by Avery Laval
It was a big job, and without wanting to, Jenna had to give Grant credit for the success he’d found in it. She watched and took minutes from a chair off to the side as he guided the staff through the meeting, easily managing different personalities and handling issues large and small. As hard as she tried not to, she found the balance of warmth and efficiency he used in handling his staff most impressive.
If only he could have been so fair and kind six years ago, when he’d handled her.
When the meeting was over, Jenna hustled back to her desk, hoping to at least be able to get comfortable on the phones and set up her email account before Grant assigned her another task. But she’d only managed to turn the computer on and create a login before he strode into the room, a bold smile on his face and a thick pile of sketches in one hand. On his arm, he’d draped his suit coat, and in just his tailored white shirt and tie, the defined muscles of his arms and chest were all too apparent. Jenna tried, unsuccessfully, not to notice. If there was a single man in the world she shouldn’t be attracted to, it was Grant Blakely.
“From the design team,” he said, moving assuredly toward his office and waving the stack of papers in the air. “I need you in my office to take notes while I brief before the meeting at one. I haven’t had a chance to become familiar with the Series 5 and 6 rings, and the designers will know the moment I walk in if I’m unprepared. I’ve got to cram, or I’m in serious danger of wasting other people’s time.”
Jenna was surprised to hear him confess his unreadiness to her. The admission almost made him seem human. Was that what made him so successful in business, this disarming openness that won you over at the word go? It certainly did make her want to work harder, to try to make him happy.
Jenna shook her head to clear it of such a romantic notion. Everything Grant Blakely did was manipulation, pure and simple. She remembered how he had behaved six years before, when she’d been at her lowest. First he’d seemed like a friend she could trust—and then he’d pounced. He’d never been willing to admit any wrongdoing then, and now he was just using this nice-guy demeanor to get what he wanted.
She couldn’t let down her guard, no matter how approachable—make that irresistible—he might seem.
“I’m sure I can help,” she said, squelching the bubbles of emotion that ran through her as best she could. She followed him into his office, sat on the couch off to the side of his desk with her notepad balanced on her knees, and looked up at her new boss. “I’m ready when you are.”
But he wasn’t ready. He was standing beside his desk chair, frozen, staring down at her hotly—almost as if he was angry. Or was she mistaking intensity for anger? Jenna stared back, trying to return the look he was giving her. It was almost as if he could stare into her head and see her thoughts. What did he imagine they were? And what was he thinking in return?
She hoped his thoughts weren’t as licentious as hers were quickly becoming. Under his searing gaze, with his brown eyes and heavy lashes fixed on her, her whole body seemed to loosen and turn into liquid. She blinked hard, trying to break the connection between them.
But it was useless. He didn’t avert his stare, only squared his shoulders to face her, as though he might reach out one hand to pull her in, to press his body against hers. That simple action was too much for Jenna’s vivid imagination. She felt her defenses go slack, and her shoulders dropped as if her spine was molten. With all her might, she willed him to look away—even as her body sent images to her mind of him crossing the room, pushing her down on the couch, opening her suit jacket and sliding his hand across the planes of her bare chest. How warm his hand would feel, how it would burn her skin as it moved under the strap of her camisole, pushing it down, moving his head lower for a kiss.
Just like that, his eyes released their lock on hers and dropped to the papers on his desk. It was as if a spell had been broken. How long had that moment lasted? A second? A minute? An hour? Had she imagined it altogether?
“Jenna? Are you with me?”
Jenna flushed. She hadn’t imagined it. Or rather, she had imagined all too much, and left herself staring at her new boss like a starstruck fan. Had her mouth been open? She shuddered at the thought. Be a professional, she reminded herself.
“I apologize, Grant.” She poised her pen over the notepad and crossed her legs. She caught him watching one leg slide over the other and felt a frisson of awareness. “You need to review the new designs?”
“Right. Lets start with the newest rings. Take notes, please—I prefer to think aloud.” He picked up a manila folder full of sketches. “I asked the designers for a look that was more art deco than what we’ve done in the past for engagement rings. We need to take back lost business from online estate dealers. Come over here and take a look.”
Jenna blanched, then forced herself to cross to the desk, lean over the opposite side. “No, come over here.” He waved an arm toward himself. “Many of these rings have a right side and a wrong side. You can’t look at them from upside down and get a real impression.”
Obediently, she rounded the desk, wedged herself behind it, standing just inches from where he leaned forward in his executive chair, close enough that she could feel the heat from his body. She leaned over the plans and tried to think businesslike thoughts. “Look at 6B,” Grant instructed. “What’s the problem there?”
Jenna stared at the ring, tried to clear her mind. But only one answer would pop into her head, so she blurted it out. “It’s unattractive?”
She was afraid her comment might offend him, but instead Grant laughed, a warm, lit-up sound Jenna found a little surprising and incredibly disarming. “Well. I suppose it might be. But that’s not the biggest issue. Here.” He reached out his right hand towards hers, and for a bated moment she thought he was about to take her hand. Instead, he slipped the pen she’d been holding out of her fingers to circle a portion of the design in ink. Jenna felt the heat of his glancing touch echo on her skin even after it was gone. “See these diamonds?” He ran the pen over the side diamonds that flanked the center stone—first the left, then the right. “Look how big they are in comparison to the center stone.”
“Very big. And therefore expensive,” Jenna said, nodding as she caught on. “The customer—presumably a man getting ready to propose—will want to spend his money on the biggest center stone he can afford, and save on the rest of the setting.”
“That’s exactly right.” There was energy in his voice. No matter what his pretense, she couldn’t doubt he loved this business. “According to our market research, male jewelry shoppers are often looking for bragging rights. Total carat weight tends to make their eyes glaze over. They’re looking for one big impact—the thing that will make her say yes.”
Jenna heard the words, let them echo in her head, stopped herself before her mouth formed the word “yes” back at him. She cleared her throat. “Did you say this ring was 6B?”
“Yes.” Grant looked back to his paperwork, as though he too were remembering himself. “Now, the other rings in the 6 series,” he droned, while she scribbled notes along. “I like them. I need more originality on A, C , and D, but E is a selling ring.” He paused while Jenna took his thoughts down, then shuffled to a new set of pages. “The 5 series I’ve seen a few times now, and I think it’s getting to where it needs to be. This is the look for women interested in colored diamonds.”
“Fancies.” Jenna murmured the industry lingo without thinking. “Yellow, champagne, blue, pink.”
“Yes, although champagne is a saturated market at the moment. The trick is, the fancy diamonds are so expensive in the popular colors that the rings need to be designed to accommodate smaller solitaires. Or settings with fewer side stones to keep them affordable.”
Jenna nodded, understanding almost by instinct the challenge that presented. “But they still need to look dazzling and unique,” she said. “Look at this one, 5C. Does it ring any bells for you?”
Grant looked up at her curiously,
wondering what she might have to say. “Only because I’ve reviewed this design several times. I liked this one from the word go.”
“It looks very familiar.” She spoke without thinking. “I think it’s quite similar to a new Tiffany design.”
Grant’s brow furrowed, surprised at her observation, and in response, Jenna’s confidence soared. Maybe she wouldn’t always be tipped off balance when they were together. At the moment it almost felt as though they were relating to each other as equals.
“Yes. I’m quite sure of it,” she went on. “It’s almost identical.” Though she hadn’t spent a dime on jewelry since her brother’s diagnosis, she had let herself linger at the windows of her second favorite designer now and then.
Grant took in what she was saying and then uttered a cold, sharp laugh. “I’m not surprised that you’re familiar with the competition’s inventory,” he retorted quickly. The words held a sting, and they found their target. He pushed himself back from the desk, rose to standing—tall, commanding, ready again to pounce. Jenna felt herself deflate in his shadow.
“Pull up the matching ring on the Tiffany website,” he said, after a moment’s consideration. “I don’t doubt your claim for a second, but I need to be prepared when I discuss this with my designers.” He rubbed his angled jawline and frowned. “It’s a serious issue, you know. Of course legal would have caught it, but by then we might have wasted a portion of the Series 5 budget on development and research. Besides, cutting corners like this is not what McCormick Jewels is known for.” Grant looked right at Jenna with this last bit and scowled. “At least, not anymore.”
Her blood boiled. For a fleeting second she’d felt so proud of herself—she’d noticed something important that others had missed, saved the company money, done good work for the first time in her life, and on her very first day! But with just a sentence, Grant Blakely had changed that pride to bitter scorn. Her eyes narrowed, but she held tight to her dignity. She turned away from him, injured, but unwilling to let it show.
“I’ll see to it right away,” she said as she showed herself out of his office. Her head raced with witty retorts but she pushed them back and reminded herself to swallow her pride. The most important thing in her world was keeping her brother safe. And it was for that reason that she needed to keep this job, no matter the frustrations—and temptations—of her new employer.
Two days later, though he’d tried to force her out of his head, Grant was still tormented by thoughts of his new personal assistant. He was supposed to be concentrating on a presentation by a potential new ad manager, but his mind kept wandering back to her. Jenna McCormick, he was quickly discovering, had the potential to be his undoing.
What was it about her that had him so distracted? Perhaps it was her flair for the unexpected. He’d expected to walk into the office on her first day and find her poised to seduce him. A low-cut blouse, a flip of the hair, a coy glance over her shoulder—that was the Jenna McCormick he’d expected to meet. Someone similar to the many women he’d dated—and usually regretted—countless times before. Instead, he’d gotten a buttoned-up, prim little secretary with pulled-back hair and next to no makeup, who within days had taught herself the phone and computer systems, deftly navigated the political waters of the office, and even managed to save him great expense on a derivative design. It threw him off his guard.
And he hated that. He’d built his career on staying focused and never misplacing his attention, and he wasn’t about to let a spoiled heiress with a budgeting problem ruin that. No matter how much sexual energy seemed to vibrate between them, he added to himself grudgingly. Once again Grant found himself wishing he could be rid of her. Three months of Jenna’s temptation could be too much, if he wasn’t careful. But what choice did he have? He couldn’t go back on his word now, not while she was doing a perfectly competent job as his assistant, and putting up with each and every request, no matter how inconveniencing, with aplomb. If he hoped to drive her out with his demands, he saw now that would be much harder than he’d imagined. If only there was another way he could prompt her to quit…
“Grant?” asked the ad manager, clearly noticing his lack of concentration. He looked up across the boardroom and really took in the woman talking to him for the first time. Dianne Framsworth had been strongly recommended to him by a board member. She was lithe, catlike, with a head full of tousled waves that he guessed took hours to put together, and a red mouth that spoke much more loudly than any words she could have used. In short, she was his type. So how had he failed to notice her existence until a half hour into the meeting? In fact, he hadn’t heard a single word she’d said. He’d been too busy wondering what made Jenna McCormick tick—and why on earth he cared.
“I’m sorry, Dianne,” Grant said, feeling defeated by his own mind, but refusing to let on the depth of his frustration. “I’m having trouble getting an office issue out of my head at the moment, and I think I’ve got to tend to it rather than give you anything less than my utmost attention.” He’d return to his office and get the investigator on the phone—see what he’d dug up so far and confirm his impression of Jenna McCormick’s motives. Then he’d be able to concentrate again. “Can I ask you to put forward some alternate times for the continuation of our meeting? I’ll take you to my PA’s desk to be scheduled right now.” He rose, knowing he was being rude but not caring, unable to keep focus on anything but Jenna, and hating it.
“I understand completely,” Dianne replied smoothly, leaning in closer to Grant, like a confidante. With one seductive motion, her shoulders rolled forward, letting her lacy camisole fall low on her cleavage. “You’re passionate about your employees—it’s an attractive quality in a man.” As she spoke, she smiled coyly, as if she knew him well, even though they’d only just met.
So she was flirting with him. Typical. The woman who had come here to seduce him was sitting down the hall filing his paperwork, while the woman who was supposed to be conducting actual business was throwing herself at him shamelessly.
Ah, well. Who was he to deny an attractive—if somewhat aggressive—woman the pleasures of innocent flirtation? Perhaps she could help him forget his vexing personal assistant. He grinned like a wolf and gestured for Dianne to follow him down the hall with a light touch on her elbow, just slow enough to qualify as a caress. “And your flexibility is an attractive quality in a—” he paused, let her brain go where it might, and then finished, “—colleague. If you’ll follow me?”
He escorted her down the long hallway toward the reception area, watched her play with her hair as they walked. He fussed over some imaginary speck of lint on his suit’s lapel, but the normal charge he got from flirting with an attractive, interested woman was missing. He thought of taking Dianne out to some exclusive restaurant, lingering over a nice bottle of wine, and then going home together—but the idea held no interest for him. Then, unbidden, the thought of Jenna McCormick as his dinner date popped into his head, and he felt a tightness in his groin in response. Dammit. Jenna was the last woman in the world he should be thinking of.
As if conjured by his wayward thoughts, the very woman appeared at the end of the hallway, looking just as prim and proper as she had all day, and just as enticing. But when she spotted Dianne and Grant heading in her direction, the look on her face switched from her quiet confidence to shock. Openmouthed, she looked from Dianne to Grant, and then back to Dianne. Her eyes clouded over with some fierce emotion—could it be jealousy? And was that what he’d actually wanted?
Jenna swallowed hard when she saw the face of Grant’s companion. What was she doing here? she wondered, then shook her head fiercely to bring herself back to the real world. Of course Dianne Framsworth would be darkening the hallways of McCormick Jewels—after all, hadn’t her husband been on the very board that had dismissed Jenna once and for all? But Jenna could have sworn she’d heard through the grapevine that Dianne was now divorced. The way she was looking at Grant, as though he were the last man in the world
, confirmed it—and, though she tried to ignore it, filled Jenna with irrational jealousy.
Before she could compose herself, Dianne’s high singsong voice filled the hall. “Jenna McCormick!” she cried. “Why, what are you doing here?”
Dianne hardly let Jenna take a breath before she spoke again. “Well, of course, you’re back at the company. How fantastic! When did they bring you back onto the board?”
Jenna flushed. Six years ago, before her parents died, Dianne had seemed like a best friend to her. But when she’d lost the company—and the high-flying lifestyle that went with it—Dianne had dropped her like a hot potato, moving on to other friends whose connections were better, whose outfits were newer and more fashionable. Now that she thought Jenna was back among the upper crust, of course she’d act like nothing had ever changed. It made Jenna cringe with embarrassment—for both of them.
“Actually, I’m not on the board,” Jenna said, trying to keep her head held high.
“Upper management, then?” Dianne supplied. “I knew they’d forgive you for gambling like that with the company’s stocks. It was naughty, and just plain dumb, of course, but it’s not like you violated any actual laws or anything…” Her voice trailed off, as she at last noticed Jenna’s narrowing stare.
“No, actually.” Jenna straightened her shoulders and tamped down the flood of irritation. This was her chance to be a professional. To prove to Grant that she could handle this job. “I’m working here as the personal assistant to the CEO.” She forced a smile as she gestured to Grant. “This is my third day on the job.”
