The Boss and the Plain Jayne Bride

by Heather MacAllister

  “Of course not.” Jayne was surprised at his tone. She’d obviously hit a sore point with him. “I’m merely posing possible explanations and ranking them in order of probability. Under these circumstances, a math error is least probable. Therefore, we should focus our efforts on a more likely reason for the discrepancy.”

  He weighed her words, taking several moments before nodding. “Sorry I jumped on you. George—Windom, the man you’re replacing—George never wanted to explain the business side of Venus to me. Told me it wasn’t necessary for me to know. Maybe he didn’t think I could grasp the complexities of his job.” Gairett’s words held a subtle challenge. “Unfortunately, in my line of work, I’ve run into too many people who doubt my mental capabilides.”

  Jayne’s brow furrowed. “Why?”

  Garrett blinked at her, then a slow smile spread over his face lighting his eyes with an emotion Jayne couldn’t read. She could see his gaze dart over her face, as though he was acquainting himself with details of her appearance he hadn’t bothered to notice before now. “How do you propose to solve the discrepancy problems?” he asked after a moment.

  Feeling unsettled, Jayne was glad to have something to say. “By first making certain we understand the method your accountant used.”

  “Very diplomatically put.”

  He never answered her question, but Jayne sensed that something had changed between them. As she reviewed bookkeeping procedures with Garrett, she noticed that he was looking at her in a different way. A layer between them had been removed and she’d never even known it was there.

  “It’s obvious you understand accounting procedures,” Jayne said after their discussion. “Now put that understanding into practice. I suggest that you take Mr. Windom’s final report and try to re-create it.”

  “He didn’t leave a final report.”

  “What?” This did not bode well for the state of the books.

  “He just—” Garrett spread his hands “—left.”

  “Without...” Jayne belatedly registered the underlying hurt she heard in his voice. “And he’d been with you how many years?”

  “Ever since my parents resumed full-time modeling when I was fourteen. So...sixteen years.”

  “Your parents modeled?” Jayne asked as she calculated his age.

  Garrett nodded. “Still do. And my sister and brother, Sasha and Sandor. They’re twins. You may have noticed them in ads lately?”

  Jayne shook her head. She wasn’t much for fashion magazines.

  “They really do look a lot alike and they’ve played that into a nice career.”

  “Do they look like you?”

  He lifted a shoulder. “There’s a family resemblance. Anyway, they filmed several commercials when they were younger, but when they hit thirteen and grew about two feet overnight, their modeling careers took off. They’re more successful than my parents and me put together. And that’s when we incorporated. It was cheaper to hire one full-time booking agent for all of us than pay commissions to another agency.”

  He must have had a very interesting childhood. One about as different from Jayne’s quiet, middleclass, only-child background as could be. “I don’t suppose you ever conducted an outside audit of your books?”

  Garrett shook his head before she finished speaking.

  Of course they wouldn’t have asked for an audit, she thought. From what Garrett had told her, this George Windom had been practically one of the family. It wouldn’t have occurred to them to suggest an audit. But it should have occurred to their manager. He was in a position of enormous trust—and enormous responsibility. An outside audit would have protected both parties. Even so, there was absolutely no excuse for the man leaving without a final reconciliation. “I apologize on behalf of my profession.” There didn’t seem to be anything else she could say.

  “Don’t blame George,” Garrett said. “I turned down all the bookings he’d made after the cruise job. I’d told him I was quitting, but he obviously didn’t believe me. But I had plans for the company and he must have resented having one of us in the office calling the shots after so many years.”

  “Maybe he thought you didn’t need him anymore.”

  “Of course we needed him. I can’t run the entire operation by myself.” Garrett stacked the ledgers into his briefcase. “George never gave me a chance to discuss his role in the company with him. Three weeks ago, I walked into my office and found his letter on my desk. His home phone had been disconnected. I don’t even know where to send his final paycheck.”

  Jayne skipped asking about family or relatives who might know Mr. Windom’s whereabouts. It wasn’t any of her business. However, the state of the books was. “Garrett, this all sounds very ominous.”

  “No, no.” He shook his head. “I know where you’re going and you’re wrong. I think George is trying to show us how much we need him. He’ll be gone just long enough for things to get in a real mess, then come riding in to the rescue.”

  Jayne tapped the briefcase. “Things are in a mess now. You can’t make the books balance. And if you can’t...” She drew in a breath. “Well, I don’t have a magic calculator.”

  Garrett stood. “I’m going to give it another try. But whether he returns or not, I still want you to be Venus’s accountant and bookkeeper.” As he spoke, he offered a hand to Jayne, which she took, impressed by the small courtesy. “George will act strictly as a booking agent. Since we’re signing on more models, he’ll have plenty to do.” With a squeeze, he released her hand.

  At that moment, a foot pushed open the door. “Jayne, it was your turn to get coffee. But since you’re always working so hard and since I’m such a wonderful friend, I—” Sylvia got that far before she spotted Garrett.

  Jayne watched her go slack-jawed as she stood stock-still, a cup of coffee and a white paper bag in each hand.

  Beside Jayne, Garrett, too, had gone still, his face arranged in a polite smile. As the seconds passed, Jayne’s gaze darted from Garrett to Sylvia and back to Garrett again, watching for his reaction. It was as though time stopped until Sylvia blinked.

  “I’m so sorry. I didn’t realize you were busy.” Nevertheless, she advanced into Jayne’s office, her eyes on Garrett.

  “I was just leaving,” Garrett murmured.

  “So soon?” Sylvia gave an artificial little laugh that made Jayne’s eyes widen in horror. “We’ve only just met.” Her gaze flicked to Jayne. “Or were about to.”

  Jayne’s tongue stuck to the roof of her mouth. “Garrett Charles, this is Sylvia Dennison, a friend of mine. Garrett is my client, Sylvia,” Jayne added with a look her friend missed, since she was busy telegraphing “I’m available” to Garrett.

  “Coffee?” Sylvia oozed forward and offered him one of the cups she held. Probably Jayne’s.

  Garrett swiftly checked his watch. “It’ll have to be some other time.”

  “When?” Sylvia gazed up at him.

  “Sometime when I’m not on my way to another appointment.” Garrett smiled briefly, then turned to Jayne. “I’ll call you after I go over the books again.”

  This time, his smile was warm and bracketed by dimples.

  She heard Sylvia sigh.

  “Let me know when you’re ready for me to take over,” Jayne said and walked him to the door.

  “I’ll do that. Thanks, Jayne.” Another dazzling smile and he was gone.

  Jayne took her time shutting the door so she could watch his progress down the hall.

  “Oh...my...God.” With a squeal, Sylvia collapsed onto the sofa. “Ohmygod, ohmygod.” She fanned herself with her hand. “He’s gorgeous! How can you stand being near him and not ripping off all your clothes and screaming ‘take me now’?”

  “I have been having a little problem with that,” Jayne murmured, but Sylvia wasn’t listening.

  “Look at me.” She held out her hand. “I’m shaking. Shaking.”

  Jayne was torn between relief to know she wasn’t alone in her reactions to Ga
rrett and envy that Sylvia felt so free to express hers. And express she did.

  “He’s the one, Jayne.”

  “Mr. Right?”

  “No, silly. The man to make me forget everything. I want to live with him in a dirty garret in a foreign country. I want to exist on bread, wine, cheese and hours of meaningless sex.” She closed her eyes on a sigh. “I want to be his love slave.”

  Except for the dirty garret part, it all sounded appealing to Jayne.

  Sylvia bolted upright. “Do you think he linked me?”

  I hope not.

  “When he said ‘sometime when I’m not on my way to another appointment,’ was he sincere? Or was he just giving me the brush-off?”

  “I think he was just being polite.”

  “No.” Sylvia shook her head. “He was looking at me.” She tapped her chest.

  “Because you were standing two inches away from him.”

  “I...” Sylvia’s mouth opened and closed. She narrowed her eyes. “You’re jealous.”

  “I am not!”

  But she was. How absurd. There was not even a remote chance that plain Jayne Nelson would ever be Garrett Charles’s love slave.

  “I didn’t think you were interested in him. If you want him for yourself, say the word and I’ll back off.”

  Good old Sylvia, actually thinking Jayne had a chance. “No...he’s all yours.”

  Sylvia dived into her white bag and withdrew her usual muffin. “Promise me that if he calls, you’ll give him my number.”

  “Sylvia, I think he’s got your number already.”

  “Promise!”

  “Okay, okay.”

  “I mean, it’s not as though I haven’t tried to fix you up with anybody,” she said and began picking out the nuts. “Vincent is trying to get extra time off so he can take you out.”

  “I don’t want to go out with your second cousin.”

  “Sure you do—we can double date. You and Vincent and me and Garrett.”

  Jayne sighed.

  By the time Sylvia left, Jayne was feeling decidedly cranky. She finished composing her memo on the errors in the Magruder report, e-mailed a copy to Bill, and concentrated fiercely on the rest of her work so that she’d be free should Garrett call. She didn’t expect him to, but with Sylvia the barracuda after him, she felt she ought to do something.

  She just didn’t know what or how.

  It was late afternoon when her phone buzzed and she answered it to hear Garrett’s molten voice on the line.

  “Jayne, I’ve got a problem,” he said immediately after identifying himself.

  “You found the reason for the discrepancy in your books?”

  He made a harsh sound. “No...I found that all the checks I’ve written on the agency account have bounced.”

  CHAPTER FOUR

  JAYNE had been nearly as surprised as Garrett had been. She distinctly remembered that the final bank statement had reported a healthy balance. Garrett had kept the checkbook up-to-date. There was still a healthy balance.

  Except that when Jayne contacted the bank vice president, Elaine, with whom she’d worked previously, the woman readily confirmed the figures. Two weeks ago, the Venus, Inc. business manager had withdrawn nearly all the liquid assets.

  “But George Windom resigned three weeks ago,” Jayne protested.

  Through the phone there was the sound of computer keys tapping. “We were not informed that he should no longer have access to the accounts,” Elaine told her.

  Of course they hadn’t been. Garrett hadn’t accepted Windom’s resignation. He thought he would be coming back.

  So. George Windom had waited a week, then cleaned them out. The action was premeditated, Jayne knew. He’d waited until the bank statements had been closed for the month so he’d have the maximum amount of time before what he’d done could be discovered.

  And Jayne was going to have to tell Garrett. Not only that, she suspected—no, sadly, she knew—worse discoveries were to come.

  They agreed that Jayne would come to the agency the next morning and conduct a complete audit of the books.

  She was so concerned about how Garrett would react to the news of his manager’s betrayal, that she barely gave a thought to her own appearance.

  Other than washing her hair three times to remove the excess conditioner.

  And changing her outfit twice. There was a fine line between inspiring confidence and intimidating. She wanted Garrett and his family to feel reassured, even though privately, Jayne didn’t think she’d find much to reassure them about.

  Thus, she wore her “breaking-bad-news” outfit. It was identical to her inspiring confidence suit, but the look was softened with a pale blue blouse and pastelstriped ascot.

  Venus, Inc. was not located in the Galleria mall, after all, but across busy Westheimer on Post Oak, smack in the middle of Pavilion, an area featuring exclusive designer boutiques catering to Houston’s wealthy elite.

  Jayne had seen the amount of rent they were paying and was expecting a larger place than the one she found wedged between an antique shop and a stationers.

  Black marble surrounded glass doors with brass handles. Very classy, she thought approvingly and pushed them open.

  Jayne felt as though she’d stepped into a different world, or at least had been transported to another planet. The women waiting in the starkly pale gray reception area looked like no human beings she knew. Images bombarded her, primarily, bones, skin, legs and lips.

  The women were young, tall and impossibly thin. They weren’t pretty—at least the kind of pretty Jayne wanted to be, but the giant pictures covering the walls made them, or women like them, look gorgeous and stunning and alluring and sophisticated and other things Jayne knew she’d never be.

  And then she saw them—photos of what must be the entire Charles family beneath the curving script of the Venus, Inc. logo. There were five pictures displayed together, including one of a younger Garrett in a black leather jacket, which he wore open without a shirt underneath.

  Mesmerized, Jayne took three steps toward it before making eye contact with a young woman behind the desk.

  “May I help you?” the receptionist asked.

  She wore her dark hair short and spiky, in the kind of cut that would send Jayne screaming from the hairdresser, or from Sylvia who would have probably been the one to talk her into it.

  “I’m Jayne Nelson. Would you please tell Garrett that I’m here?”

  The receptionist ran a bony finger down a scheduling book. “Did you have—”

  “I’m an accountant,” Jayne interrupted, so anyone within earshot wouldn’t think she was here to audition as a model—not that they would.

  “So he’s expecting you?” The young woman paused with her hand on the intercom.

  Jayne nodded, pleased that the receptionist hadn’t made some denigrating crack.

  Within seconds after the receptionist notified him, Garrett appeared in the far doorway and beckoned to her. “I am very glad to see you,” he said and exhaled with a smile that revealed both dimples and white teeth. “We’re still setting up and will be with you all in a minute,” he called to the room at large, then turned his blue, blue eyes to Jayne again.

  Jayne’s heart picked up the pace a little, even though she knew he was just relieved that she was here to help with the financial crisis and not thrilled to see her again because he was bowled over with desire for her.

  He led her down a hallway, adorned with more black-and-white blowups of models. She looked for another picture of him, but didn’t find one.

  “I’ve put you in George’s office,” Garrett said and gestured her into a room that was generously proportioned, considering the overall space occupied by the agency.

  Feet sinking into marshmallow-soft carpeting, Jayne approached the desk, running her finger across the smooth wooden surface as she walked around to the leather executive chair. The furnishings looked solid, dark and expensive, clashing with the contemporary a
ppearance of the reception area, not that the reception area looked cheap, or anything, but George obviously had been given a free rein in decorating his office space.

  “All the agency financial records are in the files, here.” Garrett waved an arm toward two wooden filing cabinets that matched the desk. “Feel free to look through anything you want. If you need something and can’t find me, ask Micky, the receptionist, though I’d appreciate it if you could keep the reason you’re here between us, for now.”

  “Sure.”

  He smiled at her again and this time, Jayne noticed the strain that pulled at the edges. Considering everything, he was holding up remarkably well, but Jayne wished she could say something to reassure him, something like, “This is all just a computer glitch and I’ll have it straightened out in no ‘time.”

  But she couldn’t and he was too smart to believe her if she did. “I have to tell you that the bulk of the money in the agency account was withdrawn in a lump sum two weeks ago.” Might as well get the bad news over right away.

  “George” he asked.

  Jayne nodded, not adding any of her suspicions. “The bank is tracing it. In the meantime, I’m going to get right to work so I can tell you what’s happened with the books as quickly as I can.”

  “Thanks.” Ganett gazed at the impressionist painting that hung over the filing cabinets. Jayne suspected that it was an original.

  “I transferred money from my own checking account to cover the outstanding agency checks.” He glanced at her. “Or those of which I’m aware.”

  “When I spoke with the bank yesterday, I told them not to honor any checks written by George Windom. You’ll have to fill out new signature cards to make it official, though.”

  “Right.”

  “Ganett?”

  He turned to her.

  “I wouldn’t wait too long.”

  He gave a curt nod. “I’ll get to the bank sometime today.” He moved toward the door. “As you saw, I’ve got a roomful of hopeful models. Thursday is our weekly open house.”

  “Garrett, go now,” Jayne urged firmly before he could leave. “Ask to speak with Elaine Ormand”