The Boss Next Door (Harlequin Heartwarming)

by Fox, Roz Denny

  Mr. Campbell noticed. He herded them all inside and shut the door. “You’re not sick, are you, Sherilyn?”

  She shook her head. “I unplugged my answering machine and turned the ringer down on the phone. Did Sheldon give you a message?”

  Her mother’s eyes clouded in sympathy, and Sherry’s hopes plummeted.

  “He did, dear. What with Emily and the children staying with us, and Nolan dashing in and out to complete the remodeling of his home, I feel terrible that your father and I didn’t even know you were being considered for a promotion. Why didn’t you tell us?”

  Sherry thought she’d steeled herself to lose, but from the way her stomach constricted, evidently she wasn’t ready to face it. “All of our lives have been so hectic. I would have told you if I’d been selected.”

  Her parents exchanged guilty glances. “We’ve been running hither and yon helping Emily square away the wedding. You still should have called. But it does explain why you haven’t dropped by. Emily’s relieved it was business that kept you away. She’s afraid that you’re...unhappy about her marrying Nolan. Emily so wants you as her maid of honor, Sherilyn.”

  Sherry recoiled from the slight censure in her mother’s tone. She’d hoped Emily would ask someone else to stand up with her. But she supposed her future sister-in-law felt it was appropriate, not only because they were friends, but because Sherry had been the one who’d invited Emily to take part in Nolan’s study. But only to prove that today’s women could function fine without men. Not Emily, apparently. It hadn’t taken her three months to fall head-over-heels in love.

  So okay, Sherry admitted it. Her nose was out of joint.

  “Sherry? You look upset. I’m so sorry you lost out on the job, honey.” Sherry’s mother gave her a bracing hug.

  “Who did get it?” Sherry asked dully. “Did Sheldon say?”

  “Oh, yes.” Mrs. Campbell turned to her husband. “I told you the man’s name, Ben. Do you remember?”

  Sherry’s dad rustled his keys. “Not anyone we knew. Jared, or maybe Garth. Sounded like a cowboy singer.”

  “Garrett Lock,” Sherry supplied. It was no big revelation, but having it spelled out cracked the dam on feelings she’d held at bay thus far. Now she faced real concern for the future of a program to which she’d dedicated so much energy. Coupled with that, a sense of failure seeped in. Personal, yes, but more than that. Her loss set back the upward mobility of women on campus.

  “I’m sure it’s a crushing disappointment at the moment, Sherry,” her mother said gently. “But I’ve found things usually work out for the best. I’m sure something good will come of this. Give it time, dear.”

  “Yes,” agreed her father. “Maybe it’s a blessing in disguise. Your mom and I have been trying to find a way to broach one of our worries—we think you’ve given up all semblance of a private life for your job. We see more of Yvette than of you. She’s always going to parties or out on a date. All you do is work, work, work.”

  A tic fluttered in Sherry’s left eyelid. “Dad. It’s after one, and I have to be at the office by eight.”

  “She’s right, Ben.” Sherry’s mom slipped her arm through that of her spouse and hauled him toward the door. “It’s enough that we had to be the bearers of bad tidings. We should have the decency to let her lick her wounds in private.”

  “Won’t work, Mom,” Sherry said, all the while wondering if she’d have half of Nan Campbell’s verve when she reached sixty. “Your ‘good cop, bad cop’ routine doesn’t work anymore. I’ve wised up.”

  “Pity,” Nan murmured. “But then, I guess it’s time you started working our old flimflam on your own offspring.”

  “Guilt isn’t effective, either.” Sherry crossed her arms and leaned a shoulder against the door frame. “I have a Ph.D. in psychology, remember?”

  “Then I know you’ll march right in there tomorrow and congratulate the winner,” her mother whispered, tiptoeing into the dark courtyard that fronted the U-shaped complex of townhomes.

  Sherry shut the door with enough force to rattle the stained-glass panels on either side. Congratulate Garrett Lock? “It’ll be a cold day in...in Texas,” she mumbled. Rats. Her mother could still lay on a guilt trip to beat all guilt trips.

  As sleep was now out of the question, Sherry went into the kitchen and brewed a pot of Red Zinger tea. Forty minutes later, she dug out the telephone book and looked up the number of the hotel where her rivals were staying. Lifting

  the receiver, she quickly punched out the main number. A cheery voice answered.

  “I’d like to leave messages for two of your guests,” she said. “One will be checking out in the morning, so please tuck it under his door. Tell Dr. Eli Aguilar that I enjoyed meeting him and Marguerite. Say it’s too bad there was only one job. Sign it Dr. Sherilyn Campbell.” She spelled her first name. Even after the staff person read it back, Sherry wasn’t sure what she wanted to say to Lock.

  “You said two messages?” the clerk prompted.

  “Yes. The second goes to Dr. Garrett Lock. Just say, congratulations on your appointment. And sign it the same way as the first.”

  After she hung up, Sherry worried that her message sounded too terse. She did have to work with the man. Somehow she couldn’t bring herself to say work for him. Technically they were a team. That had been a big problem with Kruger. He hid in his office, preferring to issue edicts in rambling memos. She hated those memos—and the fact that she could never get an appointment with him to discuss any of his preposterous decrees. He required memos in return, too. Some of hers were so hot Angel joked that she needed to fan the keys on her computer as she typed them.

  If Lock wanted to get off on the right foot, he’d make himself more accessible to staff. Come to think of it, Sherry didn’t envy him having to listen to all the initial gripes that got tossed at a new dean. Faculty members all had their petty complaints and pet projects. The classified staff lobbied for less pressure and more help. As a department chair, she bullied for growth and expansion. And if the board’s questions these past three days were any indication, they planned to tighten the old purse strings even more.

  Sherry sighed. Maybe she was a teensy bit relieved to know that Garrett Lock would be the one tearing his hair out attending all those ulcer-inducing meetings and not her.

  The clock in the living room struck three. Why go back to bed for a few short hours? Stifling a yawn, she got out her cookbook and decided to make something gooey and chocolate to take into the department tomorrow. One thing staff agreed on was that chocolate solved a lot of woes. If she appeared bearing chocolate fudge squares, no one would comment on her loss or the road maps in her eyes.

  Would Lock be surprised? She’d bet he had her pegged as a sore loser. A sore loser without domestic talents, if he was anything like Nolan’s pals in the history department.

  By seven, Sherry had showered and dressed in her favorite baggy, hot pink pants, bright orange poet’s blouse and comfy Birkenstocks. Mickey was once again ensconced on her wrist. Back to her old self. Almost, she lamented, running gel through her shorn locks. But her heavy hair had always been so difficult to tame. She might just stay with this cut for a while.

  Feeling refreshed, she hummed along with a Sugarland CD she’d popped in the player before smoothing chocolate glaze on the cooled cake. In the middle of slicing finished squares, her doorbell pealed. “What now?” She licked chocolate off her fingers. She might be resigned, but that didn’t mean she wanted well-meaning friends stopping by to commiserate. As her mom said, she preferred to lick her wounds in private.

  “Yes?” She yanked open the door. The knife she’d been using to cut the cake slipped from her fingers, bounced off the floor and splattered chocolate across the light khaki pants of the man standing there.

  Garrett Lock danced back too late to save himself. In doing so,
he spilled water down the front of his shirt from the bud vase he held.

  “I’m sorry.” Sherry leaned down and brushed at the spots on his pant leg only to watch in horror as the chocolate smeared and spread. “Oh, no!” she gasped. “I’ve made it worse.”

  In trying to see what she’d done, Garrett tilted the vase the other way and poured a stream of water over Sherry’s head.

  “Stop! I just washed my hair.” She leaped up, accidentally knocking the vase out of Garrett’s hand. It flew through the air, crashed on the entry floor and exploded. For a heartbeat they both stared at the pale pink rosebud swimming in chocolate-muddied water. Sunlight streaming over Garrett’s shoulders glittered off particles of glass embedded in the bruised petals of the delicate flower.

  “Oh. Oh,” Sherry said softly as she sank onto one knee to rescue the poor bedraggled rose.

  “Wait.” Garrett quickly jerked her to her feet. Too late. He saw a dark splotch of blood seeping through Sherry’s pink pant leg. Hauling her into his arms, he strode into her living room where he dropped her unceremoniously into a rocking chair, still clutching the soggy flower.

  Sherry’s squeak of protest was cut off by the sound of rending fabric. In one fluid motion he’d ripped her pant leg from the bottom hem to three inches above her knee.

  “What...what are you doing?” A tic hopscotched beneath her eyelid. “Look what you did to my best linen pants!” she gasped.

  “Best...?” He blinked. “I thought they were pajamas. I also thought you’d bloodied your knee. I see now that you hit a blob of chocolate.” Closing his eyes, he massaged the lean contours of his cheeks. “I have a cab waiting. I intended to cart you off to the emergency room.”

  “I can’t believe you mutilated my pants.” Sherry smacked him with the rose she’d rescued from the muck, much as she would have done to Nolan. Hopping up, she literally shoved him out the door.

  “Ouch! Are you nuts? That thing has thorns.” Garrett put his arms up to ward off her swats. “I swear, for someone who claims to abhor violence, you get plenty physical,” he grumbled.

  Sherry slid on the wet flagstone and almost fell. He caught her and held her upright until she shucked off his hands and toppled into the decorative railing that edged her small porch. “You bring out the worst in me, Lock. Shouldn’t you be meeting with Westerbrook and the rest of the deans?”

  The blue eyes assessing her narrowed marginally. “I got your note of congratulations and decided I’d been rude last night. The hotel gift shop was open and...well, I bought the flower. I was out the door before I happened to think what people would say if I gave it to you on campus. I found you in the phone book. I don’t know the area, so I called a cab. You look different, by the way. What have you done to yourself?”

  “I’ve gone back to my old job, as if you didn’t know. And let me say again—dumping that water on you last night was an accident.” Her gaze strayed to the pathetic flower now bent and mangled. Softness crept into her voice. “The rose was a nice gesture, Lock.”

  “Then do you mind telling me what happened here? Do you throw knives at every man who knocks at your door?”

  “I didn’t throw it. You were the last person I expected to see. The knife sort of...fell out of my hand. Um, I really feel bad about the chocolate on your pants. I’ll give you the name of my dry cleaner. Tell him to put it on my bill. If you hurry, you should be able to change and still make it to campus to meet the brass.” He’d be on time, but she’d have to rewash her hair. Rumors would fly, after all, about her being a sore loser.

  “Are you sure you didn’t cut your knee?” He leaned down to check again.

  His breath tickled her skin. It was all Sherry could do to stand still for his examination until he muttered, “Yup. You’re fit as a fiddle.” He stood abruptly and she flinched and flattened against the railing.

  “You’re sure one jumpy female. Hey, I feel awful, tearing your pants like that.”

  “We could call it even. I take care of my ruined pants. You take care of yours. And don’t feel obliged to replace the rose. Is that your cabbie honking?” She leaned over, trying to see out to the parking strip.

  Like a shot, Garrett pulled her back. His fingers flexed around her upper arms. “Stop. You make me nervous. That top rail wobbles.” He set her nearer the door.

  She looked amused. “The railing has always wobbled, and I’ve lived here five years. That is your cab’s horn,” she said pointedly.

  He still seemed unsure whether to go or not. “I hate leaving you with this mess. If you have a broom, I’ll sweep up the glass. I’m paying the driver. He can wait.”

  Somehow picturing this man, who as of today was her boss, inside her home with a broom in his hands, drove Sherry’s nerves to red alert. “I’m not the one with an early meeting,” she said firmly. “Go.”

  He did, but only because the cabdriver lay on the horn and Garrett didn’t want any of Sherry’s neighbors calling the cops. “I feel like we’re still off on the wrong foot,” he called as he walked backward along the center walkway.

  Sherry’s stomach stayed in knots until he totally disappeared. She’d never met a man who made a habit of throwing her into a tailspin.

  Once she’d cleaned up the glass and the watery mess and washed her hair, Sherry peeled off her pants and tossed them in the trash.

  “For pity’s sake!” Lock attracted accidents. Or else she did.

  His concern for her welfare had been commendable, however. That warm pleasant thought kept him on her mind as Sherry yanked a wild print skirt from the closet. Its riot of colors further lightened her mood.

  * * *

  LATE AGAIN, Sherry detoured past her office to the staff break room. Angel intercepted her, the secretary’s cool gray eyes assessing. “Those goodies don’t fool me, boss lady. You stayed up half the night crying, didn’t you?”

  “Nary a tear. I wouldn’t give them the satisfaction.” Sherry lifted her chin.

  “The prez sashayed his drugstore cowboy by here to see his new digs half an hour ago. Think you oughta know I’m probably the only woman on campus who isn’t tripping over her feet to kiss up to macho man.”

  Sherry placed her chocolate squares on the break-room table, along with paper plates and plastic forks, as she listened to Angel. “I expected as much.”

  “What are we going to do?” Angel asked when Sherry headed into her office.

  “Do?”

  “Yeah. Are we gonna roll over and play dead or give him the business like we did old man Kruger?”

  Sherry stuffed her purse into the locking file where she kept it during working hours. For some reason she recalled how he’d looked, standing in her doorway, holding a rose. “The man deserves a chance, Angel.”

  “Don’t tell me you’ve fallen for his pretty face, too?”

  “Certainly not. It’s just...well, I believe a person is innocent until proven guilty. If Lock rides the fence like Kruger, then we’ll take him to task.” Sherry’s lips twitched in the barest hint of a grin.

  “He’s a man, isn’t he? Already has three strikes against him.”

  Sherry watched Angel turn and dash out to answer the department phone. She remembered the accusation Yvette threw at her the other day—how friends thought she’d become a man hater. It wasn’t true, even if her attitude toward men had become a little...jaundiced. Angel, now, had good reason to be bitter, hooking up with two losers before the age of twenty-five. Still, there were good men out there.

  Sherry made a mental note to watch what she said from now on. She was the teacher—the one charged with straightening out her students sometimes warped views. Taking a moment to give the situation serious thought, Sherry realized her disenchantment with the opposite sex had come about gradually.

  The people she dealt with day in and day out were mostly wo
men whose spouses had left them for someone younger. Wives whose husbands abused them physically and mentally. Mothers fighting for custody of their kids. Women unable to get minimal maintenance from the men who’d fathered their children. Who wouldn’t be jaundiced?

  Rearranging a stack of files, Sherry’s thoughts turned to her new boss. What was the reason for his divorce? He’d certainly evaded the team’s questions on that subject. Was it because the truth would hurt him?

  Sherry slammed the files into a box. There she was, doing it again. Condemning a man on the basis of his sex. She’d told Angel she was going to give Garrett Lock a fair shake, and she would.

  It didn’t bode well for him, however, that he didn’t bother showing up in the department again all day.

  At five minutes to five, Dr. Westerbrook paid Sherry a visit.

  “I want you to know, Sherilyn, the decision to hire Garrett was unanimous. Dr. Lock had more administrative experience. Our decision would have been harder if you’d been an assistant dean. There are larger institutions elsewhere in the state that may have openings for assistant deans.”

  Sherry rocked back in her chair. “Am I to gather that Lock objects to working with me?” Anger clenched her stomach. It took every ounce of professional acumen to keep her tone level.

  “Not at all.” Westerbrook appeared ruffled. “Sheldon wants assurance that you’ll play ball with the new dean. Will you cooperate, Sherilyn?”

  “It’s not hard to be cooperative with an invisible man. Where is the boy wonder?”

  “That’s the attitude that worries us,” Westerbrook exclaimed. “According to the contract, Garrett has two weeks to relocate his household before he starts the job. It’s not his fault that Kruger waited until so late to declare his intent to retire. We’ll have to begin classes next week without Lock.”

  “A lot goes on in the first two weeks that needs the dean’s attention. Who’ll sign overloads and make decisions about adding and dropping classes based on enrollment?”