Turning the Good Girl Bad

by Avril Tremayne

  ‘But I didn’t sw—’ He broke off, and slowly his bone-melting lopsided smile appeared. ‘Oh, the “dammit”.’ He laughed. ‘Sometimes I wonder if you’re really as twinset-and-pearls as you’d have me believe, Cathy.’

  ‘Twinset and pearls?’

  ‘Prim and proper.’

  A strangled sound escaped Catherine, and Max looked at her sharply.

  She quickly schooled her features into an appropriately offended expression. ‘I do own a twinset and pearls, actually,’ she said, with the hint of a sniff. Of course nobody who’d seen her fire-engine-red cashmere twinset had ever described it as anything other than ‘hot’. And the pearls were exotic black pearls, interspersed with eye-popping turquoise.

  They’d been given to her on her twenty-first birthday, five years before, by her hang-gliding, motorbike-riding brother, Luke, and had cost half the impressive advance he’d received for his second crime novel. To describe those pearls as anything other than dazzling would be ludicrous.

  Max dipped his head in that way he had when he wanted to look her in the eye. And look he did—as though trying to dive into her brain through her pupils.

  ‘I wonder why that’s so amusing to you?’ he asked softly. ‘And what you’re not telling me?’

  Any desire Catherine had to giggle was gone. Sucked out of her by the arrested tone of Max’s voice. His utter stillness. That look... So intense...

  As though he knew...

  No, he couldn’t know.

  Not about her. And not about the book. She’d been so careful to look like, act like, be the quintessential strait-laced wallflower. She’d even changed her perfume from dark musk to lemon-scented, to reinforce the impression that she was tart and astringent and not to be touched. And the book was nowhere to be seen. Safely secret.

  So if Max thought he was going to dig below her carefully constructed surface with a keen look and a so-soft question he had another think coming.

  ‘Shall we get started?’ she asked briskly.

  But Max’s eyes had dropped, all the way to her feet, and Catherine almost groaned. She’d stuck her nail through her last pair of black tights putting them on in a rush this morning, and—of course—hadn’t wanted to take the time to stop and buy more on her way to work. So her legs were bare, and she’d gone all ‘what the hell?’ and was wearing open-toed shoes, with her red toenails on display.

  ‘Huh,’ he said, as if he was saying it to himself.

  Catherine fought off a blush. ‘Well? Shall we? Get started?’

  Max shoved a hand through his already dishevelled hair. His hair was regularly subjected to an unceremonious scrabbling of his hands through it. When he was thinking hard. Or coming up with a brilliant idea. Or exasperated. Or bored. Or... Well, anything.

  ‘Yes, if you can hurry the hell up,’ he said, and went striding back into his office.

  For the next hour Max talked. About the company’s diamond-themed African development, new hotel and shopping complex in Canada and eco-resort in Brazil. Catherine knew how Max worked—his rhythms, his style, his expectations—and could second-guess him as she made notes about actions he wanted put in place, meetings to be arranged, documents to chase up. She took a little old-fashioned dictation for some correspondence, but Max always expected her to finesse his letters using her own words, so she didn’t get too strict with the transcribing, even though she was pretending to get every single syllable verbatim—because that way she could keep her eyes very deliberately on her notepad, and off her boss.

  Which was not easy. Because Max was drop-dead gorgeous.

  Just under the too-tall threshold, with the promise of athlete-grade strength under his immaculate suits; black hair on the long side, and always, always bed-head tousled; vivid blue eyes fringed with thick, black lashes; that lopsided grin that would turn a female ice sculpture into a puddle.

  The whole package—the looks, the sense of humour, the ace brain, and that elusive factor X that made him seem unattainable without any apparent aloofness—was droolworthy.

  There was a good side and a bad side to having a hot-as-Hades boss.

  The good side? Max had women throwing themselves at him with a frequency and ardour that was embarrassing. He didn’t have to grope or flash or proposition an unwilling employee to get his sexual thrills. And what a blissful realisation that had been after the hell of her last boss—the despicable RJ Harrow.

  But the bad side—and it was very, very bad!—was that a month into the job Catherine had started wondering what Max would do if she groped or flashed or propositioned him! And she just could not get her head around how she could think like that. The last thing Catherine needed was another boss-related fracas, ending in her ignominious departure from a job she was good at.

  Not that Max would ever give her the chance to grope or flash or proposition him. Because he might be the flirt of the century—as the whole office knew!—but Catherine North wasn’t his type. Tall, leggy, blonde—dared she say horsey?—that was his type.

  She swallowed a giggle as she pictured the shock on Max’s face if starchy-knickered Ms North were to roll a prurient eye in his direction. They’d need a defibrillator! Or maybe she could give him mouth-to-mouth...

  ‘Something funny, Cathy? Because you’re allowed to laugh here, you know.’

  She looked up. ‘Nothing’s funny.’

  He did that through-the-pupils stare, then leaned back in his chair and loosened his tie with three sharp tugs. ‘Onto the problem child—Kurrangii, our luxury resort in Queensland.’

  He nudged the report he’d taken from her in-tray earlier and smiled at her—and Catherine’s heart started knocking into her ribs again as she hastily dropped her eyes and started taking notes.

  ‘Our’ luxury resort. And it did feel as if it was theirs—his and hers—because they’d worked so closely on it together.

  That night two weeks ago, when they’d stayed late to finish preparing the main report, Max had loosened his tie with those exact three tugs. Her memory of that night was so clear. Just the two of them, bouncing ideas back and forth, writing and rewriting. They’d ordered in Thai food and worked while they ate. It had struck midnight, but they’d worked on. Neither of them had been happy with the end result, so they’d decided to call it a night and do it all over again the next day—into the night if required.

  But Max hadn’t turned up the next day. Or the next, or the next, or... Well, he hadn’t shown up until today. And in the interim the only contact they’d had was via email or through his deputy, Damian.

  It had driven Catherine a little bit crazy.

  She’d figured she had two options for dealing with the situation: she could gnash her teeth at her own stupidity for mooning over her boss, of all people—and, moreover, one who liked tall, skinny, amenable blondes, not short, curvy, argumentative brunettes—or she could take affirmative action to get her out-of-control hormones back in their cage before he returned.

  In the end she’d gone hybrid and started writing Passion Flower. A teeth-gnashing way of exploring her secret fascination with Max and hopefully getting it out of her system before she did something really insane—like throwing herself at him and begging him to take her on his desk.

  Ooohh, a desk scene! Could she write that...?

  Catherine realised Max had finished dictating and was sitting there, watching her, and closed her notepad with a snap.

  ‘So, Cathy...’ he said.

  His voice sounded raw, and Catherine’s mind switched instantly to the job. ‘You need water,’ she said, standing. ‘I’ll get it.’

  ‘Huh?’

  ‘Water.’

  ‘Huh?’ he said again, and then gave his head a tiny shake.

  ‘Your voice sounds hoarse.’

  ‘No, it’s fine,’ he said irritably. ‘And
I can get my own damned water—you’re not a servant.’ He cleared his throat. ‘So, anyway... The Queensland resort. I want to know what you think of all that.’

  ‘All that?’ Catherine repeated, sitting again.

  ‘Yes, all that. I wasn’t talking to myself, was I? Or maybe I was—because you don’t normally sit there like a spewed-up piece of basalt rock.’

  ‘Spewed-up basalt?’ she spluttered, caught between laughter and outrage.

  ‘Yeah—like out of a volcano. But where’s the molten stuff? Aren’t you going to rip into me about the...the...’ He stopped, searching for words, shrugged. ‘I don’t know—the native animals or something?’

  ‘I don’t rip into you!’ she said. ‘About anything.’

  He laughed. ‘Now, that’s a lie.’

  Catherine eyed him cautiously as he stood and walked around the desk, each step redolent with the prowling energy that distinguished all his movements. He stopped just to the side of her chair, then perched his gorgeous butt on the edge of his desk.

  ‘Well? Native animals?’ He plucked the notepad out of her hand, flicked through it.

  Catherine shifted her chair backwards fractionally, clamping down on a spurt of temper. She’d had plenty to say on that subject already, as Max very well knew, because he forgot nothing, so what was this? Torture Your Personal Assistant Day?

  She looked at one of Max’s slashing black eyebrows, which seemed safer than an actual eyeball. ‘Sorry—am I supposed to be allowing for your jet lag? Because you know what I think about that. You thought the same—and you’ve already addressed the issue.’

  ‘Oh, yeah, we talked about it at length didn’t we?’ Pause. ‘That night before I left for Canada. Right?’

  That night. Catherine repeated those words in her head. That night—when she’d half wondered, half feared, that short, curvy, argumentative brunettes might actually get a look-in after all—and had ended up sexually frustrated, writing Passion Flower.

  ‘Okay, then,’ he went on, when Catherine remained silent. ‘What’s your opinion of the way I’ve addressed it? Will the changes I’ve recommended damage your perception of the resort? Does it seem less upmarket if the cabins are repositioned the way I just described and the layout and style are modified? Would you still go there?’

  ‘Yes, I’d still go. If I could afford to, I mean—which I can’t. So, no, I won’t go there, but I would.’

  Catherine mentally slapped herself. Could that be the stupidest thing she’d ever said in her life?

  ‘Because...? You would still go because...?’ he prompted. ‘I’m not asking you for the answer to global warming, Cathy—just a simple opinion about the modifications.’

  Her eyes flashed. ‘I would still go because, judging by the diagrams Carl was kind enough to show me while you were away, the redesign will actually be more in tune with the surroundings. More special. More...secret... That’s the way I’d describe it. Which feels more exclusive.’

  Max held her notepad out to her. ‘Perfect. Put something like that in that last letter, will you? One more meeting on the environmental impact study—just a formality—and we should be ready to get things underway.’

  She reached for the notepad and her knee accidentally brushed against the side of Max’s leg. Somehow that made her start to tremble. Sexual frustration alive and kicking!

  Next thing Max was tossing her notepad behind him onto the desk and catching her hand in his. Four whole months without physical contact, and in one morning three separate hits?

  Today just sucked.

  ‘You’re shaking,’ he said, his face full of concern. ‘And you’ve hardly said a word for the past hour. Something’s wrong. Are you ill?’

  ‘No, I’m not ill,’ she snapped. ‘Nothing’s wrong.’

  Max looked disbelieving.

  ‘I’m fine,’ she insisted, but he clearly wasn’t convinced.

  Catherine tried to pull her hand free. ‘A bit tired, that’s all,’ she offered.

  ‘Tired? Why?’

  Oh, for God’s sake.

  ‘Just a...a late night.’

  She wondered what Max would say if she gave him the bald truth: A late night transferring a few sexual fantasies about you from my head to the page. Yeah—maybe not.

  He let go of her hand—whew!—and folded his arms so his hands were jammed under his armpits.

  ‘Oh. A late night. I thought maybe—’ He shook his head. ‘Nothing. Must be lunchtime, right? I assume you have...’ Another clearing of the throat. ‘Do you have plans?’

  She got to her feet with alacrity. ‘Yes, I do.’

  He watched her for a long moment. X-ray eyes.

  Catherine’s hand reached for the button that wasn’t there, and at last Max waved her towards the door. ‘Can you be back by one-thirty?’

  ‘Yes, of course,’ Catherine said, and dodged around him to grab her notepad.

  She hurried from the office as Max reefed the report he’d taken from her in-tray off the desk, as though it would bite him if he didn’t subdue it.

  Typical Max! He never just picked something up—he had to throttle it.

  Back at her desk, Catherine neatened her work area mechanically. Simmering at the back of her mind was the worrying certainty that her working relationship with Max had gone off the rails this morning. That she’d been caught out.

  Something’s wrong. Are you ill?

  Yes, I’m sick with lust! What are you going to do about it?

  He’d bypass the thermometer and go straight for the psychiatrist if he knew the truth.

  She heard a curse float out from his office. He always cursed and tore his hands through his hair when something outside his control slowed him down, so he must have seen something wrong in the report.

  She caught herself smiling, and pinched her lips to stop it. What the hell was there to smile at? If there was something wrong in the report Max had only himself to blame, because he’d choofed off to Canada instead of sticking around to beat it into shape.

  And him choofing off to Canada was none of her business. She wished he’d go back to Canada. She wished he’d relocate to Canada and email his work in. Because it was not ‘our’ resort. It was his resort. And she would do well to remember that. Sharp, clear distinction between work and personal. Because work wasn’t personal. Work was work.

  And, now she thought of it, she was going to change that scene in Passion Flower. That scene with Alex and Jennifer working in the office over a Thai meal—which she would make a...a...a Chinese meal. In fact she would delete the whole scene. Because in reality that interlude had ended with a brusque ‘Thank you for your help’ and a drive away—and what was so romantic about that? What did she think she was doing, turning that into a ‘Jenny, do you know how long I’ve wanted you?’ moment, complete with a slow reel in and a soft kiss?

  She was a freaking idiot!

  And her damned book sucked.

  ‘Sucked’: word of the day.

  Her eyes moved to her in-tray, where her dark secret was buried.

  Uh-oh. Where her dark secret was not buried.

  Because the manuscript was sitting brazenly on top.

  A whoosh of panic had her reaching for the back of her chair to steady herself. Until she remembered that the report had been covering it and Max had taken the report. That was the only reason the book was sitting there exposed.

  Nothing to panic over.

  Until she reached out to grab the pages so she could stick them in her briefcase...and saw the page on top.

  She distinctly remembered scoring a red mark on the page when Max had called her name.

  But there was no red mark on the page.

  Catherine’s heart stopped, then started pounding. She slid into her chair, boneless. Flicked thro
ugh her in-tray again. Sat stock-still for one appalled moment.

  No red mark anywhere.

  So...if the report had been on top of the manuscript, that meant...

  No—God, no. Max Rutherford had picked up a few pages of her book along with his report!

  And Max had started reading that report as she was leaving the office.

  Hot, then cold, then hot. Hyperventilation. Paper bag...she needed a paper bag. Brain not working. Brain dead.

  Then adrenaline tore through her veins and her synapses fired—electrified by pure fear—and she latched on to two essential facts: one, if Max had read even one sentence of those pages he would have come screeching out already and, two, she had to get those pages back.

  Get them back immediately. But without running into his office, waving her arms and looking like an insane asylum escapee.

  Breathe. Breathe. Breathe.

  Nope—there was nothing for it. It was physically impossible for her to walk calmly into Max’s office.

  She was going in like an insane person.

  TWO

  Max sighed, unwilling to give up until he’d read every page of the report—even if he had yet to take in a single word.

  His mind wasn’t on it. His mind wasn’t in the office at all. His mind was at lunch.

  But he wasn’t going to acknowledge whose lunch his mind was at, or why it was there. Because he was a moron, and had done nothing right for two weeks, and nothing had felt right the whole time he’d been away, and enough was enough, and it was time to put his mind back where it should be.

  So he just sat at his desk, flipping, skimming, flipping, skimming. Counting down pages until he found a word he could take in: ‘Conclusion’.

  One rush of air later he found himself holding nothing.

  The report had been whisked out of his hands so fast it took a few seconds for him to feel the sting of the paper cut that had just been inflicted in the web between his thumb and his index finger.