Rock Hard

by Nalini Singh

Peeking out and seeing he was still looking through the contract, his scowl even heavier, Charlotte said, "I think they tried, but Mr. Hill was very loyal to his friend." Or too lazy to handle the matter when it was so much less stressful to let it slide and go play golf instead.

  Given his work habits--or lack of work habits--Charlotte had no idea how Bernard Hill had managed to rise to the position of CEO of Saxon & Archer, but then, as shown by Anya, the world didn't always reward those it should.

  Her skin grew cold at the reminder that she was about to end up just as unemployed as Mr. Hill.

  "One thing's clear," Gabriel Bishop said now, his jaw set in a brutal line. "McElvoy Junior has been hosing us with these charges." Grabbing the phone, he made a call to Legal. "Terminate the McElvoy contract. They're in breach for the tenth time--and get the damn penalty payments."

  Having utilized the momentary break to retrieve her laptop from the bag, Charlotte waited to be asked to hand it in since it was company property. Why he'd made her carry it up herself, she didn't know. Everyone else had been called up as they were. Maybe he wanted to punish her in some extra way because she'd thrown a stapler at his head.

  "Tell me about the Khan negotiation," he said, setting the McElvoy contract aside to pick up a different one on which it looked like he'd already scrawled notes in deep blue ink. "Hill's personal file on the situation is fragmented at best. Far as I can figure, Khan is happy to sell us the land for a parking lot but has a sentimental attachment to the building currently on-site. I'm assuming you kept better records as part of your job?"

  Charlotte stared.

  Gabriel Bishop shoved a hand through his hair, then leaned forward, forearms braced on a desk that had so many nicks and dents that she knew instinctively it had followed him from company to company as he did what he did best. "Ms. Baird," he said, those cold eyes watching her with a relentless focus that made her every muscle tense to breaking point, "from the memos I see on these files, all of which were apparently created at your workstation, you're highly intelligent. I don't want to fire you, but I will if you can't give me the information I need."

  4

  In News That Surprises No One, Anya Is a Bitch

  Charlotte was flabbergasted that he'd made a point of checking the origin of the memos for which Anya always took credit. She was so shocked that she might have frozen into silence again; it was the critical sentence "I don't want to fire you" that gave her the courage to speak.

  "Mr. Khan," she said, coughing to clear her throat and pinning her eyes on the knot of his tie so she wouldn't have to hold his gaze, "is playing hardball because he knows Saxon & Archer needs that land. There's nothing else available."

  "Reasons for your conclusion?" Gabriel Bishop asked, making edits to another document as he spoke, his strokes sure, the red ink like blood on the page.

  It was easier to speak when he wasn't looking at her. "I've seen three or four of the e-mails he exchanged with Mr. Hill." Bernard Hill had been terrible about saving crucial e-mails, but Anya had forwarded Charlotte the odd one to add to the file. "It's obvious if you read between the lines. He says things like 'I'm sure we can come to a compromise. I know how useful the land would be to Saxon & Archer, and I'm a reasonable man.'"

  Her new boss put down his pen and leaned back in his chair, his attention now fully on her. "I see. Did Hill explore any other options on the parking situation?"

  God, it was hard to think when the force of his personality was smashing against her senses. Lowering her gaze to the knot of his tie again, she said, "No," then bit her lip and went with her gut. It might be twisted into a pretzel by now, but since he hadn't fired her yet... "I did once see a memo from Brent Sinclair"--a very junior member of staff--"that suggested we implement a complimentary shuttle system from a major commercial parking lot about fifteen minutes away."

  A frown from the man on the other side of the desk. "I haven't seen that memo. Forward it to me."

  Having already popped open her laptop, Charlotte was able to quickly locate and forward the memo, and after Gabriel scanned it, he asked her countless more questions about other ongoing situations. She barely had time to breathe for the next two hours. She certainly didn't have time for nerves. The man's mind was a steel trap, and he expected the same from her. How he even knew to ask the questions, some of them incredibly detailed and obscure, she didn't know.

  She answered everything as best she could, having to access the electronic records system for the more intricate details. Just when she thought they were done, he asked her how she'd book a last-minute Friday business trip to Saxon & Archer's Sydney offices for him, with a dinner party thrown for corporate partners upon arrival.

  Charlotte blinked but managed an answer; she'd handled such details multiple times. Anya usually drafted up what she needed, and Charlotte made it happen. Maybe, she thought suddenly, T-Rex intended to make her Anya's official assistant. Not her dream job, since she'd be stuck in an office near the condescending Anya all day, but better than being unemployed.

  "Enough." Gabriel Bishop glanced at his watch. "Tell Anya to get Sinclair up here."

  Charlotte escaped as quickly as possible, sneaking away for fifteen minutes to go grab a stabilizing coffee from her favorite cafe half a block over. Walking around the entire block to calm herself, she returned to her desk to find an e-mail from Anya requesting a concise summary of a labor dispute the previous CEO had ignored for well over half a year.

  The other woman had added: p.s. Guess you haven't been demoted to being the tea lady just yet.

  Relieved at the normality of the request and of Anya's bitchiness, Charlotte knuckled down to work.

  Having sent Sinclair off to draft a more detailed breakdown of his plan after grilling the younger man and confirming the strength of his idea, Gabriel considered the mouse who'd been in his office not long ago. Ugly brown suit, soft blond hair that was in a bun today, and clear hazel eyes shielded behind the lenses of her wire-rimmed spectacles, Charlotte Baird did her best to disappear into the woodwork.

  What Gabriel had discovered today was that the mouse wasn't only hardworking but was also highly perceptive and had a keen intelligence. In the miniscule fractions of time in which she forgot to be terrified of him, she'd... sparkled. Like there was a brilliant light deep inside her, stifled by a crippling lack of confidence.

  An intriguing mouse was Ms. Baird.

  Gabriel found himself interested, and he'd never before found a mouse interesting.

  Setting aside the problem posed by having an employee who was clearly in the wrong position for her skill set, he turned his attention from the mouse to the flashy bird of paradise.

  "Anya," he said into the intercom. "Come into the office. And bring your laptop."

  Feeling as if she'd been through the wars, Charlotte ate a whole bag of chocolate raisins at her desk that evening while finishing up some work for Anya. Her brain felt like it had the consistency of noodle soup.

  It wasn't the work that had exhausted her. No, that had been hectic but interesting. It was the stress of not knowing whether she'd still have a job at the end of the week. Anya's "tea lady" comment had been pure spite, but given Charlotte's abysmal interviewing skills, she'd be lucky if future employers even trusted her to make tea.

  That morose thought was still uppermost in her mind when Molly called at seven to ask if she'd like to grab dinner down at the Viaduct. "Yes!" she said to her friend, and decided then and there that she'd put the whole employment situation out of her head for the next few hours.

  She did slip up and mention the fact she thought Gabriel was a T-Rex, which Molly found hysterical, but her news about work drama paled in comparison to Molly's bombshell. After deciding on dessert before dinner, the two of them walked down to sit by the water, ice creams in hand as they waited for a super yacht to come in. That was when Molly confessed the aftermath of a cocktail party they'd attended the previous Friday night.

  In short, her best friend had taken Zac
hary Fox, rock star and man voted "Reigning Sex God" by a men's magazine three years running, up on his offer of a one-night stand.

  Charlotte's mouth fell open. "You--with Zachary Fox--" Throwing one arm around Molly, Charlotte smacked a big kiss on her best friend's cheek, Molly's skin a pure cream now touched with color. "My hero!" She pulled back her arm a second before her ice cream would've toppled over. "At least one of us will have outrageous stories with which to shock any grandchildren we might or might not have."

  Molly giggled and leaned into Charlotte, her wild tumble of black hair pulled back into a tight braid. Then, eyes on the water rippling with color from the lights of nearby businesses, Molly told her how the one-night stand had turned into a much more complicated arrangement that held the potential to tear open old scars so jagged and raw that Charlotte wasn't sure the wounds had ever truly healed.

  "Do you think I'm being ridiculous?" her best friend whispered. "About not being caught by the media with Fox?"

  "Of course not." Charlotte finished off her cone, balled up the napkin it had been wrapped in, and took Molly's to the trash as well before coming back. "I was there, remember?" She closed her hand over Molly's, heart hurting for her friend. "Did you tell Fox about what happened? So he knows it has nothing to do with him?"

  Shaking her head, Molly pointed out the gleaming super yacht that had appeared in the distance. They watched the sleek craft glide in, the words they exchanged in the ensuing minutes layered with old pain.

  Driven by her love for the woman who'd been her best friend since they first met in nursery school over two decades ago, Charlotte said, "I'm scared, Molly. All the time." Until she couldn't breathe sometimes. "You know why."

  Molly hugged her close, her voice fierce as she said, "We don't have to talk about it."

  "No, it's okay." She turned to face Molly, looking into the warm brown eyes that had been the first thing she'd seen after she woke in the hospital bed just over five years ago. Molly hadn't left her bedside for a single minute. "I miss out on so much because I'm scared--and the thing is, I'm intelligent enough to know it." To be painfully aware she was living in a cage of her own construction. "That just makes it worse."

  "You're selling yourself short." Molly scowled. "You said I was brave, but I wouldn't have made it through high school and foster care without you. You were my rock."

  "You were mine, too." Charlotte shook her head, refusing to allow her friend to be sucked under by the trauma and anguish that had blighted her teenage years. "Don't let that tough, strong, fifteen-year-old girl down, Molly. Don't shortchange yourself like I do." Charlotte knew it was too late for her to break the bars of her own cage, but Molly had a shot and Charlotte would do everything in her power to make sure her friend took it.

  "Is it worth it," Molly said at last, the agony of memory in every word, "for a single month?"

  "That's for you to decide," Charlotte said, then fanned her face. "But I vote for breaking the bed with Mr. Kissable."

  Molly burst out laughing, the sound a little wet. "Maybe you need a rock star of your own."

  "No way. I'd rather go to bed with T-Rex." It was a flip comment that hid countless fantasies. And fantasies they would remain, she thought, as she and Molly found a place to eat after her best friend finished grilling her about her new boss. Because the fear inside her, it would permit nothing else, permit no extraordinary life where she caught and held the attention of a man like Gabriel Bishop.

  The next morning, Charlotte was still thinking about Molly and hoping her friend would find a way to talk to her rock star about the past, when geeky, sweet Tuck poked his head around her cubicle wall. "Charlie, did you hear?"

  Put on guard by the awed shock in his tone, she said, "What?"

  "Anya," he whispered, eyes all but popping out of his head and dark blond hair disheveled. "He fired Anya."

  Charlotte collapsed into her chair, her knees like jelly. "Oh, no." If Anya was gone, she had to be next. She jumped a foot when her phone rang even as the thought passed through her head.

  "Ms. Baird. In my office."

  Hanging up with trembling hands, she pushed up her glasses and told herself she could deal with T-Rex and the chopping block. After all, she'd survived far worse. That's what she had to remember. She'd survived. "I have to go upstairs," she said to Tuck.

  The nineteen-year-old's face telegraphed his distress. "God, Charlie."

  "It's okay. I'll come see you afterward." If she was even allowed back on the floor and not just shown the door.

  People didn't stare at her this time. She might've taken that for a vote of confidence if not for the funereal gloom on their faces when they glanced at her out of the corners of their eyes. Most of them had already been through the gauntlet, come out safe on the other side.

  Most of them weren't in a redundant position.

  The walk upstairs and down the corridor felt like it took an eon, and then she was entering the T-Rex's den, his door having been open. He was standing with his back to the glass wall with its incredible view, his cell phone to his ear. Today's suit was a deep charcoal gray paired with a steel-gray shirt and a charcoal tie. Austere and dark, it threw his features into stark relief.

  Gabriel Bishop was a gorgeous man.

  Charlotte could admit that in the privacy of her own mind. Too big and muscled and dangerous, but gorgeous. Like a tiger was gorgeous. Right before it ate you.

  Walking over to his desk, still involved in a discussion that--from the context--she guessed was with one of their South Island store managers, he picked up a cup of takeout coffee and held it out to her. She took it on a surge of hope. Despite her thoughts when they'd first met, T-Rex didn't have a policy of offering his victims a last meal--or last drink. Since she wasn't sure her jelly knees would continue to support her, she took a seat while he paced and talked.

  After she girded herself to sip at his version of coffee, having glimpsed the tar-black stuff in the open takeout cup on his side of the desk, she found her taste buds blooming. He'd handed her a frothy, creamy latte--one of her favorites.

  At this point, Charlotte had given up guessing how he knew things. But surely he wasn't planning to fire her... unless he got off on being cruel. On raising hopes only to dash them. There were men like that. She knew. God, she knew.

  Stomach a ball of ice between one thought and the next, she held on desperately to the cup as he ended the call and pinned her with his gaze.

  "Ms. Baird, we need to have a serious discussion about your future."

  5

  Charlie-mouse vs T-Rex: Round 1

  Gabriel watched Charlotte's slender fingers tighten around the takeout cup so hard that she dented it.

  Her cheeks had gone pale, but she kept her shoulders up and she found her voice. "Yes, sir?"

  Good, he thought. The fact she was shy and uncomfortable around him was a distinct negative when it came to the position he was about to offer her, but she had guts and she had brains. He could work with that. "I need a new PA."

  She blinked, her fingers easing their death grip on the takeout cup. "Do you want me to help HR screen applicants?" The faintest hint of a relieved smile. "I have a good idea of what Anya's job entailed."

  "No," he said, taking a seat since he could tell his size intimidated her. Not that he was much smaller sitting down. "There won't be any applicants. You are going to be my new PA."

  She just stared at him, her soft pink lips parted in a silent gasp. Bitable lips. That, he told himself, was a highly inappropriate thought, but for some reason, he couldn't wipe it from his brain. When she wasn't quivering in terror, Ms. Baird with her agile mind and her sparkling eyes was very, very intriguing. As for the rest of her--her shapeless clothes couldn't hide the fact she was built like a pocket Venus. Undo her ponytail, take off the glasses--or maybe he'd leave them on--and she'd be a petite, curvy, bitable package.

  Of course, his attraction to this pretty mouse wouldn't have saved her position if she'd been incompet
ent. Though had the latter been true, he wouldn't have found her anywhere near as intriguing. Smart women were his catnip.

  Too bad he was her boss. "You'll take over Anya's role, effective immediately."

  Eyes going wide, she squeaked out a protest. "I can't do Anya's job!"

  Gabriel raised an eyebrow. "Really? Strange, since it appears you have been doing it for the past three years." There was nothing he hated more in the business world than people who took credit for the hard work of others. "Anya couldn't answer the majority of the questions I posed to you yesterday."

  Worse, unlike Charlotte, the other woman hadn't known where to go or which files to access to get the information. She'd just smiled serenely and said she'd have the research on his desk first thing in the morning, then had no doubt gone out and e-mailed Charlotte the work requests.

  Gabriel's suspicions had been roused Monday--by the fact his PA was always available and smiling and put together in spite of the fact he'd thrown an avalanche of work at her. Any other man or woman in her position would've snapped at him at least once, and never, never would she have been able to leave the office at a reasonable hour. It had taken him less than five minutes to access the file records of the memos hitting his desk.

  The last access code was always Anya's--when she'd printed out the document. Everything below that linked back to Charlotte's workstation. It was to make dead certain of his suspicions that he'd put both women through the same interview yesterday. He didn't need a polished liar by his side; he needed Charlotte with her intelligence and her deep knowledge of the staff and their skills. Without her, it might've taken him weeks to discover Sinclair.

  Anya hadn't known the Sinclair proposal even existed.

  "But," Charlotte began on a rush of breath, as if she'd built herself up to get it all out, "I don't know how to deal with suppliers and management and--"

  "You'll learn." Gabriel couldn't figure out why a woman so damn good at her job was so diffident about her abilities. "There's really no choice. You accept this position or you pack up and go," he said, testing how far he could push her. "You've done too good a job in your current role--there's no longer any need for a full-time employee there." An absolute truth. "It's be my PA or hand in your access card to the building."