by Linda Turner
His absence obviously hadn’t stopped her from making herself at home. Wearing jeans, an oversized, faded red sweatshirt and some kind of fuzzy socks on her feet, she had papers scattered all over the table and a cup of hot chocolate close at hand. As he watched, she propped her feet on the chair opposite her, closed her eyes and went perfectly still. Seconds later, her fingers began to fly over the keys.
Amused, he silently crossed the room to take up a position directly across from her. She never noticed when he leaned back against the counter and crossed his arms over his chest. He meant to tease her the second she opened her eyes, but as his gaze wandered over her, he couldn’t help but notice, not for the first time, that the woman had an old-fashioned English-rose prettiness about her that she didn’t even seem to be aware of. There was no artifice to her, nothing calculated. Her makeup had faded hours ago, and her hair could have used a comb. Still, she was beautiful, and he couldn’t figure out why.
It had to be her skin, he decided. It had a creaminess to it, a translucence, that made a man just want to reach out and touch to see if it was as soft as it looked.
Suddenly realizing he was tempted to do just that, he pushed away from the counter with the intention of getting the hell out of there, but he’d waited too long. She opened her eyes and gasped at the sight of him standing right in front of her. “What are you doing?”
Caught watching her, he actually felt a blush steal into his cheeks. He’d never felt more like an idiot. Scowling, he snapped, “I was about to ask you the same thing. I came in here to get a drink. What are you doing?”
It was, he thought, a logical question, one that certainly shouldn’t have produced a blush, but that’s exactly what it did. Avoiding his gaze, she ripped out the sheet of paper in the typewriter, then began to gather the other pages spread out on the table around her. “I’m writing a book,” she said stiffly. “A murder mystery.”
Although he was momentarily surprised, he didn’t know why he hadn’t figured out sooner that the lady was the creative type. In spite of the fact that her former boss had done nothing but sing her praises when he’d talked to him, she wasn’t like the other women he knew in the business world. She didn’t have the tough outer shell that you needed to climb the corporate ladder, that single-minded ambition and cunning that a woman had to have to compete with a man.
Instead, she had an innocent naivete to her that the women of his world had lost years ago. Now he knew why she’d been such an easy mark for that Percy jerk who’d swindled her out of her rent money. She was a dreamer, an eternal optimist. She had to be if she actually thought she could beat the odds and get published.
He could have told her that her chances were slim to zero, but he would have been wasting his breath. Dreamers never cared about the odds—they were more interested in fairy tales and happily-ever-afters. Cynics like himself knew there was no such thing.
“I didn’t know you were interested in writing. Have you had anything published?”
Phoebe smiled slightly at the question, not surprised that he had asked it. He was, after all, a man who focused on the bottom line. He would never understand that half the fun of one day being published was the challenge of getting there. “Not yet,” she said. “But it’s just a matter of time.”
Suddenly remembering that he had missed supper and she was taking up most of the kitchen table, she quickly jumped up to unplug her typewriter and return it to its case. “I didn’t mean to hog the table. If you’re hungry, there’s leftover chicken from supper in the refrigerator. Oh, and I forgot to thank you for the bunk beds for the kids. I don’t know why you did it, but they were thrilled.”
“It was nothing—they needed a place to sleep that didn’t take up a lot of room, and that seemed like the best solution. You don’t have to put your things away,” he said, frowning as she gathered up her manuscript. “I’ve already eaten. I just felt like celebrating and remembered Alice kept some wine in the pantry.”
Plugging Phoebe’s typewriter back in, he stepped over to the pantry and grinned at the small wine rack attached to one wall. There was only one bottle in it, but one was all he needed. “Here we go,” he said as he turned back to face her. “A chardonnay from one of the Fredericksburg vineyards. Can I tempt you to join me?”
She didn’t have much of a head for alcohol and told him so. “But don’t let me stop you. What are you celebrating?”
“Outsmarting a damn clever old goat,” he said with a grin as he found a wine glass in the cabinet and poured himself a drink. “It isn’t often that I get a chance to put one over on Harold Applebee. He’s usually too smart for that.”
Amused at how pleased he was with himself, Phoebe couldn’t help but notice that whoever this Applebee character was, Mitch spoke of him with what almost sounded like affection. Which was surprising since the other man appeared to be some kind of business adversary.
Sinking back down into her chair, her brows knitting in a frown, she studied him curiously. “Is he a friend? I know that sounds stupid—people don’t usually go around outsmarting someone they consider a friend—but you sound like you admire him.”
“I do,” he said promptly. “He taught me everything I know about business. But he’s not a friend. At least, not anymore,” he qualified, as his smile faded. “He tried to pressure me into marrying his granddaughter and I refused. We haven’t spoken since.”
Phoebe couldn’t imagine anyone pressuring Mitch Ryan into doing anything he didn’t want to do. She barely knew him, but she could see that he was a man who would be as immovable as Gibraltar if he felt strongly about something.
“You didn’t love her?” she asked quietly. “Or you didn’t appreciate being pressured?”
“I’m not the marrying kind,” he retorted flatly. “I told both Lisa and Harold that at the beginning. They both thought they could change my mind.”
If she’d been looking for a relationship, Phoebe would have been wise to take his warning to heart. But she’d been there, done that, bought the T-shirt, and sold it at a garage sale. Her heart was still bruised from the beating Scott had given it, and the last thing she wanted was a man in her life. Especially one like Mitch Ryan. If he didn’t believe in marriage, he didn’t have any romance in his soul, and hers was overflowing with it.
Relieved to discover that they were as different as night and day, she said, “My grandmother used to say that you can save yourself a lot of heartache if you just listen to what people are saying when they tell you who they are— and don’t try to believe they are the person you’d like them to be. That’s a mistake I try not to make.”
Short of telling him flat out that he didn’t have to worry about her getting any ideas about him, she couldn’t have been any clearer. One look in his steely blue eyes, and she knew she didn’t have to spell it out. He wasn’t a stupid man—he’d gotten the message.
They started working together the very next morning. With the kids in school, they had the apartment all to themselves, and in the silence that engulfed them, things could have been awkward. After all, it was an intimate setting, and the fact that they were sharing the apartment was hardly the norm between a boss and his secretary. Mitch wouldn’t have blamed Phoebe if she’d been uncomfortable, but she proved to be every bit as professional as her former boss had claimed she was. All business, she did whatever he asked of her without complaint, and anyone seeing them together would have thought that they’d worked together for years instead of a matter of hours.
And things only improved the next day and the day after that. Like Jennifer, his secretary in Dallas, she didn’t need supervision or direction to do her job. She dealt with all the tenants’ problems and the plumber who arrived to start installing new pipes, began researching architects and contractors for the attic remodeling job, and still managed to handle whatever work he needed her to do for him. And with an intuitiveness that unnerved him, she began to anticipate his needs before he did.
He was, he knew, damn
lucky to have her. She was just what he’d been looking for, someone he could leave in charge whenever business took him back to Dallas. And although he’d been a little apprehensive about sharing the apartment with her and the kids, his fears had proved to be groundless. The kids were settling in nicely, and they were all learning one another’s quirks and oddities with good humor. Things couldn’t have worked out better if he’d planned them himself.
A wise man would have been sending up a silent prayer of thanks to whatever angel had sent her to the Social Club in search of an apartment. Instead, his gut was telling him he never should have hired her, let alone let her move in with him. And he’d learned a long time ago to pay attention to his gut.
She was, he thought irritably as he unobtrusively watched her type a letter for him, a woman he found impossible to ignore. And he couldn’t for the life of him say why. She didn’t flirt with him, very seldom spoke of anything but business during working hours, and even dressed in power suits and business clothes as if she were going to an office every day. Still, there was something about the way she moved, an unconscious seductiveness, that was far more enticing than the slow, knowing smiles and flirtatious batting of eyelashes that women had been using since time immemorial to get a man’s attention. Half the time, she acted like she didn’t even know he was in the same room with her.
And he was, he was discovering to his growing irritation, a man who didn’t like to be ignored. Especially by a pretty woman.
Disgusted with himself and in need of some space, he growled, “I want that mailed as soon as you finish it.”
Her eyes on the computer screen and the document she was working on, she saved the letter, then punched in the appropriate keys to print it out. “I’ll walk down to the box on the corner. Pickup’s not until one, so it will go out today.”
“It’ll go out even quicker if you take it out to the main post office,” he retorted. “I’ll handle things here while you’re gone.”
That got her attention. Surprised, she turned to look quizzically at him. “I didn’t realize this was that important. Do you want me to overnight it?”
What he wanted, dammit, was thirty to forty minutes when he didn’t have to smell the subtle, bewitching scent of her perfume. What the hell was it, anyway? “No,” he said coldly. “I just want it sent out as soon as possible, and the quickest way to ensure that is to drop it off at the main post office. If you have a problem with that, I’ll do it myself.”
That was a totally unnecessary remark—he knew it the second the words were out of his mouth and he saw her eyes widen with a quick flash of hurt. Feeling like a louse, he wouldn’t have blamed her if she’d snapped back at him, but she had, he was discovering, too much class for that. A blank look he decided he hated dropped over her face, and with no expression whatsoever, she handed him the finished letter to sign. “That isn’t necessary. That’s what I get paid to do, and we’re nearly out of stamps anyway.”
He should have apologized. He usually didn’t take out his bad moods on his employees, and he’d never before had a problem admitting when he was acting like a jackass. But there was just something about the stiff way she held herself that rubbed against his nerve endings like shards of glass. Scowling, he added his signature to the bottom of the page and shoved it back at her. “If we need any other supplies, get them while you’re out.”
She all but snapped him a salute. “Yes, sir. Will there be anything else, sir?”
His eyes narrowed at the drill-sergeant treatment, but he only shook his head. “No. Don’t forget to keep track of the mileage on your car so I can reimburse you for the gas.”
Phoebe was tempted to tell him to keep his damn gas money, but she was using her car for his business, and fair was fair. Just because he was in a foul mood about something and taking it out on her was no reason to cut off her nose to spite her face. After all, she wouldn’t even be driving to the main post office if it wasn’t for him.
Folding the letter, she slipped it into the envelope she’d already addressed, grabbed her purse, and rose from the worktable he’d set up for her use. “I’ll keep a running tally and turn it in to you at the end of each week,” she said coolly. “I should be back within an hour.”
Her chin held high, she sailed out and told herself she was glad to have a little time to herself. When she’d agreed to their arrangement, she hadn’t stopped to think that by living and working in the same apartment, she would never get away from the office. Or her boss. She couldn’t turn around without running into him. And there were times, like now, when tempers became more than a little frayed, and she couldn’t explain why. Everything would be fine, they’d both be working at individual projects without complaint and even share the computer without the least ill will. Then his eyes would meet hers, she’d get this funny feeling in her stomach, and suddenly they’d both be sniping at each other like a couple of kindergartners arguing over the same swing on the playground.
It was just too much togetherness, she decided as she reached her car in the parking garage down the street. They couldn’t, like most bosses and employees, go home to their separate apartments at the end of the day, not when their bedrooms were just across the hall from each other. They even took turns sharing the same bathroom, for heaven’s sake, and if anything was guaranteed to create tension between a man and a woman, it was that! They both just needed some space, and lots of it.
Maybe she’d take the kids to the library after supper and spend the evening there, she thought as she unlocked her car and climbed inside. Mitch and the kids had gotten along fine, but a break would probably do everyone some good.
Distracted by her thoughts, she absently placed the key in the ignition and turned it. Nothing happened. Frowning, she jiggled the key and turned it again, with the same result. Other than the soft click the key made when she turned it, there was no sound at all.
Muttering a curse, she leaned her head against the steering wheel with a low moan. No! This couldn’t be happening. Not now! She’d known the starter was going out, but she’d kept putting off getting it fixed, hoping she could make it last until after Christmas, but it looked like her luck had just run out. And it couldn’t have happened at a worse time.
“Damn!”
Now what was she supposed to do? She didn’t have the money for a new starter, and there was no way on God’s green earth that she was going to ask Mitch for an advance on her salary. Not after everything he’d already done for her. She’d just have to find another way. After all, it wasn’t as if she was completely penniless. She did have some cash—at least enough for a good used part. All she had to do was call a few junkyards and see if she could find one.
Given the circumstances, the last thing she wanted to do was return to the apartment to make the calls and have to explain to Mitch that she had another problem. If he didn’t already think that she needed a keeper, he would after this, but there was no way she was going to be able to keep this to herself. Not only did she have to use the phone in the apartment to make the calls, she was going to have to ask him to drive her to wherever she ended up getting a rebuilt used part. Groaning at the thought, she headed back to the apartment.
When she stepped inside the door, he was studying the same quarterly reports he’d been working on all morning. His eyebrows rose at the sight of her. “That was quick. Did you forget something?”
Reluctantly, she told him about the problem she’d been having with her starter. “I should have had it fixed last month, but to tell you the truth, it was working so well that I forgot about it. Now it looks like I don’t have any choice.”
“What’s it doing?” he asked, setting the reports down on his desk and pushing to his feet. “Maybe I should take a look at it.”
“Oh, no!” Horrified at the thought of him doing another favor for her, she quickly moved to her work area and reached for the phone book. “Thank you, but that’s not necessary. I know what the problem is—it’s the starter. It’s been on its
last legs for months—I guess it finally decided to give up the ghost. If you want to help, though, I’d appreciate it if you’d give me a lift to the junkyard.”
Sure he was going to regret asking why, Mitch couldn’t control his curiosity. “And why would I do that?”
“Because that’s where I’m going to get the part.”
“Of course,” he replied dryly. He should have figured as much. From the moment he’d met her, she’d done nothing but constantly surprise him with the way she solved problems—he didn’t know why this time should be any different.
Leaning back in his chair, he surveyed her with barely concealed amusement. “So you’re buying a used part. And who are you going to get to put it in for you? No self-respecting mechanic at a dealership will do that. They’ll charge you for a new one.”
“I know. That’s why I’m not taking it to the dealer. I’ll do it myself.”
She was so serious, he couldn’t help but laugh. He could just see her decked out like a grease monkey, trying to figure out where the starter even went. “Sure you are. And then you’re going to change the plugs and tune it up, right? C’mon, Phoebe, quit kidding around. We both know you don’t know one end of a motor from another.”
It was the wrong thing to say to a woman who obviously prided herself on being able to do just about anything. Casting an ironical glance at him, she said, “Wanna bet?”
Enjoying himself, he grinned. “Make it easy on yourself.”
“I intend to,” she retorted. “How about the price of the starter? I’ll buy it, then you reimburse me when I put it in correctly.”
“Only if I get to watch. I’m not going to let you sneak off and let some man put it in for you.”
Insulted, she sniffed. “I don’t have to cheat to win. So is it a bet or not?”