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Cinderella And The Ceo
SUSAN MEIER


DEKE BERTRIM HAD NEVER SEEN SUCH GORGEOUS GREEN EYES…When I first got to town to investigate the money that was missing from the family business, I didn't expect to fall in love with one of my employees. Laurel Hillman, supervisor of shipping and receiving, was beautiful but born into a different world. I'm Harvard and she barely finished high school. I have a fortune. She has a family.It was fun pretending for a little while, especially when I volunteered to coach Laurel's daughter's softball team. But I had to fulfill my obligations and return to my seat of power.Would there ever be a fairy tale where their differences didn't matter?







“I don’t act like this around other women.”

He paused and caught her gaze. “I mean, I do, but it’s more a matter of politeness. With you, it’s automatic. Almost like I was made to please you.”

Laurel’s eyes widened. “Stop that. I’ll never be able to resist you if you don’t stop saying such sweet things.”

“Sweet isn’t all you bring out in me,” Deke warned quietly. “I have a whole range of feelings for you, and about you,” he said, walking away from the steps and over to her. “At home, I usually felt very specific things for the women I dated. Some women I was attracted to. Others I liked as friends. But my feelings for you encompass all those things and more.” He traced his finger along the line of her cheekbone, sending shivers of awareness through her.


Dear Reader,

As senior editor for the Silhouette Romance line, I’m lucky enough to get first peek at the stories we offer you each month. Each editor searches for stories with an emotional impact, that make us laugh or cry or feel tenderness and hope for a loving future. And we do this with you, the reader, in mind. We hope you continue to enjoy the variety each month as we take you from first love to forever….

Susan Meier’s wonderful story of a hardworking single mom and the man who sweeps her off her feet is Cinderella and the CEO. In The Boss’s Baby Mistake, Raye Morgan tells of a heroine who accidentally gets inseminated with her new boss’s child! The fantasy stays alive with Carol Grace’s Fit for a Sheik as a wedding planner’s new client is more than she bargained for….

Valerie Parv always creates a strong alpha hero. In Booties and the Beast, Sam’s the strong yet tender man. Julianna Morris’s lighthearted yet emotional story Meeting Megan Again reunites two people who only seem mismatched. And finally Carolyn Greene’s An Eligible Bachelor has a very special secondary character—along with a delightful hero and heroine!

Happy reading!






Mary-Theresa Hussey

Senior Editor




Cinderella and the CEO

Susan Meier





www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)


Books by Susan Meier

Silhouette Romance

Stand-in Mom #1022

Temporarily Hers #1109

Wife in Training #1184

Merry Christmas, Daddy #1192

* (#litres_trial_promo)In Care of the Sheriff #1283

* (#litres_trial_promo)Guess What? We’re Married! #1338

Husband from 9 to 5 #1354

* (#litres_trial_promo)The Rancher and the Heiress #1374

† (#litres_trial_promo)The Baby Bequest #1420

† (#litres_trial_promo)Bringing Up Babies #1427

† (#litres_trial_promo)Oh, Babies! #1433

His Expectant Neighbor #1468

† (#litres_trial_promo)Hunter’s Vow #1487

Cinderella and the CEO #1498

Silhouette Desire

Take the Risk #567


SUSAN MEIER

has written category romances for Silhouette Romance and Silhouette Desire. A full-time writer, Susan has also been an employee of a major defense contractor, a columnist for a small newspaper and a division manager of a charitable organization. But her greatest joy in her life has always been her children, who constantly surprise and amaze her. Married for twenty years to her wonderful, understanding and gorgeous husband, Michael, Susan cherishes her roles as mother, wife, sister and friend, believing them to be life’s real treasures. She not only cherishes those roles as gifts, she tries to convey the beauty and importance of loving relationships in her books.










Contents


Chapter One (#u0f2b7d90-af4f-59e5-833a-ef9678dc7956)

Chapter Two (#u24e9fb2c-d290-544f-bd5b-13b0a0ba28a2)

Chapter Three (#ue90cd637-5e90-583f-8318-60913c1c67ce)

Chapter Four (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter Five (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter Six (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter Seven (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter Eight (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter Nine (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter Ten (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter Eleven (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter Twelve (#litres_trial_promo)

Epilogue (#litres_trial_promo)




Chapter One


Deke Bertrim stopped his rental car in front of a simple Cape Cod house in Greenburg, a small blue-collar town in Maryland. On this sunny Sunday afternoon in May, bicycles and assorted toys littered the front yard, but the grass was trimmed and the flower beds were free of weeds. Though all the residences on this block appeared to be well maintained, the neat fieldstone-and-brick home was the best kept on the quiet street.

Deke breathed a silent sight of relief. The house belonged to L. Hillman, supervisor of the Shipping and Receiving Department at Graham Metals, and was to be Deke’s residence for the next three months. Ostensibly he was here to go through executive training at the plant, but the truth was he would be investigating why the last audit of Graham Metals’ books was off by more than three hundred thousand dollars. Though he hadn’t said anything to his stepfather, he had been apprehensive about staying in the home of an employee, even if all the other executive trainees before him had done so because the rural Maryland plant was more than thirty miles from the nearest hotel. But seeing this well-kept house and the quiet neighborhood, Deke knew he had worried for nothing.

He got out of his car and grabbed his duffel bag and one suitcase. Considering the persona of an executive trainee, Deke had done what he supposed others before him had done. He’d packed light. He’d dressed down, wearing simple dark slacks and a comfortable polo shirt, and he would try to appear confident without being arrogant so Mr. Hillman and his family wouldn’t be suspicious of him. As he scoured every nook and cranny of the factory, subtly interrogating the employees and even stealthily prying details from Mr. Hillman himself, he had to look like an executive trainee.

Striding up the sidewalk, Deke figured he had made a good start. In fact, he was so proud of himself for assuming a role completely foreign to him that he had to contain a grin when he rang the doorbell.

The stained-glass front door opened slowly. For ten seconds Deke only stared at the absolutely stunning woman who answered his ring. With the bikes in the yard, he was smart enough to guess L. Hillman was married. So that news flash wasn’t what stole his breath or his power to think. This woman was gorgeous. Simply gorgeous.

“Hello. You must be Derrick Bertrim. I’m Laurel Hillman. Since you’ll be staying here at my house for the next few months, I guess I’m something like your tour guide while you’re in Maryland.”

“Hi. Y-yes, I’m Derrick, but I go by Deke.” He shook the hand Laurel extended as he mentally chastised himself for stuttering. He had met beautiful women before. Hell, he dated beautiful women. Seeing one out of context shouldn’t short-circuit his brain like this. “It’s nice to meet you, but you don’t have to worry about showing me around. Once your husband directs me to the factory, I’ll be fine on my own.”

Laurel grimaced. “I’m sorry. I guess no one told you, but I don’t have a husband. I’m L. Hillman. I’m the Shipping and Receiving supervisor at Graham Metals. I’m also the person who takes in the executive trainees.”

Deke froze. When he’d agreed to this assignment, he thought he would be living with a grizzled old man and his family. Somebody with enough years at the plant that he had earned the position, and somebody with enough professional savvy that he did the favor of allowing executive trainees to room with him so they would remember him when they got to the top. He didn’t have a clue he would be spending the next three months with a tall, thin woman with luscious auburn hair that curved at her shoulders and eyes so green Deke could see their color even though she stood in the shadow of her front door. Because the top two buttons of her white blouse were open, her long slender neck was exposed for his perusal. Well-worn jeans hugged her trim hips.

“Come in,” she said, still smiling pleasantly as she opened the door of her home a little wider so he could enter.

“Thank you.” Deke stepped into the foyer, carrying his duffel bag and suitcase, stifling the urge to loosen the collar of his shirt because he was incredibly uncomfortable and warm. Very very warm.

“Follow me,” she said, and Deke nodded.

Okay, Deke thought, as Laurel led him down a corridor decorated with plants, wall hangings and knick-knacks. So he had to regroup. No big deal. Lots of executives and plant supervisors were women. He didn’t even have to think about that to know it wasn’t an issue. The issue was that he was about to be living with this particular supervisor who was a woman, and hadn’t she said she wasn’t married?

Since every other executive trainee stayed here, Deke reminded himself that if there was a problem, it was his, not hers. She had already proved herself to be trustworthy, but more than that, no matter what curve this situation threw him, he had to handle it.

When they stepped into her spotless yellow-and-white kitchen, he said, “You have a beautiful home.”

“Thank you. I like it,” Laurel said, leading him past a round table surrounded by low-backed captain’s chairs, then built-in maple cabinets with white countertops to a hidden stairway. “Let’s take your things upstairs and I’ll show you your room.”

At the top of the steps, Laurel told him that he would use the bedroom on the right. She explained that the second-floor bathroom would be his and that the room across the hall with its lounge chair, television and desk, would also be at his disposal for the duration of his stay.

“You’re giving me the entire second floor?”

“The company pays me a lot of money.”

“I know, but this is your home,” Deke protested.

Laurel only laughed. “This home belongs to the bank. The money I get for your stay here will pay down some of the principal on my mortgage, and I’ll get the deed a lot sooner. I’m more than happy to let you use the entire second floor.”

Studying her lovely, innocent face, guilt flooded Deke. Though it was necessary to covertly infiltrate the plant to discover the reason for the discrepancies detected during the last audit, he suddenly felt incredibly wrong about deceiving this woman. In fact, he felt like a criminal. It was the first time since his stepfather’s assistant, Tom Baxter, created the plan to have Deke pretend to be an executive trainee that he realized he wouldn’t simply be lying to an entire plant, he would also be taking advantage of someone in an extremely personal way. A woman, no less.

He wondered if that wasn’t the real reason he became so flustered when he met her, and decided he wasn’t so much attracted to her as guilt-ridden. His family didn’t use, abuse or take advantage of anyone. If Deke was uncomfortable, overly warm and stuttering, it was because spying went against his beliefs.

Unfortunately neither he nor Tom could think of another way to ferret out the problem without alerting the person creating it and giving him or her time to cover his or her tracks.

“I don’t need the entire second floor.”

“Trust me. I have two young daughters. You will be happy for the sanctuary.”

“I feel like I’m taking advantage of you.”

“Well, don’t,” she said simply, and led him downstairs again. “I’m fine.”

Deke heard a slight quiver in her voice, and intuition he didn’t want to possess about this woman kicked in. She wasn’t fine. Something was wrong in her life. Part of him considered that if he could ascertain her problem and fix it, he could return the favor she was unwittingly paying him and his family. The sense of guilt he felt would leave him. He could get on with his mission, and all would be right with the world again.

But he dismissed that because he didn’t know for sure she had a problem. He was only guessing. And if she did, he didn’t know that he could fix it. Besides, it wasn’t his intention to get too involved with her, the town or the plant. He simply wanted to figure out why the audit was off by so much money and get back to the corporate office where he belonged because he didn’t have time for this. His stepfather, Roger Smith, planned to retire in two years, and in twenty-four short months, Deke would become responsible for the jobs of three thousand people and his family’s fortune. Having spent the past ten years traveling the country, playing minor-league baseball, only working for Graham Industries in the off-season, he wasn’t current with all the company’s projects. And he wanted to be current. Actually he wanted to be brilliant.

No, the truth was his family expected him to be brilliant. And he always did what his family expected. If he had been older than thirteen when his father died, he would have taken over his mother’s family’s company right then and there. But he had only been thirteen, his grandfather hired the man his mother eventually married, and Deke got a two-decade reprieve. He worked summers for his stepfather, got the right schooling and even worked in the off-seasons while he amused himself with his passion for baseball. Still, everybody knew he would drop that when the time came, and everybody knew he would do what was expected. Because he always did.

Which was exactly why he was here in Maryland.

“Mother, is dinner ready?” Laurel called, leading Deke into the kitchen.

“Ready to be put on the table when you’re ready to eat,” the woman who was obviously Laurel’s mother said. As tall as Laurel, with gray hair and the same fabulous green eyes, she stepped forward, wiping her hands in her apron as Deke and Laurel entered the kitchen.

“This is my mother, Judy Russell,” Laurel said, introducing him. “And this is Deke Bertrim. Like the other trainees, Deke’s agreed to stay with us while he’s at Graham Metals.”

“That’s nice,” Laurel’s mother said. “You two want to set the table?”

“Yes,” Deke agreed, jumping at the chance to help her because that was an easy way to pull his weight and maybe temper some of his uneasiness.

“That’s okay. You take a seat,” Laurel insisted when he followed her to a cupboard for dishes.

“But I want to help.”

“I’m fine,” Laurel said, pulling dishes from the shelf above her head.

He heard that damned quiver again, and felt the burden of guilt about not being honest with her when she seemed to have enough on her mind without his deception. Determined to silence the voice with good behavior and small favors, Deke reached for the stack of plates she held. Their hands inadvertently brushed, and an unexpected jolt of electricity sprinted up his arm. Confused, he stepped back. Seemingly unaffected, Laurel took the dishes through a swinging door that probably led to a dining room.

Deke leaned against the cabinet. Though he had relegated all his unusual feelings to guilt, there was no mistaking that jolt. It was sexual. Since he didn’t really know her, he recognized that little zap of electricity probably didn’t mean anything more than the fact that he was physically attracted to her. Which was fine. She was gorgeous. He’d already acknowledged that. He would probably worry more if he wasn’t attracted to her. But he was also a disciplined, intelligent man who didn’t do foolish things that would ruin his plans. A physical attraction could easily be ignored.

“If you’ll tell me where the glasses are, I’ll be glad to get them,” Deke said, addressing Laurel’s mother.

“Second door on the right,” Judy said as Laurel returned to the kitchen.

Though Deke was already at the cabinet, Laurel beat him to the handle on the cupboard door. Again when their fingers brushed, Deke felt a spiral of electricity curl up his arm, and again he stepped back.

It was odd that his attempt to rationalize this attraction hadn’t worked. Even his reminder that he wouldn’t let the attraction ruin his plan hadn’t stopped it or diminished it. Which wasn’t merely confusing, it was weird. Usually he had no trouble controlling these things.

He watched her move back and forth, to and from the dining room as she set the table. He noted the swing of her voluminous hair, then the swing of her hips as she walked. He recognized and acknowledged he found this woman very attractive, but he also told himself he could handle it.

He had to. He had to work with her and live with her for the next three months.

He narrowed his eyes and gave the problem his full attention until the answer came to him. Having an entire floor to himself, he could simply keep his distance, and that would work to a degree. But what he really needed was a diversion, something to entertain him in the downtime.

Now all he had to do was think of one.

As plates of food were being passed, Laurel surreptitiously studied the stranger she’d allowed into her home. She’d had her suspicions about him from the moment she’d read his thin personnel file and discovered he was older than the typical trainee the corporate office sent to Graham Metals. But that was just the tip of the iceberg.

Because Deke’s records didn’t give her a clue about his personality or his lifestyle, except that he had attended Harvard and he got his late start in business because of playing professional baseball, Laurel wasn’t going to offer him the opportunity to stay in her home. But Tom Baxter had insisted, assuring her that Deke Bertrim could be trusted. She’d reminded Tom that when she brought one of his trainees into her home, she literally was trusting him with her life and the lives of her daughters, but Tom stood fast. Deke Bertrim was not to be treated differently from the other trainees. Just because he was a little older—thirty-three—and a little better educated, that didn’t make him better than the other executive candidates or change Tom’s orders for putting him through his paces. Deke Bertrim needed this training the same as everybody else.

And he most definitely would not hurt her and her daughters, Tom assured her. Since Tom was a personal friend of Deke’s family, he could state with unequivocal certainty that Deke Bertrim was harmless.

Peeking across the dinner table at her boarder’s thick black hair, big blue eyes, broad shoulders, well-structured chest and beautiful biceps clearly outlined by his polo shirt, Laurel sincerely doubted the man was harmless. At least not to any red-blooded American female over the age of sixteen. But her daughters were four and eight, and she and her mother were clearly out of the market for romance, so she supposed the whole group of women was safe. Besides, she trusted Tom’s judgment. In the three years and six management trainees since she and Tom had started this procedure for indoctrinating his junior executives into the real world of manufacturing, he’d never steered her wrong. She and her family were thriving because of it.

“More soup, Mr. Bertrim?” Laurel’s mother asked, bringing Laurel back to the present and into the conversation around their dinner table.

“Thank you, Mrs. Russell, but I’m stuffed. That was wonderful.”

As usual, her mother beamed with pride. “My beef-barley soup and homemade bread always win raves at church functions.”

“I don’t doubt it,” Deke agreed, smiling.

The guy hadn’t wasted any time winning over her mother, Laurel thought, then glanced at her two little girls, Audra and Sophie. Staring at the new boarder with sparkles in her blue eyes, four-year-old Sophie was definitely enamored, which was okay since she was well below the age of trouble.

But eight-year-old Audra was not even slightly smitten. She appeared to be too caught up in anger to have any feelings at all about the man at their table. Laurel’s beautiful brunette with the saucy smile and expressive brown eyes looked about ready to kill someone. Laurel supposed it was lucky Deke didn’t have anything to do with that.

“Audra, why don’t you help me get dessert?” Laurel said, hoping to get some private time with her daughter.

But Deke Bertrim almost jumped out of his seat.

“I’ll help.”

“We’re fine,” Laurel said politely, but firmly.

Unfortunately, he wouldn’t take no for an answer. “I still want to help.”

“Actually I’d like a minute alone with Audra,” Laurel explained, knowing that if they were all going to live together for the next few months, they might as well start being honest now.

“Okay,” Judy said, rising from her seat. “Then Sophie, Deke and I will get the carrot cake. And you can have the dining room to yourselves while we’re gone.”

Sophie immediately hopped off her chair, not about to miss this golden opportunity to be nearly alone with Deke, as Deke snapped to Judy’s aid, assisting her from her seat. Again, Laurel was struck by the fact that he was too nice, too helpful. But with angry Audra at her right, she didn’t have time to puzzle it out.

“You okay?” Laurel asked the second the swinging door closed behind the merry band on its way to get cake.

“Mr. Marshall can’t coach softball this year,” Audra announced glumly.

Laurel bit her lower lip. “Honey, I know you really liked him,” she said, smoothing the silky sable hair at Audra’s temple. “But Mr. Marshall is getting old. If he retired it’s because it’s time,” she said, trying to subtly convey the message to her little girl that he hadn’t left because of something she had done.

“I know,” Audra said with a sigh, then folded her arms on the table and laid her head atop them. “But he was the best coach.”

“And I’ll bet he thought you were the best player,”

Laurel agreed. “But I’m also sure somebody every bit as nice will take his place.”

“That’s just it,” Audra said as the three amigos pushed through the swinging door carrying plates of carrot cake. “There’s nobody who wants to take his place. Without a coach, we don’t have a team.”

“I see,” Laurel said, hiding her concern. After Audra’s father left, Audra had been quiet and reclusive until she discovered softball. Suddenly, with the introduction of team sports into her life, she’d become chipper and happy again. Laurel knew it was because Artie Marshall had taken a liking to Audra and treated her very well, filling her need for a father figure. But Laurel also recognized that Audra got her exercise, her connection to the community and her relief from summer boredom from that one little game. If Audra couldn’t keep playing, there would be a big hole in her life.

“A coach for what?” Deke asked as he handed a piece of cake to Laurel at the same time that smiling Sophie handed a piece to Audra.

“Softball,” Audra mumbled, obviously not as impressed with their new boarder as Sophie was, because she didn’t even raise her head to look at him.

At Audra’s lackluster response, Deke peered at Laurel.

Laurel shrugged. “This is a small town. Everybody works. Some people have two jobs. The former coach retired, but he’s getting on in years. It must have become too much for him.”

“Oh, Artie Marshall’s just an old fuddy-duddy,” Laurel’s mother said, then slid a bite of cake into her mouth. “He’s angry because he didn’t win the championship last year and he’s taking it out on the new kids this year.”

“That’s not true!” Audra immediately protested.

“I’m sure it’s not true,” Laurel quickly agreed, not wanting this to turn into any kind of negative commentary about Audra’s hero. “And I’m also sure somebody else will come along.”

“Like who?” Audra demanded.

“I don’t know, honey,” Laurel began, but Deke interrupted her.

“I could do it.”

Judy’s face bloomed with surprise, Sophie grinned cheerily, and even Audra lifted her head from her arms. But Laurel said, “I don’t think so.”

“Why not?” Deke said. “What else am I going to do? As a trainee, I only work eight hours a day. And I’m stuck in a town where I don’t know anybody. I have plenty of time to do this.”

Audra’s big brown eyes grew even bigger. “You do?”

Deke smiled warmly. “Of course, I do.” Even as Laurel’s suspicions about this very friendly, helpful man compounded, she couldn’t deny that only a truly good person would volunteer to coach a bunch of eight-year-old girls. But more than that, his coaching the team would be a big favor to Laurel. Audra would always have a ride to and from her games and practices, which to a single mother was like manna from heaven.

Maybe she was wrong to be so suspicious of this guy? Maybe instead of questioning her good fortune with her handsome boarder, she should just thank her lucky stars?

Her brain immediately issued a firm warning that letting down her guard would be foolish, but Laurel ignored it. For once in her life it felt good to trust someone so easily. It felt good to get some help with her kids.

She couldn’t think of a reason or a way in the world that his coaching a softball team could backfire. Still, she knew something would go wrong. That was just the way her life was.




Chapter Two


Since Deke was unfamiliar with the town, he accepted a ride to the plant with Laurel the next morning, but they hardly spoke. He spent most of the drive trying to get accustomed to seeing her in tight jeans, a loose ragged T-shirt and steel-toed boots. It didn’t seem fair that a woman could look that good dressed that badly, and Deke convinced himself that was why he couldn’t seem to pull his gaze away from her.

Forcing his eyes in the direction of the passenger-door window of her Toyota, he reminded himself that he was at this plant to find out how an audit could be off by over three hundred thousand dollars. At this point, he didn’t know if someone had made an honest mistake, if someone had embezzled money or if someone was stealing inventory. He only knew regular procedures kept confirming the mistake without giving any clue as to a reason for it. Because he could very well be dealing with a thief, he couldn’t be too cavalier about this problem or preoccupied with a pretty woman.

But he try as he might, he couldn’t stop sneaking peeks at Laurel, and he knew he had been blessed that her daughter’s softball team needed a coach. Since the season started in less than two weeks, he had been forced to call an emergency practice. Tonight he would be busy with a gaggle of eight-year-old girls, not six feet away from Laurel watching TV, smelling that wonderful scent she wore.

When they arrived at the factory, Laurel immediately showed him to the Human Resources Department. She introduced him to the director who would monitor his progress during his training, and Deke forgot all about his gorgeous landlady. He had passed the first hurdle in his charade, when Laurel accepted him as a trainee, but upper management might not be so easy to fool. As far as he was concerned, this was his real moment of truth.

Because Bertrim was the name of his mother’s first husband and Deke’s deceased father, and not the name of the stepfather who actually ran the corporation for his mother’s family, Deke didn’t give a second thought to anyone recognizing his name. And since he had played minor-league baseball for more than a decade, the Human Resources director didn’t question his late start in business.

It almost seemed his unusual life was tailor-made to allow him to slip into a subsidiary unnoticed, and when he came to that conclusion, he got his first inkling that all this was awfully darned lucky—and coincidental.

Suddenly, it dawned on him that he had been set up. The realization hit him like a runaway fast ball. He wasn’t sure if he had been sent here to actually get the training he was supposed to be pretending to get, or if he was being tested to see if he was smart enough to take over when his stepfather retired, but he did know he had been set up.

Insulted, furious, Deke didn’t know what to do. He had worked for this corporation in one form or another since he was sixteen. True, he had never been at the top, but he knew the ins and outs…sort of. He didn’t know everything. Even he admitted he should be at his stepfather’s side every minute of the next two years.

All right, maybe he did need some training. But he didn’t need this entry-level stuff. Besides, it was embarrassing. And time-consuming. Surely he could learn a hundred times more at his stepfather’s side than he could learn from the supervisors at one little subsidiary.

Reining in his temper and his frustration, Deke became his usual controlled, disciplined self, not about to say or do anything out of line until he ascertained what was really going on. The HR director walked him to a section of the plant floor that was cordoned off by wire fence and looked like a cage. He led him through the mesh gate, called Laurel from a workstation at the back of the area and told Deke that this was his first stop in his working tour of the plant. She was the person who would provide his first four weeks of training.

Given the number of coincidences, Deke wasn’t taking anything for granted anymore. Not even Laurel’s easy acceptance. For all he knew she could be in on this scheme, too.

The thought that she might have conspired with his family brought him up short. He suddenly recognized that for the past twenty-four hours, while he had been blinded by her beauty and eagerly trying to think of ways to do right by her, she could very well have been taking notes on his abilities. Worse, through the course of the afternoon that followed, he suspected his performance was not worth writing home to mother about. He knew it for sure when he punched a hole in a bag of foam peanuts and sent them raining down on the entire department.

By the time four o’clock rolled around, Deke was so angry he could have spit nails. He didn’t mind that Laurel had him doing menial labor, so he would understand the intricacies of her department, or even that he wasn’t gifted as a shipper. It was the fact that no one talked with him about needing to be trained or needing to prove himself that bugged the hell out of him.

“So, ready to call it a day?” Laurel asked about ten minutes before quitting time.

Not sure how to deal with her, Deke rubbed his hand across the back of his neck. “Yeah, I’m ready.”

Through no fault of Deke’s they were within a foot of each other. Though he was preoccupied with not being told the truth why he was at this plant, he nonetheless had to steel himself against reacting to Laurel’s alluring scent. He knew it would be total insanity to look into her sexy green eyes. But in shifting his gaze, he only succeeded in noticing that her complexion was smooth and clear. Radiant, in spite of eight hours in a grimy manufacturing plant.

“I heard you called a softball practice for after work,” Laurel said.

Deke struggled not to growl with frustration. It was almost sacrilegious that his family would drag softball into their scheme.

“Yes, I did.”

“Good. I’m sure the girls are eager to get started.”

“Most of them are,” Deke agreed, walking away because he didn’t want to get any more involved with his “boss” than he had to. All things considered, she probably was the person who reported his progress to his family. And after the day he’d spent, running to keep up with tasks the other employees seemed to be able to do in their sleep, he doubted her account would be a good one.

But Laurel stopped him by touching his forearm. “I really appreciate your doing this.”

Warmth radiated from the spot she touched on his arm, but more than that, her genuine smile of gratitude brought his thoughts to a crashing halt. How could he accuse her of being in on any kind of conspiracy? If she knew anything about his family’s plan to test him, a woman of Laurel’s level of sincerity would never be able to hide it from him.

Which meant she didn’t know his family had probably paid the old coach to retire for a summer, and she really was appreciative of his coaching her daughter’s softball team.

That knowledge inspired a burst of male pride in Deke. After hours of losing the battle with foam peanuts, pleasing her made him completely forget that she’d spent the day treating him like a peon. Worse, he had the urge to please her again.

Deke almost groaned. In thirty seconds of conversation and with one touch on his arm, Laurel made him forget he was here to please his family, not please her! How was he supposed to quickly, efficiently ascertain what his family wanted from him so he could do it and get the heck out of here, when the world’s biggest distraction was always close enough to touch?

“You’re welcome,” he said, then walked away from her.

The truth was, this would be a lot easier if she was in on his family’s scheme. At least then his anger would keep him sane. Without that, his wayward reactions to her could really throw a monkey wrench into things.

“All right, that’s it for the day,” Deke called to the noisy group of eight- and nine-year-old girls who were performing various softball drills on the grassy playing field. “Melody and Rachel, you gather the equipment this afternoon. Tomorrow we’ll have a schedule of whose turn it is to make sure all the balls and bats get into the duffel bag for me to take home. I’ll also have a printed practice schedule for your mothers. Right now, you guys, er, girls, can hit the showers.”

Audra tugged on his pant leg. “We don’t have showers, Mr. Bertrim.”

“Okay, then,” Deke said, glancing around to try to figure out what the appropriate dismissal line would be.

“Go to your mother’s car. Get on home. Get outa here,” he said, and started to chuckle. This was different, but fun, and so far the girls were nothing but enthusiastic little charmers.

“See you, Mr. Bertrim,” Sally Walker sang as she ran by him.

“See ya.”

“See ya.”

The chorus continued until all the girls were off the field and jogging toward the vehicles awaiting them in the gravel parking lot. Only Audra stayed behind.

Deke glanced down at her. “So, how’d I do?”

She shrugged. “Most of the girls like you because you’re cute. So you didn’t do too bad, but tomorrow we’re really going to want to play ball.”

“And you will,” Deke agreed, picking up the duffel bag that contained the equipment and slinging it over his shoulder. The hour-and-a-half of exercise was exactly what he needed to clear his head and put everything into perspective. He was heir to the throne of his family’s business, and apparently they thought he needed some training or a test of his abilities. He didn’t like that he hadn’t been told the truth, but he wasn’t so arrogant that he wouldn’t respect his family’s wishes. Or Tom Baxter’s. Because in two years Tom would be Deke’s right-hand man. And Deke needed to win Tom’s respect as much as he needed to win his stepfather’s. After thinking all this through, Deke realized he wanted to prove himself. And quickly. So there would be no doubts.

And so he could get the hell home, away from the temptation of a woman who would drive him insane if he had to live with her for three long months. A woman whose daughter was currently yanking on his pant leg.

“But there’s nothing wrong with some practice drills to get you into shape.”

Audra looked at him. “We’re eight. All we do is exercise. We don’t need to get in shape.”

Laughing because she was downright adorable, Deke ruffled her hair. “Smart little thing aren’t you?”

“My mother had me tested to see if I was gifted.”

Deke stopped by his small white rental car, rifling in his pants pocket for his keys. “Are you?”

“Borderline,” Audra said, shrugging. “But don’t let that scare you.”

“Hey, I don’t care if you have green hair. All I care is that you catch the ball, throw the ball and hit the ball when you’re supposed to.”

Audra grinned. “Me, too.”

Because the softball field was only a few blocks from Laurel’s home, Audra and Deke made the trip in minutes. When he pulled the car into the driveway, Audra bounded out as if her pants were on fire. Deke followed her up the sidewalk and into the kitchen.

“So was it fun?” Laurel asked Audra, but she looked at Deke.

“It was great, Mom.”

Deke smiled and nodded, confirming that the situation would probably work out. He saw Laurel breathe a sigh of relief.

“I made beef stew,” Laurel announced, and as she said the words, Deke smelled the spicy, rich aroma. But he also smelled something else. Something sweet. Cinnamon.

“And an apple pie,” she added, turning away from him to the stove, as if embarrassed to face him.

Instead of the sexual reaction he usually felt any time he was in Laurel’s company, warm and fuzzy emotion enveloped Deke when he realized she’d made that pie for him…that’s why she was embarrassed. Just from watching Audra play, he knew softball meant a great deal to her, and because Laurel was grateful to him for saving her daughter’s summer, she’d baked him a pie.

Thrown off balance because no one had ever done something so personal, yet so practical for him, and he didn’t know how to respond, Deke said, “I love pie.”

She risked a peek at him. “Most people do.”

“Thank you,” Deke said, overwhelmed with a gratitude that felt very much like amazement. People had given him gold money clips encrusted in diamonds, but it wasn’t the same as having somebody bake a pie for him. He got the sense that pleasing Laurel was the best thing in the world a man could do, but as soon as he got that feeling it amended itself. What he really felt wasn’t that pleasing her was the best thing a man could do, but that pleasing her was somehow his job—or maybe his destiny.

Which was preposterous. He had a destiny all lined up, one that had been waiting for him since birth. He didn’t need another one.

“You’re welcome. Now go wash up and we’ll eat.”

“Yeah, wash up,” Judy said with a laugh. “We’re starving.”

Deke hadn’t even realized Judy was in the room until she spoke, and he knew this situation was throwing him for so much of a loop that he wasn’t paying enough attention to what he was doing. If he didn’t soon gather his wits and keep them, he might accidentally give away his real identity. And that wouldn’t just be stupid, it would be trouble.

He left the kitchen quickly, scolding himself about keeping a tighter rein on his feelings and reactions. As he rinsed the grime off his face and hands, he reminded himself he had already acknowledged he found this woman dangerously attractive. He couldn’t be noticing things like how generous and sweet she was, and he also couldn’t be lingering on his own unexpected male need to please her. That would be pointless and absurd. Since he knew he was being tested, he had to be on his toes at all times, not constantly distracted by a woman he hardly knew.

When he entered the kitchen, he felt normal again. But in spite of the lectures he’d given himself, when Laurel joined them at the table, he found himself stealing glances at her.

She was the strangest woman he’d ever met. Not strange as in weird, but strange as in different. She wasn’t the pampered professional he saw during his stints in the corporate office. She worked in a manufacturing plant, in steel-toed boots and a hard hat. Yet, she still looked, smelled and baked like a woman. A really feminine woman. Someone who cared for and catered to her family. Someone who made him feel like family, too.

Deke was accustomed to getting special treatment, but Laurel wasn’t treating him well because he was the son of the people who owned controlling interest in the stock of the company she worked for or even because he’d been voted Pittsburgh’s most eligible bachelor three years in a row. She didn’t know any of those things about him. She’d baked him a pie because she was a nice person, someone grateful to him for what he had done, not who he was.

The feeling that inspired was so appealing and so seductive he could have savored it all night. But he didn’t because it once again undermined his control, making him vulnerable to saying something that might actually give away his identity.

And he couldn’t say or do anything that would cause Laurel to guess who he was until he passed his test. He didn’t doubt that he was sent here to figure out the reason for the audit discrepancy, that was the test. But as it stood right now, he didn’t have a clue if he was looking for a thief, an accounting error or an embezzler as the answer to the riddle created by his parents. And his biggest worry was that it might take him more than the scheduled three months to figure it out.

But when he realized he might be here for more than three months, it didn’t bother him as much as it had back at softball practice. The truth was, he sort of felt as if he had fallen into heaven. He had a challenge that would stimulate him for eight hours each day. When he left work, he drove to a ball field and literally got to play like an eight-year-old for two hours. And when he was done, he got a reward. Spicy, melt-in-your-mouth stew with dumplings and homemade apple pie.

Unable to help himself, Deke surreptitiously reached down and grabbed about a quarter inch of skin on his forearm and pinched. When it hurt, he knew he wasn’t imagining this. The only problem was, he wasn’t exactly sure he should enjoy it so much, either.

He expected Laurel to argue when he volunteered to help with the dishes, but she readily accepted his offer, because she needed to spend time supervising Audra’s homework and getting Sophie ready for bed. While Judy filled the sink with warm soapy water, Deke cleared the table and found a dish towel. In fifteen minutes he and Judy had the kitchen cleaned and then Deke drove Judy to her home across town. He discovered that Laurel’s mother was a widow, had been since Laurel was four, and that she had a slight heart problem that precluded her from working, so she baby-sat Laurel’s kids after school and on their days off. Sometimes she came to Laurel’s to care for the girls, though she preferred it when the girls came to her house. But the four of them always ate dinner together because they were family, and that was what family was supposed to do.

On the return trip Deke wondered if he’d landed on some distant planet where everything that happened was good and pure. Lost in thought, he nearly bumped into Laurel in the downstairs hall, the little alcove where the doors of the three bedrooms converged.

He caught her by the shoulders to steady her. Because she was wearing a sleeveless robe, the velvet touch of her naked skin against his palm ricocheted through him, and he remembered this situation had its peril after all.

“What are you doing here?” she whispered, her eyes huge because she had been frightened.

“I’m sorry. I promised Audra I would say good-night.”

When Laurel took a step back, trying to shrug out of his hold, Deke realized he still had his hands on her shoulders and quickly dropped them to his sides.

“Okay,” she whispered. “But just peek in the door and say good-night. If you actually go into her room, she could talk for hours. And she needs her sleep.”

“I’ll just peek in,” Deke agreed, lowering the volume of his voice, too. He didn’t know what it was about this woman that got to him, but she had something that could make him forget to do the simplest, most logical things like lower his voice, almost as if he couldn’t think in her presence. Or maybe it was more that when he was in her presence, he couldn’t think the way he was accustomed to thinking. All his habitual thought processes slipped away as if everything was new. Her lack of pretense and artifice, her treating him nicely when she didn’t know who he was, her appreciation for things he did actually made him feel differently about himself.

But he also recognized something more. Something physical that defied description. The woman was so attractive to him that wanting to touch her was instinctive. The most normal, most natural urge in the world.

And he had to struggle to control impulses he could normally quash with one rational thought.

He made a move to go around her, to get to Audra’s room, but Laurel stepped in his path. He stopped, thinking she’d done that accidentally, but when she didn’t move out of his way, Deke glanced down at her. She licked her lips and Deke’s breath froze in his lungs. The woman was going to kill him if she didn’t stop doing things like this.

“What?” he whispered harshly, desperately seeking any act of self-preservation.

She licked her lips again. “Look, I don’t know how to say this, but…but Audra’s very special.”

“I know. And if you’re worried that I’m somehow going to hurt her, don’t. I’ll keep the relationship centered around softball.”

She stopped him just by catching his gaze. “I know. I trust you.” She combed her fingers through her thick silky hair. “That’s what bothers me. I seem to be able to trust you very easily. Very naturally. What I’m trying to say is thanks.”

Again Deke was hit with a strange surge of emotion that completely defied description. It was warm. It was fuzzy. But it was deeper and more intense than a mere surface sentiment. He recognized the pride that filled him knowing he’d done something that obviously pleased Laurel, but that pride was edged aside by stronger, more potent, more important things. From what she’d said about trusting him easily and the way she seemed uncomfortable with it, he knew that she felt this instant attraction, too, and wasn’t sure how to handle it either. He wasn’t imagining this. He wasn’t crazy.

“So, thanks,” she finished, bringing him out of his reverie.

The soft feminine tone of her voice warmed him all over, even as it filled him with need. He swallowed.

“You’re welcome.”

Another minute ticked by with Deke unable to do anything but stare at her, wondering what the heck he was supposed to do with all these brand-new feelings. Laurel was different from the women he knew. Very different. At home, she was also very different from the tough drill sergeant who ran the Shipping and Receiving Department for Graham Metals. He liked her. She liked him. But he didn’t have a clue what he should do right now.

Pittsburgh’s most eligible bachelor three years in a row absolutely, positively, definitely thought he should kiss her. But the guy who was supposed to become chairman of the board when his stepfather retired thought he should run like hell in the other direction. He had a big job ahead of him and Laurel Hillman was the kind of woman who could steal a man’s soul. She was already distracting him from his purpose for being at her factory. He knew, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that getting involved with her would ultimately distract him from his destiny. She would change his life. And he didn’t want to change his life. He liked it the way it was.

But there was no denying that he wanted to kiss her. No denying that he was curious about the feel of her lips against his and the taste of her mouth.

Still, looking into her big green eyes, Deke also knew he couldn’t ignore the fact that a kiss would change things. And he couldn’t afford that. He was excited about the challenge of proving to his family that he was completely, happily, shrewdly capable of running the family empire. But to do that he needed to be focused. He couldn’t be distracted by a pretty woman or a romance.

He backed away. Laurel stepped to the side and he headed for Audra’s room.

“Good night,” he said to Laurel, grabbing the door handle to open Audra’s bedroom door. “Good night, Audra,” he called, then closed the door and all but ran away from them.

“Good night,” Laurel whispered, watching him go, touching her lips, confirming for Deke he had done the right thing. If he had kissed her, this situation would have probably spiraled out of control.

In her bedroom, Laurel bundled herself in her covers and tossed and turned for two hours.

She normally didn’t do things like this. She normally didn’t want to kiss her boarder. But this time she wanted to.

She really wanted to.

And it scared the life out of her.




Chapter Three


The alarm woke Laurel the next morning, and though she quickly silenced it because she didn’t want an ebullient four-year-old girl bouncing into her room, she didn’t get out of bed. Instead, she pulled her comforter over her head and squeezed her eyes shut.

She would have let that man kiss her last night. A virtual stranger. Another man on the fast track. Heck, she would have happily kissed him first if she thought she could stretch far enough, quickly enough, to reach his mouth before he changed his mind and turned away.

She knew better than this. That was why she was so comfortable taking in executive-trainee boarders. Her ex-husband had been a well-educated man on the fast track, a man who was working his way to upper management in leaps and bounds, rather than one rung on the corporate ladder at a time. But when Aaron got his big break, a job as president of a manufacturing plant in Texas, he told her that she and Audra didn’t fit into the world he was entering. So he’d left them. The day she discovered she was pregnant with Sophie, he’d left them with a mortgage, a used car and not even grocery money in the bank.

She filed for child support, and instead of giving it, Aaron waived his rights to the kids. Completely. He had never even seen Sophie. He no longer acknowledged his daughters’ existence, and if the gossip she heard was true, he now had another wife, more kids. Two boys this time. And a corporate-lawyer wife. A woman who made as much money as he did, someone who enhanced his position.

Yeah, Laurel knew all about executive trainees. She didn’t belong in their world, and they were only passing through hers. She saw the situation for what it was. If she developed anything other than friendship with any one of these guys, she would be walking irresponsibly into another heartbreak.

Grounded by those realities, Laurel climbed out of bed. Though it was a warm May morning, she slid out of her sleeveless pajamas and put on a one-piece, long-sleeved flannel pair that even had feet, then covered them with a chenille robe. In case Deke had gotten the wrong idea the night before from her concealing, but more flattering summer-weight nightclothes, she nipped that problem in the bud.

She went to the kitchen and retrieved a filter and ground coffee to make a pot so it would be ready when she got out of the shower. Unfortunately, when she turned from the cabinet to go back to her bedroom, her executive-trainee border was already in the kitchen doorway. Their eyes met for a few seconds, and then Deke’s gaze sort of tumbled from her sleep-tousled hair to her thick robe, to the legs and feet of her flannel pajamas.

Red flannel pajamas. Sprinkled with Santas. Covered by a robe so thick it could be a winter coat.

She probably looked like an idiot.

“Hey, Pajama Mama!”

Grateful for the interruption, Laurel turned toward the alcove door. “Hey, Sophia Maria,” she said, stooping and opening her arms to let blue-eyed, blond-haired Sophie jump inside for a hug.

“Are you gonna make me pancakes?” Sophie asked energetically before she gave Laurel a smacking kiss on the cheek.

“Do you want pancakes?”

Grinning happily, Sophie nodded.

“Then pancakes it is,” Laurel said, sliding her four-year-old daughter onto one of the captain’s chairs at the table. “Right after I shower.”

Accustomed to little delays and disruptions, Sophie again nodded her agreement.

After a hasty “Good morning. Help yourself to coffee when it’s ready” to Deke, Laurel scrambled out of the kitchen and into her bedroom.

When she returned a few minutes later, showered and dressed in jeans and another old T-shirt, Deke and Sophie were already eating. Laurel stopped dead in her tracks.

“I hope you don’t mind,” Deke said, indicating the pancakes with his fork. “Sophie and I were a little hungry.”

“No. No, that’s fine,” Laurel said, barely able to keep the astonishment out of her voice.

Deke winced. “You don’t sound like it’s fine.”

“I’m just surprised,” Laurel said, taking a seat at the table and fixing a plate of pancakes for herself. “The boarders I’ve taken in usually don’t cook.”

“Lots of small-town minor-league teams like to have their players room with people in the community. It’s good PR,” Deke explained, then took a bite of pancake. After he chewed and swallowed, he added, “But we weren’t supposed to let our hosts wait on us. We were supposed to try to blend in like family. That’s when I learned how to cook.”

“So you’re used to being a boarder?”

He shook his head. “Yes and no. I only did it twice, and both families I was assigned to had schedules that conflicted with mine—”

“Hey, Deke!” Audra said, entering the room. Laurel’s eight-year-old was self-sufficient to the point that she always had herself dressed for school before she came into the kitchen for breakfast. Her sleeveless shirt and jeans made her look too thin and too young to be as independent as she was.

“Hey, Audra. Ready for practice this afternoon?”

“Yeah. You make our schedule?”

“Yeah. You practice that overhand throw I showed you?”

“Yeah.”

From there the conversation turned to the softball team. With Deke and Audra talking like longtime friends, and with him having made breakfast for starving Sophie, Laurel knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that this particular fast-tracking executive trainee was nothing like the other men she had housed. Certainly not like her ex-husband.

In fact, he was so unlike her usual guests that she was having trouble equating him with her ex-husband, and that, she realized, was the problem. She wasn’t a stupid woman, but she wasn’t a blind one, either. The man was gorgeous. And different. Not only was he good to Sophie and right for Audra, but he could cook. None of her executive trainees had ever—ever—volunteered to cook. She could think of only one who had even made a pot of coffee.

Laurel was losing her natural defenses, and she decided the best way to combat the latest assault on her conviction to stay away from him was the direct approach. Surely there was something wrong with this guy. Something in his past that would make him much less desirable. Once she found out what that was, she would be safe again. And because every female in the plant had been asking her questions about him, she knew exactly how to unearth it quickly, easily and so painfully he would stop giving her those sidelong glances that clearly let her know he found her attractive, red Santa pajamas and all.

Since Deke now drove himself to work, Laurel waited until they were well into the morning routine and the other Shipping and Receiving employees were occupied with their jobs in different sections of the cage before she confronted him.

“So, Deke,” she said, standing beside his desk and feigning interest in the stack of documents in front of him, “you have me completely baffled.” Pretending to be occupied with checking his workload, she asked, “How does an absolutely gorgeous man who can cook get to be thirty-three without getting married?”

Her description made Deke laugh, though he wasn’t surprised she asked. After that little rendezvous in the alcove the night before, neither of them could act as if they didn’t find the other attractive. And straightforward Laurel wouldn’t beat around the bush. Just like with those ridiculous pajamas, she would find the fastest—never mind most embarrassing—way to diffuse this problem.

“I guess I’ve never wanted to get married,” he said, glancing up at her.

Looking at her expectant face, he wished the eagerness he saw in her eyes meant that she had changed her mind about their situation and was anticipating he would tell her something that would give her the green light to pursue the attraction. But he knew better. Laurel was too practical, too blunt, too pragmatic, too honest. If she wanted to pursue him, she would just do it. She wouldn’t ask permission.

Disappointment flooded him, but he ignored it. “As silly as this is going to sound…” he began, sorting through some packing slips on his desk and feeling that they should try whatever means available to diminish the attraction. It was imprudent and irresponsible to be unhappy that she had somehow made up her mind he wasn’t worth pursuing. No matter how much electricity sizzled between them, they couldn’t have a relationship. There was no sense in being dumb about this.

“…for every one of the ten years I played minor-league ball, I thought I was going to be picked up by a major-league team.” He paused, looked into her eyes again and wasn’t surprised when the click of their gazes caused his pulse to pick up.

In fact, since she was being so strong, he decided he could relax a little and enjoy the surge of excitement just being near her gave him. Unfortunately that quickly turned into the need for a kiss, and he found himself wanting to press his palms to her cheeks, to bring her face to his so he could feel the softness of her mouth against his. Though he knew he would never kiss her in a million years, somehow the longing, the wanting, was its own reward, and he let himself savor that, too.

“But I never got the big call. I never came out of the minor leagues. I would probably still be there now, except my stepfather—”

Deke stopped himself, face-to-face with the problem he had been worrying about all along. His preoccupation with her had almost caused him to make a monumental slip. He couldn’t afford any kind of mental lapse. He was supposed to be sharp. Investigating. Not taking advantage of her discipline so he could enjoy feelings and sensations he wasn’t supposed to have.

“Your stepfather what?”

He drew a long breath and returned his attention to assembling the tasks on his desk. “My stepfather convinced me that I should find a more stable job.”

Laurel shrugged. “He was probably right.”

For the first time Deke admitted to himself that he wasn’t sure he agreed. He wanted to take over the company. He wanted his stepfather to retire and enjoy what was left of his life. But Deke missed baseball. He missed that piece of his identity; there was a part of him that felt empty and lost without it. Business gave him purpose and responsibilities, but baseball had given him heart, and maybe a soul. Coaching the girls provided a little relief, but not enough, and he still felt the loss. Part of him now wondered if that wasn’t why he was so drawn to Laurel.

“But that doesn’t explain why you’ve never married. Was it because you thought no woman would want to be stuck with a man who traveled around the country playing sports? Or did you refuse to tie yourself down to one woman?”

Deke only stared at her. Because he had taken a long mental side trip, he wasn’t surprised she’d dragged him back into the conversation. But he hadn’t expected her to be so desperate to be rid of him that she would be brutally blunt. “You really don’t mince words, do you?”

“I can’t,” Laurel said, then dropped a stack of green papers onto the desk in front of him. “I’ve already gotten a million questions from the girls at break time. Tomorrow is our one-hour lunch. I won’t survive if I don’t have some details to give them.”

“Oh,” Deke said, suddenly feeling foolish. She was asking for her friends? He couldn’t believe he’d mis-interpreted her intentions. He knew she found him attractive. He also knew from those pajamas that she didn’t want to find him attractive. Still, her reason for probing made more sense than to think she was so determined to be rid of him she would be rude. She wasn’t rude. She was sweet and kind and deliciously wonderful.

Which was exactly why he had to stay the hell away from her. Rude he could combat. Sweet, sensitive and considerate made him want to confide in her. Trust her. And that was the bottom-line problem. He wanted to trust her. But he couldn’t. He couldn’t trust anybody. Especially not the woman who might know exactly why Tom Baxter had sent him to this tiny factory on the edge of nowhere.

The crazy part of it was, if he told her the truth about why he hadn’t married, their chemistry wouldn’t be a problem anymore, because she would stay away from him. She might even stop being nice to him—which would probably take away his desire to confide in her.

Suddenly he realized the truth would set them both free.

“I haven’t gotten married because I don’t think I’m a good candidate for marriage. I’ve always been very happy with my life exactly the way it is. I’m free to do what I want to do when I want to do it.” And free to take over when my stepfather stops working. No worry that I’m shortchanging a wife, no commitments to consider, no complications. Just a clear path to do what was required as heir to the Graham fortune. Getting married had never once entered his head because it would have confused things.

“I can’t understand why anyone would voluntarily make a commitment like marriage,” he added, so honest even he felt like a heel. “Except to have kids,” he decided on the spot. “I never realized how much I liked kids until I started coaching your daughter’s softball team.”

“Well, they certainly love you,” Laurel stated emphatically, then turned her attention to the green papers on his desk. “Anyway, these are purchase orders,” she said, realizing she had dodged a bullet by making that quick decision the night before not to kiss him. Just like her first husband, Deke Bertrim wasn’t right for her. He might not be the kind who would pick a wife to enhance his career, but in some respects his reasons for not getting married were actually more deadly. He was self-centered, self-absorbed and unable to commit.

Thank God. Now they could get on with the rest of his training.

“Purchase orders are issued by the Purchasing Department when they buy goods and supplies. So, every time something comes through that door,” she said, pointing to the Shipping and Receiving bay, “we should be able to find a purchase order for the goods received.”

Because this was a standard operating procedure for most manufacturing plants, Deke nodded his understanding as Laurel expected him to.

“When a delivery arrives, we look in there,” she said, pointing to a gray metal filing cabinet, “and find the purchase order that matches it. Once we check the packages to be sure they contain the items on the purchase order, we stamp both copies with our Received stamp and send the supplies to Inventory with the pink copy for verification.”

Studying the stamped green copy of the purchase order, Deke again nodded.

“Then we go into the computer, look up the purchase order and mark it in electronically.” She said this as she continued to sort and stack papers on the table in front of her. “After everything is recorded in the computer, the green copies are thrown away.” She nodded in the direction of the papers Deke held. “Those copies are from items received yesterday. This morning I’ll show you how to get into the purchase-order software and mark them Received.” She caught his gaze. “Think you can handle that?”

“I can handle that.”

“Good.”

They talked only about work for the rest of the day. When they got home, Laurel started dinner. Deke took Audra to softball practice. Aside from a few giggled comments from Sophie about junior kindergarten, dinner conversation centered on softball. Deke and Laurel’s mother cleared up the dishes. Laurel helped with homework. When Deke drove Laurel’s mother home for the night, Laurel got the girls ready for bed.

And the whole time Laurel saw—favor by favor, kindness by kindness—that this man was not at all who he said he was. But more than that, he wasn’t who he thought he was. He said he didn’t want to be tied down, but he easily committed to Audra and her softball team, he played with Sophie and even drove Judy home. He didn’t have a selfish bone in his luscious body.

He also liked company, evidenced by the way he had never used the TV upstairs. He sat downstairs with Laurel, Judy and the girls. He liked being part of a family, and he fit into Laurel’s as if he was meant to be there. Yet he honestly believed he wasn’t the kind to settle down.




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