Conflict of Interest. Gina Wilkins

marriage? At least Adrienne was spared the embarrassment of late-life half siblings. Lawrence Corley hadn’t particularly wanted her, much less any more offspring at this stage of his life.

      She really should have insisted on finding another place to stay for the night, even if she had to make use of one of those bargain-rate motels Gideon had mentioned. She wasn’t sure why she hadn’t put up more of an argument. She’d found herself agreeing almost before she’d realized what she was doing.

      What was it about him she found so persuasive? Sure, he was handsome, but she was accustomed to being around striking men. His green eyes were uncomfortably perceptive but hardly hypnotic. She’d been aware of a tug of attraction, but she had never allowed her hormones to guide her actions before.

      So what was she doing in his bed?

      She and Gideon hadn’t engaged in much conversation after she had agreed to stay the night. Somehow she’d found herself tucking Isabelle into bed and reading her a bedtime story—a suggestion that had come from Gideon. By the time Isabelle was asleep, Gideon had been closed into his office and settled at his computer. He’d looked up from his work only long enough to absently inform Adrienne where she could find the clean linens. As an afterthought he had added that she should let him know if she needed anything, but she suspected he was hoping there would be no further interruptions.

      She had spent the rest of the evening reading one of the manuscripts she’d brought with her. After watching the local ten-o’clock news, she’d turned in a good two hours earlier than she would have usually gone to bed. Gideon had not once emerged from his office.

      Rolling onto her side, she closed her eyes, but sleep proved elusive. It was much too quiet. She could hear every gust of wind, not to mention hooting owls and the occasional moo from a distant cow. As soon as she had Gideon’s signature on several contracts, she was heading back to civilization and her long-overdue vacation.

      Groggy and disoriented, Adrienne woke after a restless night when the morning sun hit her full in the face. Either Gideon was an early riser, she thought, glaring at the sheer curtains that allowed the dawning sun into the room, or he was a heavy sleeper who wasn’t bothered by the light.

      The bedside clock read six-forty-five when she climbed out of bed and moved into the adjoining bath. By seven-fifteen, she had showered, dried her hair and dressed in one of the two casual outfits she had packed with the two professional pantsuits she’d brought with her. Smoothing her thin, emerald-green sweater over comfortably tailored black slacks, she left Gideon’s bedroom.

      Gideon and Isabelle were in the kitchen, and from the look of things, the morning was not running smoothly. Isabelle’s fine blond hair was a pillow-tangled mess, and there was a smear of grape jelly on her chin. She wore a long-sleeved pink T-shirt festooned with cartoon characters Adrienne didn’t recognize and black leggings that ended just above her bare feet. A half-eaten bowl of cereal sat in front of her, along with the remains of two jelly-spread slices of wheat toast and a half glass of milk.

      Dressed in a wrinkled T-shirt and jeans, Gideon stood nearby, his dark hair in its apparently usual disarray, a look of impatience on his unshaven face. Just as Adrienne entered the room, he glanced at the microwave clock and said, “Isabelle, if you don’t hurry with your breakfast, you’re going to be late for school. How can anyone take this long to eat a bowl of cereal?”

      “I was reading the cereal box,” the child explained. “It has funny jokes on the back.”

      “You can already read?” Adrienne asked as she walked straight to the coffeemaker on the counter next to Gideon.

      “I can read the easy words,” Isabelle answered, her tone somewhere between modest and boastful.

      “And you’re only four?”

      “Just turned four,” Gideon said. “The kid is smart, but she’s very slow,” he added with a meaningful look at Isabelle’s cereal bowl.

      Isabelle dutifully spooned another bite into her mouth. Adrienne accepted the coffee mug Gideon offered her and filled it with strong, fragrant black coffee. She sipped the brew gratefully, feeling the jolt of caffeine clear her mind. “When does Isabelle’s school start?”

      “Eight,” Gideon muttered with another impatient glance at his watch.

      “I suppose we’d better hurry, then.” She set her mug down and moved toward the table. “Isabelle, it’s time to finish getting ready. Let’s go do your hair, brush your teeth and find your shoes.”

      “She hasn’t finished her cereal,” Gideon pointed out.

      Adrienne shrugged. “She won’t starve. My father sent me to school plenty of times with my breakfast half-eaten because I’d dawdled. I learned to eat in a timely fashion or be hungry before lunchtime.”

      Gideon gave it a moment’s thought, then nodded. “Makes sense. Go with Adrienne, Isabelle. Tomorrow morning you’ll have to save your cereal-box reading until you’re completely ready for school.”

      Though her lower lip protruded just a bit, Isabelle slipped out of her chair and followed Adrienne out of the kitchen.

      With Adrienne supervising, it took less than ten minutes to get Isabelle groomed and shod. “She’s still going to be late,” Gideon predicted, retrieving his car keys from a drawer in a table near the front door. “But at least it’ll only be by a few minutes. Why don’t you come with us, and I’ll buy you breakfast after we drop Isabelle off?”

      Business breakfasts and lunches were commonplace for her, so she nodded. “Sounds good. But breakfast is on me. I’m the one putting you out.”

      “We’ll argue about the check later. Let’s go.”

      Because Gideon drove a pickup, they decided to strap Isabelle’s booster seat in the back of Adrienne’s rental car to give them more room. Adrienne gave him the keys and slid into the passenger seat. She waited in the car while he escorted Isabelle into Miss Thelma’s Preschool. He wasn’t gone long, and he was scowling when he returned.

      “Miss Thelma dressed me down for bringing Isabelle late,” he muttered. “Talked to me like I was one of her preschoolers.”

      Adrienne winced. “How did you respond?”

      “I told her I was doing the best I could under the circumstances, and if she didn’t like it, too bad. Prissy old biddy.”

      “I hope you didn’t add that last part aloud.”

      “No. Not this time, anyway.”

      “Admirable restraint.”

      “I thought so.”

      “Isabelle’s parents are away, I take it?”

      “Isabelle’s parents—my father and his second wife—are dead,” Gideon replied with a bluntness that startled her. “They died in an accident last year. Isabelle lives with my older brother, Nathan, who’s away on his honeymoon. He was married Saturday morning.”

      “So you’re baby-sitting.”

      “I wasn’t supposed to be. My mother volunteered for that task, but she had to leave town yesterday because of a medical emergency with her sister. She didn’t have anywhere else to leave the kid, so she dumped Isabelle with me.”

      Adrienne frowned a bit as she tried to understand his family tree. “Your mother was baby-sitting Isabelle?”

      “Yes. Ironically enough, she’s become a sort of surrogate grandmother to the child my father created with someone else while my mother was still married to him.”

      Before Adrienne could come up with a suitable response—if there was one—he turned the car into the parking lot of a metal-sided diner that looked as though it had been built in the 1950s. Most of the clientele appeared to drive pickup trucks. She noticed when Gideon escorted her inside that male customers outnumbered the women, and the majority of both genders wore blue-collar working clothes. The clatter