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macaroni.”
    Mac gaped at her. “Are you questioning me?”
    Feeling a strong need to help Lacy, she lifted her chin. “Maybe I’m confused because I’m not a full-time employee,” she said, trying to soften the blow. “Maybe I’m confused because I’m also not a parent. But I can’t see what difference it would have made to let her eat a little macaroni. She’s a kid. She was hungry.”
    Mac sucked in a breath. Once again Ellie got the impression he was controlling his temper. Fear flooded her. She knew better than to anger a man. Yet, here she was arguing about macaroni. No, she was arguing for Lacy. The kid was a kid, yet in two days Ellie had only seen her playing once. She hadn’t been able to choose her own lunch. Something was wrong here!
    Finally Mac slowly said, “I was feeding her. And I’ll make her macaroni tomorrow.”
    â€œBut she wanted macaroni today.”
    Mac squeezed his eyes shut. “Miss Swanson, go do the laundry.”
    An odd sense of empowerment swelled in Ellie. He was furious with her for questioning him. Yet, he hadn’t made a move toward her. He hadn’t even yelled.
    Still, she wouldn’t push her luck.
    Â 
    That afternoon while both kids were napping, Mac paced his office. Nobody— nobody —questioned him, yet Ellie hadn’t hesitated. He should be furious. He should have instantly fired her for insubordination. Instead, he’d felt a stirring of guilt for denying Lacy what she wanted for lunch and unexpected appreciation that Ellie had a soft spot for his daughter. His appreciation actually got worse when she turned around before leaving and questioned him one more time.
    Lacy was a little girl whose mother had abandoned her. Her nanny had refused to move to Coral Gables when they’d run here before Pamela’s new movie could be released. She had no aunts and uncles or cousins because Mac was an only child. Her grandparents were jetsetters.
    Even Mac felt for her. He’d lived that himself. An only child, dependent upon nannies for support and love. But at least he’d had one stable, consistent nanny. Mrs.Pomeroy. She was more of a grandmother to him than his grandmother had been. Their bond was so strong that he’d bought her the house in Coral Gables as a retirement gift. It was also why he’d called her when he’d made the decision to hide while Pamela resurrected her career, and Mrs. Pomeroy had suggested he buy the house next to hers. She was here for support, to love his kids, and could even babysit for short spans. But she was eighty years old now. She couldn’t be his children’s nanny. Not even for three or four weeks while he looked for a new one.
    So he knew the value of having a loving nanny. A consistent, stable nanny. If Ellie Swanson checked out, he’d be tempted to offer her anything she wanted to be Lacy and Henry’s nanny permanently.
    Except for his damned attraction to her.
    There they’d stood, in his ugly bedroom—he certainly hoped the people who’d owned the house before him hadn’t paid the decorator well—with Ellie being insubordinate, and all he could think of was how close they were to the bed.
    It was ridiculous. He didn’t know the woman. He could embarrass her or cause her to leave if he made a pass at her. Yet, the pull of attraction he felt to her was so strong, he’d forgotten every one of those good reasons he was supposed to keep his relationship with her purely professional.
    He opened his cell phone and checked one more time for messages. If Phil would just get back to him and tell him one way or another about Ellie, then Mac could act. He could either fire her or feel comfortable leaving her alone with his kids and go back to work so he wouldn’t have to be around her so much.
    But there was no cell phone message from Phil. No incoming call. He was on his own with Ellie Swanson until Phil