The Boss and the Beauty

by Donna Clayton

  “I’d be more than happy to help Cindy.”

  Three full seconds passed before she was able to actually comprehend what Kyle had said.

  “In fact,” he continued, “I’ll take her to dinner tonight. I hadn’t realized that her overtime schedule had been encroaching so badly on her social life. Is seven o’clock okay with you?”

  Near hysteria broke out in her brain when she realized that his last question had been directed at her. What should she do? Should she blurt out the truth? That there was no dinner invitation from Mike? That the whole wild story was created as a means of making Kyle jealous, and it had snowballed out of control until it included a suggestion that Kyle take her out?

  Lord, she would never be able to explain this. Never.

  Inhaling slowly, Cindy garnered all the control she could muster. She glanced up at Kyle and said, “Seven o’clock sounds good to me.”

  “Good,” Kyle said. Then he said his goodbyes to the ladies and left the break room.

  “Wow,” Molly exclaimed, “did that turn out great, or what?”

  Olivia laughed. “It couldn’t have gone better if we’d have rehearsed it.”

  “And suggesting that pretend date was sheer genius, Patricia,” Rachel said.

  Patricia’s face just beamed.

  “How could you?” Cindy stood up and reached for her purse. “How could you guys do that to me?”

  “Oh, now,” Sophia crooned. “Calm down.”

  “You lied,” Cindy accused them all. “You lied to Kyle.”

  “Well, just a little,” Molly admitted. “But look at the bright side. Kyle’s taking you on a date.”

  “A pretend date,” she reminded them. “A pretend date that’s based on a basket full of lies.”

  She glared at their grinning faces before she walked away.

  “Now don’t be angry with us,” Rachel called after her.

  “We did it for you,” Olivia said.

  Before the break room door swooshed shut, Cindy heard them all laughing triumphantly. But she was simply too upset to feel jubilant. She couldn’t believe her friends would pull her into such a mess—a mess she’d now have to face all on her own.

  She punched the elevator call button and waited. How was she going to straighten this out? she wondered, apprehension lying heavy in her stomach. But then something strange began to twirl and dance on top of the dark dread. Something light, almost buoyant. And it took Cindy the entire ride in the elevator up to the fourth floor to identify it.

  Excited anticipation.

  Chapter Five

  Cindy stood at her closet, mentally debating on one outfit after another. This might be a pretend date she was going on with Kyle, but she still wanted to look her best.

  She groaned softly. Nothing she owned seemed suitable. Granted, she didn’t have many evening clothes to begin with. Why would she, when she spent all her time working at Barrington Corp.? But the dressy clothes she did have were part of her old wardrobe of unexciting, figure-hiding styles. Another soft groan escaped her. What was she going to wear?

  Her two o’clock meeting with Kyle couldn’t have been more awkward. Kyle had seemed quite unruffled by the scene in the break room when all her friends had railroaded him into taking her out to dinner. When she went to his office to discuss the details of his trip to California he seemed his business-as-usual self, but Cindy had been a bundle of raw nerves.

  She’d left half of the information regarding the travel plans she’d made for him on her desk and she’d had to go and retrieve it. Then she couldn’t seem to relay the airport shuttle times and plane schedules accurately. Oh, the plans she’d made for him were just as he’d requested. It was just that her nervous state made it impossible for her speak correctly or coherently.

  Finally she’d simply handed him the file with all the schedules, connecting flights and hotel reservations and told him to look it over. All she wanted to do was get out of his office before he had a chance to bring up their date. And she’d almost succeeded.

  She’d already pulled open his office door and had tossed a cursory goodbye smile over her shoulder.

  “So I’ll pick you up at seven,” he had called after her.

  Sudden anxiety had frozen her smile into something that felt—and most probably looked—plastic. “Seven sounds good,” she had told him.

  Cindy would have left then, but he said, “I’ll need your address.”

  “Oh.” She’d felt silly that she hadn’t thought of it herself. “Of course.”

  She’d gone to his desk and jotted down her apartment number and street name on a piece of paper, realizing then that Kyle had never been to her home. She found it kind of sad to think that she’d never really seen this man—whom she cared for so very deeply—outside of Barrington Corp.

  Before she had completed writing down the information, Kyle had said, “I haven’t met this new guy from the mail room. The one who’s interested in you.”

  Without a thought, Cindy had admitted, “Me, either.”

  Kyle’s frown had made her nearly gasp. Lord, she’d been sure she’d ruined everything right then and there.

  “You’re going to go out with a man you’ve never even met?” There had been clear disapproval in Kyle’s tone.

  That had been her chance, she’d thought. To tell him the whole sordid truth. However, she’d let the moment slide. She wanted this date with Kyle. She might hate the circumstances surrounding it, she might feel terrible because of the lies, but she wanted this date. Just this one. Was that too much to ask?

  “Y-you heard the girls rave about him,” she’d stammered. “They say he’s good-looking. And friendly.” She’d shrugged, her plastic smile shining. “Besides, he apparently thinks I’m cute.”

  By then her anxiety level had been through the roof. She just had to get out of there before she lost her nerve and confessed everything.

  “See ya at seven.” She’d hustled out of his office and had spent the rest of the day deeply immersed in projection numbers and building costs so she wouldn’t have to think about what she was doing.

  Now here she was, searching frantically for something decent—and seductive—to wear on this date that she simply had to go on. Why had she been so stubborn this afternoon in Kyle’s office? Why hadn’t she just fessed up to the truth when she’d had the perfect opportunity?

  Because you simply can’t give up this perfect opportunity, a silent voice responded. A date. With the man of her dreams. Any woman would lie, cheat or steal to have a chance like this. It didn’t matter if it was pretend or not.

  Cindy reached to the very back of her closet and pulled out a plain, black cocktail dress. The scoop-neck, long sleeves and A-line design equated a timeless style. Yes, the hem was a little long, coming to rest right at her knee, but she was sure a little feminine ingenuity could fix that problem.

  After slipping the dress onto her body, she went to her dresser and pulled out a long, narrow scarf. The silky, diaphanous strip of fabric was so sensuous to the touch, when she’d received it from one of the girls this past Christmas, she’d wondered when she would wear such a thing. But now she saw that it was the perfect solution to her problem.

  The fully lined dress felt smooth against her skin as she neatly folded the material at her waist and then secured the black silk scarf into place to hold it. There, she thought. That would hold the hem a couple of inches above her knee and show off her legs to their best advantage. Grinning, she couldn’t help but feel like a teenaged Catholic school girl hiking up the skirt of her uniform. With her thoughts so focused on a certain oh-so-handsome male, Cindy guessed the extra leg she was intent upon showing just might have earned her a well-deserved rap on the knuckles with some disapproving nun’s ruler.

  She expelled a whispery chuckle as she fluffed her soft curls with her fingers and then looked in the mirror to check her makeup. Perfect, she thought. Well, as perfect as she was going to get, anyway.

  The buzzer sounded
, indicating that someone was at her front door. It was Kyle. The heady anticipation that had simmered in her stomach all afternoon now churned and spiraled, until she felt she had her very own mini tornado whirling out of control inside her.

  Shoes! She needed shoes. Running for the closet, she pulled out a brand-new pair of black sling-backs, the three-inch heels designed to show off her shapely calves. Before she slipped her feet into them, she ran her hand up the length of her silk-stockinged leg.

  The move had been completely spontaneous, made for the sole purpose of making sure her hose were smooth and properly positioned. But she wasn’t prepared for the wave of memory-filled bleakness that rolled over her, swallowing her whole.

  As a little girl, Cindy had watched her mother make that very same movement dozens—no, hundreds—of times before going out for the evening.

  “This isn’t the same thing,” Cindy whispered to the empty room, dread sitting on her chest like a lead weight. “It isn’t the same thing at all.”

  She reached up to push her hair from her eyes, and her own movement in the dressing mirror caught her eye. She looked at her reflection, the short and sexy haircut, the made-up face, the shorter-than-usual dress.

  Are you certain this isn’t the same thing? a small, stern voice whispered in her head.

  Cindy wanted desperately to answer no. But she just couldn’t be sure she was being completely honest.

  The doorbell buzzed a second time, the sound continuing a little longer than it had the first time.

  Shoving the silent doubts aside, she firmly said, “I want to do this. I want to go out on this date with Kyle.”

  Without reflecting any longer, without one more thought about the past, she snatched up her small evening bag and went to answer the door.

  The single candle threw romantic light across the tabletop. Cindy dabbed at the corners of her mouth with a napkin and then smiled at Kyle.

  “My dinner was delicious,” she told him. “Thank you.”

  Her filet mignon had been prepared in a delicate and very yummy butter sauce. And the vegetables had been roasted to perfection.

  “You’re welcome,” he said. “But we aren’t finished yet. There’s still dessert.”

  Automatically Cindy pressed her palm to her stomach. “Oh, I couldn’t. But don’t let me keep you from having something.”

  He smiled, and Cindy felt her heart lurch in her chest. The sensuous tension she’d felt between them for days and days now was very much present as they sat in the restaurant. However, she was getting used to it. In fact, she was finding she actually liked the heightened sense of awareness that the current—or electricity, or whatever it was—caused.

  “I’m not much for sweets,” he said. “How about coffee?”

  She nodded. “Coffee would be wonderful.”

  As the waitress removed their empty plates and silverware and then poured them coffee, conversation lagged and Cindy took a moment to study Kyle.

  He looked so handsome in his dark, double-breasted suit. Seeing him in a blazer was nothing new to her. He wore a suit every day at Barrington. But he was comfortable enough with her to loosen his tie, remove his jacket and roll up his shirtsleeves whenever they worked past five. And by that time of the day, his jaw was usually shadowed with a new growth of whiskers, although she had to admit she found the rugged look very sexy indeed. But tonight he’d shaved before picking her up, his face looking so smooth, it was all she could do to keep from reaching out and running her fingers over his skin.

  Kyle looked just as polished and shined as she did with her new makeover. A smile stole across her mouth and happiness danced in the pit of her stomach. She liked the idea that he’d gone to such pains to look so good. Just for her.

  After taking a sip from his coffee cup, he said, “You know, all through dinner we talked about work. Days of Knights, my upcoming trip to California, the renovation plans for the older hotels.”

  He looked at her for a silent moment, then continued. “If you go out—” He stopped, a small frown drawing his brows together for an instant. Then he amended, “When you go out with this guy from the mail room, you’re going to have to tell him about yourself. The conversation is going to have to become, you know, a little more personal.”

  A chuckle emanated from deep in his chest, a sound that Cindy found to be extremely sexy. She’d have loved the opportunity to place the flat of her hand on his chest and feel the vibration of his laughter against her palm. However, she knew that wasn’t something that was going to happen any time soon. And it would never happen if he ever got wind of the big fat lies she and her friends had told him.

  “What’s funny?” she asked.

  His dark eyes glittered, and Cindy’s whole body seemed to grow warm at the sight.

  “Not funny, really,” he said. “Peculiar would be a better description.”

  She grinned. “Then what’s so peculiar that it has you laughing?”

  He moistened his lips, and Cindy’s eyes were glued to the slow path the tip of his tongue made across his dusky flesh. The memory of their kiss in the conference room flashed through her mind, and her blood heated even more.

  That kiss had been so quick. Too quick. She wondered what it would be like to have lots and lots of time to feel his mouth on hers. Time to experience him. Time to taste him.

  “In all the time we’ve worked together,” he said, “we’ve never sat down and talked about ourselves. I don’t know a thing about you. I don’t know where you were born, where you grew up, where you went to school. Nothing.”

  He ran his index finger down the length of his coffee cup, and something happened to the atmosphere. It grew taut. Like elastic, or a big rubber band that had been stretched tight.

  After a moment she said, “I don’t know a thing about you, either.”

  The sultry quality of her voice startled her. She wondered if Kyle heard it.

  Reaching out, he slid his fingers over the back of her hand, his thumb resting in the valley between her first two knuckles.

  “I’ll tell you what,” he said, “you tell me about you. Then I’ll tell you about me. Deal?”

  She smiled. “Deal.”

  So over a leisurely cup of coffee, she told him she was born in New York, that she’d grown up in various big cities all over the world. London, Paris, Houston, Los Angeles, Montreal. She’d even lived in Melbourne, Australia, for eighteen months as a teenager. As to her education, she went to school wherever she happened to be at any given time.

  Kyle’s dark eyes lit with fascination, just like everyone else who had ever listened to Cindy speak of what they saw as a different and exciting adolescence. What Cindy never told anyone, and she would not tell Kyle now, either, was that she hated her childhood. She abhorred growing up with no sense of permanence in her life. Never knowing where she would be during any given month, never knowing when she’d have to pick up and move.

  That sort of life-style created two different types of people. Outgoing extroverts who made friends easily, or reserved introverts who had a hard time meeting people.

  Cindy placed herself in the latter category. Lighting from place to place had made her terribly shy. Not to mention lonely. It seemed that just as soon as she’d made a friend or two, she would be flying off to some other corner of the world.

  As far as she was concerned, her childhood might have been different all right, but there had been nothing exciting or interesting about how she’d grown up. The worst part had been the men. All those men. And not one father for her among them.

  No, it just wouldn’t do to go into too much detail with Kyle.

  “Enough about me,” she finally told him. “Tell me about you.”

  By then the small band had begun to play and several couples were enjoying the music as they slowly circled the parquet dance floor.

  “Dance with me.” Kyle reached out and took her hand, standing up at the same time.

  Although she allowed him to guide her from her c
hair, she felt panic well up like a tidal wave. Cindy frantically blurted, “Don’t think I’m going to let you get out of our deal. I held up my end. You need to hold up yours.”

  She felt she was filling the air with meaningless words, but she couldn’t help it. The idea of being in Kyle’s arms as they swayed to what held the promise of being the most romantic music ever created was enough to totally unnerve her.

  He chuckled, and again she felt the urge to splay her hand on his chest, but again she resisted.

  “I’m not trying to get out of anything,” he told her. “We can talk and dance at the same time, can’t we?”

  His boyish grin was charming enough to lure the twinkle right out of the stars in the sky, his gaze lighting with a teasing glint.

  “It’s easy,” he said. “Like walking and chewing gum at the same time.” His voice lowered an octave as he added, “I know you can handle this.”

  The subtle compliment held a mysterious, sexy quality that only seemed to increase the current humming around them.

  “My dance steps may need a little practice—” she couldn’t believe the flirtatious tone coming out of her mouth “—but I’ve never been called clumsy.” She grinned up at him through lowered lashes. “Let’s go for it.”

  His hand was warm against the small of her back. His shoulder felt hard against her fingertips, her other hand enveloped by his. The music could have been a physical thing, a cape or blanket that wrapped around them, seeming to cut them off from everything and everyone else in the room.

  His jaw pressed against her temple, and she closed her eyes, filling her lungs with the heated scent of his enticing, bosky cologne. If there was a paradise, this was it. In Kyle’s arms, their bodies close, their thighs periodically touching as they danced to the slow, soul-stirring strains, her whole emotional system seemed to shift into some kind of chaotic overdrive.