Millionaire Boss
Millionaire Boss
Peggy Moreland
Penny Rawley hadn' t traveled across Texas to have sexy CEO Erik Thompson boss her around! Sure, she was his new secretary, but she' d come to his million-dollar firm with one thing in mind: marrying the man she' d always loved. Now the irresistible beast had the nerve to ignore her– when he wasn' t shouting orders.Well, that was gonna change… .Erik couldn' t believe his eyes. Penny Rawley had gone from mousy secretary– to desirable woman! Now he wanted to take her to bed and show her just who was boss… but found himself scrambling to keep his hard heart intact. For pretty Penny had him aching with a brand-new desire– to claim this beguiling innocent as his own!
“I Haven’t Saved Myself
All These Years To Toss Away
My Virginity To The First Man
Who Shows Me A Little Attention!”
The moment the words were out, Penny clapped a hand over her mouth, her face draining of color. With a strangled sob she ran for her room.
Erik winced at the furious slam of the door.
A virgin? Had his mousy secretary just confessed to being a virgin?
He shook his head. No way, he told himself. She couldn’t be a virgin. Not with a body like that.
At the thought, an image pushed itself into his mind of her standing in the ballroom in that dress. The clingy, glittery fabric hugged her body like a second skin, accentuating a slender waist and full sensuous hips.
He groaned, knowing he’d never get to sleep that night. Not when he knew a virgin slept in the room across from his….
Dear Reader,
Welcome to the world of Silhouette Desire, where you can indulge yourself every month with romances that can only be described as passionate, powerful and provocative!
The always fabulous Elizabeth Bevarly offers you May’s MAN OF THE MONTH, so get ready for The Temptation of Rory Monahan. Enjoy reading about a gorgeous professor who falls for a librarian busy reading up on how to catch a man!
The tantalizing Desire miniseries TEXAS CATTLEMAN’S CLUB: LONE STAR JEWELS concludes with Tycoon Warrior by Sheri WhiteFeather. A Native American ex-military man reunites with his estranged wife on a secret mission that renews their love.
Popular Peggy Moreland returns to Desire with a romance about a plain-Jane secretary who is in love with her Millionaire Boss. The hero-focused miniseries BACHELOR BATTALION by Maureen Child continues with Prince Charming in Dress Blues, who’s snowbound in a cabin with an unmarried woman about to give birth! Baby at His Door by Katherine Garbera features a small-town sheriff, a beautiful stranger and the bundle of love who unites them. And Sara Orwig writes a lovely tale about a couple entering a marriage of convenience in Cowboy’s Secret Child.
This month, Silhouette is proud to announce we’ve joined the national campaign “Get Caught Reading” in order to promote reading in the United States. So set a good example, and get caught reading all six of these exhilarating Desire titles!
Enjoy!
Joan Marlow Golan
Senior Editor, Silhouette Desire
Millionaire Boss
Peggy Moreland
www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
PEGGY MORELAND
published her first romance with Silhouette in 1989 and continues to delight readers with stories set in her home state of Texas. Winner of the National Readers’ Choice Award, a nominee for Romantic Times Reviewer’s Choice Award and a finalist for the prestigious RITA Award, Peggy has appeared on the USA Today and Waldenbooks bestseller lists. When not writing, she enjoys spending time at the farm riding her quarter horse, Lo-Jump. She, her husband and three children make their home in Texas. You may write to Peggy at P.O. Box 1099, Florence, TX 76257-1099.
Contents
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
One
It was the stuff romance novels were made of.
Man and Woman meet briefly during college, then go their separate ways after graduation.
Man dedicates his life to building a business and quickly establishes himself as a leader in the corporate world and as one of the most sought-after bachelors in the world.
Woman, having lost her heart to Man, resigns herself to being an old maid and devotes her life to keeping house for her widowed brother and caring for his three motherless children.
Ten years later Woman finds Man’s classified ad for a secretary and applies for the job, certain that it is destiny that she has found the advertisement at the precise moment when she’s decided her brother and his children have become too dependent on her and she needs to create a life of her own, separate from them.
Reunion takes place, where Man declares his undying love for Woman, and they live happily ever after.
Penny Rawley would have laughed at the clichéd plot and the pathetic heroine with her terminal case of unrequited love, if it wasn’t her own life she was reflecting on…well, except for that last scene, the one with the reunion and happily-ever-after. That particular drama had yet to be played out.
But it would soon, she thought, glancing uneasily at the elevator doors opposite her desk. Would he recognize her when he arrived? she wondered nervously. Would he remember the young college coed who had typed his term papers for him ten years ago?
Odd as it seemed, though she’d worked for Erik Thompson for almost a month, she had yet to meet with him face-to-face…at least, not in the recent past. He had been on a business trip in Japan when Eleanor Hilloughby, the secretary whom Penny had replaced, had hired Penny for the job. A dear, sweet lady, Eleanor had claimed she was retiring to spend more time with her grandchildren—though Penny suspected the woman might well be, at this very moment, cheerfully weaving baskets in some insane asylum and not doting on her grandchildren as she’d professed.
After less than a month in Erik’s employ, Penny was convinced that anyone who worked directly for the man was a prime candidate for a frontal lobotomy. He was disorganized, self-absorbed and communicated with his employees as if they were nothing but machines.
She huffed a breath at the reminder of the hundreds of e-mails he’d blasted to her computer from the far corners of the world. Nothing but fragments, the lot of them. Clusters of words thrown together without heed for syntax, spelling or punctuation. She found deciphering them as tedious as unraveling a secret code.
But what irked her more was that not once, in any of the e-mails he’d sent to her, had he commented on the change in his office staff or referred to her directly in any way. Each post he’d sent was addressed to mysecretary@cybercowboy.com. For all he’d indicated, Penny could be a monkey sitting behind what was once Mrs. Hilloughby’s desk, gleefully eating bananas while handling all his business and personal affairs.
She told herself that it didn’t matter, that the lack of remembrance didn’t hurt. Just because she remembered Erik, didn’t mean that he should remember her, as well. After all, she was Penny Rawley, poster child for wallflowers worldwide. Plain. Forgettable. Invisible. Whereas, he was the Erik Thompson. Computer genius. Entrepreneur extraordinaire. The most sought-after bachelor in Texas, if not the world. The self-proclaimed lawman who rode through cyber space on bandwidth rather than a horse, packing a keyboard instead of a six-shooter as he tracked down criminals in the relatively new frontier known as the Internet.
But it did hurt, she admitted, blinking back an unexpected rush of tears. If he didn’t recognize her when he arrived, or even acknowledge in some way that he’d once made her acquaintance, she feared she’d die of a broken heart…or, at the very least, suffer extreme humiliation.
To heck with her date with destiny, she told herself, already reaching for the purse she’d tucked within the kneehole space of her desk. She would quit. Leave before he arrived. Spare herself the heartbreak and humiliation. She’d find a new job. One with a lesser-known company, a less-infamous owner. One where she had no past connection with her employer.
Just as she stood, purse in hand, prepared to make a hasty exit, the elevator dinged, signaling its arrival on the executive floor. Trapped, with no escape left to her, she watched, frozen, as the doors slid silently open and the car’s single male occupant stepped out. The man carried a briefcase in one hand and held a thick sheaf of papers before his face with the other.
She slid her gaze down his body, noting the black T-shirt with Cyber Cowboy emblazoned across its front, the faded jeans that hugged slim hips, the long, muscular legs whose long, sure strides brought him ever closer to her desk. She dragged her gaze from the tips of scuffed cowboy boots crafted from an unidentifiable exotic skin and back up to the coal-black hair that curled damply on his forehead and over his ears.
Erik Thompson? she asked herself in bewilderment. She’d expected him to have changed over the years, to have incorporated a more polished style, one that befit his current status and wealth. A three-piece, custom-made silk suit, Italian loafers, a gold Rolex watch. Something to attest to his success. But he hadn’t changed at all! He still dressed like a down-on-his-luck cowboy, just as he had when she’d first met him in college ten years before.
Without lifting his gaze from the report he studied, he passed by her desk and mumbled a one-word directive for coffee.
She slowly turned her head, following his unflagging progress toward his open office door. Her gaze drifted from the dark hair that curled against the neck-band of his T-shirt, down a broad back and tapered waist to his buttocks and a frayed tear just below his hip pocket. Her breath snagged in her lungs and burned there as a strip of black silk appeared in the narrow slit. Oh, my God! she thought, heat flooding her face. Black silk briefs. He wears black silk briefs! Her purse slipped from suddenly weak fingers and dropped to the carpet with a soft thud at her feet.
Seemingly oblivious to the sound of her purse dropping or the lustful stare that monitored his movements, he stepped inside his office, hooked the worn heel of a cowboy boot around the bottom edge of the door and gave it a shove. The door slammed shut between them, the sound as sharp and startling as the report of a gun, making Penny jump.
She placed a hand over her heart and sank weakly down onto her chair. “Oh, my God,” she murmured, then said again more slowly, “Oh…my…God.”
She wasn’t sure how long she sat there, staring at the closed door, an image of the man on the other side filling her mind, her pulse thundering at the erotic visions that built, before his voice boomed from the other side, “Where’s my coffee!”
She hesitated, remembering her earlier decision to leave, then bolted to her feet. I’ll give it a couple more days, she promised herself as she poured coffee into the thick ceramic mug that Mrs. Hilloughby had indicated was his favorite. Then, if I find him impossible to work with, I’ll quit.
She snatched the itinerary from the printer as she raced by her desk, but forced herself to pause outside his door and take a deep breath, before knocking. Not hearing a response, she opened the door and peeked inside.
He was seated behind the desk opposite her, the heels of his hands pressed against his temples, studying the report he’d dropped between his braced elbows. Sunshine streamed through the plate glass window behind him, creating a golden halo of sorts for a fallen angel.
At eighteen she’d thought Erik Thompson the best looking and sexiest man she’d ever met, and nothing she saw now changed that earlier opinion. Then, as now, he projected an image of strength, self-confidence, an intellectual intensity that merely hinted at the sharpness of a brilliant mind, an impatience to conquer the world and claim it as his own…and an inborn sexuality that turned her insides to warm, spun honey.
Granted, she had to look beyond his rough appearance to see those traits and experience that thrill. It seemed he still had an aversion to a comb and razor, she thought dreamily, as she skimmed her gaze over the damp curls that drooped endearingly over his forehead, the dark stubble that shadowed his jaw.
As she stared, he dragged a weary hand down his face, flipped a page, then returned the hand to his temple, as if he needed it to support the weight of his head. He’s exhausted, she realized with a stab of sympathy, then just as quickly wondered at the cause of his fatigue.
Remembering his demand for coffee and suspecting his need for the stimulating caffeine was real rather than ego generated, she crossed to his desk. “Good morning, Mr. Thompson,” she said, deciding the formal greeting more appropriate—especially since he hadn’t seemed to recognize her. “How was your trip to Japan?”
His attention riveted on the report, he muttered something unintelligible and held out a hand. His response was so much like her brother’s grumpy morning greetings to her, she was taken aback. Were all men alike? she wondered incredulously. Did they all take for granted that their needs would be met without a thought or a care for the person who was fulfilling those needs?
Determined to make him acknowledge her presence, she set the mug on his desk just out of his reach and took a step back. Folding her arms beneath her breasts, she pursed her lips and waited, tapping the itinerary furiously against her forearm.
After a moment he glanced up, his gaze snagging on the abandoned mug without ever making it to hers. Frowning slightly, he hooked a finger in its handle and shifted his gaze back to the report as he took the first cautious sip. “You the new secretary?”
Penny rolled her eyes. Even in conversation he seemed to communicate in sentence fragments, though she didn’t need to struggle to decode this particular message. His meaning was all too clear and proved what she’d already suspected.
He didn’t remember her.
But she didn’t die of a broken heart, as she’d feared she might. Nor did she suffer even a shred of humiliation. Instead a slow fury burned its way through her. “Yes,” she said, and thrust out a hand, determined to make him touch her, prove to him that she was a human being and not one of his complicated computer systems. “Penny Rawley.”
He glanced up, met her gaze briefly, then dropped his gaze to her hand. His frown deepening, he set aside his mug, gave her hand a quick pump, then released it. “Mrs. H. show you the ropes?” he asked, infuriating her further by turning a page of the report and continuing to read, instead of focusing his attention on her.
“Yes. She was very thorough.”
“Took care of all the details in my life. Personal and business. Expect you to do the same.”
“She made my duties quite clear.”
One corner of his mouth tilted upward in what appeared to be a fond smile. The effect on her system was devastating.
“Yeah. I’m sure she did.” He glanced up and met her gaze, those bedroom-blue eyes of his turning assessing as he let his gaze drift slowly down her front. It was all she could do to keep from patting self-consciously at the sensible bun she’d styled her long hair into, or tugging at the hem of her conservatively cut skirt. She held her breath, waiting for some sort of reaction from him, an indication that he remembered her.
When he merely shifted his attention back to his report, the breath sagged out of her, right along with all her wishful dreams. Disheartened, she placed the papers she held on his desk. “I’ve prepared your weekly itinerary. If you’ll review it, I can answer any questions you might have.”
Without looking up, he dragged the itinerary across the top of the report he’d been reading and scanned the first page while slowly sipping his coffee. He flipped quickly through the long list of appointments, then swept the itinerary aside and focused on the report again. “Cancel ’em.”
Her brows shot up at the unexpected command. “Cancel them?” she repeated in surprise.
“Yeah. Leaving for California this afternoon. Gone for at least a week.”
She stared, thinking of all the calls she’d have to make, the egos and tempers she’d surely have to soothe when she informed the individuals that the Erik Thompson would be unable to meet with them as previously scheduled.
He glanced up, his brows drawing together in a frown of impatience when he saw that she still stood opposite his desk. “Was there something else you needed?”
She backed toward the door. “W-well, no,” she stammered. “Unless, of course, you have any other instructions for me.”
He waved a hand, hastening her exit. “No.” He swung his legs up, planting his boot heels on the polished surface of his desk, and reared back in his chair, holding the report before his face. “Not at the moment.”
Erik lowered the report to peer at the door his secretary closed behind her.
A mouse, he thought in disgust as the door snapped shut with a quiet, cautious click. A prim and proper, red-headed, scared-of-her-shadow mouse. What the hell was Mrs. H. thinking when she hired a woman like that to take her place as his secretary?
Knowing there was only one way to find out, he pushed back his chair and strode from his office.
His new secretary—the mouse, as he’d already dubbed her—glanced up from her desk as he passed by.
“Where are you going?” she asked in surprise.
“Out.”
“But you just got here!”
He ignored her and stepped onto the elevator, punching the button for the ground floor.
Twenty minutes later he was standing on the back stoop of his former secretary’s house, waiting impatiently for her to respond to his knock.
When she did, he brushed past her. “Who’s the mouse?”
“Mouse?” she repeated in confusion, closing the door behind him. “You mean the new secretary I hired for you?”
He pulled out a chair from the table and sat down. “Yeah. Her. What’s the deal?”
She seated herself in the chair next to his. “You’ve met her, then,” she said, looking pleased with herself.
“Yeah. And she’s a mouse. What were you thinking? She’ll never work out.”
“But she’s perfect,” she insisted, as if surprised by his assessment. “Very organized, extremely intelligent, loyal to a fault. Plus, she’s single and more than willing to work the odd hours your schedule demands.”
“She’s a mouse,” he repeated disagreeably. “She’ll never be able to stand up to the pressures of this job.”
“You mean she’ll never be able to withstand your temper tantrums.”
He frowned at the reprimand in her tone and snatched up a salt shaker, narrowing an eye at it as he turned it in his hand. “That, too,” he muttered, reluctant to admit that his former secretary had hit the nail on the head.
“Then maybe you ought to learn to control your temper,” she suggested, sounding more like a mother than a former employee.
Erik glanced over at her and set down the shaker, unable to suppress the half smile her scolding drew. God, but he was going to miss the old girl. “Why don’t you give up on this retirement nonsense and come back to work for me? You know as well as I do that no one can replace you.”
“Can’t. My grandchildren need me.”
“I need you,” he argued. “Those rugrats have their own mothers to take care of them. I only have you.”
“You’re a big boy,” she was quick to remind him, “and more than capable of taking care of yourself.”
He let her argument pass without comment, allowing the silence to stretch out between them. He knew it was the right tactic when she began to wring her hands.
“When was the last time you ate?” she asked uneasily.
“Can’t remember. At least a day. Maybe two.”
“Erik Thompson!” she cried, and pushed herself from the table. “For heaven’s sake,” she fussed as she bustled about, setting a griddle on the stove and turning on a burner beneath it. “A man needs food to keep up his strength.”
“Yeah, I know,” he replied, smiling smugly. “That’s why I need you.”
She pursed her lips and gave him her best you’re-not-fooling-me-for-a-minute-young-man look over her shoulder, then turned her attention to pouring pancake batter over the griddle.
Chuckling, Erik reared back in his chair and hooked his thumbs in the waist of his jeans as he glanced around the cozy kitchen. God, but he loved this room with its never-ending supply of mouthwatering aromas, ridiculous clutter of useless knickknacks, the jumble of artwork and pictures that papered the refrigerator door. He figured he’d spent more time at this table and in this room than he had in those of his childhood home, a fact that spoke volumes about his relationship with his parents.
“Have you heard anything more from Boy Wonder?” she asked as she flipped a pancake.
Erik frowned, reminded of the irritating and mysterious hacker that jumped from machine to machine and server to server, continuing to elude Erik. “Yeah. A couple of times. He’s still around, slipping in back doors and into systems where he has no business.”
“Has he done any damage?”
“None that I can determine. I figure he’s due to do something big soon, though. He’s been hanging around way too long.”
“You’ll catch him,” she told him confidently.
“Damn straight,” he muttered, irritated that the hacker had thus far managed to dodge the traps he’d set for him.
“She’ll do a fine job.”
He glanced up, mentally thrown off balance by the quick change in topic. Then, realizing she was referring to his new secretary, he scowled and pushed back, giving her room to set a plate in front of him. “Not as good as you.”
She smiled, obviously pleased by the compliment as she sank down on the chair next to his. She placed a hand over his, her smile turning wistful. “I’m grateful for the job you offered me after Red died. I honestly don’t know what I would’ve done, if not for you.”
Reminded of the death five years earlier of the man who had been more a father to him than his own father ever had been, Erik firmed his lips against the emotion that crowded his throat. He turned his hand over and gripped his fingers around hers. “Red was a good man. The best.”
Her eyes filled with tears. “He would be so proud of the work you’re doing.”
“He gave me my first chance. Taught me everything he knew.”
“Yes, and he’d be even prouder to know that you took that knowledge and continued his work.”
“We continued it,” he argued, reminding her that she was very much a part of the work he’d carried on after her husband’s death.
She laughed and gave his hand a squeeze before releasing it. “And I enjoyed every minute of it. But it’s time for me to enter the next stage of my life, that of doting grandmother.”
“You’ll be bored out of your mind in a month’s time, I guarantee it.”
“No,” she told him, and lifted her apron’s skirt to dab the telltale tears from her eyes. “I’m really looking forward to spending time with my grandbabies.”
He braced his forearms on the table and leaned toward her, his expression growing earnest. “Then just go part-time at the office. There’s no reason why you can’t continue to work for me and spend time with your grandchildren, too.”
Chuckling, she shook her head. “You’re just afraid that if I retire completely I won’t cook for you anymore.”
He scowled, but picked up his fork. “That’s not it at all. I need you, Mrs. H. We’re a team.”
“And you and Penny will make a good team, too.” She smiled and placed a hand on his cheek. “Give her a chance,” she urged gently. “You’ll see. Penny Rawley is exactly the woman you need in your life.”
Hours later Erik was still scowling, wondering what Mrs. H. had meant by that last comment.
Penny Rawley is exactly the woman you need in your life.
Was the old girl playing matchmaker? he wondered as he glanced over at his secretary, who sat before a computer terminal at the end of his credenza, transcribing from tapes the data he’d recorded during his meetings in Japan.
He quickly looked away, discarding the troublesome thought. No, he told himself. Though Mrs. H. had run roughshod over his life for more than fifteen years, ever since Red had brought Erik home with him the first time, and over Erik’s office since her husband’s death, she’d never once tried to fix him up with a woman.
He glanced up again as his new secretary rose and headed for her adjoining office. Her hand was on the doorknob when he called out, “Hold up a sec.”
Penny stopped, startled by her employer’s barked command, her heart seeming to stop, too. It leaped into a pounding, joyous beat as she turned to face him, as she was sure that he had at last remembered her. “Yes?” she asked expectantly.
“Do you have any family?”
“Well…no,” she replied, caught off guard by the unexpected question. “Other than a brother, two nieces and a nephew,” she added prudently.
“Good.” He spun his chair around and grabbed the mouse next to his keyboard and began to scroll through a complicated table of computer codes. “’Cause you’re going to California with me this afternoon.”
Her eyes widened as she stared at the back of his head. “To California? With you?”
“Yeah. Go home and pack a bag. Throw in something fancy,” he added.
She gulped a breath, trying to absorb the fact that she would be traveling with him. “Fancy?” she repeated dully.
“Yeah. You know. A cocktail dress or something.”
“B-but why?”
His brows drew together as he found the information he was looking for and clicked on the accompanying file. “A black-tie thing,” he mumbled. “Supposed to bring a date.”
Two
Suzy shoved Penny’s suitcase aside and flopped down on her stomach on the bed, propping her chin on her hands. “I can’t believe Erik didn’t remember you.”
Disappointed because he hadn’t, Penny avoided Suzy’s gaze. “It’s been ten years,” she reminded her friend.
“So what? It’s been ten years for you, too, and you remembered him.”
“Yes, but that’s different.”
Suzy rolled her eyes but—thankfully—let the comment pass without argument. Instead, she craned her neck and peered over the side of the suitcase, poking through the items Penny had already packed. “So how long will y’all be gone?”
“A week.”
“Are you planning on jumping his bones?”
Penny whirled from her closet. “Suzy!”
Arching a brow, Suzy held up a plastic case, taunting Penny with the damning evidence she’d found. “Why else would you have started taking the Pill?”
Her cheeks flaming, Penny snatched the packet of birth control pills from her friend’s hand and shoved it back into her suitcase, burying it beneath a stack of underwear. “That’s none of your business. Besides, I started them over a month ago.” Just about the time she’d applied for the job as Erik’s secretary, she thought but didn’t say.
Chuckling, Suzy sat up, plumping pillows at the headboard before sinking back against them. “Just trying to help you face the facts.”
“If you want to be helpful,” Penny replied irritably, “you can tell me what I should wear to a black-tie affair.”
“What are your choices?”
Penny turned to study the row of clothes hanging neatly in her closet. “Well, there’s the floral dress that I wore Easter Sunday three years ago,” she offered, then glanced at Suzy. “You know. The calf-length dress with cap-sleeves and Puritan-style collar?”
Groaning, Suzy covered her face with her hands. “Please tell me you’re not seriously considering wearing that old thing?”
“What’s wrong with the floral dress?”
“Nothing, if you were going to be herding a gaggle of toddlers at an Easter egg hunt. Jeez, Pen,” she complained. “You gotta stop dressing like somebody’s mother. Think bold. Daring. Go for shock value. I guarantee you, if you do, not a man in the room will be able to take his eyes off you. Not even the Cyber Cowboy himself.”
Penny turned to stare at the clothes hanging in her closet, all of which seemed more appropriate for a PTA meeting at one of her nieces’ or nephew’s schools than for a cocktail party escorted by Erik Thompson.
Not that he would notice her, anyway, she thought, swallowing back a swell of tears.
“I don’t have anything else,” she said, sniffing as she dragged the floral dress from its hanger. “It’ll just have to do.”
Suzy vaulted from the bed. “Then let’s go shopping. We’ll buy you something sinfully expensive. Something totally outrageous that will have Erik Thompson’s eyes bugging out of his head.”
Tempted, Penny glanced at the bedside clock, and the tears pushed to her eyes. “There isn’t time. I have to meet him at the office parking lot at five.” She swept a hand across her cheeks, then carefully folded the floral dress and placed it in her suitcase. “This will just have to do.”
Suzy moved to stand beside her and slipped an arm around her shoulders. “The dress’ll do fine. And so will you,” she added, giving Penny a reassuring squeeze. Drawing away, she sighed as she scooped her purse from the foot of the bed. “I guess I’d better go so you can finish packing. Call me the minute you get back in town.”
“I will.”
“You’d better,” Suzy warned as she headed for the bedroom door. “I want to hear every intimate detail. Oh, and Penny?”
Penny turned to look at her. “What?”
“Don’t forget to take your pills.”
Erik lounged against the hood of his truck, his arms folded over his chest and his buttocks braced against the grill guard, watching as his new secretary steered her beige sedan into her assigned space in the building’s underground parking garage. The vehicle was as plain and nondescript as its owner, he thought, with a woeful shake of his head.
What was Mrs. H. thinking when she hired the woman? he wondered again. Penny Rawley was a mouse, afraid of her own shadow. The first time he lost his temper—which, he admitted, he was prone to do on occasion—she’d probably run from his office, bawling. And he didn’t have the time or patience to deal with a crybaby.
Scowling, he watched her flip up her sun visor, eject a cassette tape from the player on the dash, then carefully slip the tape into its plastic case and tuck it neatly into the console. Her movements were as methodical as a pilot’s, clicking off controls after a landing…which wasn’t a bad thing, he reflected grudgingly. Erik appreciated order. Not that he managed to ever create it on his own. But that’s what secretaries were for, right? Hadn’t Mrs. H. always taken care of all the little details of his life, allowing him the freedom and time to focus on the bigger, more important issues?
Damn straight she had, he thought, swallowing back a lump of emotion. He was going to miss the old girl. She had possessed a sixth sense for determining his mood and anticipating his needs, and had managed for the most part to ignore his temper tantrums…but was unafraid to give him a good tongue lashing when she felt he deserved one.
And now he was stuck with a damn mouse, he thought irritably as he watched his new secretary twist around inside her car to collect something from the back seat.
Her hair was still wound up in that old-maid bun he’d noticed at the office that morning, and she was dressed in the same utilitarian suit, with that damn fussy bow tied prissily beneath her chin.
A week, he thought with a sigh as he heaved himself away from his truck and headed for her car. He’d be lucky if he didn’t die of boredom after the first day.
When he reached the side of her car, he bent over, bracing his hands on his knees to place his face level with the open window. “Ready?”
Before he knew what was happening, he found himself staring at the business end of a small canister of mace. A mouse fending off a man-eating lion. The image that popped into his mind was ridiculous enough to be comical.
“Please don’t shoot,” he deadpanned. “I’ll go peacefully.”
She sagged weakly, then clamped her lips together and reached for the window’s handle, rolling the glass up between them with quick jerks of her hand. After snatching her shoulder bag from the passenger seat, she shoved open the door. “You startled me,” she accused.
He arched a brow, surprised by the unexpected display of temper. “Didn’t mean to,” he said, stepping out of her way. “Was just going to offer to help you with your luggage.”
She headed for the rear of her car, her nose in the air. “I can manage on my own, thank you.”
She stabbed the key into the lock, gave it a furious twist, then flung up the lid. Their hands brushed and their heads bumped as they both reached for the bag she’d stored inside. She leaped back, clutching her hand against her chest, as if stung.
Scowling, he pulled her bag from the trunk. “Over there,” he said, with a jerk of his head toward his truck, then slapped a palm against the trunk’s lid, slamming it down.
She drew the strap of her purse to her shoulder and turned, but stopped before she’d taken a full step, her eyes going wide.
He pressed a hand against the small of her back. “What’s the matter?” he asked, giving her a nudge to put her into motion. “Never seen a truck before?”
She sidestepped just enough to escape his touch. “Of course I’ve seen a truck,” she replied, sounding flustered. “I grew up on a ranch. I just never considered that you would drive one.”
He tossed her bag into the back, then opened the passenger door and shot her a wink as he held it open. “No true cowboy would be caught dead driving anything else.”
When she continued to hesitate, nervously eyeing the gaping distance between the ground and the running board created by the six-inch lift he’d added to the truck’s original design, he realized the cause of her concern. Short of hiking her skirt up around her waist, there was no way she was going to negotiate the climb.
Though he thought that scenario might be worth observing, he resolved her problem by wrapping an arm around her waist and swinging her up. She squealed as he swept her from the ground, then clung to him as he planted her conservative little pumps on the floorboard and her fanny on the passenger seat.
Dusting off his hands, he took a step back. “Comfortable?” he asked, trying hard not to smile.
She stared at him, her green eyes wide and unblinking, her face pale but for two bright spots of color high on her cheeks. A wisp of carrot-red hair had escaped her bun and now brushed her temple. A sense of déjà vu swept over him. Had he seen those eyes before, that face? Had he enacted this scene before?
A frown puckered his brow as he narrowed an eye at her. “Have we—”
She tore her gaze from his and turned to face the front. “Quite comfortable,” she replied, cutting him off. “Thank you.”
Erik frowned a moment longer, then lifted his shoulder and headed for the driver’s side of his truck.
Penny stole a peek at Erik, who sat slumped in the seat next to hers, his head tipped back, his eyes closed, his lips slightly parted in sleep. Though the private jet’s cabin was dimly lit, the overhead reading lamp and the glow from his laptop computer screen provided enough light to illuminate features she’d always considered too perfect to be human.
Taking advantage of this rare opportunity to study him unawares, she leaned for a closer look. He hasn’t changed all that much, she noted. The squint lines fanning from the corners of his eyes were a little deeper than she remembered and his cheeks were a little more lean, but basically he looked the same as the memory she’d kept locked away in her heart for the past ten years.
She caught her lower lip between her teeth, wondering what he would say if she were to tell him that she’d fantasized about him throughout the years, weaving dreams about him that made her blush even now to think about them.
He’d probably laugh, she thought, swallowing back the disappointment. He’d never given her a moment’s notice in college, treating her much as he did now, as if she were nothing but a robot programmed to do his work. Then her purpose had been to earn him an A in English. Now it was to take care of all the little details in his business and personal life.
So what exactly is it about this man that you find so irresistible?
Shying away from the question, she plucked a piece of lint from the sleeve of his T-shirt…then, unable to resist, let her fingers linger on the gentle swell of biceps. The memory of him scooping her up into his arms and plunking her into his truck, settled like a heavy mist over her mind and her heart. Unconsciously she let her fingers drift down his sleeve, shivering when she encountered warm flesh. Then, realizing what she was doing, she snatched back her hand and squeezed her eyes shut.
Oh, Lord, she cried silently. I’ll never survive a whole week without jumping him like some sex-starved nymphomaniac!
In spite of her determination to do otherwise, she stole another peek at him and had to grip her hands over the armrests to keep from reaching out and brushing back the endearing lock of hair that drooped over his forehead.
He’s too handsome, she thought, feeling the panic rising higher. Too worldly, too sexy…too everything!
And she was plain-as-a-copper-penny Penny Rawley, a dried-up old maid who’d barely ventured farther than fifty miles from the ranch she’d grown up on.
Disheartened by the reminder, she lifted a hand to turn off the overhead light, not trusting herself to look at him any longer without touching him again.
But just as her finger brushed the light’s button, an electronic alarm beeped shrilly on his laptop computer. Frozen in place by the chilling sound, she watched the screen flash red.
Erik bolted upright, knocking his forehead against the hand she still held aloft. He blinked twice, then shoved her arm from in front of his face and grabbed for his laptop, drawing it to the edge of the portable desk.
“I didn’t touch it,” she said quickly, fearing the dark scowl that creased his brow was an indication that he thought she’d done something to harm his precious computer. “I swear. I just reached up to turn off your light.”
“It’s him,” he muttered, ignoring her, his eyes riveted on the screen.
“Him?” she repeated, turning to stare at the screen. “Him who?”
Eyes narrowed, his fingers fairly flying over the keyboard, he replied, “Boy Wonder.”
She stared, watching as window after window popped into view, the information that flashed on each as foreign to her as Erik’s reference to Boy Wonder.
“He’s just down the street.” He set his jaw as he increased the size of one window and scrolled through the garbled lines of data registered there.
“Down the street?” she repeated, wondering if he realized they were presently flying 30,000 feet above the ground.
“From the office,” he snapped impatiently, then swore and slammed a fist down on the edge of the portable desk, making the laptop, as well as Penny, jump. “He’s gone,” he said, then swore again. “That sneaky hacker slipped through the cracks again.”
Frightened by his anger, she asked uneasily, “Who is Boy Wonder?”
“If I knew who he was,” he growled, “I wouldn’t be sitting here listening to you yap. I’d be hauling his butt to jail.”
Resenting his contemptuous reply to what she considered a simple and justifiable question, Penny flounced around in her seat and slapped her arms across her chest. “Well, excuse me. It isn’t as if I’m aware of every detail of your life and business. I’ve only worked for your company a month, you know.”
Erik whipped his head around, prepared to lambast his secretary…but when he saw her face, his scathing retort dried up in his mouth.
Those were tears in her eyes, he realized, his stomach clenching at the sight of them. Big alligator-size tears that looked as if they might overflow her eyes and slide down her cheeks at any moment. A twinge of something close to guilt—an emotion Erik rarely indulged in—pricked at him and he tore his gaze from her.
Not your fault, he told himself as he shut down his laptop. She’s a mouse. A crybaby. Totally incapable of handling the stress her job entailed.
“Cry and you’re fired,” he warned as he shoved the laptop under his seat. “I won’t have a crybaby working for me.”
Penny turned her head again, this time away to face the opposite bank of windows, blinking furiously. “I’m not a crybaby.”
“Could’ve fooled me.”
She graced him with the coldest, most damning look she could muster under the circumstances. “I’m not a crybaby,” she repeated tersely. “But you, on the other hand, are undoubtedly the rudest, most self-possessed, most linguistically challenged man I’ve ever met.”
“Never said I wasn’t,” he replied easily, then frowned. “Linguistically challenged? What the hell is that supposed to mean?”
Jutting her chin, she smoothed the hem of her skirt over her knees. “My point exactly.”
His frown deepening, he shoved back his seat and closed his eyes. “You are, too, a crybaby,” he muttered, then held up a hand in warning, as if anticipating a comeback from her. “I’m going to sleep,” he informed her. “And I’d advise you to do the same. We’ve got a lot of work to do once we reach California.”
Moaning softly, Penny sat up straighter in her chair and pressed a hand to her lower back, arching against it as she tried to ease the dull ache there. After more than six hours sitting before a monitor, entering and tracking data for her employer, her eyes burned from the strain of staring at a glowing screen, and every muscle in her body screamed from sitting in the inappropriately designed chair.
Erik certainly hadn’t exaggerated when he’d warned her that they’d have a lot of work to do once they reached California, she thought wearily.
Sighing, she rose and crossed to the wet bar in the hotel’s penthouse suite in search of something to drink. “Would you like a soda?” she asked. “Or something to eat? We never got around to eating lunch,” she reminded him.
When he didn’t respond, she glanced his way. He sat slumped on the overstuffed sofa as he had all day, his cowboy boots propped on the coffee table, his laptop balanced on jean-clad thighs. His forehead looked like a freshly plowed field, the furrows that ran across it deep and wavy, a testament to the level and intensity of his concentration.
The man is a machine, she thought in disgust, a suspicion she’d formed before their trip to California, but now knew for a fact.
They’d arrived in California a little after ten the night before and were at their hotel by eleven, where she’d discovered to her dismay that he intended that they share a suite. She hadn’t had time to recover from the shock of that nerve-warping discovery before Erik had hustled her onto a glass elevator and to a penthouse on the hotel’s uppermost floor.
Once there she lost her ability to speak when confronted with the elaborately appointed and spacious suite—which, thankfully, she’d discovered consisted of a living area and two large bedrooms, each with its own private and luxurious bath. Erik hadn’t shared her starry-eyed fascination with the suite’s opulence and its ceiling-to-floor view of San Diego’s skyline, or her desire to explore. Instead he had immediately mumbled a curt good-night and gone straight to his room and to bed.
Disappointed, Penny had gone to her room, as well. But when she’d awakened that morning, she’d found herself alone in the suite—though, not for long. She’d barely had time to shower and don a fresh suit before Erik had returned, carrying a briefcase filled with a thick stack of reports. Without a word of greeting or explanation as to his whereabouts, he’d given her clipped orders to enter the data from the reports into a computer he’d set up for her on the suite’s only desk.
They’d worked silently and without a break ever since.
Sighing again, she chose a can of juice for her employer, poured it into a glass, then selected some fresh fruit, cheese and crackers from the basket on the bar and arranged them on a plate.
“Here,” she said, placing the snack on the coffee table beside his propped boots. “Eat.”
When he didn’t respond, she drew in a frustrated breath. “Mr. Thompson!”
He jumped, swore, then glared up at her. “What?”
“Food,” she said and pointed to the plate. “Now eat before you collapse from lack of nourishment.”
He scowled and turned his face back to the screen. “Not hungry.”
Wondering why life seemed to always link her with grumpy, sour-faced men who didn’t have the good sense to take care of themselves, Penny snatched the laptop computer from his thighs.
“Hey!” he cried, dropping his feet to the floor and sitting up. “What do you think you’re doing?”
“Taking care of you,” she replied, “just as Mrs. Hilloughby instructed me to do. Though I can see it will be a thankless job,” she added with more than a little resentment. She set the computer out of his reach, then pointed a finger at the plate. “Now eat,” she ordered.
Scowling, he snatched up the plate and fell back against the sofa. He stuffed a strawberry into his mouth and smashed it between his teeth. “Satisfied?” he asked, dashing a hand over his chin to catch a stream of juice that leaked from the corner of his mouth.
With a sniff, she turned for the bar to make a snack for herself. “Only when the plate is clean.”
Erik narrowed an eye at his secretary as she sank down onto a chair opposite the sofa, primly balancing her plate over pressed-together knees.
“What did you do before you came to work for me? No,” he said, holding up a hand before she could respond. “Let me guess. An army nurse? A nun in an all-girl school? A prison guard for a chain gang? A marine drill sergeant?”
She offered him a tight smile. “Funny. But, no, I was none of those things. After graduating from college, I was employed at a local bank, serving as the bank president’s secretary. I resigned about three years ago to work for my brother.”
“Doing what? Breaking kneecaps for him? Kicking puppies? Stealing old ladies’ canes?”
Though his suggestions were outrageous enough to be humorous, Penny refused to dignify his sarcasm with a smile. “My duties included housekeeping, cooking for a family of five and caring for my nieces and nephew.”
He bit a chunk off a wedge of cheese. “Why’d you leave?”
Uncomfortable with his close scrutiny, as well as his question, she lifted a shoulder. “My brother is a widower and depended on me too much, leaving the care of his children entirely up to me. If I’d stayed, he would have continued to ignore them.” She lifted a shoulder again. “So I left.”
“Bet your brother was plenty ticked at you for leaving him in a bind.”
She stiffened, reminded of Jase’s angry phone call when he’d returned to the ranch and found her gone and a new nanny in her place. “I didn’t leave him in a bind,” she stated defensively. “I hired a woman as my replacement. A very capable woman, I might add, who immediately won the children over with her cheerful disposition and youthful exuberance.”
“Cheerful disposition and youthful exuberance?” He snorted a laugh and popped a grape into his mouth. “Who’d you hire? Mary Poppins?”
Irritated by his contemptuous remark, she ignored him and nibbled on a slim wedge of Gouda she’d selected from the variety of gourmet cheeses she’d placed on her plate.
He shook his head and popped the last strawberry into his mouth. “Should’ve stayed with your brother,” he said as he set the plate aside and reclaimed his laptop. “No kid deserves to have a stranger dumped on ’em…even if the alternative is being saddled with a frumpy old aunt who wouldn’t know fun if it bit her square on the butt.”
Frumpy old aunt?
Numb, Penny could only stare, his description of her smacking at an already bruised self-esteem.
She rose quickly, tears stinging her eyes, and crossed to the bar, furiously blinking them back, not wanting to give him the opportunity to call her a crybaby again. She dumped the remains of her snack into the waste basket, rinsed off her plate, then grabbed her purse from the bar and headed for the door.
At the sound of her leaving, he glanced up. “Hey! Where do you think you’re going?”
“For a walk,” she replied, trying her best to keep the tears from her voice.
“But we’ve got that black-tie thingamajig at seven.”
“I’ll be back before then,” she promised, then quickly closed the door behind her before he saw her tears and knew how much his tactless—if accurate—description of her had hurt.
Penny walked down the street, her chin bumping dejectedly against her chest, her gaze on the blurred tips of her black pumps. She wanted to despise Erik for the cruel things he’d said about her but found she couldn’t. Not when he was right. She was frumpy. And she feared she wasn’t much fun, either.
But how could she be fun, she cried in silent frustration, or even know what it was, when she’d never been allowed to have any while growing up? After their parents’ death, Jase had assumed guardianship of her, and if Erik thought Penny didn’t know what fun was, then he should meet her brother, Jase, the epitome of the glowering wielder of the proverbial whip.
She caught her lower lip between her teeth, feeling a stab of guilt for her less-than-charitable thoughts toward a brother who had sacrificed so much for her. Life hadn’t exactly been kind to either of them, she reflected sadly. Their parents’ death had forced Jase to drop out of college and return home to take care of Penny and run the family ranch. And ranch life left little time for fun. Penny knew, because for years she’d worked right alongside her brother.
And when her friends had gone off to college to kick up their heels and spread their wings a little, Penny had remained at home, commuting from their ranch to Austin each day to take courses at the University of Texas. And with Jase, by that time, saddled with the responsibilities of his own growing family, Penny had felt obligated to help finance her education by typing term papers for other students and offering tutoring on the side. Between the long commute, a full load of classes each semester, evenings spent with her head buried in books and whatever hours left over in the day filled with typing term papers or tutoring some unmotivated jock, pitifully few hours remained in which to make new friends or pursue a social life.
No, she thought miserably as she dragged her feet to a stop before a shop’s window display. Penny Rawley wouldn’t know fun if it were to bite her square in the butt, just as Erik had suggested.
Fearing she would cry again if she allowed herself to think about the upsetting conversation any longer, she forced herself to focus on the items displayed in the window. Skimpy sundresses in varying shades of the rainbow draped headless mannequins with hourglass figures, while cropped tank tops danced from invisible strings above coordinating shorts that looked barely long enough to cover a woman’s behind.
And superimposed over it all was Penny’s reflection.
Slowly she focused on it. The sensible bun. The tailored blouse with its crisp bow tied neatly beneath her chin. The utilitarian suit jacket that hung loosely at her hips, hiding a figure that Penny wasn’t even sure existed any more. The A-line skirt, its hem brushing modestly at her knees. She couldn’t see any farther…but she didn’t need to see more of her reflection to realize that frump fit her to a T.
Sickened by the reminder that Erik was right to label her a frump, she started to turn away but stopped and slowly turned back around. But she didn’t have to be a frump, she told herself as she stared at her reflection. She could change. There was no reason she couldn’t dress differently. Granted, she’d never bothered to stay abreast of current fashion trends. Had no need, not when her wardrobe was dictated by what was serviceable for ranch and housework. But that’s what sales clerks were for, right? It was their job to stay on top of what was hot and what was not in the fashion industry. Surely she could trust one of them to help her make a few selections.
Remembering the black-tie affair that Erik expected her to attend with him at seven and the floral dress she’d brought to wear, she glanced at her watch. Two hours. She had two hours in which to recreate herself.
Oh, Lord, she prayed silently, please let it be long enough to create a miracle.
Three
Penny knew she was late and that Erik would probably be furious with her. But she didn’t care. She was too high, too pumped with excitement to care about anything, other than her new look.
Burdened with her purchases, she fumbled the card key for their hotel suite into the slot, pushed the toe of her shoe against the door, then hurried inside. “Mr. Thompson?” she called. “I’m back.”
When she didn’t hear a response, she headed straight for her bedroom, wincing when she saw a piece of paper taped to the door. After dumping her purchases on her bed, she removed the note and read: “Where the hell are you? Main ballroom. Now.”
He hadn’t even bothered signing his name.
Refusing to let his curt note rob her of her good mood, she tossed the paper over her shoulder and dived gleefully into the pile of purchases she’d dumped on the bed. Finding the clothing bag that covered her new dress, she held it up high…and her smile slowly faded.
I can’t do this, she cried silently, panicking. There’s no way in the world I can possibly wear in public a dress made from scarcely more fabric than that of a man’s oversize handkerchief.
Oh, yes, you can, a voice insisted—a voice that sounded suspiciously like her friend Suzy’s. And you’re going to make Erik Thompson’s eyes pop right out of his head.
Clutching the dress to her breasts, Penny headed for the bathroom, repeating under her breath a phrase from the story “The Little Engine that Could,” which her niece Rachel loved Penny to read.
“I think I can, I think I can, I think I can.”
Erik tipped back his head and drained the champagne from the glass, then plunked it down on the tray of a passing waiter. He glanced toward the ballroom’s entrance for about the zillionth time since entering the room and swore under his breath when he still didn’t see a sign of his missing secretary. Scowling, he stuffed his hands into the pockets of his tuxedo slacks and headed for the buffet table.
“Hey, Erik!”
Balancing a plate on his palm, Erik glanced over his shoulder and saw his old friend Buzz Kenney bearing down on him. Relieved to find a familiar face among a sea of strangers, he plucked another skewer of grilled shrimp from the tray. He used his teeth to drag one off its end, before dropping the skewer to his plate and turning to greet his friend. “How’s it going, Buzz?”
“Can’t complain.” Buzz slapped a bear-like hand against Erik’s back. “How ’bout you?”
Erik’s eyes bugged as the force of Buzz’s greeting made the shrimp he’d just swallowed hang in his throat. He gulped, swallowed hard, forcing it down, then slipped a finger behind his shirt’s starched collar and craned his neck. “Fine,” he croaked, “until you came along.”
Buzz tossed his head back and boomed a laugh. “You always were a bit on the puny side.”
Erik shot his friend a frown. “And you were always an overgrown bully.”
“Now, Erik,” Buzz chided. “Surely by now you’ve forgiven me for shoving you buck naked into the girl’s locker room when we were in junior high?”
“Oh, I’ve forgiven you all right,” Erik replied dryly. “I just haven’t forgotten the incident. Nor will I.”
Chuckling, Buzz draped a companionable arm along Erik’s shoulders and turned to survey the room. “Mmm-mmm. Have you ever seen so many gorgeous babes gathered under one roof?”
Erik chose a bacon-wrapped mushroom from his plate and popped it into his mouth, not bothering to look up. “Yeah. One too many times.”
Buzz clasped a hand over his heart. “Oh, man. Don’t tell me the great Erik Thompson has lost his appetite for beautiful women?”
Erik lifted an indifferent shoulder. “If you’ve tasted one, you’ve tasted ’em all.”
“Then you haven’t been samplin’ from the same buffets I’ve been feedin’ from.” He dug an elbow into Erik’s ribs, then boomed another laugh when the dig sent Erik staggering sideways a step.
Frowning, Erik rubbed a hand over a rib he was sure would be sore the next day. “Why don’t you go beat up on somebody else for a while?”
“And leave you all alone?” Grinning, Buzz folded his arms across his chest and rocked back on his heels, trolling the room with his gaze again. “Caught that pesky hacker yet that’s been givin’ you grief?”
Irritated by the reminder, Erik plucked a filled champagne glass from the tray of a passing waiter. “No.” He tossed back half the bubbly liquid.
“Boy Wonder, isn’t it?” Buzz asked, angling his head to look at Erik for confirmation.
“Boy Worrywart, would be more like it. The guy’s becoming a royal pain in the ass, ducking in and out of systems, nosing around where he hasn’t any business.”
Buzz arched a thick brow, leveling a pointed look at Erik. “Sounds like a kid I used to know.”
In spite of the years that separated him from his crimes, Erik felt the heat crawl up his neck. “Yeah, but I was just a kid. Didn’t know any better.”
“Maybe Boy Wonder’s just a kid, too. His name suggests he might be.”
Erik’s frown deepened. “No kid is that good.”
“You ought to know,” Buzz replied, and turned his gaze back to the room. “You were the best.” He puckered his lips in a silent whistle. “Whooee. Would you look at that?” He gave the points of his bow tie a gleeful tug. “Ultimate babe at three o’clock.”
Erik rolled his eyes, amazed that a man Buzz’s age still reverted to locker-room lingo when confronted with a good-looking woman. “Are your hormones always on red alert?”
Buzz grinned as he headed toward the redhead who had caught his eye. “Wouldn’t want ’em any other way.”
In spite of himself, Erik found himself chuckling as he watched Buzz move in for the kill. He pitied the poor woman his buddy had zeroed in on. The woman didn’t know it yet, but she didn’t stand a snowball’s chance in hell of resisting Buzz’s killer charm. The man had more moves than a Ryder truck and more come-on lines than a drunk in a bar at closing time. Erik knew because he’d seen the man in action more times than he cared to remember.
Shaking his head, he started to turn for a second helping from the generous spread of hors d’oeuvres, but spun back, every muscle in his body tensed in denial.
No, he told himself as he stared at the woman smiling shyly up at Buzz. It couldn’t be. He took a step toward the couple, but stopped, sure that he was wrong.
No, he told himself again. The hair color was right, but the style was all wrong. Mouse wore her hair twisted up in a tight, spinsterish bun, not swinging at shoulder length and mussed as if she’d gone a fast round in bed with an overly zealous lover. And there was no way in hell that woman’s body could possibly belong to his secretary. Not that he had a clue what his secretary’s figure looked like. Not when he’d seen her in nothing but those stupid, sexless suits favored by so many executive-type women.
In spite of his doubts, he found himself taking another step toward the couple. Then another. And another until he’d reached Buzz’s side. He slapped a hand against his friend’s back. “Hey, Buzz,” he said, turning on a killer smile that he knew from experience most women found hard to resist. “Aren’t you going to introduce me to your friend?”
“And chance losing her to a smooth talker like you? Man, I’m not that—”
Whatever else Buzz had to say on the subject was lost to Erik as the woman turned to fully face him. “Damn,” he gasped weakly, bracing a hand against Buzz’s arm for support as he found himself staring into all-too-familiar green eyes. He dragged his gaze from her face and down her front, nearly choking when he encountered the mounds of creamy flesh that the bustier-style bodice pushed above the dress’s heart-shaped neckline. “Penny?” he asked, forcing his gaze back to her face. “Is that you?”
Though her smile remained in place, he saw the uncertainty in her eyes, recognized the level of nerves in the tremble of the fingers she smoothed down her thighs—thighs that the dress’s brief hemline barely covered.
“Yes,” she said, then caught her lower lip between her teeth and dropped her gaze, nearly making him groan at the provocativeness in the demure gesture. “I’m sorry I’m late,” she murmured. “I was…detained.” She peeked up at him through a web of lashes. “You aren’t upset with me, are you?”
“Upset?” he repeated, when upset was much too mild a word to use to describe his earlier dark mood. “No,” he lied. “I was just worried that you’d gotten lost or that something might have happened to you.”
She laid a hand on his arm. “I’m so sorry to have worried you,” she said with a contriteness that he would expect from the Penny he’d gotten to know over the last twenty-four hours. But he wasn’t sure he knew who this new Penny was…or if he even liked the change.
He frowned, eyeing her suspiciously. “What’d you do to your hair?”
She caught a lock between her fingers and twisted self-consciously. “I had it cut this afternoon. Do you like it?”
He deepened his frown. “It’s all right…I guess.”
Her disappointment was instantaneous and blatantly obvious, even to a man as self-possessed as people claimed Erik to be.
Buzz stepped between the two. “I like your new hairstyle just fine,” he assured Penny, then gallantly offered her his arm. “Now how ’bout that dance you promised me?”
Penny looked up at Buzz, her hesitancy to accept his invitation evident in her wide, green eyes. She glanced at Erik, then quickly away, and forced a smile as she slipped her arm through Buzz’s. “I’d love to.”
Erik stood where they had left him, watching the man he’d once considered his oldest and closest friend steer his secretary toward the dance floor. When they reached the area and Penny stepped into Buzz’s arms, Erik whirled for the bar, muttering curses under his breath about playboys and innocent lambs being led to the slaughter.
It was well after midnight when Erik unlocked the door to their hotel suite and gestured impatiently for Penny to enter before him.
Her cheeks flushed with excitement, she swept past him on ridiculously high heels, trailing a provocative scent that had Erik lifting his nose and sniffing the air, in spite of his current disgust with his secretary.
She tossed a glittery purse the size of a small envelope onto the sofa, then spun, her hand clasped beneath her chin. “Wasn’t that the most wonderful party!”
Disgusted by her exuberance—as well as by her behavior for the last couple of hours—Erik shrugged out of his tuxedo jacket and threw it toward the sofa. It landed on the floor about two feet shy of his mark. “It was all right,” he muttered.
“All right?” she repeated, then laughed gaily and flung her arms wide. “I can’t remember when I’ve had such a marvelous time. The orchestra was absolutely divine, and your friend, Buzz, such a skillful dancer. I’ve never swing danced before, but he was so patient with me, so kind to offer instruction.”
Erik cut a glance at her, then frowned as he emptied the contents of his pockets onto the bar, resenting her good mood, but unsure why. “We’re here to work,” he reminded her. “Best you remember that.”
Her eyes widened in alarm. “Oh, I haven’t forgotten.” She quickly stooped to scoop his jacket from the floor, then straightened, holding it against her chest as she smoothed the wrinkles from it.
But not before Erik had gotten another good look at the luscious mounds threatening to spill over the top of her dress.
He tore his gaze from the tempting sight and ducked behind the bar, suddenly finding himself in dire need of a drink. Selecting a miniature bottle of bourbon, he dumped its contents into a glass, started to add water, then decided against it and tossed the drink back, neat. He inhaled sharply as the bourbon hit the back of his throat, gulped it down, then hissed a breath as the liquor burned a path all the way to his stomach.
He glanced over to find Penny staring at him in horror.
“What?” he snapped impatiently.
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Peggy Moreland
Penny Rawley hadn' t traveled across Texas to have sexy CEO Erik Thompson boss her around! Sure, she was his new secretary, but she' d come to his million-dollar firm with one thing in mind: marrying the man she' d always loved. Now the irresistible beast had the nerve to ignore her– when he wasn' t shouting orders.Well, that was gonna change… .Erik couldn' t believe his eyes. Penny Rawley had gone from mousy secretary– to desirable woman! Now he wanted to take her to bed and show her just who was boss… but found himself scrambling to keep his hard heart intact. For pretty Penny had him aching with a brand-new desire– to claim this beguiling innocent as his own!
“I Haven’t Saved Myself
All These Years To Toss Away
My Virginity To The First Man
Who Shows Me A Little Attention!”
The moment the words were out, Penny clapped a hand over her mouth, her face draining of color. With a strangled sob she ran for her room.
Erik winced at the furious slam of the door.
A virgin? Had his mousy secretary just confessed to being a virgin?
He shook his head. No way, he told himself. She couldn’t be a virgin. Not with a body like that.
At the thought, an image pushed itself into his mind of her standing in the ballroom in that dress. The clingy, glittery fabric hugged her body like a second skin, accentuating a slender waist and full sensuous hips.
He groaned, knowing he’d never get to sleep that night. Not when he knew a virgin slept in the room across from his….
Dear Reader,
Welcome to the world of Silhouette Desire, where you can indulge yourself every month with romances that can only be described as passionate, powerful and provocative!
The always fabulous Elizabeth Bevarly offers you May’s MAN OF THE MONTH, so get ready for The Temptation of Rory Monahan. Enjoy reading about a gorgeous professor who falls for a librarian busy reading up on how to catch a man!
The tantalizing Desire miniseries TEXAS CATTLEMAN’S CLUB: LONE STAR JEWELS concludes with Tycoon Warrior by Sheri WhiteFeather. A Native American ex-military man reunites with his estranged wife on a secret mission that renews their love.
Popular Peggy Moreland returns to Desire with a romance about a plain-Jane secretary who is in love with her Millionaire Boss. The hero-focused miniseries BACHELOR BATTALION by Maureen Child continues with Prince Charming in Dress Blues, who’s snowbound in a cabin with an unmarried woman about to give birth! Baby at His Door by Katherine Garbera features a small-town sheriff, a beautiful stranger and the bundle of love who unites them. And Sara Orwig writes a lovely tale about a couple entering a marriage of convenience in Cowboy’s Secret Child.
This month, Silhouette is proud to announce we’ve joined the national campaign “Get Caught Reading” in order to promote reading in the United States. So set a good example, and get caught reading all six of these exhilarating Desire titles!
Enjoy!
Joan Marlow Golan
Senior Editor, Silhouette Desire
Millionaire Boss
Peggy Moreland
www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
PEGGY MORELAND
published her first romance with Silhouette in 1989 and continues to delight readers with stories set in her home state of Texas. Winner of the National Readers’ Choice Award, a nominee for Romantic Times Reviewer’s Choice Award and a finalist for the prestigious RITA Award, Peggy has appeared on the USA Today and Waldenbooks bestseller lists. When not writing, she enjoys spending time at the farm riding her quarter horse, Lo-Jump. She, her husband and three children make their home in Texas. You may write to Peggy at P.O. Box 1099, Florence, TX 76257-1099.
Contents
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
One
It was the stuff romance novels were made of.
Man and Woman meet briefly during college, then go their separate ways after graduation.
Man dedicates his life to building a business and quickly establishes himself as a leader in the corporate world and as one of the most sought-after bachelors in the world.
Woman, having lost her heart to Man, resigns herself to being an old maid and devotes her life to keeping house for her widowed brother and caring for his three motherless children.
Ten years later Woman finds Man’s classified ad for a secretary and applies for the job, certain that it is destiny that she has found the advertisement at the precise moment when she’s decided her brother and his children have become too dependent on her and she needs to create a life of her own, separate from them.
Reunion takes place, where Man declares his undying love for Woman, and they live happily ever after.
Penny Rawley would have laughed at the clichéd plot and the pathetic heroine with her terminal case of unrequited love, if it wasn’t her own life she was reflecting on…well, except for that last scene, the one with the reunion and happily-ever-after. That particular drama had yet to be played out.
But it would soon, she thought, glancing uneasily at the elevator doors opposite her desk. Would he recognize her when he arrived? she wondered nervously. Would he remember the young college coed who had typed his term papers for him ten years ago?
Odd as it seemed, though she’d worked for Erik Thompson for almost a month, she had yet to meet with him face-to-face…at least, not in the recent past. He had been on a business trip in Japan when Eleanor Hilloughby, the secretary whom Penny had replaced, had hired Penny for the job. A dear, sweet lady, Eleanor had claimed she was retiring to spend more time with her grandchildren—though Penny suspected the woman might well be, at this very moment, cheerfully weaving baskets in some insane asylum and not doting on her grandchildren as she’d professed.
After less than a month in Erik’s employ, Penny was convinced that anyone who worked directly for the man was a prime candidate for a frontal lobotomy. He was disorganized, self-absorbed and communicated with his employees as if they were nothing but machines.
She huffed a breath at the reminder of the hundreds of e-mails he’d blasted to her computer from the far corners of the world. Nothing but fragments, the lot of them. Clusters of words thrown together without heed for syntax, spelling or punctuation. She found deciphering them as tedious as unraveling a secret code.
But what irked her more was that not once, in any of the e-mails he’d sent to her, had he commented on the change in his office staff or referred to her directly in any way. Each post he’d sent was addressed to mysecretary@cybercowboy.com. For all he’d indicated, Penny could be a monkey sitting behind what was once Mrs. Hilloughby’s desk, gleefully eating bananas while handling all his business and personal affairs.
She told herself that it didn’t matter, that the lack of remembrance didn’t hurt. Just because she remembered Erik, didn’t mean that he should remember her, as well. After all, she was Penny Rawley, poster child for wallflowers worldwide. Plain. Forgettable. Invisible. Whereas, he was the Erik Thompson. Computer genius. Entrepreneur extraordinaire. The most sought-after bachelor in Texas, if not the world. The self-proclaimed lawman who rode through cyber space on bandwidth rather than a horse, packing a keyboard instead of a six-shooter as he tracked down criminals in the relatively new frontier known as the Internet.
But it did hurt, she admitted, blinking back an unexpected rush of tears. If he didn’t recognize her when he arrived, or even acknowledge in some way that he’d once made her acquaintance, she feared she’d die of a broken heart…or, at the very least, suffer extreme humiliation.
To heck with her date with destiny, she told herself, already reaching for the purse she’d tucked within the kneehole space of her desk. She would quit. Leave before he arrived. Spare herself the heartbreak and humiliation. She’d find a new job. One with a lesser-known company, a less-infamous owner. One where she had no past connection with her employer.
Just as she stood, purse in hand, prepared to make a hasty exit, the elevator dinged, signaling its arrival on the executive floor. Trapped, with no escape left to her, she watched, frozen, as the doors slid silently open and the car’s single male occupant stepped out. The man carried a briefcase in one hand and held a thick sheaf of papers before his face with the other.
She slid her gaze down his body, noting the black T-shirt with Cyber Cowboy emblazoned across its front, the faded jeans that hugged slim hips, the long, muscular legs whose long, sure strides brought him ever closer to her desk. She dragged her gaze from the tips of scuffed cowboy boots crafted from an unidentifiable exotic skin and back up to the coal-black hair that curled damply on his forehead and over his ears.
Erik Thompson? she asked herself in bewilderment. She’d expected him to have changed over the years, to have incorporated a more polished style, one that befit his current status and wealth. A three-piece, custom-made silk suit, Italian loafers, a gold Rolex watch. Something to attest to his success. But he hadn’t changed at all! He still dressed like a down-on-his-luck cowboy, just as he had when she’d first met him in college ten years before.
Without lifting his gaze from the report he studied, he passed by her desk and mumbled a one-word directive for coffee.
She slowly turned her head, following his unflagging progress toward his open office door. Her gaze drifted from the dark hair that curled against the neck-band of his T-shirt, down a broad back and tapered waist to his buttocks and a frayed tear just below his hip pocket. Her breath snagged in her lungs and burned there as a strip of black silk appeared in the narrow slit. Oh, my God! she thought, heat flooding her face. Black silk briefs. He wears black silk briefs! Her purse slipped from suddenly weak fingers and dropped to the carpet with a soft thud at her feet.
Seemingly oblivious to the sound of her purse dropping or the lustful stare that monitored his movements, he stepped inside his office, hooked the worn heel of a cowboy boot around the bottom edge of the door and gave it a shove. The door slammed shut between them, the sound as sharp and startling as the report of a gun, making Penny jump.
She placed a hand over her heart and sank weakly down onto her chair. “Oh, my God,” she murmured, then said again more slowly, “Oh…my…God.”
She wasn’t sure how long she sat there, staring at the closed door, an image of the man on the other side filling her mind, her pulse thundering at the erotic visions that built, before his voice boomed from the other side, “Where’s my coffee!”
She hesitated, remembering her earlier decision to leave, then bolted to her feet. I’ll give it a couple more days, she promised herself as she poured coffee into the thick ceramic mug that Mrs. Hilloughby had indicated was his favorite. Then, if I find him impossible to work with, I’ll quit.
She snatched the itinerary from the printer as she raced by her desk, but forced herself to pause outside his door and take a deep breath, before knocking. Not hearing a response, she opened the door and peeked inside.
He was seated behind the desk opposite her, the heels of his hands pressed against his temples, studying the report he’d dropped between his braced elbows. Sunshine streamed through the plate glass window behind him, creating a golden halo of sorts for a fallen angel.
At eighteen she’d thought Erik Thompson the best looking and sexiest man she’d ever met, and nothing she saw now changed that earlier opinion. Then, as now, he projected an image of strength, self-confidence, an intellectual intensity that merely hinted at the sharpness of a brilliant mind, an impatience to conquer the world and claim it as his own…and an inborn sexuality that turned her insides to warm, spun honey.
Granted, she had to look beyond his rough appearance to see those traits and experience that thrill. It seemed he still had an aversion to a comb and razor, she thought dreamily, as she skimmed her gaze over the damp curls that drooped endearingly over his forehead, the dark stubble that shadowed his jaw.
As she stared, he dragged a weary hand down his face, flipped a page, then returned the hand to his temple, as if he needed it to support the weight of his head. He’s exhausted, she realized with a stab of sympathy, then just as quickly wondered at the cause of his fatigue.
Remembering his demand for coffee and suspecting his need for the stimulating caffeine was real rather than ego generated, she crossed to his desk. “Good morning, Mr. Thompson,” she said, deciding the formal greeting more appropriate—especially since he hadn’t seemed to recognize her. “How was your trip to Japan?”
His attention riveted on the report, he muttered something unintelligible and held out a hand. His response was so much like her brother’s grumpy morning greetings to her, she was taken aback. Were all men alike? she wondered incredulously. Did they all take for granted that their needs would be met without a thought or a care for the person who was fulfilling those needs?
Determined to make him acknowledge her presence, she set the mug on his desk just out of his reach and took a step back. Folding her arms beneath her breasts, she pursed her lips and waited, tapping the itinerary furiously against her forearm.
After a moment he glanced up, his gaze snagging on the abandoned mug without ever making it to hers. Frowning slightly, he hooked a finger in its handle and shifted his gaze back to the report as he took the first cautious sip. “You the new secretary?”
Penny rolled her eyes. Even in conversation he seemed to communicate in sentence fragments, though she didn’t need to struggle to decode this particular message. His meaning was all too clear and proved what she’d already suspected.
He didn’t remember her.
But she didn’t die of a broken heart, as she’d feared she might. Nor did she suffer even a shred of humiliation. Instead a slow fury burned its way through her. “Yes,” she said, and thrust out a hand, determined to make him touch her, prove to him that she was a human being and not one of his complicated computer systems. “Penny Rawley.”
He glanced up, met her gaze briefly, then dropped his gaze to her hand. His frown deepening, he set aside his mug, gave her hand a quick pump, then released it. “Mrs. H. show you the ropes?” he asked, infuriating her further by turning a page of the report and continuing to read, instead of focusing his attention on her.
“Yes. She was very thorough.”
“Took care of all the details in my life. Personal and business. Expect you to do the same.”
“She made my duties quite clear.”
One corner of his mouth tilted upward in what appeared to be a fond smile. The effect on her system was devastating.
“Yeah. I’m sure she did.” He glanced up and met her gaze, those bedroom-blue eyes of his turning assessing as he let his gaze drift slowly down her front. It was all she could do to keep from patting self-consciously at the sensible bun she’d styled her long hair into, or tugging at the hem of her conservatively cut skirt. She held her breath, waiting for some sort of reaction from him, an indication that he remembered her.
When he merely shifted his attention back to his report, the breath sagged out of her, right along with all her wishful dreams. Disheartened, she placed the papers she held on his desk. “I’ve prepared your weekly itinerary. If you’ll review it, I can answer any questions you might have.”
Without looking up, he dragged the itinerary across the top of the report he’d been reading and scanned the first page while slowly sipping his coffee. He flipped quickly through the long list of appointments, then swept the itinerary aside and focused on the report again. “Cancel ’em.”
Her brows shot up at the unexpected command. “Cancel them?” she repeated in surprise.
“Yeah. Leaving for California this afternoon. Gone for at least a week.”
She stared, thinking of all the calls she’d have to make, the egos and tempers she’d surely have to soothe when she informed the individuals that the Erik Thompson would be unable to meet with them as previously scheduled.
He glanced up, his brows drawing together in a frown of impatience when he saw that she still stood opposite his desk. “Was there something else you needed?”
She backed toward the door. “W-well, no,” she stammered. “Unless, of course, you have any other instructions for me.”
He waved a hand, hastening her exit. “No.” He swung his legs up, planting his boot heels on the polished surface of his desk, and reared back in his chair, holding the report before his face. “Not at the moment.”
Erik lowered the report to peer at the door his secretary closed behind her.
A mouse, he thought in disgust as the door snapped shut with a quiet, cautious click. A prim and proper, red-headed, scared-of-her-shadow mouse. What the hell was Mrs. H. thinking when she hired a woman like that to take her place as his secretary?
Knowing there was only one way to find out, he pushed back his chair and strode from his office.
His new secretary—the mouse, as he’d already dubbed her—glanced up from her desk as he passed by.
“Where are you going?” she asked in surprise.
“Out.”
“But you just got here!”
He ignored her and stepped onto the elevator, punching the button for the ground floor.
Twenty minutes later he was standing on the back stoop of his former secretary’s house, waiting impatiently for her to respond to his knock.
When she did, he brushed past her. “Who’s the mouse?”
“Mouse?” she repeated in confusion, closing the door behind him. “You mean the new secretary I hired for you?”
He pulled out a chair from the table and sat down. “Yeah. Her. What’s the deal?”
She seated herself in the chair next to his. “You’ve met her, then,” she said, looking pleased with herself.
“Yeah. And she’s a mouse. What were you thinking? She’ll never work out.”
“But she’s perfect,” she insisted, as if surprised by his assessment. “Very organized, extremely intelligent, loyal to a fault. Plus, she’s single and more than willing to work the odd hours your schedule demands.”
“She’s a mouse,” he repeated disagreeably. “She’ll never be able to stand up to the pressures of this job.”
“You mean she’ll never be able to withstand your temper tantrums.”
He frowned at the reprimand in her tone and snatched up a salt shaker, narrowing an eye at it as he turned it in his hand. “That, too,” he muttered, reluctant to admit that his former secretary had hit the nail on the head.
“Then maybe you ought to learn to control your temper,” she suggested, sounding more like a mother than a former employee.
Erik glanced over at her and set down the shaker, unable to suppress the half smile her scolding drew. God, but he was going to miss the old girl. “Why don’t you give up on this retirement nonsense and come back to work for me? You know as well as I do that no one can replace you.”
“Can’t. My grandchildren need me.”
“I need you,” he argued. “Those rugrats have their own mothers to take care of them. I only have you.”
“You’re a big boy,” she was quick to remind him, “and more than capable of taking care of yourself.”
He let her argument pass without comment, allowing the silence to stretch out between them. He knew it was the right tactic when she began to wring her hands.
“When was the last time you ate?” she asked uneasily.
“Can’t remember. At least a day. Maybe two.”
“Erik Thompson!” she cried, and pushed herself from the table. “For heaven’s sake,” she fussed as she bustled about, setting a griddle on the stove and turning on a burner beneath it. “A man needs food to keep up his strength.”
“Yeah, I know,” he replied, smiling smugly. “That’s why I need you.”
She pursed her lips and gave him her best you’re-not-fooling-me-for-a-minute-young-man look over her shoulder, then turned her attention to pouring pancake batter over the griddle.
Chuckling, Erik reared back in his chair and hooked his thumbs in the waist of his jeans as he glanced around the cozy kitchen. God, but he loved this room with its never-ending supply of mouthwatering aromas, ridiculous clutter of useless knickknacks, the jumble of artwork and pictures that papered the refrigerator door. He figured he’d spent more time at this table and in this room than he had in those of his childhood home, a fact that spoke volumes about his relationship with his parents.
“Have you heard anything more from Boy Wonder?” she asked as she flipped a pancake.
Erik frowned, reminded of the irritating and mysterious hacker that jumped from machine to machine and server to server, continuing to elude Erik. “Yeah. A couple of times. He’s still around, slipping in back doors and into systems where he has no business.”
“Has he done any damage?”
“None that I can determine. I figure he’s due to do something big soon, though. He’s been hanging around way too long.”
“You’ll catch him,” she told him confidently.
“Damn straight,” he muttered, irritated that the hacker had thus far managed to dodge the traps he’d set for him.
“She’ll do a fine job.”
He glanced up, mentally thrown off balance by the quick change in topic. Then, realizing she was referring to his new secretary, he scowled and pushed back, giving her room to set a plate in front of him. “Not as good as you.”
She smiled, obviously pleased by the compliment as she sank down on the chair next to his. She placed a hand over his, her smile turning wistful. “I’m grateful for the job you offered me after Red died. I honestly don’t know what I would’ve done, if not for you.”
Reminded of the death five years earlier of the man who had been more a father to him than his own father ever had been, Erik firmed his lips against the emotion that crowded his throat. He turned his hand over and gripped his fingers around hers. “Red was a good man. The best.”
Her eyes filled with tears. “He would be so proud of the work you’re doing.”
“He gave me my first chance. Taught me everything he knew.”
“Yes, and he’d be even prouder to know that you took that knowledge and continued his work.”
“We continued it,” he argued, reminding her that she was very much a part of the work he’d carried on after her husband’s death.
She laughed and gave his hand a squeeze before releasing it. “And I enjoyed every minute of it. But it’s time for me to enter the next stage of my life, that of doting grandmother.”
“You’ll be bored out of your mind in a month’s time, I guarantee it.”
“No,” she told him, and lifted her apron’s skirt to dab the telltale tears from her eyes. “I’m really looking forward to spending time with my grandbabies.”
He braced his forearms on the table and leaned toward her, his expression growing earnest. “Then just go part-time at the office. There’s no reason why you can’t continue to work for me and spend time with your grandchildren, too.”
Chuckling, she shook her head. “You’re just afraid that if I retire completely I won’t cook for you anymore.”
He scowled, but picked up his fork. “That’s not it at all. I need you, Mrs. H. We’re a team.”
“And you and Penny will make a good team, too.” She smiled and placed a hand on his cheek. “Give her a chance,” she urged gently. “You’ll see. Penny Rawley is exactly the woman you need in your life.”
Hours later Erik was still scowling, wondering what Mrs. H. had meant by that last comment.
Penny Rawley is exactly the woman you need in your life.
Was the old girl playing matchmaker? he wondered as he glanced over at his secretary, who sat before a computer terminal at the end of his credenza, transcribing from tapes the data he’d recorded during his meetings in Japan.
He quickly looked away, discarding the troublesome thought. No, he told himself. Though Mrs. H. had run roughshod over his life for more than fifteen years, ever since Red had brought Erik home with him the first time, and over Erik’s office since her husband’s death, she’d never once tried to fix him up with a woman.
He glanced up again as his new secretary rose and headed for her adjoining office. Her hand was on the doorknob when he called out, “Hold up a sec.”
Penny stopped, startled by her employer’s barked command, her heart seeming to stop, too. It leaped into a pounding, joyous beat as she turned to face him, as she was sure that he had at last remembered her. “Yes?” she asked expectantly.
“Do you have any family?”
“Well…no,” she replied, caught off guard by the unexpected question. “Other than a brother, two nieces and a nephew,” she added prudently.
“Good.” He spun his chair around and grabbed the mouse next to his keyboard and began to scroll through a complicated table of computer codes. “’Cause you’re going to California with me this afternoon.”
Her eyes widened as she stared at the back of his head. “To California? With you?”
“Yeah. Go home and pack a bag. Throw in something fancy,” he added.
She gulped a breath, trying to absorb the fact that she would be traveling with him. “Fancy?” she repeated dully.
“Yeah. You know. A cocktail dress or something.”
“B-but why?”
His brows drew together as he found the information he was looking for and clicked on the accompanying file. “A black-tie thing,” he mumbled. “Supposed to bring a date.”
Two
Suzy shoved Penny’s suitcase aside and flopped down on her stomach on the bed, propping her chin on her hands. “I can’t believe Erik didn’t remember you.”
Disappointed because he hadn’t, Penny avoided Suzy’s gaze. “It’s been ten years,” she reminded her friend.
“So what? It’s been ten years for you, too, and you remembered him.”
“Yes, but that’s different.”
Suzy rolled her eyes but—thankfully—let the comment pass without argument. Instead, she craned her neck and peered over the side of the suitcase, poking through the items Penny had already packed. “So how long will y’all be gone?”
“A week.”
“Are you planning on jumping his bones?”
Penny whirled from her closet. “Suzy!”
Arching a brow, Suzy held up a plastic case, taunting Penny with the damning evidence she’d found. “Why else would you have started taking the Pill?”
Her cheeks flaming, Penny snatched the packet of birth control pills from her friend’s hand and shoved it back into her suitcase, burying it beneath a stack of underwear. “That’s none of your business. Besides, I started them over a month ago.” Just about the time she’d applied for the job as Erik’s secretary, she thought but didn’t say.
Chuckling, Suzy sat up, plumping pillows at the headboard before sinking back against them. “Just trying to help you face the facts.”
“If you want to be helpful,” Penny replied irritably, “you can tell me what I should wear to a black-tie affair.”
“What are your choices?”
Penny turned to study the row of clothes hanging neatly in her closet. “Well, there’s the floral dress that I wore Easter Sunday three years ago,” she offered, then glanced at Suzy. “You know. The calf-length dress with cap-sleeves and Puritan-style collar?”
Groaning, Suzy covered her face with her hands. “Please tell me you’re not seriously considering wearing that old thing?”
“What’s wrong with the floral dress?”
“Nothing, if you were going to be herding a gaggle of toddlers at an Easter egg hunt. Jeez, Pen,” she complained. “You gotta stop dressing like somebody’s mother. Think bold. Daring. Go for shock value. I guarantee you, if you do, not a man in the room will be able to take his eyes off you. Not even the Cyber Cowboy himself.”
Penny turned to stare at the clothes hanging in her closet, all of which seemed more appropriate for a PTA meeting at one of her nieces’ or nephew’s schools than for a cocktail party escorted by Erik Thompson.
Not that he would notice her, anyway, she thought, swallowing back a swell of tears.
“I don’t have anything else,” she said, sniffing as she dragged the floral dress from its hanger. “It’ll just have to do.”
Suzy vaulted from the bed. “Then let’s go shopping. We’ll buy you something sinfully expensive. Something totally outrageous that will have Erik Thompson’s eyes bugging out of his head.”
Tempted, Penny glanced at the bedside clock, and the tears pushed to her eyes. “There isn’t time. I have to meet him at the office parking lot at five.” She swept a hand across her cheeks, then carefully folded the floral dress and placed it in her suitcase. “This will just have to do.”
Suzy moved to stand beside her and slipped an arm around her shoulders. “The dress’ll do fine. And so will you,” she added, giving Penny a reassuring squeeze. Drawing away, she sighed as she scooped her purse from the foot of the bed. “I guess I’d better go so you can finish packing. Call me the minute you get back in town.”
“I will.”
“You’d better,” Suzy warned as she headed for the bedroom door. “I want to hear every intimate detail. Oh, and Penny?”
Penny turned to look at her. “What?”
“Don’t forget to take your pills.”
Erik lounged against the hood of his truck, his arms folded over his chest and his buttocks braced against the grill guard, watching as his new secretary steered her beige sedan into her assigned space in the building’s underground parking garage. The vehicle was as plain and nondescript as its owner, he thought, with a woeful shake of his head.
What was Mrs. H. thinking when she hired the woman? he wondered again. Penny Rawley was a mouse, afraid of her own shadow. The first time he lost his temper—which, he admitted, he was prone to do on occasion—she’d probably run from his office, bawling. And he didn’t have the time or patience to deal with a crybaby.
Scowling, he watched her flip up her sun visor, eject a cassette tape from the player on the dash, then carefully slip the tape into its plastic case and tuck it neatly into the console. Her movements were as methodical as a pilot’s, clicking off controls after a landing…which wasn’t a bad thing, he reflected grudgingly. Erik appreciated order. Not that he managed to ever create it on his own. But that’s what secretaries were for, right? Hadn’t Mrs. H. always taken care of all the little details of his life, allowing him the freedom and time to focus on the bigger, more important issues?
Damn straight she had, he thought, swallowing back a lump of emotion. He was going to miss the old girl. She had possessed a sixth sense for determining his mood and anticipating his needs, and had managed for the most part to ignore his temper tantrums…but was unafraid to give him a good tongue lashing when she felt he deserved one.
And now he was stuck with a damn mouse, he thought irritably as he watched his new secretary twist around inside her car to collect something from the back seat.
Her hair was still wound up in that old-maid bun he’d noticed at the office that morning, and she was dressed in the same utilitarian suit, with that damn fussy bow tied prissily beneath her chin.
A week, he thought with a sigh as he heaved himself away from his truck and headed for her car. He’d be lucky if he didn’t die of boredom after the first day.
When he reached the side of her car, he bent over, bracing his hands on his knees to place his face level with the open window. “Ready?”
Before he knew what was happening, he found himself staring at the business end of a small canister of mace. A mouse fending off a man-eating lion. The image that popped into his mind was ridiculous enough to be comical.
“Please don’t shoot,” he deadpanned. “I’ll go peacefully.”
She sagged weakly, then clamped her lips together and reached for the window’s handle, rolling the glass up between them with quick jerks of her hand. After snatching her shoulder bag from the passenger seat, she shoved open the door. “You startled me,” she accused.
He arched a brow, surprised by the unexpected display of temper. “Didn’t mean to,” he said, stepping out of her way. “Was just going to offer to help you with your luggage.”
She headed for the rear of her car, her nose in the air. “I can manage on my own, thank you.”
She stabbed the key into the lock, gave it a furious twist, then flung up the lid. Their hands brushed and their heads bumped as they both reached for the bag she’d stored inside. She leaped back, clutching her hand against her chest, as if stung.
Scowling, he pulled her bag from the trunk. “Over there,” he said, with a jerk of his head toward his truck, then slapped a palm against the trunk’s lid, slamming it down.
She drew the strap of her purse to her shoulder and turned, but stopped before she’d taken a full step, her eyes going wide.
He pressed a hand against the small of her back. “What’s the matter?” he asked, giving her a nudge to put her into motion. “Never seen a truck before?”
She sidestepped just enough to escape his touch. “Of course I’ve seen a truck,” she replied, sounding flustered. “I grew up on a ranch. I just never considered that you would drive one.”
He tossed her bag into the back, then opened the passenger door and shot her a wink as he held it open. “No true cowboy would be caught dead driving anything else.”
When she continued to hesitate, nervously eyeing the gaping distance between the ground and the running board created by the six-inch lift he’d added to the truck’s original design, he realized the cause of her concern. Short of hiking her skirt up around her waist, there was no way she was going to negotiate the climb.
Though he thought that scenario might be worth observing, he resolved her problem by wrapping an arm around her waist and swinging her up. She squealed as he swept her from the ground, then clung to him as he planted her conservative little pumps on the floorboard and her fanny on the passenger seat.
Dusting off his hands, he took a step back. “Comfortable?” he asked, trying hard not to smile.
She stared at him, her green eyes wide and unblinking, her face pale but for two bright spots of color high on her cheeks. A wisp of carrot-red hair had escaped her bun and now brushed her temple. A sense of déjà vu swept over him. Had he seen those eyes before, that face? Had he enacted this scene before?
A frown puckered his brow as he narrowed an eye at her. “Have we—”
She tore her gaze from his and turned to face the front. “Quite comfortable,” she replied, cutting him off. “Thank you.”
Erik frowned a moment longer, then lifted his shoulder and headed for the driver’s side of his truck.
Penny stole a peek at Erik, who sat slumped in the seat next to hers, his head tipped back, his eyes closed, his lips slightly parted in sleep. Though the private jet’s cabin was dimly lit, the overhead reading lamp and the glow from his laptop computer screen provided enough light to illuminate features she’d always considered too perfect to be human.
Taking advantage of this rare opportunity to study him unawares, she leaned for a closer look. He hasn’t changed all that much, she noted. The squint lines fanning from the corners of his eyes were a little deeper than she remembered and his cheeks were a little more lean, but basically he looked the same as the memory she’d kept locked away in her heart for the past ten years.
She caught her lower lip between her teeth, wondering what he would say if she were to tell him that she’d fantasized about him throughout the years, weaving dreams about him that made her blush even now to think about them.
He’d probably laugh, she thought, swallowing back the disappointment. He’d never given her a moment’s notice in college, treating her much as he did now, as if she were nothing but a robot programmed to do his work. Then her purpose had been to earn him an A in English. Now it was to take care of all the little details in his business and personal life.
So what exactly is it about this man that you find so irresistible?
Shying away from the question, she plucked a piece of lint from the sleeve of his T-shirt…then, unable to resist, let her fingers linger on the gentle swell of biceps. The memory of him scooping her up into his arms and plunking her into his truck, settled like a heavy mist over her mind and her heart. Unconsciously she let her fingers drift down his sleeve, shivering when she encountered warm flesh. Then, realizing what she was doing, she snatched back her hand and squeezed her eyes shut.
Oh, Lord, she cried silently. I’ll never survive a whole week without jumping him like some sex-starved nymphomaniac!
In spite of her determination to do otherwise, she stole another peek at him and had to grip her hands over the armrests to keep from reaching out and brushing back the endearing lock of hair that drooped over his forehead.
He’s too handsome, she thought, feeling the panic rising higher. Too worldly, too sexy…too everything!
And she was plain-as-a-copper-penny Penny Rawley, a dried-up old maid who’d barely ventured farther than fifty miles from the ranch she’d grown up on.
Disheartened by the reminder, she lifted a hand to turn off the overhead light, not trusting herself to look at him any longer without touching him again.
But just as her finger brushed the light’s button, an electronic alarm beeped shrilly on his laptop computer. Frozen in place by the chilling sound, she watched the screen flash red.
Erik bolted upright, knocking his forehead against the hand she still held aloft. He blinked twice, then shoved her arm from in front of his face and grabbed for his laptop, drawing it to the edge of the portable desk.
“I didn’t touch it,” she said quickly, fearing the dark scowl that creased his brow was an indication that he thought she’d done something to harm his precious computer. “I swear. I just reached up to turn off your light.”
“It’s him,” he muttered, ignoring her, his eyes riveted on the screen.
“Him?” she repeated, turning to stare at the screen. “Him who?”
Eyes narrowed, his fingers fairly flying over the keyboard, he replied, “Boy Wonder.”
She stared, watching as window after window popped into view, the information that flashed on each as foreign to her as Erik’s reference to Boy Wonder.
“He’s just down the street.” He set his jaw as he increased the size of one window and scrolled through the garbled lines of data registered there.
“Down the street?” she repeated, wondering if he realized they were presently flying 30,000 feet above the ground.
“From the office,” he snapped impatiently, then swore and slammed a fist down on the edge of the portable desk, making the laptop, as well as Penny, jump. “He’s gone,” he said, then swore again. “That sneaky hacker slipped through the cracks again.”
Frightened by his anger, she asked uneasily, “Who is Boy Wonder?”
“If I knew who he was,” he growled, “I wouldn’t be sitting here listening to you yap. I’d be hauling his butt to jail.”
Resenting his contemptuous reply to what she considered a simple and justifiable question, Penny flounced around in her seat and slapped her arms across her chest. “Well, excuse me. It isn’t as if I’m aware of every detail of your life and business. I’ve only worked for your company a month, you know.”
Erik whipped his head around, prepared to lambast his secretary…but when he saw her face, his scathing retort dried up in his mouth.
Those were tears in her eyes, he realized, his stomach clenching at the sight of them. Big alligator-size tears that looked as if they might overflow her eyes and slide down her cheeks at any moment. A twinge of something close to guilt—an emotion Erik rarely indulged in—pricked at him and he tore his gaze from her.
Not your fault, he told himself as he shut down his laptop. She’s a mouse. A crybaby. Totally incapable of handling the stress her job entailed.
“Cry and you’re fired,” he warned as he shoved the laptop under his seat. “I won’t have a crybaby working for me.”
Penny turned her head again, this time away to face the opposite bank of windows, blinking furiously. “I’m not a crybaby.”
“Could’ve fooled me.”
She graced him with the coldest, most damning look she could muster under the circumstances. “I’m not a crybaby,” she repeated tersely. “But you, on the other hand, are undoubtedly the rudest, most self-possessed, most linguistically challenged man I’ve ever met.”
“Never said I wasn’t,” he replied easily, then frowned. “Linguistically challenged? What the hell is that supposed to mean?”
Jutting her chin, she smoothed the hem of her skirt over her knees. “My point exactly.”
His frown deepening, he shoved back his seat and closed his eyes. “You are, too, a crybaby,” he muttered, then held up a hand in warning, as if anticipating a comeback from her. “I’m going to sleep,” he informed her. “And I’d advise you to do the same. We’ve got a lot of work to do once we reach California.”
Moaning softly, Penny sat up straighter in her chair and pressed a hand to her lower back, arching against it as she tried to ease the dull ache there. After more than six hours sitting before a monitor, entering and tracking data for her employer, her eyes burned from the strain of staring at a glowing screen, and every muscle in her body screamed from sitting in the inappropriately designed chair.
Erik certainly hadn’t exaggerated when he’d warned her that they’d have a lot of work to do once they reached California, she thought wearily.
Sighing, she rose and crossed to the wet bar in the hotel’s penthouse suite in search of something to drink. “Would you like a soda?” she asked. “Or something to eat? We never got around to eating lunch,” she reminded him.
When he didn’t respond, she glanced his way. He sat slumped on the overstuffed sofa as he had all day, his cowboy boots propped on the coffee table, his laptop balanced on jean-clad thighs. His forehead looked like a freshly plowed field, the furrows that ran across it deep and wavy, a testament to the level and intensity of his concentration.
The man is a machine, she thought in disgust, a suspicion she’d formed before their trip to California, but now knew for a fact.
They’d arrived in California a little after ten the night before and were at their hotel by eleven, where she’d discovered to her dismay that he intended that they share a suite. She hadn’t had time to recover from the shock of that nerve-warping discovery before Erik had hustled her onto a glass elevator and to a penthouse on the hotel’s uppermost floor.
Once there she lost her ability to speak when confronted with the elaborately appointed and spacious suite—which, thankfully, she’d discovered consisted of a living area and two large bedrooms, each with its own private and luxurious bath. Erik hadn’t shared her starry-eyed fascination with the suite’s opulence and its ceiling-to-floor view of San Diego’s skyline, or her desire to explore. Instead he had immediately mumbled a curt good-night and gone straight to his room and to bed.
Disappointed, Penny had gone to her room, as well. But when she’d awakened that morning, she’d found herself alone in the suite—though, not for long. She’d barely had time to shower and don a fresh suit before Erik had returned, carrying a briefcase filled with a thick stack of reports. Without a word of greeting or explanation as to his whereabouts, he’d given her clipped orders to enter the data from the reports into a computer he’d set up for her on the suite’s only desk.
They’d worked silently and without a break ever since.
Sighing again, she chose a can of juice for her employer, poured it into a glass, then selected some fresh fruit, cheese and crackers from the basket on the bar and arranged them on a plate.
“Here,” she said, placing the snack on the coffee table beside his propped boots. “Eat.”
When he didn’t respond, she drew in a frustrated breath. “Mr. Thompson!”
He jumped, swore, then glared up at her. “What?”
“Food,” she said and pointed to the plate. “Now eat before you collapse from lack of nourishment.”
He scowled and turned his face back to the screen. “Not hungry.”
Wondering why life seemed to always link her with grumpy, sour-faced men who didn’t have the good sense to take care of themselves, Penny snatched the laptop computer from his thighs.
“Hey!” he cried, dropping his feet to the floor and sitting up. “What do you think you’re doing?”
“Taking care of you,” she replied, “just as Mrs. Hilloughby instructed me to do. Though I can see it will be a thankless job,” she added with more than a little resentment. She set the computer out of his reach, then pointed a finger at the plate. “Now eat,” she ordered.
Scowling, he snatched up the plate and fell back against the sofa. He stuffed a strawberry into his mouth and smashed it between his teeth. “Satisfied?” he asked, dashing a hand over his chin to catch a stream of juice that leaked from the corner of his mouth.
With a sniff, she turned for the bar to make a snack for herself. “Only when the plate is clean.”
Erik narrowed an eye at his secretary as she sank down onto a chair opposite the sofa, primly balancing her plate over pressed-together knees.
“What did you do before you came to work for me? No,” he said, holding up a hand before she could respond. “Let me guess. An army nurse? A nun in an all-girl school? A prison guard for a chain gang? A marine drill sergeant?”
She offered him a tight smile. “Funny. But, no, I was none of those things. After graduating from college, I was employed at a local bank, serving as the bank president’s secretary. I resigned about three years ago to work for my brother.”
“Doing what? Breaking kneecaps for him? Kicking puppies? Stealing old ladies’ canes?”
Though his suggestions were outrageous enough to be humorous, Penny refused to dignify his sarcasm with a smile. “My duties included housekeeping, cooking for a family of five and caring for my nieces and nephew.”
He bit a chunk off a wedge of cheese. “Why’d you leave?”
Uncomfortable with his close scrutiny, as well as his question, she lifted a shoulder. “My brother is a widower and depended on me too much, leaving the care of his children entirely up to me. If I’d stayed, he would have continued to ignore them.” She lifted a shoulder again. “So I left.”
“Bet your brother was plenty ticked at you for leaving him in a bind.”
She stiffened, reminded of Jase’s angry phone call when he’d returned to the ranch and found her gone and a new nanny in her place. “I didn’t leave him in a bind,” she stated defensively. “I hired a woman as my replacement. A very capable woman, I might add, who immediately won the children over with her cheerful disposition and youthful exuberance.”
“Cheerful disposition and youthful exuberance?” He snorted a laugh and popped a grape into his mouth. “Who’d you hire? Mary Poppins?”
Irritated by his contemptuous remark, she ignored him and nibbled on a slim wedge of Gouda she’d selected from the variety of gourmet cheeses she’d placed on her plate.
He shook his head and popped the last strawberry into his mouth. “Should’ve stayed with your brother,” he said as he set the plate aside and reclaimed his laptop. “No kid deserves to have a stranger dumped on ’em…even if the alternative is being saddled with a frumpy old aunt who wouldn’t know fun if it bit her square on the butt.”
Frumpy old aunt?
Numb, Penny could only stare, his description of her smacking at an already bruised self-esteem.
She rose quickly, tears stinging her eyes, and crossed to the bar, furiously blinking them back, not wanting to give him the opportunity to call her a crybaby again. She dumped the remains of her snack into the waste basket, rinsed off her plate, then grabbed her purse from the bar and headed for the door.
At the sound of her leaving, he glanced up. “Hey! Where do you think you’re going?”
“For a walk,” she replied, trying her best to keep the tears from her voice.
“But we’ve got that black-tie thingamajig at seven.”
“I’ll be back before then,” she promised, then quickly closed the door behind her before he saw her tears and knew how much his tactless—if accurate—description of her had hurt.
Penny walked down the street, her chin bumping dejectedly against her chest, her gaze on the blurred tips of her black pumps. She wanted to despise Erik for the cruel things he’d said about her but found she couldn’t. Not when he was right. She was frumpy. And she feared she wasn’t much fun, either.
But how could she be fun, she cried in silent frustration, or even know what it was, when she’d never been allowed to have any while growing up? After their parents’ death, Jase had assumed guardianship of her, and if Erik thought Penny didn’t know what fun was, then he should meet her brother, Jase, the epitome of the glowering wielder of the proverbial whip.
She caught her lower lip between her teeth, feeling a stab of guilt for her less-than-charitable thoughts toward a brother who had sacrificed so much for her. Life hadn’t exactly been kind to either of them, she reflected sadly. Their parents’ death had forced Jase to drop out of college and return home to take care of Penny and run the family ranch. And ranch life left little time for fun. Penny knew, because for years she’d worked right alongside her brother.
And when her friends had gone off to college to kick up their heels and spread their wings a little, Penny had remained at home, commuting from their ranch to Austin each day to take courses at the University of Texas. And with Jase, by that time, saddled with the responsibilities of his own growing family, Penny had felt obligated to help finance her education by typing term papers for other students and offering tutoring on the side. Between the long commute, a full load of classes each semester, evenings spent with her head buried in books and whatever hours left over in the day filled with typing term papers or tutoring some unmotivated jock, pitifully few hours remained in which to make new friends or pursue a social life.
No, she thought miserably as she dragged her feet to a stop before a shop’s window display. Penny Rawley wouldn’t know fun if it were to bite her square in the butt, just as Erik had suggested.
Fearing she would cry again if she allowed herself to think about the upsetting conversation any longer, she forced herself to focus on the items displayed in the window. Skimpy sundresses in varying shades of the rainbow draped headless mannequins with hourglass figures, while cropped tank tops danced from invisible strings above coordinating shorts that looked barely long enough to cover a woman’s behind.
And superimposed over it all was Penny’s reflection.
Slowly she focused on it. The sensible bun. The tailored blouse with its crisp bow tied neatly beneath her chin. The utilitarian suit jacket that hung loosely at her hips, hiding a figure that Penny wasn’t even sure existed any more. The A-line skirt, its hem brushing modestly at her knees. She couldn’t see any farther…but she didn’t need to see more of her reflection to realize that frump fit her to a T.
Sickened by the reminder that Erik was right to label her a frump, she started to turn away but stopped and slowly turned back around. But she didn’t have to be a frump, she told herself as she stared at her reflection. She could change. There was no reason she couldn’t dress differently. Granted, she’d never bothered to stay abreast of current fashion trends. Had no need, not when her wardrobe was dictated by what was serviceable for ranch and housework. But that’s what sales clerks were for, right? It was their job to stay on top of what was hot and what was not in the fashion industry. Surely she could trust one of them to help her make a few selections.
Remembering the black-tie affair that Erik expected her to attend with him at seven and the floral dress she’d brought to wear, she glanced at her watch. Two hours. She had two hours in which to recreate herself.
Oh, Lord, she prayed silently, please let it be long enough to create a miracle.
Three
Penny knew she was late and that Erik would probably be furious with her. But she didn’t care. She was too high, too pumped with excitement to care about anything, other than her new look.
Burdened with her purchases, she fumbled the card key for their hotel suite into the slot, pushed the toe of her shoe against the door, then hurried inside. “Mr. Thompson?” she called. “I’m back.”
When she didn’t hear a response, she headed straight for her bedroom, wincing when she saw a piece of paper taped to the door. After dumping her purchases on her bed, she removed the note and read: “Where the hell are you? Main ballroom. Now.”
He hadn’t even bothered signing his name.
Refusing to let his curt note rob her of her good mood, she tossed the paper over her shoulder and dived gleefully into the pile of purchases she’d dumped on the bed. Finding the clothing bag that covered her new dress, she held it up high…and her smile slowly faded.
I can’t do this, she cried silently, panicking. There’s no way in the world I can possibly wear in public a dress made from scarcely more fabric than that of a man’s oversize handkerchief.
Oh, yes, you can, a voice insisted—a voice that sounded suspiciously like her friend Suzy’s. And you’re going to make Erik Thompson’s eyes pop right out of his head.
Clutching the dress to her breasts, Penny headed for the bathroom, repeating under her breath a phrase from the story “The Little Engine that Could,” which her niece Rachel loved Penny to read.
“I think I can, I think I can, I think I can.”
Erik tipped back his head and drained the champagne from the glass, then plunked it down on the tray of a passing waiter. He glanced toward the ballroom’s entrance for about the zillionth time since entering the room and swore under his breath when he still didn’t see a sign of his missing secretary. Scowling, he stuffed his hands into the pockets of his tuxedo slacks and headed for the buffet table.
“Hey, Erik!”
Balancing a plate on his palm, Erik glanced over his shoulder and saw his old friend Buzz Kenney bearing down on him. Relieved to find a familiar face among a sea of strangers, he plucked another skewer of grilled shrimp from the tray. He used his teeth to drag one off its end, before dropping the skewer to his plate and turning to greet his friend. “How’s it going, Buzz?”
“Can’t complain.” Buzz slapped a bear-like hand against Erik’s back. “How ’bout you?”
Erik’s eyes bugged as the force of Buzz’s greeting made the shrimp he’d just swallowed hang in his throat. He gulped, swallowed hard, forcing it down, then slipped a finger behind his shirt’s starched collar and craned his neck. “Fine,” he croaked, “until you came along.”
Buzz tossed his head back and boomed a laugh. “You always were a bit on the puny side.”
Erik shot his friend a frown. “And you were always an overgrown bully.”
“Now, Erik,” Buzz chided. “Surely by now you’ve forgiven me for shoving you buck naked into the girl’s locker room when we were in junior high?”
“Oh, I’ve forgiven you all right,” Erik replied dryly. “I just haven’t forgotten the incident. Nor will I.”
Chuckling, Buzz draped a companionable arm along Erik’s shoulders and turned to survey the room. “Mmm-mmm. Have you ever seen so many gorgeous babes gathered under one roof?”
Erik chose a bacon-wrapped mushroom from his plate and popped it into his mouth, not bothering to look up. “Yeah. One too many times.”
Buzz clasped a hand over his heart. “Oh, man. Don’t tell me the great Erik Thompson has lost his appetite for beautiful women?”
Erik lifted an indifferent shoulder. “If you’ve tasted one, you’ve tasted ’em all.”
“Then you haven’t been samplin’ from the same buffets I’ve been feedin’ from.” He dug an elbow into Erik’s ribs, then boomed another laugh when the dig sent Erik staggering sideways a step.
Frowning, Erik rubbed a hand over a rib he was sure would be sore the next day. “Why don’t you go beat up on somebody else for a while?”
“And leave you all alone?” Grinning, Buzz folded his arms across his chest and rocked back on his heels, trolling the room with his gaze again. “Caught that pesky hacker yet that’s been givin’ you grief?”
Irritated by the reminder, Erik plucked a filled champagne glass from the tray of a passing waiter. “No.” He tossed back half the bubbly liquid.
“Boy Wonder, isn’t it?” Buzz asked, angling his head to look at Erik for confirmation.
“Boy Worrywart, would be more like it. The guy’s becoming a royal pain in the ass, ducking in and out of systems, nosing around where he hasn’t any business.”
Buzz arched a thick brow, leveling a pointed look at Erik. “Sounds like a kid I used to know.”
In spite of the years that separated him from his crimes, Erik felt the heat crawl up his neck. “Yeah, but I was just a kid. Didn’t know any better.”
“Maybe Boy Wonder’s just a kid, too. His name suggests he might be.”
Erik’s frown deepened. “No kid is that good.”
“You ought to know,” Buzz replied, and turned his gaze back to the room. “You were the best.” He puckered his lips in a silent whistle. “Whooee. Would you look at that?” He gave the points of his bow tie a gleeful tug. “Ultimate babe at three o’clock.”
Erik rolled his eyes, amazed that a man Buzz’s age still reverted to locker-room lingo when confronted with a good-looking woman. “Are your hormones always on red alert?”
Buzz grinned as he headed toward the redhead who had caught his eye. “Wouldn’t want ’em any other way.”
In spite of himself, Erik found himself chuckling as he watched Buzz move in for the kill. He pitied the poor woman his buddy had zeroed in on. The woman didn’t know it yet, but she didn’t stand a snowball’s chance in hell of resisting Buzz’s killer charm. The man had more moves than a Ryder truck and more come-on lines than a drunk in a bar at closing time. Erik knew because he’d seen the man in action more times than he cared to remember.
Shaking his head, he started to turn for a second helping from the generous spread of hors d’oeuvres, but spun back, every muscle in his body tensed in denial.
No, he told himself as he stared at the woman smiling shyly up at Buzz. It couldn’t be. He took a step toward the couple, but stopped, sure that he was wrong.
No, he told himself again. The hair color was right, but the style was all wrong. Mouse wore her hair twisted up in a tight, spinsterish bun, not swinging at shoulder length and mussed as if she’d gone a fast round in bed with an overly zealous lover. And there was no way in hell that woman’s body could possibly belong to his secretary. Not that he had a clue what his secretary’s figure looked like. Not when he’d seen her in nothing but those stupid, sexless suits favored by so many executive-type women.
In spite of his doubts, he found himself taking another step toward the couple. Then another. And another until he’d reached Buzz’s side. He slapped a hand against his friend’s back. “Hey, Buzz,” he said, turning on a killer smile that he knew from experience most women found hard to resist. “Aren’t you going to introduce me to your friend?”
“And chance losing her to a smooth talker like you? Man, I’m not that—”
Whatever else Buzz had to say on the subject was lost to Erik as the woman turned to fully face him. “Damn,” he gasped weakly, bracing a hand against Buzz’s arm for support as he found himself staring into all-too-familiar green eyes. He dragged his gaze from her face and down her front, nearly choking when he encountered the mounds of creamy flesh that the bustier-style bodice pushed above the dress’s heart-shaped neckline. “Penny?” he asked, forcing his gaze back to her face. “Is that you?”
Though her smile remained in place, he saw the uncertainty in her eyes, recognized the level of nerves in the tremble of the fingers she smoothed down her thighs—thighs that the dress’s brief hemline barely covered.
“Yes,” she said, then caught her lower lip between her teeth and dropped her gaze, nearly making him groan at the provocativeness in the demure gesture. “I’m sorry I’m late,” she murmured. “I was…detained.” She peeked up at him through a web of lashes. “You aren’t upset with me, are you?”
“Upset?” he repeated, when upset was much too mild a word to use to describe his earlier dark mood. “No,” he lied. “I was just worried that you’d gotten lost or that something might have happened to you.”
She laid a hand on his arm. “I’m so sorry to have worried you,” she said with a contriteness that he would expect from the Penny he’d gotten to know over the last twenty-four hours. But he wasn’t sure he knew who this new Penny was…or if he even liked the change.
He frowned, eyeing her suspiciously. “What’d you do to your hair?”
She caught a lock between her fingers and twisted self-consciously. “I had it cut this afternoon. Do you like it?”
He deepened his frown. “It’s all right…I guess.”
Her disappointment was instantaneous and blatantly obvious, even to a man as self-possessed as people claimed Erik to be.
Buzz stepped between the two. “I like your new hairstyle just fine,” he assured Penny, then gallantly offered her his arm. “Now how ’bout that dance you promised me?”
Penny looked up at Buzz, her hesitancy to accept his invitation evident in her wide, green eyes. She glanced at Erik, then quickly away, and forced a smile as she slipped her arm through Buzz’s. “I’d love to.”
Erik stood where they had left him, watching the man he’d once considered his oldest and closest friend steer his secretary toward the dance floor. When they reached the area and Penny stepped into Buzz’s arms, Erik whirled for the bar, muttering curses under his breath about playboys and innocent lambs being led to the slaughter.
It was well after midnight when Erik unlocked the door to their hotel suite and gestured impatiently for Penny to enter before him.
Her cheeks flushed with excitement, she swept past him on ridiculously high heels, trailing a provocative scent that had Erik lifting his nose and sniffing the air, in spite of his current disgust with his secretary.
She tossed a glittery purse the size of a small envelope onto the sofa, then spun, her hand clasped beneath her chin. “Wasn’t that the most wonderful party!”
Disgusted by her exuberance—as well as by her behavior for the last couple of hours—Erik shrugged out of his tuxedo jacket and threw it toward the sofa. It landed on the floor about two feet shy of his mark. “It was all right,” he muttered.
“All right?” she repeated, then laughed gaily and flung her arms wide. “I can’t remember when I’ve had such a marvelous time. The orchestra was absolutely divine, and your friend, Buzz, such a skillful dancer. I’ve never swing danced before, but he was so patient with me, so kind to offer instruction.”
Erik cut a glance at her, then frowned as he emptied the contents of his pockets onto the bar, resenting her good mood, but unsure why. “We’re here to work,” he reminded her. “Best you remember that.”
Her eyes widened in alarm. “Oh, I haven’t forgotten.” She quickly stooped to scoop his jacket from the floor, then straightened, holding it against her chest as she smoothed the wrinkles from it.
But not before Erik had gotten another good look at the luscious mounds threatening to spill over the top of her dress.
He tore his gaze from the tempting sight and ducked behind the bar, suddenly finding himself in dire need of a drink. Selecting a miniature bottle of bourbon, he dumped its contents into a glass, started to add water, then decided against it and tossed the drink back, neat. He inhaled sharply as the bourbon hit the back of his throat, gulped it down, then hissed a breath as the liquor burned a path all the way to his stomach.
He glanced over to find Penny staring at him in horror.
“What?” he snapped impatiently.
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Peggy Moreland
Тип: электронная книга
Жанр: Современные любовные романы
Язык: на английском языке
Издательство: HarperCollins
Дата публикации: 16.04.2024
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О книге: Penny Rawley hadn′ t traveled across Texas to have sexy CEO Erik Thompson boss her around! Sure, she was his new secretary, but she′ d come to his million-dollar firm with one thing in mind: marrying the man she′ d always loved. Now the irresistible beast had the nerve to ignore her– when he wasn′ t shouting orders.Well, that was gonna change… .Erik couldn′ t believe his eyes. Penny Rawley had gone from mousy secretary– to desirable woman! Now he wanted to take her to bed and show her just who was boss… but found himself scrambling to keep his hard heart intact. For pretty Penny had him aching with a brand-new desire– to claim this beguiling innocent as his own!