Code Name: Nanny (SEAL and Code Name #5)(21)

Then don’t act like a baby, Summer wanted to say. Instead she held out her cell phone. “She’s very worried about you, Audra.”

“No kidding. She worries about everything.”

Another reason to tell the girls the truth, Summer thought grimly. But it still wasn’t her call. While Audra paced the room, phone to her ear, Summer sat down with Sophy.

“She didn’t mean to cause any trouble.” Sophy watched her sister pace. “She just likes to talk. When she saw her friend downstairs, they started gossiping and forgot the time.”

“Then she’ll have to learn not to forget. Audra inconvenienced a dozen people today and frightened her mother badly.” Summer frowned, remembering that Sophy had been about to tell her something earlier. “What did you mean before when you said Audra was going to meet someone. How did you know that?”

Sophy looked away, fiddling with her backpack. “It was just a thought. It doesn’t matter.” Audra was still talking on the cell phone, arguing with her mother, when Sophy pushed to her feet. “Can we go now?”



Sitting beside Tate Winslow, Cara put down her phone with a sigh of relief. “They found her in the bathroom. She was talking with a friend and didn’t notice the time.”

“Thank God.” Tate looked away from traffic and squeezed her shoulder. “Is Sophy upset?”

“Ms. Mulvaney says she’s been wonderful. The two seem to have hit things off in grand fashion.”

“That’s the new nanny, right? How is Audra taking that?”

“Too soon to say. The girls loved their old nanny, even though she was getting very lax.” Cara laughed. “Maybe because she was lax.”

“What was the problem again?”

“Appendicitis. It ruptured while she was shopping in San Francisco on her day off. She’s still very sick, and I’m just glad I could find a dependable replacement on short notice.”

“Where did you find Ms. Mulvaney, by the way.”

“Oh, a friend of a friend,” Cara said vaguely. “I have my own network, too, Senator.”

“I don’t doubt it for a second, Counselor.” Tate smoothed a strand of hair off her cheek. “Now tell me what’s really going on.”

Cara stared out at the line of lights sprawling south toward Carmel. “Sometimes I wish you weren’t so smart. And so damned stubborn.”

“Same goes, Counselor.”

“It was all a very long time ago. I thought it was finally over.” Cara closed her eyes. “Buried deep.”

“I haven’t got a clue what you’re talking about, honey.”

“You aren’t supposed to.” The exhaustion was back in her voice. “No one is. I worked hard to be sure of that.” Cara’s voice wavered. “But someone found out, and they’ll use it against me. Tate, I don’t how to tell you this, but—” She stared down at her locked hands. “I was pregnant. It was years ago, back in a different universe. It was sordid and hopeless and I had school debts to repay, my mother to support, my sister to worry about. There was no way in heaven I could—” Her voice broke. “What could I give a baby when I could barely feed myself?”

“I’m pulling over—”

“No, keep driving. Otherwise, I won’t have the nerve to finish.”

She closed her eyes, swept back to the cramped student apartment in West Philadelphia, with the trolley tracks right outside her window. She remembered the cold clack of metal wheels late at night, and she remembered feeling frightened, alone, and desperate. Then she’d gotten sick, and a simple bout of flu had developed into pneumonia.

A worse nightmare had followed.

“Who was the father?” Tate’s face was set in grim lines.

“Do you really want to know?”

“Tell me his name. I know the rest already. If he didn’t want the child, that makes him a coward as well as a bastard.”

“Close enough.”

He stared into a line of traffic. “I could kill him for leaving you like that.”

“Forget him. He was—a mistake. A colossal, inexcusable mistake.” Cara sat back stiffly. “I was taking a class with him, and we happened to meet at the library once or twice. It seemed so casual at the time. We did some research together, and the next thing I knew . . .” She gave a broken laugh. “What a pathetic cliché. He was my professor, Tate. Older, experienced, handsome. Like a fool, I fell blindly in love, right into bed with him.”





[page]chapter 7

Tate cut through traffic, then pulled off onto the shoulder. Before Cara could catch a breath, his arms were around her.

“Point number one: You have never been pathetic in your life. Point number two: He took advantage of you. As a professor, he was years older and in a position of authority, so don’t tell me the mistake was yours,” Tate said savagely.

She turned her face into his shoulder, trembling. “I knew it was wrong. Deep down, I knew it was just nailing a student. But I told myself I was different, that he would see what a valuable asset I could be. I was already doing research, writing papers for him, answering his letters. Then after three months I found out he was going back to his old position in Boston. He had a wife and four kids, and I was never pegged to be more than a diversion to get him through the school term.”