“This assistant position is perfect for you,” Daryl added with a glance over her shoulder at Zach.
Assistant.
Realization formed a knot in her stomach as Daryl’s words and Zach’s presence sank in. Work…with Zach. How was she supposed to work with him day after day when her skin tingled with anticipation whenever he was near?
“Don’t you agree, Zach?”
The firmly worded question told Allison that Zach had already made his disagreement perfectly clear. But his response was as cool and slick as the crystal on the face of the watch he wore as he said, “Of course. Allison will make the perfect partner. I’m looking forward to the start of our professional relationship.”
Professional relationship.
As they walked out of Daryl’s office together, Allison didn’t need any special app from Zach’s cutting-edge phone to translate what those words meant. The worst part was she should have seen it coming. She couldn’t have anticipated Daryl extending her contract, but she had worked at Knox long enough to know Zach’s reputation. Work first. Period.
Yesterday going to dinner as Zach’s girlfriend had seemed like an adventure, one night of pretend before the clock struck midnight. But as with a different fairy tale, it was the kiss that broke the spell—a kiss that changed the moment from a fun adventure to something…more.
A kiss that had knocked down the protective barriers she’d built since the breakup with Kevin. One that overwhelmed her common sense and made her long to surrender her entire body and soul. And one that Zach regretted just as deeply.
Remember Plan A…
In a few weeks, she’d walk away from Knox Security—and Zach—without a look back. Whatever ridiculous hope she’d had that he was different from Kevin had withered at his frigid reaction in front of their boss. She wouldn’t give Zach another thought. Not one…
“Allison, wait.”
She turned at the sound of his voice, but he was closer than she thought. She took a stumbling step back to avoid running straight into his chest. He reached out to steady her, his hands bracketing her waist exactly like they had before he kissed her. Heat soaked into her skin from his touch, and Zach must have felt it, too. He snatched his hands back before they could burn.
“Allie—” He gave his head a quick shake. “Allison.”
“Might as well call me Ms. Warner,” she muttered.
He blinked as if the idea had actually crossed his mind. “What?”
“Nothing.”
Silence fell between them, tension-filled and rife with could have been and never was. Zach sighed, regret flashing for an instant in his blue eyes. But then he straightened his shoulders, and his business-only mask fell into place. “I’ve been a salesman here for five years and not once has Daryl said I need help with a client. For him to insist on it…” The line etched between Zach’s brows clearly spoke his displeasure with his boss’s change in tactics. He shook his head. “I feel like I’m under a microscope right now, and I can’t do anything that might be seen as losing my head.”
And why did that make everything so much worse? To know she wasn’t the only one who’d lost her head? It was one thing to feel control slip away during a heated kiss, but to hear him admit it as part of an argument for why that one kiss would never be anything more…
“Last night was a mistake. The best thing for both of us is to pretend it never happened.”
Allison felt her face start to heat as anger burned inside her. Zach expected her to keep her mouth shut and go on with business as usual. Just like Kevin had. And while she could no way compare her long-time relationship with Kevin to a single kiss from Zach or his brush-off to Kevin’s betrayal, Allison refused to make things that easy on him.
“It’s too bad,” she said finally.
“What is?”
“That we didn’t know sooner that we’d be working together.”
“I know. I’m glad we’re seeing this the same way,” he said, his voice grim, but Allison shook her head.
“I don’t think we do. See, if you’d known we’d be working together, you never would have kissed me. Because now you’re going to forget that kiss ever happened.”
“And what would you have done?” Zach asked, the words sounding pried from his throat with a rusty crowbar. “Had you known we’d be working together?”
“Me?” She shrugged. “I still would have kissed you. But I would have tried a lot harder to make sure you couldn’t forget.”
It was the perfect parting shot, and had life been a movie with Allison in the lead role, she would have gotten away with tossing the line over her shoulder on route to the elevator. But life wasn’t a movie, and she was starting to realize her sense of timing stunk. Instead of the director calling “cut,” the crack of Daryl’s door opening broke the moment, and both Allison and Zach froze. For a split second, her gaze stayed locked with Zach’s before she looked over to their boss framed by the doorway.
“Good, you’re both still here.” Nothing in their boss’s expression gave any indication he’d picked up on the tension between her and Zach, but Allison’s sigh of relief was short-lived. “Zach, about that cancer benefit—take Allison with you. Your partnership starts tonight.”
Chapter Four
It’s only one night.
Zach repeated the mantra as he handed the valet the keys to his car. The refrain had been playing through his mind from the moment Daryl insisted Zach take Allison along to the gala at the upscale Scottsdale hotel. Lights glowed from inside and out, illuminating the lobby and the well-dressed men and women making their way through the frosted glass doors.
Just one night. He took a deep breath as he circled to the passenger side of the car and steadfastly ignored his conscience’s biting reminder that he’d used that same justification the night before—a decision that could potentially make tonight and the next few weeks feel like tap dancing through a minefield.
Juggling a fake girlfriend and temporary assistant all wrapped up in one smart, sassy package would be difficult at any time. But to manage it when his total attention should be focused on winning the Collins account and making his case for the upcoming promotion…
He could do it. He had to. Zach refused to let this opportunity slip by. He wasn’t going to spend his life looking back at his failures. He’d learned all he needed to know about could-have-beens from his father.
Nathan Wilder had been a dreamer. But instead of dreaming about a glorious future, his dreams had remained locked in the past. He was the high school golden boy who’d never eclipsed his popularity as the starting quarterback, a grown man whose crowning achievement in life was being named homecoming king his senior year.
Could have ridden that university football scholarship straight to the pros…
Could have made a fortune in endorsements.
And even as a young boy, Zach had understood why those could-have-beens never turned into more than that.
Could have had it all…but then your mother got pregnant with you…
Zach was the reason behind his father’s life of failure. He had known that ugly truth since he was a kid, but he still got a sick feeling in his stomach whenever he thought about it. He’d seen old videotapes of the championship game where his father quarterbacked his team to victory. Nathan Wilder often watched the old games after he’d been drinking. Zach had come to despise football, but he’d seen those taped games as a kid. His father had been a great quarterback.
There was no telling what his father might have accomplished if he hadn’t been burdened with a child he didn’t want and a wife he’d felt obligated to marry.
It was a mistake Zach wouldn’t repeat.
He was going to have his success, and no one, no one would be to blame because he would not fail.
All he had to do was keep his focus on his goal, to keep reaching for what he really wanted—
The passenger door opened, and Zach caught another glimpse of the long legs and smooth skin that h
ad tempted him from the moment Allison opened her front door. Desire hit like a blow beneath the belt, sucking the air from his lungs and sending his blood rushing from his head. He should have been prepared, but he already had the uneasy feeling Allison was one woman who would always catch him off guard.
Her green eyes glowed, the dimple in her cheek on full display, as she held out her hand. “Have I mentioned how much I’m looking forward to this?”
“Several times,” he said dryly even as he steeled himself for the warm, silken feel of her skin against his own as he led the way inside the hotel.
Anyone who thought revenge was best served cold never met a dish like Allison, Zach decided. There was nothing cold about the woman at his side. Her halter-style dress hugged the curves of her breasts and narrow waist before flaring over her hips and cascading in tiers to below her knees. Zach didn’t know enough about women’s fashions to name what the dress was made of, but the material had an iridescent sheen and captured all the warmth of a desert sunset. In one moment, the dress was gold, then orange and pink and red…. And even though it had to be nothing more than a trick of the lobby’s crystal chandeliers, he couldn’t help thinking the shifting, undulating glow came not from the overhead light, but from a fire burning inside the woman herself.
The charity event had brought out the best and the brightest of Scottsdale society, but as they walked into the ballroom, Allison put them all to shame. A flickering flame amid a room full of moths. And even though he knew he was only going to end up burned, the beat of the blood in his veins urged him closer.
“Are we fighting?”
As Allison leaned close, he caught the strawberry scent of her shampoo along with a hint of a sexier perfume, the sweet and spicy combination a perfect blend for the woman herself. With her scent filling his head, it took a moment for the words to gel. “Fighting?”
“I figure we need some kind of cover story for the scowl on your face.”
She smiled at a group of men near the bar as they passed by, and Zach figured his “scowl” just got even darker when he saw the subtle nudges and nods in her direction, the immediate straightening of spines and lift to their shoulders, putting masculine interest on display. Allison didn’t seem to notice how their gazes roamed over her golden skin and slender curves, but Zach turned her toward him, making sure his body blocked their line of sight.
The protective instinct was more familiar than the sting of jealousy, but in the past, Zach had always justified those feelings as an occupational hazard. He sold high-tech security systems, that was his job, but he liked the idea of keeping people safe. With Allison, though, he was going to be the one who needed extra security to keep her from slipping past his defenses with her spirit and sass and an ability to roll with the punches that had already saved him from Riana Collins once.
“We’re not fighting.”
She gave him a patronizing pat on her arm. “It’s all right. We can always kiss and make up later.”
“We’re not fighting,” he stressed as he leaned closer to make his point. And there would be no kissing. Until the Collins deal was sealed, they had to maintain the pretense of dating for Riana’s benefit. But that charade didn’t extend beyond the ballroom, so Zach had no reason to think of the ride home to Allison’s condo, of the walk to her door, of a good-night kiss, or—heaven help him—an invitation inside.
And yet he could see those moments reflected in the darkening of her green eyes, hear the whispered invitation in the sudden catch in her breath, feel the sexual attraction pulsing between them…
But then someone bumped into Zach from behind with a muttered apology, and the moment was broken.
Allison blinked, shaking off the same sensual spell that had held him captive, and regained her earlier confidence. “Then at least try to look like you’re enjoying yourself.”
“I think you’re enjoying this enough for the both of us,” he muttered even as he attempted to relax and pull off a passable imitation of a smile.
Over the next half an hour, Allison seemed to go out of her way to prove his words true. She hummed along with a cover band playing in the background, tapping her foot with the beat of the drum. She went back and forth between items up for silent auction, a tiny frown between her brows, as if debating where to spend her last dollar. She listened with empathy and encouragement as guests at the benefit shared stories of courage and survival.
But unlike his smile, unlike their relationship, nothing in Allison’s words or actions was staged or put on for show.
“Don’t you two make such a gorgeous couple,” a silver-haired matron said over the music and laughter filling the hotel’s gold and ivory ballroom.
“That’s what I always say,” Allison replied as she and Zach joined the older woman and her balding husband at a buffet table loaded with rich and decadent desserts. She slanted Zach a glance guaranteed to make a man’s mouth water with a different but equally decadent hunger. “Isn’t it, darling?”
“You know, the pretend girlfriend thing is only for Riana’s sake,” he muttered as the older couple drifted toward a fountain overflowing with drizzling chocolate.
Allison offered a sassy smile as she selected a chocolate-covered strawberry and lifted it to her lips. “Turns out I’m something of a method actor. I need to stay in character.”
It was payback, Zach knew, and he deserved it. He’d hoped—foolishly, he’d known that even as the inane sentiments were leaving his mouth—by announcing they should forget the kiss they’d shared, it would somehow make it so. The wave of a magic wand even though he’d stopped believing in fairy tales so long ago, he couldn’t recall an innocent, wide-eyed time when he might have actually thought they could come true.
Reality was a kiss that still sizzled beneath his skin and a mandatory working relationship that could prove untenable if he wasn’t careful. But after the subtle touches and secretive smiles as Allison expertly pushed his buttons, Zach wasn’t feeling careful. He was ready to push back.
He closed his hand around her wrist, taking more pleasure than he probably should in the slight flare of surprise in her green eyes. Lifting the slender hand still holding the strawberry she’d just tasted to his own mouth, he murmured, “Funny thing about revenge… It cuts both ways.”
He may as well have aimed the warning at himself, but he didn’t bother to heed it. The sharp edge of desire sliced at the tight reins of his control as he took a bite of the strawberry. It was only imagination that he could taste the flavor of Allison’s lips in the fruit’s fresh, juicy flavor. But he didn’t imagine the leap in her pulse beneath his fingers or the subtle hint of color staining her cheeks as he held her hand and gaze captive. Signs that while Allison may have been playing, she wasn’t acting.
The attraction between them was real, potent…and nothing but trouble if he couldn’t get it back under control.
A sudden screech of feedback made Allison jump, and she quickly pulled her hand from his. He should have been grateful for the interruption. But as he watched Allison set the unfinished strawberry aside and wipe her fingers on an ivory colored napkin, part of him resented the intrusion.
“Thank you all for coming this evening.” Riana Collins stood on the small stage previously occupied by the four-piece cover band. Dressed in a low-cut black gown, her dark hair pulled high in a sleek ponytail that accentuated her exotic features, she looked comfortable and confident in the spotlight. And why not? From what he’d seen by the well-dressed crowd—laughing, talking and drinking champagne—the benefit was going to be a success.
“She looks amazing,” Allison commented as Riana thanked her fellow committee members for their hard work before introducing the president of the charity.
Zach shot her a wry look. “Now that is a statement no wise man would touch with a ten-foot pole.”
“Oh, come on, Zach. You’re a guy. And anyone can see Riana Collins is a gorgeous woman. I don’t expect—” Allison cut herself off abruptly. Maybe because t
his wasn’t a real date and neither of them were supposed to have any expectations.
But something in her acceptance bugged him. “More assumptions, Allie?”
“What do you mean?” she asked, her expression a little uneasy as she met his gaze.
“You’ve already said you think I’d make a bad boyfriend. Now I’m an unfaithful one, too?”
“I didn’t say that,” she argued. “I wasn’t even talking about you in particular.”
He eyed her carefully. “So who was he? The guy you didn’t expect to keep his eyes off beautiful women?”
“Old boyfriend. Old news,” she insisted with a toss of her blond head.
Her eyes snapped with the spirit Zach was getting used to, and he was glad to see it. “I hope you dumped him.”
“Not as fast as I should have.”
“Let me guess. Not before his hands followed where his eyes shouldn’t have been.”
She gave a short laugh. “Something like that. But the truth is, I should thank Kevin. If not for what he did, I wouldn’t be here now.”
If that was the case, then maybe Zach owed good ole Kev his thanks as well. He’d caught more than a few eyes wandering Allison’s way throughout the evening, looks he’d warned off with a pointed glare even as a proprietary feeling filled him. Knowing he had no right to that feeling didn’t make a bit of difference.
When it came to work, he’d done—and would continue to do—what he had to in order to get ahead. His clients were typically wealthy businessmen who enjoyed the finer things in life and surrounded themselves with people they saw as equals. Peers. Members of their own class. So Zach had learned to play golf, to appreciate a fine cigar, to know the difference between a hundred dollar bottle of wine and the stuff that came from a box.
Still, designer suits, champagne and caviar were as far from his hand-me-down, beer and burger upbringing as he could possibly get, and he always felt like an imposter as he walked into these black-tie events. The wrong-side-of-the-tracks kid dreading the moment when someone would spot the poor boy who didn’t belong.
Temporary Boss...Forever Husband Page 5
