refused to let some uptight little man lecture her on this. “You specifically instructed that no party was to be seated unless everyone was present.”

  “The entire party was present.”

  “No, Mr. Riderman...” She stopped, suddenly remembering the bronze vase. “You mean she is eating with her dead husband’s...?”

  “Will you keep your voice down?” he said, almost hissing. “Mrs. Riderman is one of our oldest and best customers. She’s also an influential voice in the New York arts society.”

  Who eats with her husband’s ashes? “Does Mr. Brown know about this?”

  “Of course he knows.”

  “Oh.” And he wasn’t disturbed? “I’m sorry. I’ll make sure that doesn’t happen again.” The next time a party arrived carrying a jar of remains, she’d make sure to seat them promptly.

  “It most certainly will not,” Javier replied. “You’ve done quite enough damage for the evening.”

  Arianna stiffened as he touched her elbow. She still wasn’t used to being touched so casually. In Corinthia, only her family and closest confidants took such liberties.

  And Manolo, she added ruefully. He had taken a lot of liberties. But then, she’d been foolish enough to think the words coming out of his mouth were sincere.

  “Are you sending me home?”

  Javier shook his head. “Only Max can do that.” Arianna was certain she heard a silent “unfortunately” prefacing the sentence. “For now, I just want you out of the way.”

  “Doing what?” As if she couldn’t guess.

  * * *

  Folding tableware. Tucked away at the corner of the bar, with a stack of linen napkins and a silverware tray in front of her, she was quickly becoming an expert at the task.

  Take a napkin off the pile, fold the cloth carefully into a triangle and stack a knife and two forks by the fold. Then tuck the corners to keep the silverware in place before rolling them into a cylinder. Within five minutes she’d built a small pyramid. At this rate, the restaurant would have table settings to last until New Year’s.

  She should have called home
by now. If she was back home, she’d be curled up in her big comfortable bed right now waiting for a servant to bring her a cup of lavender mint tea.

  Instead, her feet hurt, her back hurt and her stomach wouldn’t stop lurching from the constant food smells passing by her nose. All she wanted to do was close her eyes and sleep for the next twenty-four hours straight.

  Worse, after three days, she was no closer to deciding what she should do.

  As if on cue, a wave of nausea hit her, forcing her to press a fist to her lips. If she didn’t know better, she’d say the child inside her was voicing its opinion. Too bad she did not know what side the bambino was on. Then again, how could an embryo know what to do when she herself didn’t?

  If only she had not seen Manolo’s true colors. Then perhaps the idea of spending a lifetime with him would not seem so...daunting. Her father, of course, was thoroughly impressed by the man and had been thrilled when she and the industrialist began dating. A wedding and grandchild would send him over the moon.

  But wasn’t wanting to please Father what had gotten her into this dilemma? Knowing how happy the relationship made her father, she’d ignored the questions whispering in her ear. If Manolo’s kisses failed to make her head spin, or if there were times when she thought he loved being with the king more than with her, it was her imagination. After all, no relationship was perfect one hundred percent of the time. Perhaps if they were intimate her doubts would disappear...

  Finding another woman’s underwear in his apartment had shown her how wrong that idea was. Unfortunately, the shutters were pulled from her eyes a little too late.

  “You’re doing that wrong,” a voice said from behind her.

  Max. A quiver struck low in her stomach. The bambino seemed to have an opinion about him as well. Since that first day, her stomach insisted on wobbling every time she and the owner crossed paths.