My Phony Valentine

by Marie Ferrarella

T.J. knew Theresa was waiting for an answer. “I’d really rather not, Theresa.”

  Theresa wasn’t prepared for any opposition. Taking her by surprise, it left her speechless for exactly half a second. Then she rallied.

  “Please?” Like a train leaving the station, Theresa’s voice took on momentum as she spoke. “It’d only be for a few hours. Show him the rest of the campaign you’ve been working on. He really liked the preliminary drawings we sent up.”

  It was a royal “we” and T.J. was used to it. She had been the one who had worked on the preliminary drawings, faxing them up to MacAffee Toys’ headquarters in San Jose as she went along.

  T.J. felt herself weakening. Not that she really wanted to pretend to be Theresa, but in her recollection, she had never actually said no to her cousin.

  “Theresa, I—”

  Theresa heard what she wanted in T.J.’s tone. “Done. Well, I’m going to see if I can get that doctor to give me a sponge bath—”

  Her screen saver came on, a little mouse running madly in a wheel to keep from slipping and being rattled around. TJ. knew exactly how the mouse felt. She hit a key and the tiny cartoon rodent disappeared.

  “Doctors don’t give sponge baths, Theresa. They have the nurses do that.”

  The chuckle was deep, throaty and entirely sensual. “Always a first time. Give me a call later. I’m at Harris Memorial. Room 312. Bye.”

  Like a leaf falling to the ground in the aftermath of a whirlwind, T.J. felt dizzy.

  “Wait! When is he supposed to be here?” In typical Theresa fashion, Theresa was leaving her without any details, depending on the fact that she could ferret them out herself.

  T.J. wasn’t in the mood to ferret.

  Theresa hadn’t quite hung up. “Eleven o’clock. He’s arriving from San Jose at LAX. American Airways. Flight 17. Emmett is going with the limo to pick him up. Might be nice if you were in it,” she added.

  “Be nicer if you were in it.” But TJ. was talking to a dial tone. She sighed, replacing the receiver. Eleven o’clock. That didn’t give her much time.

  Heidi Wallace, Theresa’s executive secretary, peeked into TJ.’s office less than a minute later. An understanding smile swept over the woman’s finely lined face as she walked in. She laid a black garment bag over the back of the only other chair in the office.

  “Swept right over you, didn’t she?”

  T.J. looked down at herself before glancing back at the other woman. “Do the tread marks show that much?”

  Heidi laughed. A sense of humor was a prerequisite for working with Theresa Cochran.

  “Wide and deep.”

  T.J. sighed, unconsciously eyeing the garment bag. “How did you know?”

  “She called me first.” Heidi was already heading for the door. “Emmett will be around to pick you up in the limo at ten-thirty.” T.J.’s brows rose in surprise. “Seems she didn’t think you would say no.”

  And why should she? I never have so far. “I suppose there’s no harm in it.”

  Turning her swivel chair so that she faced the windows, T.J. looked at her reflection in the glass. With a resigned sigh, she held her hair away from her neck. Maybe if she wore it up...

  Heidi could see half a dozen ways it could cause harm, but she wasn’t being paid to comment on that. “If you say so. But if you’re going to take La Cochran’s place, I’d say you need a bit of a quick makeover.” She nodded toward the bag Theresa had instructed her to bring to T.J. Inside was one of her business suits, complete with matching shoes and purse.

  T.J. was dressed more casually than usual, having slipped on jeans and a baggy pullover before leaving home this morning. Theresa had never cared what she wore as long as she held up her end of the load. T.J. pointedly ignored the garment bag.

  “Christopher MacAffee is coming to talk business. I don’t think he’s going to care what I look like as long as the campaign is conducted with dignity and profit.”

  Heidi had her instructions. “Humor me—and her. The head of C & C Advertising shouldn’t look as if she was taking in laundry on the side.” Heidi picked up the garment bag and laid it across T.J.’s desk. “She keeps a change of clothing in the office in case she’s, um, working all night.”

  Or entertaining a client, T.J. thought.

  “Why don’t you make use of it?” Heidi prodded.

  T.J. pushed herself away from her desk and rose to her feet, eyeing the bag. “She really was sure of me, wasn’t she?”

  Heidi crossed her arms before her. T.J.’s easygoing disposition was a matter of record. “When have you ever given her cause for doubt?”

  T.J. didn’t answer. Instead, she took the garment bag and went to Theresa’s suite of offices to change.

  Okay, so how bad could it be?

  EMMETT MITCHELL, C & C Advertising’s chauffeur for the last three decades, held up a large placard with Christopher MacAffee’s name on it. He aimed it at the sea of people disembarking from the airplane that stood tethered to the side of the building by means of a carpeted corridor.

  Beside him, TJ. shifted uncomfortably in Theresa’s high heels, scanning the crowd. She had never met Christopher MacAffee, but she knew that he was a tall, stately-looking man with dark hair and a demeanor that would have easily placed him at the head of a Victorian household a hundred years ago.

  Her eyes flickered briefly over the tall, dark-haired man who was just emerging from the plane in the distance. He was the kind of man Theresa would pounce on with relish, TJ. thought. Her own pulse scrambled a little as she watched him walk toward her.

  Of course he was walking toward her, she thought disparagingly. Everyone on the plane was walking toward her. She was in the direct path of the disembarking passengers.

  T.J. glanced at the chauffeur on her left. Emmett looked like a gnarled gnome, his skin a leather brown that seemed to complement the light beige livery he wore. “Do you see him anywhere, Emmett?”

  In response, the snowy-haired man who had once driven her uncle and her grandfather before him shook his head firmly.

  “Can’t say I do, miss.” He raised the placard higher with a touch of impatience. “But I haven’t the faintest idea who I’m looking for to begin with.”

  “That makes two of us.” She sighed. “It would have been easier on us if his father was still president. I once saw a photo of him in a magazine—a tall, thin man in his mid-sixties.”

  “Oh, a young guy.”

  TJ. struggled to hide her smile. Emmett had changed his mind about his age several times in the past fifteen years, fearing retirement would be forced on him. He pushed the number back periodically.

  “Yes, like you,” she agreed.

  That drop-dead-gorgeous-looking man in the gray Armani suit was still coming toward her, T.J. noted out of the corner of her eye. As she turned her head, he made eye contact with her.

  Her pulse jumped as Mr. Gorgeous stopped right in front of her.

  The man nodded at the placard in Emmett’s hands. “I believe you’re looking for me.”

  The words All of my life materialized on her lips and it took effort to actually keep from saying them. Instead, she heard herself saying, “You’re not Christopher MacAffee.”

  He smiled and T.J.’s blood warmed several degrees, turning the cold airport lobby almost balmy. “Why wouldn’t I be?”

  “No reason.” Smooth, T.J., smooth.

  The grin widened, showing off teeth that rivaled Theresa’s precious snow-capped mountains. “I’m happy to hear that, because I am.” He put out his hand to her. “Christopher MacAffee.”

  It took her a second to assimilate the information. Belatedly, T.J. put out her own hand and shook his. Christopher’s grip was firm and warm. She felt something twist within her stomach and knot.

  “And I’m—” Tongue-tied.

  “Theresa Cochran,” Christopher finished for her. Eyes the color of sunlight-warmed grass bathed her in their light as he smiled at her. “I’d recognize you anywhere, alth
ough I have to say you’re even better looking in person than you are on the society page.”

  “There’s a reason for that,” Emmett muttered under his breath as he lowered the placard to his side.

  T.J. shot him a silencing look. They had gone over the charade and the need for it during the ride to the airport. She knew exactly what Emmett thought of it. Not much, but winning the account would be a prestigious feather in their cap.

  Emmett chuckled.

  In an attempt to draw Christopher’s attention away from what would cause her chauffeur to chuckle like that, T.J. spoke quickly, though her voice sounded a little squeaky to her ear at first. “Thank you, Mr. MacAffee. Why don’t you just follow me?”

  With a slight inclination of his head, Christopher linked his arm through T.J.’s. “With the utmost of pleasure. And it’s Christopher, please.”

  “Christopher, please what?” T.J. heard herself asking. Oh, Lord, she was flirting, just like Theresa. It had to be the suit.

  He laughed then, a deep throaty laugh that curled through her like hickory smoke, warm and scented. “They were right about you,” he murmured as he took out his handkerchief and dabbed at the fresh perspiration on his forehead. “You really are something else.”

  Her heart skipped a beat, even though she knew that the compliment was meant for Theresa and whatever preconceived notions she must have conjured up in Christopher’s mind.

  “You don’t know the half of it,” she replied with what she hoped was a sexy smile.

  2

  THE PALM THAT GRIPPED the hand rest on the escalator undulating its way down to the ground floor of the airport was clammy and Christopher was very aware of it. He was also acutely aware that the world around him was spinning ever so slightly if he didn’t concentrate on hanging on to it with both hands.

  Christopher refused to give in to the feeling that had accompanied him all during the flight and threatened to overwhelm him now. He didn’t have time to be sick.

  Instead, he forced himself to concentrate on the reason he was here in this overcrowded, stuffy airport. His brain felt as if there were a fog descending upon it. He was halfway through the electronic doors before he remembered. Christopher stopped abruptly. It took him a moment to focus on the woman next to him.

  “What?” T.J. turned luminous blue eyes up at his face. Was it her imagination, or did he look a little pale?

  “I forgot. I brought a valise with me. It should be coming onto the luggage carousel by now.” Wherever that was, he thought. Disorientation mushroomed.

  Reluctantly, T.J. backtracked into the airport lobby, her arm still hooked through Christopher’s. She had the impression she was steadying him. “Oh, I didn’t know you were staying overnight.”

  Damn, wasn’t it just like Theresa to neglect to fill her in on the details? Just how long was she supposed to keep up this charade, anyway?

  Christopher blinked to clear his vision, but his eyes still felt moist and watery. And a tremendous pounding had begun in his temples. Terrific way to conduct business.

  “I’m not.” Moving on leaden legs, Christopher found a place by the carousel. Luggage from two flights comingled on the conveyor belt as their owners stood around the perimeter, trying to spot individual pieces.

  He’d gone to meet with his father yesterday. The old man was just getting over an intense twenty-four-hour case of the flu. He’d spent more than half the visit going on about it. Christopher was getting the uneasy feeling that perhaps advice hadn’t been the only thing the older man had given him.

  “I brought along some of our latest toys so that whoever is assigned to the account could get a feeling for them if and when I sign.”

  If and when. The man knew how to keep people on their toes. T.J. nodded. “That would be me.”

  He narrowed his brows. It took more effort than he would have thought. “You work on the account directly?”

  That was a slip. Theresa never did, but maybe he didn’t know that. This isn’t going to be easy, she thought.

  “Sometimes,” T.J. amended quickly. She decided to embellish. How would he know the difference? “When the account really interests me.” And working on the proposals for MacAffee Toys had really fired her imagination. “I guess I’ve never outgrown my love for toys.” She laughed quietly. A small woman elbowed a towering hulk of a man out of the way as she claimed three pieces of garish luggage. T.J. stepped aside. “Which makes playing with Megan very easy.”

  All the suitcases were beginning to look alike. He wondered uneasily if his had been lost.

  “Megan?”

  Just the sound of the little girl’s name brought a fond smile to T.J.’s lips. Her marriage had been a mistake from the moment she and Peter had left the church, but Megan had been a wonderful consolation prize. Thirty pounds of trouble, energy and sticky fingers. “My daughter.”

  Christopher raised his eyes from the carousel. “You have a daughter?”

  She wondered if he had brought anything that would capture Megan’s imagination. “Yes,” she murmured absently as she scanned the spinning collection of luggage. Why hadn’t he just carried it on with him?

  Christopher always liked to know who he was dealing with. Nothing in the background his people had presented him with mentioned that Theresa Cochran had ever been married or given birth to a child.

  “I didn’t know you had a daughter.”

  T.J. caught the warning look Emmett flashed her. Abruptly, her words replayed themselves in her head. Damn, she had to keep her mind off the way her heels pinched and on the fact that she was supposed to be Theresa and not herself. Theresa had no children. She had never been married.

  T.J.’s mouth twisted in a self-deprecating smile. And if it hadn’t been for a really horrid eight months she would rather forget, neither had she. But the brief union had given her Megan and that had made all the difference in the world to her. Megan was worth enduring anything.

  She ignored Emmett’s knowing look and stared straight ahead at the luggage carousel, willing the valise to materialize.

  “I’m sorry. I love her so much that sometimes I forget she really isn’t mine.” She could feel both Christopher and Emmett looking at her. Emmett, no doubt, was dying to see just how she intended to pull herself out of this. “She’s my cousin’s two-year-old. T.J. knows how crazy I am about her and right now, she’s letting me play Mom. I have her for the weekend.”

  Mentally biting her lip, T.J. forced herself to calm down and take it slow. People, after all, saw what they thought they saw. And Christopher thought he was seeing Theresa. That made things a little easier for her. She just had to perpetuate that impression—and stop tripping over her own tongue.

  She smiled, letting the expression drift sensually over her face and eyes the way she had seen Theresa do so many times.

  “At times I really do feel as if she were my own. Megan’s a terrific little girl.” As an addendum, T.J. grabbed onto the first thing that occurred to her. “My cousin is away on a skiing trip.”

  “Skiing.” How long had it been since he had allowed himself to get away for a skiing trip? He couldn’t remember. “That sounds like fun.”

  The idea of standing on two skinny boards while sailing down a mountainside slick with snow did not come under her definition of fun.

  “So they say.”

  Christopher looked down at T.J. quizzically. She made it sound as if she didn’t care for it. “‘They?’” he echoed. “Funny, I thought I read somewhere that you were an avid skier.”

  Dummy. You’ve got to stop answering as you. Theresa loved to ski. “I am,” she said quickly. She let another rosy smile curve her mouth. “I was just being flippant. They tell me I do that a lot.”

  He looked as if he bought it, she thought. T.J could feel her heart fluttering madly. She was way out of practice. There had been a time where a simple switch would have been a challenge to her, not an obstacle course to overcome. Frazzled nerves insisted on knitting together, causing
more unrest inside her.

  “Do you ski?” she asked, turning the conversation away from “herself” and onto safer ground. Damn it, Theresa, why did you have to pick today to get into an accident?

  “I used to.” For a moment, an isolated scene from his past rose in his mind’s eye. College. Winter break. And powdered snow so pure, it looked as if it belonged in a Currier and Ives painting. “Maybe we could get together sometime and test the powder at Vail.”

  This was probably the nineties equivalent of “We’ll do lunch sometime,” she mused.

  “Maybe,” TJ. agreed slyly, giving him her best Theresa imitation. She glanced back toward the carousel. A large black valise was just being belched out onto the conveyor belt. Mentally, she crossed her fingers. “Is that your suitcase?”

  It took him a moment to recognize it. “Yes, that’s mine.” Christopher reached for it just as a sharp abdominal pain cut his breath away.

  When Christopher hesitated, Emmett closed his fingers round the handle. “Nice save,” the chauffeur murmured to T.J.

  T.J. lowered her voice. She knew he was referring to her lapse about skiing. “Glad someone is enjoying themselves.”

  “Best time I’ve had in years,” the old man said with a chuckle. Thin, sinewy arms strained beneath the livery as he hefted the suitcase off the carousel.

  Emmett had all but raised the Cochran girls in the limousine and although Theresa was now his boss, he was partial to T.J. They all were. T.J. had grown up to be one of them, without any airs or pretentiousness. Theresa, pampered, spoiled, accustomed to being obeyed, always behaved—perhaps without even meaning to—as if she was a cut above the people who worked for her.

  They had no choice but to forgive her, but the line that divided her from them was always there.

  There was no such line with T.J., despite the fact that she and Theresa shared the same company founding grandfather. Its absence bred the strong bond of loyalty TJ. inspired.

  Christopher moved to take the valise from the old man. Chauffeur or not, it didn’t seem right that the man should have to struggle with the luggage.