“I think it would be for the best if she had someone else protecting her.”
“Best for her or best for you?”
“For us both,” Jude said, praying that Duncan would understand without him having to go into detail.
Duncan took a bite out of another cookie, then lifted his mug to take a sip of coffee. All the while, he kept his gaze steady on Jude. It took everything within him not to squirm.
He hadneversquirmed in Duncan’s presence, and he didn’t want to now. But it wassohard not to.
“Well,” Duncan finally said. “I’m aware that Angela has some feelings for you.”
Jude straightened. He knew?
“The question is, how do you feel about her?” Duncan asked. “Is the request for the bodyguard change because you hope she’ll lose interest if you aren’t around her as much? Or is it because you’re not sure you can do your job well because you also have feelings for her?”
Jude wanted to ask which one was likely to get him fired. But the reality was that his job wasn’t as big a consideration as it had been when he’d first started feeling drawn to Angela.
“What do you like about Angelica?” Duncan asked, apparently taking Jude’s silence as an answer to his initial questions. “What’s drawn you to her?”
The answer to that was pretty easy since he’d spent a lot of time thinking about her.
“From the moment I met her, she has shown how strong she is. How persistent she is. There might be things she isn’t sure about doing, but she hasn’t backed away from anything yet. Faced with scary situations, she pushes forward.”
Duncan nodded. “She is very determined.”
“I have so much respect for how she’s handled everything. She’s faced a lot of difficulties in her life, and I just want to do what I can to make things easier for her.”
Duncan regarded him with a steady stare. Jude had no idea what was going through his mind.
“How did you know that she had feelings for me?” Jude asked, hoping Duncan didn’t say that he hadn’t known for certain but that Jude had confirmed it.
Duncan chuckled. “I just watched one daughter fall in love, so I’m primed to recognize the symptoms in her twin.”
Fall in love…
Jude's chest constricted at Duncan's casual use of those words.
Love.
Was it that already? The constant pull he felt toward Angela, the way his day brightened when he saw her smile, the fierce protectiveness that surged through him whenever she was threatened or hurt? Was it really love?
"I care about her," he said carefully, testing the waters. "More than I should, given my position."
"Your position." Duncan set down his coffee mug and leaned back in his chair. "Tell me, Jude, what exactly do you think your position is in this family?"
The question caught him off guard. "I'm head of security. I work for you."
"You do work for me, yes. But you're also someone I trust with my life and the lives of my children and the woman I love. Someone who's been part of this family for over two decades." Duncan's expression softened. "When I told you that you are like a son to me, I meant it."
The words sent an unexpected warmth through Jude's chest, but they also made his situation feel even more complicated. If Duncan saw him as family, how would he feel if a relationship developed between him and Angela?
"That's exactly why this is problematic," Jude said. "Angela is your daughter. She's been through enough without me complicating her life."
"How would you be complicating it?"
Jude ran a hand through his hair, struggling to articulate the tangle of concerns in his mind. "I’m older than she is.”
That had definitely weighed on his mind a lot, in addition to everything else.
