‘Synergy needs this contract to survive, doesn’t it? Well, they don’t get this contract without you.’ His black brows drew together. ‘Have you ever really worked hard, Amanda? Because you’re about to be worked really, really hard.’
‘You think I’ve never worked hard?’ What the hell did he know of her?
‘I don’t think you’ve ever had to. I think you use whatever means you have to hand to avoid it.’
‘Wow.’ Her eyes opened wide. ‘What an opinion you have of me.’
‘It’s not your fault. You were spoilt. You had a grandfather who indulged your every whim. You’ve never learnt the meaning of the word no.’
‘Is that what you think?’ My God, he had no idea—hadn’t he been the one to teach her? And as a result—being sent away to that awful school…She’d changed—no longer was she the little madam who’d deliberately left her boots caked in mud for him to clean like some servant boy.
‘That’s what I know,’ Jared said flatly. ‘He’d do anything for you, Amanda.’
At that comment she turned away. It was a timely reminder. Grandfather had and would always do whatever he could for her—even if it hadn’t necessarily been the best thing, he had meant well. He had loved her. And now she had to pay him back. It was her turn. But she defended the way things had been.
‘There’s nothing wrong with doing things for those you love. For wanting to make their path smoother than the one you had.’ Grandfather had only wanted to protect her. In his own way he had been making up for the loss of her parents. The loss she’d been too young to really feel—not overtly anyway. And he didn’t want her to have to work as hard as he had. Old-fashioned enough to want her to live ‘like a lady’—and have all the suitable accomplishments of a lady. To draw, to dance, to play piano, to speak French—to just about be rendered useless.
‘You can’t be protected or cosseted for ever. Even real princesses have to work hard at what they do.’
Inside she burned at the injustice. But she refused to rise to his bait. Not again. She shut the lid on the seething emotions inside. Offered the one truth she could manage. ‘You have no idea how hard I can work, Jared.’
‘No? I guess you can prove it to me.’ He smiled—that wolf smile. ‘I wonder if you’ll do it as well as you proved you had no personal feelings for me.’
She trembled—trapped by circumstance into behaving but unable to stop one last bite. ‘You know what, Jared? I admit it. I do have personal feelings for you. I hate you.’
For more reasons than he’d ever know.
His smile broadened. ‘I know. It’s going to be fun, isn’t it?’
That wasn’t quite the word she had in mind.
He stepped closer, but she stepped a half-inch back, crossing her arms—an ineffectual barrier but it was all there was.
‘And what are we going to do about…about…?’
He raised an ironic brow. ‘The way you kiss?’
‘The way we kiss.’ It wasn’t as if he hadn’t kissed her back—if anything he’d led the dance, his hands had crossed the boundaries, his tongue had teased hers out.
‘Nothing.’ He shrugged. ‘I can control it.’
That got her. As if it weren’t anything spectacular? Of course it was. She’d done a lot of kissing and that had been in another class. He thought he’d been testing her? Yeah right. He’d been as breathless as her. As hot as her.
‘Oh, really?’ she asked, pouring on the sarcasm.
He stood stock-still, meeting her fiery gaze with a banked, black one of his own. ‘Sure.’
She deliberately let her eyes trail down his body and back up again. He could control it? She turned and literally flounced out. Determined to prove him wrong on everything.
Chapter Five
THE second Amanda got to her desk she picked up the box of chocolates and put the lot in the bin.
‘We’re having a planning meeting late this afternoon.’
Damn, he’d followed her through, carrying on the conversation as if that kiss had never happened.
‘I’m not free this afternoon.’ She didn’t turn to face him. ‘Tomorrow morning will have to do.’
‘I’m not in town tomorrow. It’ll have to be tonight.’
‘But—’
‘This is priority work, Amanda.’
Amanda saw the way Sean was sitting unnaturally still at his desk. The way he was staring at her and then at Jared and then back to her—and down, looking at her mouth and then her blouse.
Hell. The top two buttons were still undone—and Amanda’s buttons were never undone. That was the problem with Jared—he made her forget all the important things, such as that now she had to be nice to him.
‘Where and what time?’ she turned and asked him sweetly.
He grinned, knowing how much she was hating having to change her attitude. ‘I’ll pick you up from here at six.’
‘No,’ Amanda said hurriedly. She did not want to meet him in the evening. ‘I can come to your office at four. Would that suit?’
‘I thought you were busy.’
‘I can squeeze you in.’
His eyes met hers for a pregnant moment and she felt heat flood into her cheeks—had she really said that? Was he really thinking of what she was suddenly thinking of?
‘That would be perfect,’ he purred and with a wave to the others was gone as silently as he’d arrived.
Bronwyn looked worried. ‘Are you sure you can handle this, Amanda? I mean, things look a little—’
‘I know.’ Amanda raced into damage-control mode. ‘Jared likes to tease. But I can handle him.’ She’d learn to handle herself around him. She looked around at the other two and realised just how much they were counting on her. Not to mention Grandfather. She straightened. ‘I can handle the account, Bronwyn. I won’t let you down.’
No getting close. No proving anything. Not until this job was out of the way and the money was in the bank.
Jared breathed the fresh cold air, opting to go for a walk rather than get in his car and go straight back to his office. What the hell had he been thinking? He hadn’t, of course—the minute he’d got her into a room alone he’d been unable to stop pouncing. Hand on heart he hadn’t intended to touch her. But hand on heart he couldn’t resist. He walked faster as his body threatened to react awkwardly to the memory of that kiss.
She was the hottest woman he’d known. But she was also destined to be his forbidden fruit. He’d set up a business situation; following through on that heated encounter wasn’t possible when they were going to be working together. So stupid—he should have stayed away.
Almost ten years ago he could have had her but honour and duty to another had forced him to refuse. Now, it was his own integrity and he would stay in control of it.
But despite that, and despite knowing all about her spoilt streak, he still wanted.
Amanda got to his office two minutes before she said she would. The receptionist told her to go straight up. His office was nice, large, but not ridiculously so, and very informal. She turned her back on the sofa, opted for a chair at the round table in the corner. For the first few moments she felt awkward, but it was as if the morning had never happened. He kept his distance, barely looked at her, as he showed her the previous campaigns and pointed out what he liked and didn’t like about them.
She relaxed. Focusing on the work, she started to hit her stride, making notes, making points, asking questions.
‘Let’s get something to eat.’ His suggestion came out of the blue.
She glanced out of the window—when had it got dark? What time was it? After six already? How had that happened?
‘Aren’t we done for the day?’ She had copious pages of notes.
‘No,’ he answered uncompromisingly. ‘I’m away tomorrow and I want you to be able to get on with this asap. I want to meet on Monday and you can show me what you’ve come up with.’
Monday?
‘So let’s go to a restaurant and
keep going.’ He sat back in his chair, looking at her rather than at the papers spread between them.
‘But—’
‘Think of it as killing two birds with one stone. You need to work to be able to eat, right? Tonight you can do both. Besides—’ he suddenly had that smile on ‘—a restaurant is nice and bright and public.’
She made herself look away from him, looked around her instead. The office was very quiet and the darkness closing in on them through the window made the scene more intimate. She was drawn back to him again—meeting his eyes…
‘OK.’ It was a no-brainer.
He drove, his car even more luxurious than she’d imagined it would be when at the airport bus stop on Sunday night, with its spacious seating, the stretch-rightout leg room, gleaming interior and purring power under the bonnet.
Those years ago in Ashburton he’d had no car—had either hitched a ride or worst case, ridden a rusty old mountain bike. Back then Amanda had ridden in her grandfather’s Daimler, seated in the back seat like Lady Muck. It was Amanda who had no car now.
‘Any preference—Italian? Thai?’
She shook her head, realising she no longer felt that hungry.
He pulled into a park and walked her half a block up the street—giving her a sidelong look. ‘They do a really good chocolate fondant here.’
‘What makes you think I’d like that?’ she asked tartly.
He laughed and reluctantly so did she. OK, maybe she could do with a little sweetening. The warmth of the restaurant came out of the open door to meet them. The maître d’ smiled at Jared and led them straight to a table in a quiet corner.
Amanda narrowed her eyes—had he booked this? When? It was obvious the two men knew each other, and Jared was clearly used to such quick service. Quite the successful man, wasn’t he?
She shouldn’t be surprised. He’d worked so hard back then, of course he’d have continued that habit. No doubt he deserved every inch of his obvious success. But somehow it grated. Especially in light of her own failures. While he’d gone up in the world, she’d tumbled down. But she’d never worked like him, never had to—not ’til now. Maybe there was a kind of justice to it? But it wasn’t fancy things she wanted—in truth she’d never really wanted them. Right now she’d give up all the riches in the world to have her grandfather healthy again.
She watched Jared sit back in his fine tailored suit, noting the ease with which he spoke to the waiting staff—so at home in a scene of such wealth and sophistication.
He’d be even more irresistible to women now, wouldn’t he? What with serious money as well as those superb looks and that sizzling attitude. They’d be falling over themselves to land him. And he’d be happy to make the most of it. Always he’d have the pick of the most beautiful women around.
Amanda glared at the menu card.
‘Shall I order the dessert right away?’ Jared was grinning at her.
‘I think I can hold off.’ She winced as she realised this was one of those places that was so expensive it didn’t detail the prices. ‘What else is good?’
‘The veal.’ He didn’t need to look at the menu to know the dish.
‘OK.’ She didn’t want to take responsibility for deciding how many millions this meal was going to cost.
‘I’ll have it too.’ He added a bottle of wine to the order and a bottle of his own company’s juice.
Amanda looked everywhere but at him in the intervening moments. Sure it was bright and public, but they were in a darker corner near the back and there was something dangerously intimate about a small table set for two. What a fool she was for agreeing to this.
Once upon a time they’d been from opposite sides of the tracks. Now those positions had been reversed. Jared was the one issuing the orders, Jared was the one in control of her career—and he was enjoying it, wasn’t he?
Payback time. But what she didn’t know was why—and he didn’t know the possible ramifications. She wasn’t going to tell him. Wasn’t going to play the pity card—he never had. All she could do was what he had—work hard—maybe that would make him accept her competence.
‘It’ll be fine,’ Jared assured the waiter when he came with the wine. ‘I’ll pour.’
The waiter left immediately and Jared filled her glass. She lifted it, but paused when she saw him put the bottle back on the table.
‘You’re not having any?’
‘I don’t drink.’
‘Is that because of your dad?’ she asked straight out.
There was a momentary tightness to his mouth but then he answered. ‘I like to have all my wits about me.’ He lifted his gaze and the irony gleamed at her. ‘But you go right ahead and relax.’
He’d avoided the reference to his father. It had made him uncomfortable—perhaps even a little angry? But Jared couldn’t constantly dig about her antecedents and not let her do the same. The fact was they knew a lot about each other—most of which each preferred the other would forget.
How many of his employees knew he’d gone without breakfast every day of his teens? That the teacher at school had given him a bag with an apple and sandwich on the sly and that he’d cleaned her car on weekends as payment? How many knew that James wasn’t his surname but his middle name—that he’d rejected his father’s name as soon as he could. She knew. And Jared knew she knew. And she was sure he hated it.
Was that the cause of the friction between them? The reminders of what they’d once been? Was his judgment of her grounded in that old imbalance—when she’d had everything and he’d had nothing? She could understand it—because with the turning of the tables, she was coming close to resenting him now.
She looked at the deep red liquid in her glass. ‘I’m not having a whole bottle of wine all to myself.’
‘No?’ Jared’s grin became positively evil and he toyed with his cutlery. ‘Maybe you’d like something stronger later—brandy perhaps?’
She’d had brandy just once in her life. And she would never, ever have it again. The scent of it turned her stomach. She fiddled with her wine glass. He was deliberately taunting her, reminding her. It wasn’t the first time he’d referred to their past encounter and the only way she could think of to stop the unsubtle comments was to take him full on. He thought he was embarrassing her? He was, but she could never be as embarrassed and humiliated as she’d been that night. Did he even know what had happened afterwards?
‘It took him a long time to cool down.’
His eyes sharpened. ‘Your grandfather?’
She nodded. ‘Why did you do it?’ Why had he betrayed her so completely?
‘You were so young. And you were hell-bent on making the biggest mistake of your life.’ His fingers ran over the blade of his knife. ‘Did you really think I’d take advantage of you like that?’
He was only a couple of years older than her. It wasn’t as if it were a couple of decades. ‘I was sixteen.’
‘In some countries that would be illegal.’
‘And in others we could have been married for two years already.’
He snorted. ‘You were too young.’
‘It wasn’t obvious you were going to be such a puritan.’ Had he any idea of the rumours that used to float around about him? About his success and prowess as a lover? Was it any wonder she’d believed that her risqué stunt would be just the thing to turn his head towards her?
‘Let you down, didn’t I, honey?’ He laughed but it wasn’t a warm sound. ‘Wasn’t all the rough rebel you wanted.’
He’d left her in all her glory—a silk and lace negligee on her grandfather’s front doorstep. He’d rung the bell so loudly that both Polly the housekeeper and Grandfather had come running. She’d been wickedly angry with him. But not as angry as he’d been with her. Her wrist had been bruised for days from the force with which he’d dragged her out of his car and up to the door. But that wasn’t ’til after…he’d taught her the lesson in his own style.
‘He did exactly what you suggeste
d.’
‘What was that?’
How could he not remember? ‘Locked me up ’til I was old enough to know better.’
‘Did he?’
‘Eastern Bay School for Girls.’
‘How awful for you,’ he mocked. ‘A veritable prison, I imagine.’
‘In its own way, absolutely.’ Two years in the most hellish boarding school, not even on her home island, and full of the snobbiest, cattiest girls ever to have been born. Add to that a bunch of prison wardens impersonating teachers and the whole place was set for a right old party—not.
‘And did it work?’
‘Save me from myself, you mean?’
His gaze intensified.
She deliberately lowered hers and allowed a smile to touch her lips. Mona Lisa all the way.
The silence was long.
‘Why did you do it?’ His voice sounded rusty.
Their eyes met full on once more. She looked away first. She picked up the wine and took a small sip. ‘I guess I was young. At the mercy of hormones or something.’
‘And you’re still at the mercy of hormones?’
She looked back to him—instantly fell into the velvety darkness.
‘You still want me, Amanda.’
She forced herself to reply. ‘You’re an attractive man.’ Only a little bit of a wobble. ‘But I’m older now. You don’t need to worry. I won’t be hunting you down again.’
‘I won’t find you waiting in my bed for me late one night?’
‘My body might still find yours attractive, Jared,’ she said, fighting for breath, ‘but I wouldn’t sleep with you if you were the last man alive.’
‘Oh, really?’
She froze at the way he’d so coolly mimicked her words of this morning. Knowing damn well he had as much right to sound sarcastic as she had then. ‘You ruined everything.’
‘Did I? By not giving the spoilt princess her way? Were you not indulged for a while? I bet it didn’t take you that long to wind him round your little finger again.’
She calmed herself with a count to ten. ‘Like I said, it took a long time for him to cool down.’ And now he was in trouble. She had to keep that and only that at the forefront of her brain. She couldn’t let this haze of desire cloud her judgment and ruin everything—not again. ‘Look, Jared. We’re grown-ups now. Let’s laugh about it and move on. We have to work together and that’s the extent of our relationship. Professional, agreed?’
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