care of the house and cooked for the family. I have a brother a couple of years younger than me. I’d give Mom her medicine and take her to her medical appointments."
Derek had dropped his hand from her face, but he sat so close she could feel the warmth from his body. "And then . . ." he prompted.
"And then the bills kept piling up. So I went to work as a waitress at an all-night café. I stayed with Mom during the day while Dad worked and he stayed with her at night while I worked." She sat up straighter and lifted her chin. "As Mom got worse, I had to nurse her."
"I’ll bet you were a good nurse," Derek said.
"Unfortunately, not good enough. Mom died." She couldn’t choke back the tears.
He pulled her to his side and put his arm around her shoulders. "I’m sorry, Lori." He reached over and wiped a tear from her face. "I understand the pain of losing someone you love. I lost my father a few years ago."
Lori’s eyes overflowed with tears. She sniffed and wiped them away. Derek pulled her head down to his shoulder. She wasn’t sure if he was saying words or just making soothing sounds, but his gentle voice comforted her and his arm around her shoulder felt just right. He pulled his shirt out of his pants and wiped her eyes with his shirttail.
She didn’t know how long they sat like that, but finally she had no more tears to shed.
Derek said, "I’m glad to see you’re human. You’re always in such control I’ve wondered if you have any feelings at all."
Did she have feelings? Right now, she felt a warm tingle everywhere Derek touched her. Her stomach felt fluttery. She wondered if her heart would beat right out of her body. Oh, she had feelings, all right — feelings that a secretary shouldn’t feel for a boss who’d already warned her he didn’t want a personal relationship.
She’d managed to hide these feelings for months on the job, but she couldn’t control her emotions in this situation. The two of them seemed to be alone in the world. There were no sounds except the sound of their voices. There was no motion except their own limited movements. There were no other people and no other activities. Nothing to do but think and feel.
"Talk to me, Lori. Tell me how you went from being the caretaker for your family to being the caretaker of this disorganized sales manager." He squeezed her shoulder.
"After Mom died, there were still a lot of bills to pay." She sighed and sniffed. "So I kept my waitress job at night and got a job as a nurse’s aid during the day. My dad also took a second job, and my little brother even got a job delivering pizzas. It took us over three years, but we finally paid off all the bills."
"Did you work both jobs all that time?"
He looked at her like … like she didn’t know what. She did know that look made her feel all fluttery inside.
"Of course. We’d never have paid the bills otherwise."
"But you were on your feet all the time on both jobs. How could you keep doing it year after year?" Derek asked.
Lori shrugged and looked at the closed door. "I didn’t have any choice."
"Of course, you had a choice. Many people would have just declared bankruptcy. You weren’t responsible for your mother’s bills," Derek said.
"My family was responsible for the bills, and I’m part of my family. We believe in paying our debts." She tried to pull away from Derek’s light embrace, but his arm tightened on her shoulder.
He said, "You are the most remarkable woman I’ve ever met."
"I just did what I had to do," Lori said. His praise embarrassed her.
"Well, don’t leave me in suspense. How did you finish your education and get your secretarial training?" he asked.
Lori took a deep breath and pulled away. This time Derek dropped his arm from her shoulder and leaned back against the wall.
"After we paid the bills, I gave up the hospital job and kept waitressing."
Derek interrupted. "Why did you give up the full-time job and keep the part-time job?"
"With tips, I could make more in thirty hours as a waitress than I could in forty hours as an aid. And that left me time to take GED classes," she added.
"So you got your GED and went on to secretarial school." Derek shook his head. "You’re so good I thought you must have taken office classes in high school and worked in offices ever since high school."
"That’s why I was so scared . . ." She didn’t mean to tell Derek she had been afraid to go to work for Consolidated Electronics. She’d felt like an outsider. Everyone else had probably graduated from high school on a normal schedule and worked in an office for years.
"Why you were so scared about what?" Derek asked.
"Never mind." She shook her head.
"Oh, no. You’re not stopping now. Keep talking," Derek said. "You said, ‘That’s why I was so scared . . . ‘"
She couldn’t believe she’d already told him so much about herself. He probably couldn’t think any worse of her than he did already. "Why I was so scared when I got my first office job, when I started as a clerk in the sales department." She reached for her purse again and twisted the strap.
Derek set the purse aside and took her hands. "That was your first office job?" He grinned. "I thought you were an old pro. I wondered why you’d been hired as a file clerk instead of a secretary right from the beginning."
"You could have checked my personnel file if you were interested."
"Oh, I was interested." That usually authoritative voice sounded very different. He shook his head. "Never mind about that. I didn’t need to read your personnel file. I knew everything I needed to know just from watching you work."
"I’m surprised you even noticed me in that sea of faces in the clerical pool."
"Your face never blends into a sea. I noticed you, all right."
That almost sounded like he noticed her face, but he’d already made it clear that it was her work he noticed. She couldn’t let herself even think about her romantic dreams.
Derek kept talking. "I don’t care about your experience. You’re the best secretary I’ve ever had. In fact the best secretary I could ever want." He squeezed her hands.
Lori looked down at their joined hands — his so large and strong, hers so dainty but just as strong. "I guess we make a good team. You’re a great boss."
He laughed. "Don’t let anyone else in the office hear you say that. You’ll ruin my reputation. I’ve heard them call me the tyrant of sales and Derek the Devil before."
"They just don’t know you. You’re not a tyrant or a devil." She raised her head and looked him in the eyes. "You’re very good at your job, and you expect everyone else to be as good at theirs." Her voice dropped. "I try my best to be good enough for you."
Derek’s face turned serious. "You’re probably better at your job than I am at mine, and I’m much better at mine because you’re so good at yours." Then he smiled again. "Just don’t let anybody else find that out."
He was still holding her hands. She pulled away and stood up. "Okay, turnabout is fair play. You have to tell me about yourself now."
"There’s nothing to tell," he said as he stood. Then he grinned. "I didn’t let you get by with that, and I’m sure you won’t let me get by with it either."
She hoped he didn’t notice that she had a hard time breathing when he grinned. "You’re right. I won’t."
He stood so close to her she wondered if he could hear her heartbeat. She couldn’t step away without bumping into the pile of coat, briefcase, and purse. Talking about being on her feet all the time in her former jobs reminded her how uncomfortable she was after a full day of wearing heels. She leaned against the elevator wall, took off her shoes, and added them to the pile. She curled her toes in the plush carpet to ease her aching feet.
Derek reached out to her and pulled her to him. His hand on her head guided it down to his chest. Without her heels, he could rest his chin on top of her head. Only a few seconds passed before he seemed to realize what he was doing. He dropped his arms and stepped back at the same time she pulled away.
"I’m afraid my story isn’t as dramatic as yours," he said. "My life has been pretty boring. I grew up in a family with an older brother and younger sister. Dad was a salesman, and Mom stayed home with the kids."
She’d hardly been in his arms long enough to feel it, but she felt alone now that he was a few inches away. "So, you decided to become a salesman like your dad?" she asked.
"I’m sure that’s part of the reason. I’ve always looked up to Dad. I started selling early. Every year, I sold the most tickets in our troop to the Boy Scouts’ Jamboree. Later, it was the most candy for the band and the most calendars for the student council," he said.
Lori wished she could put more distance between them. If she continued to feel the warmth from his body and breathe his scent, she’d never want to leave. She said, "So you’ve been a smooth talker all your life."
Derek let her pull away slightly, but he gripped her arms above the elbows with his hands. "I don’t think I’m a ’smooth talker.’ I’m a professional. I know my products, and I believe it’s my job to help a client solve a problem. If our product isn’t the solution, I won’t sell it to him. And as sales manager, I expect the same from the salesmen I supervise."
"That’s one thing everyone agrees on. Even those who call you Derek the Devil admit you put the client first," Lori said.
Derek smiled and dropped his hands from her arms. "So you admit you’ve heard the names I’ve been called."
"I never said I haven’t heard things." She turned around to keep from looking at his lips
Trapped by Love: A Novelette Page 3