“No way.” Jessie pulled back and grasped the armrests with both hands. “I’m no model.”
“First of all, you could be if you’d lose the frames and let that hair down. But you know this feature. We never show the face. I sent two photographers out this weekend to get me some colorful cleavage shots, and this is what they came back with.”
Scarlet slapped two proof sheets on top of the staff memo, each showing an array of deeply cut blouses and sweaters on women walking the streets of New York City. The colors were blah and the shots unremarkable.
“Oh, these won’t do,” Jessie agreed. “Color Me Charismatic” was one of Charisma’s most popular monthly features—a candid photograph of an anonymous woman on the street wearing something in a maverick, memorable color and making it work for her. They always had a theme like “Skirts that Flirt” or “Watch Your Back” and the photographers usually managed to get an angle where the woman’s face was at least partially obscured, which protected the magazine and the unwitting “model.”
Scarlet tapped one manicured nail on the mess of pictures. “You have a good eye, Jessie. I knew you’d recognize dreck when you see it. So, come on, I have an outfit in mind and a body. Yours. Let’s go.”
Jessie narrowed her eyes at Scarlet. Why today? Today she wanted to hide in her cube and relive every single moment of last night’s “date” with Cade. Especially the last kiss at her door. Or maybe the one in the cab, when his tongue touched hers and—
“Why don’t you ask someone else, Scarlet? I have so much to do.”
Scarlet tugged the staff memo out from under the pictures and peered at it. “You have to read a staff memo that came out last Monday?”
Busted. The memo was the first thing she had grabbed to look busy while she relived the way Cade held her hand. The way he smelled and sounded and, oh saints alive, the way he kissed.
“Hel-lo?” Scarlet leaned a little closer to Jessie and waved a hand in front of her face. “You with me today, Jess?”
Jessie started to laugh. “I’m just a little tired this morning.”
“Great, I’ve got just the color to wake you up.” Scarlet managed to pull Jessie from her chair. “You have to be the ‘Color Me Charismatic’ woman on the street sometime during your tenure as an intern. Them’s the rules, darling.”
Sighing deeply, Jessie left her cube and followed Scarlet down the hall to where Lainie protected a closet stocked full of clothing samples from the top designers in the world and every imaginable accessory. The Closet was located perilously close to Cade’s office, but he hadn’t arrived yet this morning. Since he was never late, Jessie assumed he had a meeting out of the office.
Which was just as well, because she’d probably melt at the sight of him.
“I see you found a victim,” Lainie said dryly as she handed an oversize key ring to Scarlet.
“Why don’t you do it?” Jessie asked her roommate.
Lainie slapped her hands over her breasts. “Evidently my little double A’s don’t make for great cleavage.”
Jessie glanced down at her chest. “I’m just a B.”
“A B-plus,” Scarlet insisted as she slipped the key into the door and reached in to flip on the light. “And I have a bra in here that will take you to a C in record time. Lainie, undo her braid, will you?”
Jessie automatically protected her head. She didn’t want anyone to notice her hair, the color and texture of so many other Elliotts’. “Can’t my hair stay back?”
“Not a chance,” Scarlet said from inside the closet. “And don’t even think about wearing those glasses. That’s an order.”
Twenty minutes later, Jessie was out on Park Avenue, wearing a screaming yellow sweater with a giant black zipper up the front and black leather pants, her hair whipping in the breeze and her glasses somewhere on Lainie’s desk. And all Scarlet could do was tug that zipper lower and lower.
“Any farther and you’ll run into my pants,” Jessie said as she brushed a hair from her face.
“That’s next month’s feature,” Scarlet said dryly. “‘Hips You Want to Hug.’”
“Count me out,” Jessie said as she inched the zipper up just enough to cover the single front clasp of the black lace bra she now wore. “By the way, this isn’t a bra. This is an optical illusion.”
Scarlet chuckled and snagged the zipper down again. “That cleavage is real. Just…enhanced.” She stepped back and eyed her work, signaling over her shoulder. “We’re ready, Nick.”
A few passersby glanced at them, but for the most part they were ignored by the pedestrian traffic. Scarlet gave Jessie a little push toward the freelance photographer they used for lots of Charisma shoots. “Walk straight to Nick. Think sexy thoughts.”
Sexy thoughts? Now that was the first thing she’d been asked to do that felt easy.
Sexy thoughts…Cade McMann.
“Chin up, shoulders back, think about something provocative,” Scarlet ordered.
Provocative…Cade McMann.
From behind her, Scarlet fanned Jessie’s long hair over her shoulders. “Keep going toward Nick,” she said as she dodged out of the frame. “Push your chest out. Look toward the street and think about something absolutely lusty.”
Oh, lusty would definitely be Cade McMann.
Turning toward the noise and traffic, Jessie thought about Cade’s smile. His silvery eyes. His incredible mouth.
And then she stumbled on a crack in the sidewalk as she stared right into all three.
The subject of her fantasies leaned against a street sign, his arms crossed, a wide smile on his face. “Now that is what I would call a charismatic cleavage.”
Cade levered himself off the sign pole and ambled toward her, his gaze drifting all the way down to her toes, and back up again to settle in the V of her neckline. The rush of heat in her lower half could melt the leather pants.
“You run this photo, Scarlet,” he said as he approached Jessie and continued to sear her with his stare, “and zipper sales will skyrocket within an hour and yellow will be pronounced the new black.”
For a moment, Jessie couldn’t breathe. She looked up at Cade, her heart thundering like a thousand horses over the Colorado prairie. As he neared her, he locked on her eyes and she realized with a start that she had left her glasses upstairs.
But she couldn’t look away. His wolflike gaze swallowed her up, and all of Park Avenue just disappeared into the background.
He leaned into her ear and whispered, “You look like a bumblebee who could seriously sting the most unsuspecting victim.”
Chills danced down her spine as she laughed and threw him a teasing look. Somewhere in the distance, she heard Nick’s camera clicking and ticking.
“Out of the frame, Cade,” Scarlet snapped, nudging him away. “I’m trying to get a shot here.”
“Don’t worry, Scarlet,” Nick called from his spot a few feet away. “I got the shot. You’ll love it.”
“Glad I could help.” Cade winked, and as he continued into the EPH building, he called to Scarlet, “Let her keep that sweater, okay?”
Jessie watched him disappear into the building, his broad shoulders filling up the doorway, his golden hair grazing the back of a very expensive suit jacket.
“Oh, that’s adorable!” Scarlet exclaimed as she studied the digital image captured in Nick’s camera. “Look at this, Jessie.”
Scarlet held out the camera and Jessie peered into the screen on the back. Nick had caught Cade leaning down as though he were kissing Jessie’s hair, his gaze aimed squarely at her breasts.
“Just look at your face,” Scarlet said, jabbing Jessie with a little elbow.
Nick had captured her teasing, flirtatious glance and the flash of unadulterated lust on Cade’s face. It was, for “Color Me Charismatic,” a perfect shot.
“Don’t forget the face blur,” Jessie said. “‘Color Me Charismatic’ is anonymous.”
“Are you kidding?” Scarlet waved her hand in one of her flamboyant gesture
s. “That’s just to protect us from lawsuits. You can sign a model release. This shot is so sexy. You know, if I didn’t know better I would say you’ve missed your calling as an actress. You look downright infatuated with Cade in that picture.”
“I took an acting class in college,” she said quickly. And she’d barely passed. She hadn’t been acting infatuated. She was.
Cade dug his hands deep into his trouser pockets and squinted down at the scene far below his office window. Although he stared at the splash of red-and-orange flowers spilling across the median strip, all he could really see was the vision of Jessie, her yellow curves and auburn hair and green eyes dancing as she flirted with him.
The same vibrant woman he’d kissed over dessert…and in the cab…and at her door. She was everything bright and alive and attractive.
He’d always thought she was pretty and spunky, but after spending all that time talking to her, he was just mesmerized by her. What was it about her?
He peered at the flowers below.
Had there really been lilacs in that cement garden last spring? He’d never noticed the flowers on Park Avenue before. Was it possible he walked down that street every day and never noticed lilacs in the spring, or the colors of the trees?
I even wear lilac perfume sometimes.
His intercom buzzed and Chloe Davenport’s distinct voice broke his reverie.
“Fin’s waiting, Cade. In her conference room.”
Damn. He glanced at his watch and realized he was ten minutes late for a management meeting. What the hell was the matter with him? He was staring out the window thinking about trees and flowers while his very future hung on Charisma’s balance sheet.
He reached over and hit the speaker to respond to Fin’s assistant. “I’ll be right there, Chloe.”
“She’s got two things on the agenda,” Chloe added. “The P&L from last month and the staff assignments for September.”
“Will do.” From his credenza, he picked up the file folder he’d been looking at yesterday, right before Jessie Clayton came wafting into his office and turned down the shadowing assignment.
Some fact-finding mission he’d gone on last night.
He still didn’t know any more about Jessie’s reasons for avoiding Fin than he did when the evening began. He’d tried a dose of seduction and it backfired. Instead, he’d been the one damn near seduced.
By the time he watched her slip into the door of her apartment building, he’d forgotten why he’d asked her out for drinks and dinner and could only think about how much he enjoyed the evening with a charming, sweet, energetic young woman who talked about flowers.
Damn, that wasn’t like him. But, still, he couldn’t remember the last time he’d enjoyed himself so much. And then when he got out of that cab and saw her on the street this morning, her hair blowing, those clothes hugging her curves, her expression lost in some fantasy…
He grabbed his phone and dialed. Chloe answered on the first ring. “Finola Elliott’s office.”
“Tell her five more minutes,” he said quickly. “I have to make one call.”
“Make it fast.” He could imagine Fin’s assistant rolling her blue eyes or crinkling her nose in distaste.
“I will,” he promised. And he meant it. Because if he gave this too much thought, he might talk himself out of it. He could tell himself he was just trying to get to know Jessie Clayton better, for business reasons, but he knew that was an excuse for a little more time with her.
He started calling immediately, until he found what he wanted. It took him a full ten minutes to convince the man on the other end of the phone, but once he got a commitment, Cade grabbed the files he needed and headed to the conference room connected to Fin’s office. He used the hallway entrance, which gave him the chance to glance over to the editorial cubes and peek at Jessie’s empty chair. She might still be down on the street shooting “Color Me Charismatic”…or right around the corner in The Closet getting changed. Sliding that big black zipper down over the lace of that—
“Earth to McMann.”
He turned back to the conference room doorway at the sound of Fin’s impatient voice. “Sorry, Fin,” he said with a little laugh. “I was just checking out the action in the cubes. It’s Friday and you know the natives tend to lose their focus.”
At the head of an oval mahogany table, Fin brushed a sleek strand of auburn hair over her shoulder and gave him a smile that made her eyes sparkle like Tiffany emeralds. “You seem distracted, Cade. Are you sure you’re not the native losing his focus?”
“Get real, Fin.” He pulled out a chair and dropped the financial files on the table, glancing at the wall where the first few finished pages of the January issue had been hung for the staff to review. “The next issue’s going to be great, Fin, but the monthly numbers aren’t nearly as attractive.”
She frowned and flipped open the file, studying the spreadsheet. “Not hopeless, but you might want to get on Liam’s calendar for a chat.”
“I already did.” Not that he needed to schedule a meeting with EPH’s top financial executive. They’d been friends for so long they were more like brothers.
Fin looked up from the spreadsheet, all sparkle gone from her eyes. “We are going to win this, aren’t we, Cade?”
“Yes,” he said with total assurance. “You’ve earned it, Fin, and we can do it. We were the leader at the six-month mark, so if we don’t make any mistakes between now and the end of the year, we should be in.”
She nodded. “We have to stay completely on task. No distractions, no mistakes.”
And that, he reminded himself sternly, should really include dalliances with interns under the guise of figuring out her motives. The job of running Elliott Publication Holdings was the brass ring that Fin, a certified workaholic driven to success, wanted more than anything.
But Patrick Elliott wasn’t basing his decision on who wanted the job the most. Like every decision the patriarch of the Elliott clan made, the answer lay in the bottom line. Whichever editor-in-chief produced the most significant profit margin for the year won the prize. So the competition for advertising, subscribers and cost-cutting had never been fiercer among the executives who ran The Buzz, Snap, Pulse and Charisma magazines.
And Cade wanted that honor as much as Fin did. Not only would it mean an automatic promotion for him, but he deeply respected and admired Fin, and genuinely believed that EPH would be a better company with her at the helm. Plus he loved nothing more than the challenge of avoiding any errors and winning the game.
As she looked back at the file, he studied her. There was always an undercurrent of sadness to Fin, like she worked with such fury and concentration because it helped her escape. As long as he’d known her, she’d had extremely strained relations with her parents, especially Patrick. Of her brothers, only her twin, Shane, the editor-in-chief of The Buzz, seemed to share a close relationship with Fin.
Fin looked up at him, and Cade expected her to comment on the numbers. But her eyes softened for a moment instead. “You will make an excellent editor-in-chief when I move up to EPH, Cade. I can’t imagine a person more qualified to run this magazine.”
He recognized motivation when she dangled it in front of him. “Thanks, Fin. We’re a great team. We can do this.”
“We will,” she said decisively, and they launched into an hour-long review of every line item on the spreadsheet.
As always, Fin asked question after question, rarely satisfied with the first answer, always digging for a better solution. And when they were finished, she seemed satisfied that they’d attacked the numbers as best they could.
“I’ll make a point of talking to Liam,” Cade said as he closed the financial files.
“Yes, but in the meantime, keep a very tight rein on the January issue. We have three months left, Cade. A lot can happen in three months.”
“I know,” he agreed. “Are you ready to move on to staff assignments?”
She nodded and after they
’d reviewed responsibilities for upcoming issues, Fin pulled the last item from his staffing file. “It’s September,” she said. “Don’t I get to wear a new shadow this month?”
No mistakes. That was his rule. So how to handle the issue of the shadow intern? “Maybe under the circumstances, you’d rather not. Some of your meetings this month will be extremely sensitive.”
“We could do a half-day shadow,” she suggested. “I’ll schedule my confidential appointments for afternoon. I like this program, Cade. We don’t pay the interns and we have to be sure they are rewarded and trained.”
“No argument there.”
She glanced at the list of five intern names in his file. “Have you picked one yet?”
“I have one or two in mind.” One in mind constantly, as a matter of fact. “But I’m still interviewing.” Interviewing. Yeah, that was a good word for it.
“Who’s your top choice at the moment?”
Why lie? She was his top choice. For a number of things. “Jessie Clayton.”
Fin raised one beautifully arched eyebrow. “We’ve discussed her before. She’s made a science out of avoiding me. Have you figured out why?”
“No, not yet.” But he would. “Anyway, Scarlet has her on a big assignment for the March issue and I’m not sure if the timing will work out for the shadowing project.” And she turned the opportunity down. But something in him wanted to protect Jessie, so he purposely kept that piece of information from Fin.
“I like her work and Scarlet raves about her ideas on layout and design,” Fin said, looking hard at him. “But you mentioned last month that you wanted to do some digging into her background.”
“I did. She checks out. I don’t know why she avoids you, but she has done excellent work at the magazine.”
“None of the other interns stands out this year,” Fin said, looking at the list again. “She seems to be popular and smart.”
And smells like a spring garden. Cade cleared his throat and took the file from Fin. “I’ll find the right intern for you by next week.”
Fin seemed to accept that as they packed up to leave. Just as they stepped into the hall, a sudden burst of female “Ooohs” and “Ahs” erupted from the sea of cubicles.
Dynasties:The Elliots, Books 7-12 Page 33