“This is it,” she said coolly, “the one in the middle of the block with the light on.”
He pulled into the driveway. “A house? You own it?”
“No. I’m renting this one, but I’m starting to look for a place to buy.” The next step in her plan. With the business on its feet, it was time to start building equity.
“Nice. But you could use a jack-o’-lantern.”
“Jack o’-lantern?”
“You know, a pumpkin, carved to look like a face, with a candle inside,”
“I know what a jack-o’-lantern is.”
“Good. Because that front doorstep of yours could definitely use one. You know Halloween’s getting close.”
“Yes, I know, but a pumpkin has not been at the top of my list of priorities. I’ve been busy at -”
“At work,” he finished for her.
She glanced over, but saw no sign of the humor she might have expected. His gaze was fixed with great concentration on her bare front step.
She prepared to say her thank-yous, but he turned the engine off. For a blood-thundering instant she thought he was going to turn to her, reach across the bucket seats, take her in his arms and …
Before her imagination could get too carried away, he’d gotten out and come around to open her door. She thanked him, but ignored his hand.
She’d known him less than eight hours, but sometimes that was all it took to see the flaws. He’d made no effort to hide them. From his own words she’d learned he hated schedules and put fun ahead of responsibility. He hadn’t learned that achievement followed a plan.
It all added up to one message: he was a man to stay away from.
Too bad her hormones didn’t agree.
“A hatchback, huh?”
She followed the direction of his gaze to the garage door windows. Oh. Hatchback. Car.
“That’s right. A total suburbanite, that’s me. It comes in handy for hauling things from the hardware store.”
“But you don’t drive in to the city?”
“Not if I can help it. It’s more efficient to take the train. That way I can work during the commute and don’t have to worry about parking. You always drive?”
“I like the freedom.”
Stepping within the pool of light at the front door, she took a slow, steadying breath as she unlocked the door then turned to him, holding out her hand.
“Thank you, Paul. I enjoyed the evening. Dinner was wonderful, and Mama Artemis’s is a real find. I -”
He ignored the hand and the speech. Grasping her upper arms, he turned her to face him, startling her into silence. He bent his head, so slowly she thought she might explode from the waiting before he ever reached her lips.
And then, when the waiting had finally ended, all he did was brush his mouth against hers - top lip, bottom, top lip again. Softly, quickly.
“Good night, Bette.”
He turned her around and headed her inside. Automatically, she closed the storm door and wooden door behind her. But she couldn’t move any farther. She heard his car door shut, heard the engine start, heard his car back up and pull away, and still she stood, leaning against the door’s wooden panels, staring into the hallway’s familiar shadows.
One thought; filled the yawning emptiness his touch had made of her mind.
Uh-oh.
Chapter Three
*
PAUL TURNED THE corner and caught one last glimpse of the neat neighborhood in the rear view mirror.
A neighborhood where all the corners were squared, all the houses in a straight line, all the lawns trimmed and the trees big. Someone with a ruler had probably plotted out the whole thing, including the flower beds filled with yellow mums.
It suited Bette Wharton right down to the ground.
A vague vision of his apartment rose in his mind. Although he’d lived there several years he couldn’t form a clear picture of it.
The walls were light, maybe white, and the windows good-sized so tree-dappled sunlight made it into the rooms. He had an old couch his mother gave him when she redecorated the room over the garage. But he could envision it better in that hideaway of his teen years than in his own living room. Books, a TV and stereo equipment rested on shelves of boards and bricks, smacking a bit of college days. But he’d been reluctant to put up shelves. That seemed too permanent, too attached.
He accelerated onto the tollway and headed north.
That seemed too permanent, too attached.
Maybe that was what bothered him about the museum deal.
Jobs he’d done for several museums around the country as one-shot deals had worked out fine. In fact, he’d enjoyed them. The people sure weren’t in the business for money, and he liked that about them.
Plus, he appreciated that museums these days were acknowledging the lighter side of everyday life, the toys, the games, the hobbies. And he enjoyed visits to Washington, especially since they gave him a chance to visit Tris.
But now, with the Smithsonian talking about a regular arrangement … He just didn’t know.
Someone like Bette Wharton would probably jump at this kind of opportunity. He suspected that, to her, it would be a building block in some great life plan.
He checked the rearview mirror as he steered toward the exit, caught sight of his half smile and turned it into a grimace.
All right, so he was attracted to Bette, despite the suspicion she actually had one of those god-awful five-year plans the magazines always wrote about. Why? What was so great about Bette Wharton?
She wasn’t classically beautiful or a sex goddess knockout. And he found himself absurdly glad she wasn’t. Anybody could spot a woman like that.
He’d listened to the crisp coolness of her voice and heard that hint of spiciness beneath. He’d touched the no-nonsense wool of her suit and felt the softness of her skin. He’d acknowledged the common sense coming from her mouth and recognized the uncommon sensuality of that maddening upper lip. He’d looked into the forthright navy blue of her eyes and seen that she had secrets there.
Secrets . Maybe that was it. Maybe that defined the whole thing. This feeling that she’d hidden her teasing and laughter beneath a life ruled by an appointment calendar, and the challenge of luring that teasing and laughter out of hiding.
So, maybe what he felt came more from the challenge of making her see that other side of herself, the free spirit. He could handle that.
A challenge … Yeah, he could enjoy that.
*
“PAUL MONROE’S ON line two, Bette.”
Bette sidestepped Darla’s curious look, just as she’d sidestepped earlier questions with a simple statement that she and the client had an enjoyable business dinner. “Thank you, Darla.”
She waited until her assistant closed the door behind her, took a deep breath and lifted the receiver.
“Good morning, this is Bette Wharton. May I help you?” It was chicken to pretend she didn’t know who was on the other end of the line, but she wanted an extra second to remind herself of how she’d decided to deal with him.
“Hi, Bette. It’s Paul.”
So much for formality, she thought with an unwilling and wry smile. “Good morning, Paul. I hope everything’s going smoothly so far with Sally.”
“Sally? Oh, the temporary temporary assistant. Yeah, everything’s fine. In fact, you know what she did?”
“What?”
“She made me fresh coffee.” He sounded so impressed she couldn’t help but chuckle.
“No! Really?”
“Go ahead and laugh, but Jan never does that for me. She says anybody who comes and goes as much as I do deserves to drink whatever’s available.”
“She has a point.”
“Well, just don’t go telling Sally, okay? I usually only get fresh coffee about twice a year, so this is a treat.”
“I promise not to tell Sally, but she won’t be there much longer.”
“How’d you know?”
“H
ow’d I know what?”
“That Sally won’t be here much longer.”
“Because she’ll be replaced by your permanent temporary as soon as you make a selection.”
“Oh. I thought maybe my reputation had already gotten to her. Isn’t that an oxymoron?”
“Isn’t what an oxymoron, and what reputation?”
” ‘Permanent temporary.’ That’s an oxymoron - you know, a built-in contradiction.”
“I guess it is.” She hated herself for it, but she couldn’t resist repeating, “And what reputation?”
“For going through a lot of assistants fast.”
She wondered if the reason was solely his business habits.
She’d quickly learned that a certain breed of men viewed assistants, especially temps, as a two-birds-with-one-stone dating service. She’d have been surprised if Paul Monroe was one; she’d also have been too disappointed for her own comfort.
In her coolest, most neutral tones, she said, “I understand that’s the reason Jan Robson contacted us in the first place, isn’t it?”
“I guess it is.” If she thought she caught sheepishness, she could also imagine a grin lurking.
“And that, I’m sure, is why you’re calling this morning.” She thought he mumbled “not exactly,” but ignored it. “I’ve emailed the files to you, since they somehow ended up back with my papers, uh, last night. You can look them over, then let my office know before the close of business today whom you have selected and we’ll make every effort to have that person in place tomorrow morning.”
“I don’t like the sound of that.”
What was there not to like? She was being more than reasonable; getting someone lined up overnight qualified as above and beyond the call of good customer service. She decided to quell him with a single syllable. “Oh?”
“Particularly that part about the email and then notifying your office.” He sounded singularly unquelled. “I thought we could meet for lunch and discuss the whole thing then, say about one -”
“I’m sorry, lunch won’t be possible.” Not if she hoped to catch up with yesterday’s leftover chores.
“You’ve got to eat. All I’m saying is spend that time with me. And, of course, going over these files.”
“I don’t eat lunch.” Now why had she said that? There were certainly times she’d skipped the meal to finish work, but she’d also had her share of business lunches. She was reacting almost as if she were afraid of Paul Monroe. Ridiculous.
“You don’t eat lunch? Well, no wonder you’re thin. I tell you, Bette, my mom would definitely worry about you.”
“It’s very kind of your mother to be concerned.” What a damn fool thing to say. His mother didn’t know of her existence. She was becoming a blithering idiot. “But I must go now. I’ll wait for your decision on those files, Mr. Monroe. Goodbye.”
She hung up before she could hear any answer, then stared at the instrument as if something might leap out of it to snatch away the final shreds of her composure.
Jerkily, she picked up a pencil and rammed it into the small sharpener from her drawer.
Why did she react that way?
All right, Paul Monroe made her a little nervous. Yes, she felt an attraction to him, although clearly nothing serious, since she had a firm fix on the man’s faults. Even though that eye-dancing smile could make the clearest of faults a bit fuzzy around the edges. But she hadn’t turned him down because of that … exactly.
She’d turned him down because she had a lot of work and he’d disrupted her schedule yesterday. It was only logical to make up the time today.
Refusing his invitation constituted an ordinary, reasonable business decision.
Then why had she just methodically sharpened her pencil to exactly half its previous length?
Never mind that. She was working on the computer anyway. As soon as she got her thoughts in order.
She felt flustered because Paul Monroe was not an ordinary, reasonable business associate. No wonder she had an odd reaction - he was odd.
Satisfied with that analysis, Bette turned to her delayed tasks from the day before, and tried to concentrate.
All day she tried.
An annoying anticipation edged into her afternoon, lifting the edges of her concentration and peeling it away like a label coming unstuck.
By six-fifteen she had sharp, but rather short pencils, and had accomplished little else.
At the opening squeak of her office door, she jumped, a hand to her heart. Her pulse burst into a sprint, then slowed. Only Darla. She frowned fiercely. Only Darla? Exactly whom had she been expecting?
“Bette? Are you all right?”
“Yes, I’m fine. What is it, Darla?”
“There’s someone here -”
The door swung wide and there he was, grinning and sending her pulse off in double time.
“Hi, Bette.”
Darla looked over her shoulder, then back at Bette. “Do you want me to …?” She let the words trail off, and Bette could tell Darla didn’t want to do anything, that she approved of Paul’s presence in her boss’s office.
Bette felt ganged-up on - Paul Monroe, Darla Clarence, and her own heartbeat.
“It’s all right, Darla. Thank you.”
She waited until Paul moved into the room and Darla closed the door. That gave her a chance to prepare a cordially businesslike scold. “Paul -”
“Don’t apologize, Bette.”
Her prepared words vanished. “Apologize!”
“Yeah, I understand about lunch. Some people get uptight about keeping to a schedule. They just can’t help it.”
“Uptight.” She forced the word through clenched teeth.
He went blithely on.
“I realized I shouldn’t have pushed about lunch. But now that you’ve had all afternoon to catch up -” he hesitated just long enough for her to remember how abysmally she’d failed to use the afternoon to catch up, and that it was all his fault ” - let’s go to dinner.”
“I have plans.”
Most men would have instantly withdrawn at the deliberate chill in those three words. She should have remembered that when it came to what nine out of ten men would do, she faced Mr. Ten.
“Plans?” he repeated as if he’d never heard the word. “Don’t you want to have dinner with me?”
She opened her mouth and shut it immediately, uncertain it would deliver the sentiment she needed to express.
Damn the man.
“I have a lot of work to do.”
Why did the truth sound so lame?
“Didn’t you have a good time last night?”
“Yes, I had a good time, but -”
“Good. I did, too. I want to hear about your business, and you should probably know more about mine before we make a final choice on this permanent temporary.” Not giving her a chance to respond, he continued. “We’ll try this pizza place I know where they serve deep-dish by the pound. It’s across the street from where the St. Valentine’s Day Massacre took place back in the twenties, and legend has it one victim crawled to the front step and breathed his last right there.”
*
NEARLY FOUR HOURS later Bette found herself trying to figure out exactly where she’d lost control.
Somewhere, she figured, between the time Paul played on her sense of responsibility by mentioning the need to discuss business and the time he cast out the lure of deep-dish pizza. She dismissed as overly pessimistic the voice that insisted on whispering that control had walked out the minute he had walked in the day before.
The dinner had been wonderful. And so, she had to admit, had the company.
He’d regaled her with tales of the oddities he’d seen in his business and of the escapades he’d pulled in his life. He’d also drawn stories from her of her childhood and her travails in setting up her business, but she didn’t enjoy that half as much as when he talked - and made her laugh.
As the cab carried them south from the restaurant
toward the center of the city, she studied him. A man whose business was children’s toys. A man who refused to live by schedules or plans. A man who seemed wary of committing to something as simple as choosing a temporary assistant. Logic said a man wary of committing to anything.
Or anyone?
“Wait a minute. Stop here,” Paul ordered the cabbie as they neared the northern limit of Michigan Avenue’s Magnificent Mile.
Bundling Bette out of the taxi, he paid the fare and started her off across the wind-whipped boulevard.
“What are you doing? Where are we going?”
“The beach.”
“What?”
“Oak Street Beach. I haven’t been there all summer.”
He took her hand and wrapped it securely in the warmth of his, then led her across the lanes of traffic. They’d reached the sidewalk bordering the beach before she thought to protest further.
“Don’t you think it’s a little late in the season to be going to the beach?”
“Didn’t want to rush into anything,” he said with a grin, still pulling her along.
“Hey. Wait a minute. I’m getting sand in my shoes.” Hauling back on his hand, she managed to stop him.
“Take ‘em off.”
She glared. “I also have hosiery on, and besides, it’s October.”
“It’s also probably seventy degrees, and the sand’s been soaking up sun all day.”
He had a point; she ignored it. “I’m not taking my shoes off and walking in the sand in my hose. And before you say it,” she rushed on, “I’m not taking off my hose on a public beach, either.”
He looked at her a long moment, and she had the impression that a measuring and accounting was taking place.
“You want to go back?” It was an offer more than a question.
She considered the toes of her shoes, already awash in a wave of sand. The black leather pumps needed polishing anyhow, and their wedge heels were nearly flat. She glanced at the tall, lighted buildings standing sentinel behind them, then out to the glistening roll of the lake and finally back to Paul.
Good Guy Heroes Boxed Set Page 123
