LITMIR.BIZ

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very woman he’d just been thinking of.

      Maddy Monroe was letting herself in.

      Unannounced.

      Uninvited.

      Definitely unwelcome.

      Her pale blue gaze landed on his, and after a heartbeat’s hesitation, during which he almost believed he saw trepidation, she smiled her glossy TV smile. “Alex! Got a minute?”

      She was in reporter mode. Even if she wasn’t and she tempted him to think of her as a friend—or more than a friend—as she had the other night with her tender, understanding eyes and soothing voice, he had to resist talking to her. He couldn’t talk to anyone because no one could possibly understand what he was going through.

      He lifted his head from his hands and slumped back in his chair. “No. I don’t.”

      She slipped through the door and closed it behind her anyway. Her pastel pink blouse and white slacks weren’t as camera-ready as the jackets and skirts she usually wore, but they had probably allowed her to slip unnoticed onto the top executive floor. “This will be quick, I swear.”

      He smoothed a hand down his dark blue tie to straighten it against his shirt. “Yes, it will. Because you’re leaving.” He gestured at the door she was inching away from.

      “Just a couple of questions, Alex. Please,” she begged prettily, but there was a quaver to her voice. He halted in the middle of reaching for his coffee cup.

      Unwisely wondering what was going on with her, he ran his gaze over her more carefully. For the most part, she appeared as polished as usual, though she’d used a little more makeup beneath her eyes and her sleek blond hair looked as if she’d shoved her hands through it. Nothing particularly telling, but nonetheless noteworthy for the perfectly groomed woman he’d known.

      He picked up his coffee cup and held it between his fingertips, staring into the black liquid. He could see her in his mind’s eye, smell her even with the aroma of strong coffee right under his nose.

      Great. Ignoring her wouldn’t work. He’d have to drive her away.

      He raised his gaze to hers as casually as possible and asked, “Being granted the exclusive right to cover Joseph McCoy’s birthday party wasn’t enough for you?”

      They’d only offered ETE access to the party to better control media coverage of the event. Whether she’d figured that out or not shouldn’t matter to her when the deal had benefited her and her show so much. Plus, granting the exclusive had saved his family from having to put up with her reporting from a helicopter over their heads. The woman was nothing if not tenacious.

      He added, “Considering the guest list, I would think your producers would be damn near giddy with the job you did.”

      She slid into one of the comfortable round-backed, mahogany-and-leather chairs facing his desk. “Oh, they’re pleased, all right.” She didn’t appear particularly excited to have made her bosses happy. She steadily met his gaze. “But I’m not done here yet. I still need to talk to you.”

      She held up a hand to stop him before he could open his mouth to say forget it. “I know you prefer to be the ‘behind the scenes guy,’ staying mostly out of the public eye. Which is why I came without Dan Gurtings, my cameraman, or a recorder or my notebook.”

      She spread her hands wide as if to offer proof that there were no unusual lumps or bumps on her person. With the way her silky blouse and flat-front slacks fit her curves, he’d already noticed.

      He snorted at her concession and set his coffee back down untasted. “Funny how that also made it easier for you to slip past security.”

      One corner of her lightly glossed mouth twitched upward before she visibly schooled her features. “Joseph has given me an interview, albeit a short one, and Cooper Anders called me to set up a meeting….”

      Alex did his damnedest not to react. Heaven help them if Cooper had spoken to Maddy before Sara had convinced him with good old-fashioned love to give up his quest for revenge against the McCoys.

      But if Cooper had revealed anything negative, Maddy wouldn’t be fishing so hard. Cooper would have also warned them, especially now that he and Sara were engaged.

      When Alex continued to do nothing more than impassively watch her despite the tension slow to leave his body, her delicate nostrils flared slightly in exasperation and she continued. “But I’d really like to talk to you about…everything that has happened to your family as a result of Marcus’s death.”

      “I thought I’d made myself pretty clear the other night—”

      “I know there is more going on here, Alex. I know it in my gut just from looking at you. You’re not yourself.”

      Lord, there was a truth if he’d ever heard one. Everything he’d based his sense of self on had been a lie. Just as in the stable, the temptation to open up and confide in her about his confusion, his heartache, pulled at him with remarkable strength.

      She had been so easy to talk to all those years ago, always willing to simply listen rather than trying to impress him in some way. Madeline Monroe had been the first woman he’d met who appealed to him physically but at the same time had made him feel so at ease.

      After she took the on-air reporter job with Entertainment This Evening, he’d tried to convince himself that her approachability, her understanding, had all been an act to get closer to Joseph. The eldest McCoy’s influential ties to the media far exceeded his own, but a huge part of him had wanted to believe better of her.

      Now was not the time to risk testing her sincerity.

      He rested his elbows on the arms of his chair and tented his fingers in front of him. “As you said the other night, people change.”

      “Not without cause,” she protested.

      He lobbed the argument right back to her court. “And what caused you to change?”

      “Nothing. I—we’re not discussing me. We’re discussing you.”

      “No, we’re not, Maddy. You’re leaving.” He leaned forward and reached for the intercom button on his phone. “Peggy?”

      “She’s not at her desk,” Maddy interjected.

      “She just brought me this coffee—” He stopped himself. “I’m sure she wasn’t at her desk when you arrived, or you would never have been able to slip in. She’s undoubtedly back by now.” He pressed the buzzer that would signal he needed his executive assistant.

      Peggy normally let him know if she was stepping away for any amount of time. But thanks to his dark mood this morning, she’d probably figured he’d prefer not being disturbed.

      “I doubt it. Seems someone told her that her car alarm had been triggered, and she had to go down to disarm it.” Only a vague smugness could be found in the slight upward curl at the corners of Maddy’s mouth. Otherwise, she was all wide-eyed innocence.

      Yeah, right.

      “Is it?” he asked.

      She nodded. “Funny how those things just keep going off.”

      “Is that where your cameraman is? Bumping a certain white BMW?” He automatically cocked his head to listen, despite being fourteen floors up behind a curtain wall of thick tinted glass.

      A perfectly arched blond brow twitched higher and she shrugged. The woman had no shame.

      Ridiculously he found himself liking her spunk and drive, much the way he had all those years ago when they’d dated.

      Before he’d found out he’d been a mere stepping stone to get to his father—damn it, his grandfather—for help landing a job. A stab of hurt, surprisingly strong despite the long passage of time, nailed him in the ribs at the thought of how she’d used him.

      And he hadn’t even slept with her.

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