by Leanne Banks
Amanda stared at him. “Pardon me?”
“The Eastco deal is done. It will be a light day,” he said.
“Easy for whom?” Amanda asked, knowing how quickly her work piled up in her absence. “I was gone yesterday. Remember?”
“I remember. It will be a light day,” he told her. “I promise. The poor kid’s been through too many changes lately. This one isn’t necessary.”
Amanda felt the intensity of his gaze down to her bones. She hadn’t become invisible again. Yet. With Lilly clinging to her and Jack looking at her that way, she had no choice. “Okay,” she said.
Jack glanced at Mrs. Downey. “We’ve had a change of plans, but I’d like to compensate you for coming out on such short notice.”
After quickly downing cereal, toast and milk, the three of them piled into Jack’s Mercedes and headed for Amanda’s town house apartment on the other side of town. Showing no favoritism, Delilah greeted them at the door, swirling between each pair of legs.
Lilly squealed with delight.
Jack quirked his lips into a wry grin. “The slut?” he asked in a voice for Amanda’s ears only.
“I didn’t exaggerate. Let me get dressed. It will only take a few minutes. Make yourselves at—” She broke off, the comparison between her comfortable but modest apartment and Jack’s luxurious home hitting her. “Have a seat,” she said instead.
Lilly wandered upstairs and watched Amanda lose a battle with a curling iron. When Amanda applied lipstick, the little girl puckered her lips; a silent invitation for Amanda to paint her tiny mouth, too. Amanda smiled and complied, then put on her pearl earrings. Digging through the jewelry box, Lilly selected the gaudy rhinestone drop earrings Amanda had received as a gag gift and never worn.
Chuckling, she clipped the large earrings on Lilly’s little ears. “Oh, your daddy is going to love these. Let’s go.”
They walked downstairs, and Amanda watched Jack do a double take at his daughter. “She has excellent taste, wouldn’t you say?” Amanda asked.
Audibly swallowing his amusement, he nodded. “You look beautiful, Lilly.”
“This is when you say thank you,” Amanda whispered to Lilly.
“Thank you,” Lilly echoed in a whisper.
Lilly was a hit at the office until just after lunch, when the little girl’s energy began to wane, boredom began to set in and naptime loomed. After much coaxing, coddling and a promise of cookie and juice after the nap, Amanda was able to persuade Lilly to lie down on a sofa in an office down the hall.
Amanda plopped down in her chair, cradled her chin in her hands and closed her eyes. A nap sounded pretty good to her right now, too.
“Sleeping on the job?” Jack asked in an amused voice.
Chagrined, she immediately straightened.
He leaned against her desk. “How did you get her to take a nap?”
“Complex negotiations. It would require too much of your time to explain.”
“You pulled the cookie trick again, didn’t you?”
“Think about it. If a nap followed by juice and cookies were part of the required schedule for the United Nations, I bet our conflicts would significantly decrease.”
He nodded. “Point taken. I need you in my office. I’ve got a new project in mind for you.”
Amanda’s silly heart leaped at his words. I need you.
“Okay,” she managed, and pulled herself back in line. “Now?”
“Yes,” he said and led the way.
Following him, she waited expectantly after he closed the door. Gazing at her thoughtfully, he remained quiet for far too long.
Amanda’s stomach began to dance with uneasiness.
He slowly walked toward her and stopped. “I need you...” he began, sending her heart into another tripping mode. She wished he would stop that.
“...to move in with me and take care of Lilly for a while.”
Move in with me. Amanda locked her knees. Her head began to swim. Move in with me. His words echoed in her mind. She didn’t even think she’d fantasized hearing those before.
“I know it’s an unusual request, but Lilly needs you. I need you to help her during this time of transition for her. She never really liked Ms. Brown that much, but she adores you.”
Amanda slammed the brakes on her thoughts. This was all about Lilly. This was not about Jack or his feelings for Amanda. The knowledge rubbed at a raw spot inside her. She took a mind-clearing breath. “But didn’t you tell me the doctor said Ms. Brown should get over her flu in a few days? And she’ll be able to take care of Lilly again?”
“Yes and no. She’ll recover, but I called her today and asked her honestly how she felt her position was working out with Lilly. Ms. Brown said Lilly still didn’t seem happy, and she wondered if another personality might suit better.”
Amanda felt a sinking sensation in her stomach. “You didn’t let her go.”
“I did.”
Amanda shook her head. “Oh, Jack. I’m not a nanny. I’m an administrative assistant.”
“But you’re great with Lilly.”
“What about my job?”
“I’ve arranged for a replacement,” he told her.
Amanda felt as if she’d been kicked. “That easily?”
“No!” he said, raising his voice. “Dammit, not that easily.” He raked a hand through his hair. “My little girl has been miserable since she came to live at my house. I can’t help her. The nanny can’t help her. But you did. What choice do I have?”
“You were sure I would agree, weren’t you?”
“I hoped. It’s not forever. It’s just until she adjusts to living with me. Afterward, you’ll have your job back,” he said. “And my undying gratitude.”
Amanda sighed and walked away from him. She felt torn. If she stayed at Jack’s house, she would be in intimate contact with him on a daily basis. It wouldn’t be all business between them. She could end up falling more deeply for him. She could, in fact, fall irrevocably for him. It was a terrible risk to take.
She glanced at him, and the combination of ruthless determination and vulnerability stamped on his face quashed her inner protests.
Carol would either tell her she was crazy or that this was an opportunity she couldn’t pass up. This could be Amanda’s only chance with Jack. This could be her chance to stop being the invisible woman. Maybe Jack would really see her, and maybe if he saw her, he would also see that she was meant for him.
“I still need to keep up my activities and classes. I will want to keep up with my friends.”
“Consider it done.”
“My cat will have to move in.”
He paused a millisecond. “Okay.”
“I will want to oversee the person temporarily assigned to this position, so I don’t come back to a mess.”
“Makes sense.”
She rolled her eyes. “I’ve never seen you this agreeable. Should I ask for a million in unmarked bills?”
He chuckled. “You might be surprised. You’ll do it?”
“I need to know that you’ll be spending time with Lilly in the evening and on the weekends.”
“I will. I would have before, but you know that Sandra made it difficult,” he said, meeting her gaze. “Anything else?”
“Just one thing,” Amanda said.
“Here comes the million in unmarked bills,” he said cynically.
“Not quite,” Amanda said, surprised at the slight edge of bitterness in his tone. She’d never heard it directed toward her before. “Once a week I’ll bring Lilly to your office and you will have lunch with her.”
Jack looked at her as if she were an alien he could never hope to understand. “I was certain you’d ask for more compensation,” he muttered. “Is that all?”
“Yep. I’m warning you, though. If your goal is Lilly in starched pinafores and speaking when spoken to, you’ve just gotten yourself into a doozy of a mess.”
His expression turned thoughtful, and she saw a ra
re glimmer of vulnerability in his strong features. “My goal is to make Lilly happy.”
Her heart caught. “I’ll do my best.”
The following week Jack took an overseas trip for the purpose of cultivating an international account. Although his days were filled with meetings and business lunches and dinners, his mind frequently wandered to thoughts of Amanda and Lilly. He placed a couple of transcontinental calls home and was relieved to hear all was well.
His meetings went so well he arrived home one day early. Jack entered his foyer to the sounds of laughter and the “Limbo” song. Delilah greeted him by weaving between his legs and purring. Following the sound of the music, he walked into the kitchen and saw his daughter and Amanda doing the limbo underneath a jump rope stretched across two kitchen chairs.
Amanda, barefoot and dressed in jeans and a cropped shirt, shimmied under the rope, her movements baring her belly to his gaze. “I don’t know about this, Lilly,” she said. “I’m not sure I can—”
Distracted by the curve of her waist, he watched her stumble. Hearing her little squeak, he automatically grabbed her to keep her from falling. Amanda stared at him.
Her hand clung to his, and he secured her with his other hand on her back. No bra, he idly noticed. His staid, conservative secretary wasn’t wearing a bra. A strange sizzling sensation spread through him. Her mouth formed an O of surprise. She had a pretty, lush mouth, he thought. He hadn’t noticed it before.
“You’re home early,” she finally managed, still holding his hand.
“I wrapped things up quickly.” He pulled her to her feet.
Her eyelashes fluttered, and her cheeks turned pink. She looked down at their joined hands. “Oh,” she said, and removed her palm from his as if it had been burned.
Jack would have sworn he’d seen her fingers tremble slightly when she’d lifted her hand to her forehead, but that couldn’t be true. And he sure as hell wasn’t feeling a kick of arousal.
Amanda made a sound resembling a faint chuckle, then, seeming to gather her composure, she turned to Lilly. “It must be your day, sweetie. You beat me at limbo, and your daddy’s here!” She cut off Lilly’s tape player and put her arm around his daughter. “He has been cooped up in an airplane for a long time, and I bet he rushed back just so he could see you. I bet he also needs a hug.”
Hesitating, Lilly eyed him with a mixture of wariness and childlike sympathy. With slow steps she moved toward him, and when he bent down, she wrapped her arms around his neck.
Jack’s heart dipped. He picked her up and squeezed her small frame to him. “Hi, princess. Have you had a good time with Amanda?”
Lilly nodded.
“Have you been a good girl?”
Lilly nodded.
“Very good,” Amanda added. “Plus she was smearing me during the limbo dance. Since it was going to be just us girls tonight, Lilly asked if we could have spaghetti instead of the chicken cordon bleu the housekeeper left. I can heat up the chicken for you if you like?”
Jack shook his head. “Spaghetti’s fine.” He set Lilly down when she began to squirm. “I’ll clean up and be back down.”
After dinner and kissing Lilly good-night, Jack poured a drink in the den. Hearing the soft click of a door closing, he glanced out the window and saw Amanda on the back porch. He picked up a newspaper and skimmed it for a few minutes, then checked the window again. She still sat on the porch. He strolled outside.
“Nice night,” he said.
“Almost every night,” she said, rolling her shoulders. “I found out there’s less glare from the city lights here, so the evening sky looks beautiful.”
“I hadn’t really noticed,” he murmured.
“You’ve been busy making conquests,” she said, looking at him.
“Conquests?”
“Corporate conquests. How many international companies did Fortune’s Marco Polo conquer this time?”
He quirked his mouth at her reference to his reputation. “Lots of interest. One commitment.”
“Good for you,” she said with a smile, then rubbed her left shoulder.
“Got a problem, there?” he asked.
“Just a little tight. I think I did one too many rounds of the limbo,” she admitted.
“Where is it?”
“Right here,” she pointed. “but—”
Jack put his hands on her shoulder and felt the small knot. He rubbed and massaged her shoulders while Amanda fell silent She let out a quiet moan that pulled at his gut Her cropped shirt was thin, and he remembered she wasn’t wearing a bra.
Brushing aside the thought, he continued the massage. “You’re very quiet.”
“You haven’t ever rubbed my shoulders before,” she said.
“Is it helping?”
“You—” she took a careful breath “—you’re very good.”
Her words were both an unwitting sensual compliment and invitation, and he wondered what Amanda was like in bed. Was she conservative and repressed, the way she was in the office? Or uninhibited, like she was with his daughter? How responsive would she be? What would make her sigh and gasp? How would her nipples respond to his fingers and mouth?
He felt the dull ache of arousal between his legs. Over Amanda? Jack shook his head.
“You’re different here from the way you are at the office.”
“Different jobs,” she said slowly as if she were forcing herself to concentrate. “With Lilly, she needs me to act a little crazy to get her to come out of herself. She needs lots of hugs.” She made a soft moan.
“And at the office?” he prompted, his curiosity about his assistant growing. There was more about Amanda than met the eye.
“At the office you need me to be efficient and to anticipate your needs so your time won’t be wasted.” She sighed and leaned away from him. “Thank you,” she said. turning slightly to face him. “You need me to be invisible.” A lock of hair slid over one of her eyes like a filmy shield of her secrets. Meeting his gaze, she gave a soft, wry smile. “I’m very good at being invisible.”
Amanda said good-night, and Jack stayed awake. Although he was tired, he couldn’t sleep because of the time zone change. In the middle of the night while he surfed through late-night television, he thought about Amanda. He decided that perhaps she had a few surprises behind those big brown eyes. Maybe she wasn’t just background music after all.
Two days later Amanda brought a picnic lunch for Lilly and Jack to share at the office while she answered questions from her replacement, took care of transition confusion and grabbed a lightning-quick lunch with Carol in a snack bar. “I want an update,” Carol demanded.
“Lilly’s such a sweetie. She—”
“Jack. I want an update on your progress with Jack, since you have now penetrated the Fortune outer wall.”
Amanda laughed and shook her head. “I’m not that much of a schemer. I’ve been much busier with Lilly than Jack.”
Carol frowned. “But part of your purpose in taking on this job was making Jack Fortune see you as a woman.”
“Well, I think maybe he does,” she said, thinking of the questions he’d asked her and the way he’d looked at her. “There’ve been a few nights that we talked.”
“Talk?” Carol asked. “Talk is all?”
“Mostly,” Amanda said. “He rubbed my shoulder one night, but—”
“A massage. That’s better.” Carol studied her. “Your eyes are sparkling.”
Amanda felt her cheeks heat, remembering the way his hands had felt on her. She’d barely been able to breathe, let alone think or talk. It had been torture to pull away, but if she’d allowed him to continue, she’d feared she would do something crazy like turn around in his arms and kiss him. Although Amanda was finding it more and more difficult to keep her feelings invisible to Jack, she was determined to keep her hopes under control.
“No. My eyes are not sparkling.” She shook her head at both Carol and her crazy hopes. “Nothing has happened. He hasn�
��t professed undying love, nor does he seem to have gotten a big eureka that I’m the woman of his dreams. Nothing has happened,” she said again to keep herself on the ground.
“Uh-huh,” Carol said in disbelief. “Your eyes are sparkling, and it’s not due to new contact lens.”
Amanda changed the subject, then scooted back to work a few minutes later. On her way to her office she saw Mollie Shaw hanging outside Stuart Fortune’s office.
Amanda knew Mollie was Chloe Fortune’s young wedding consultant, but she’d only spoken to her a couple of times. “Can I help you find something?”
Mollie blushed. “Oh, no. I—uh—” She bit her lip. “I—uh—I was looking for Emmet, Chloe’s father. I needed to discuss some of the wedding arrangements with him.”
“With Emmet,” Amanda repeated doubtfully. “Emmet’s office is on the next floor.”
“Oh,” Mollie said, her cheeks deepening with color. “My sense of direction needs a little work. Thanks,” she said, then quickly breezed away.
Puzzled, Amanda looked after her for a long moment. She returned to Jack’s office, gave a quick hug to Lilly and an update to Jack.
“Thanks,” he said. “Your replacement is having a difficult time.”
“Why?”
“Because I start every sentence with ‘Amanda does it this way.’”
She smiled. “Are you saying you miss your invisible assistant?”
A curious, seductive light flickered in his green eyes. “You might have been invisible, but what you did wasn’t,” he told her. “I have a conference in fifteen minutes. Is there anything else?”
“Not really,” Amanda said, thinking of Mollie Shaw. “Except I just saw Mollie Shaw hanging around Stuart’s office. She said she was here to see Emmet, but she seemed very nervous.” She shrugged. “It’s probably nothing. Will you be home for dinner tonight?”
“No. I’m joining Trina. Time for that rain check.”
Amanda felt her stomach sink and instantly chided herself. Just because she was caring for Jack’s daughter and the nature of the conversations had become more personal didn’t mean he was anywhere near having romantic feelings for her. Just because he’d seemed to look at her, really look at her, a few times, didn’t mean he wanted anything from her except to help Lilly be happy.
