Free The Heart of a Hero by Janet Chapman Page A

she’d actually hidden until the bus had left. Julia knew, though, because she’d watched the divorced mother of three change out of her waitress uniform, contort herself into a tight pair of jeans and low-cut jersey, spray her really impressive cleavage with cologne, then take a magazine and walk into the maintenance room to wait.
    Julia got out of bed with a groan, willing to bet all her worldly possessions that Nicholas had made the trip down the mountain in half the time it had taken him to get her down it yesterday, even as she’d wondered what Wanda had . . . offered the man for thanks. Julia stood in the middle of the hotel room and tried to imagine what it was like to be a walking, talking chick magnet.
    Not that Nicholas seemed to notice. Or if he did, not that he seemed to let any of the chicks ever . . . stick. Since he’d shown up in Spellbound Falls a little over a year ago, Julia had never seen Nicholas in town with a woman. He used to come into the Drunken Moose on the weekends she worked, but always with one of his guards, or with Mac or Duncan, or often alone. She remembered he was a good tipper, but she also remembered that when any of the waitresses had tried flirting with him, he’d either politely brushed them off or pretended not to notice.
    Guessing nobody’s life was perfect, not even walking, talking chick magnets, Julia headed for the bathroom with every intention of trying out the luxurious marble soaking tub. She stopped when she heard a knock on the door—only to spin around when she realized it had come from the
rear
entrance to the room.
    Even though she cleaned the cottages, she knew about the corridors carved into the granite that ran behind each of the five hotel segments, as well as the tunnels that joined the segments together so the rooms could easily be serviced during the winter months. In fact, there was an entire warren of caves connecting the hotels with the pool, conference pavilion, and restaurant, which the guests were also encouraged to use during foul weather. Not that the corridors
felt
cavelike, since some of them were actually large enough to drive a cart down and the myriad glass-topped reflective tubes flooded them with natural light.
    “Who is it?” Julia called out when the knock sounded again as she looked at the bedside clock, wondering why housekeeping was so
early
. Dang it, she really didn’t want any of her coworkers knowing she’d spent the night here, figuring it would be bad enough when they found out she’d been given an apartment.
    “Room service,” a heavily accented male voice answered.
    Really? “Just a minute,” she muttered, sprinting into the bathroom and grabbing the plush robe off the back of the door. She walked back into the room as she belted the robe closed, then opened the rear door a crack. “I didn’t order room service,” she said to a man she didn’t recognize holding a tray of covered dishes. “Oh, is that coffee?” she asked, opening the door wider, only to shake her head. “Never mind. You must have the wrong room. I didn’t order anything,” she repeated.
    The guy glanced to the left of the door, then stepped inside. “Numeral seven,” he said, walking over and setting the tray on the table in front of the windows. He pulled an envelope from his pocket and handed it to her. “For a Mademoiselle Campbell?”
    Julia pulled out the card and frowned at the handwritten note.
    Consider this a blatant attempt to persuade you to accept a proposition I have for you, Julia, although in no way should you feel obligated. I’m afraid Olivia was correct in stating that my apartment is in need of a good vacuuming, and if you were to consider performing that particular task, I would enjoy treating you and Trisha to dinner at Aeolus’s Whisper this evening.
    —Nicholas
    How . . . lovely.
    Well, he knew she worked in housekeeping, after all; but dinner at Aeolus’s? Either the man really hated vacuuming or he’d just