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a tactless idiot in silly shoes. If he were to be impressed enough to recommend her to his Human Resources director, her problems would be over.

      Her most pressing ones, anyway.

      Summoning a bright professional smile, Mary held out her hand. ‘I’m Mary Thomas,’ she said.

      The name didn’t ring a bell with Tyler, but then it wasn’t a particularly memorable one. In fact, there was nothing particularly memorable about her now that he had a chance to study her more closely. She had beautiful skin and intelligent grey eyes, but her round face was quirky rather than pretty, with eyebrows that didn’t quite match and features that all seemed to tilt upwards, giving her a humorous look.

      None of which explained why she seemed so familiar.

      Irritated by his inability to place her, Tyler took her hand and shook it. ‘Tyler Watts,’ he introduced himself briefly.

      ‘I know,’ said Mary, acutely aware of the feel of his fingers closing around hers and pulling her hand away rather sharply.

      ‘You do?’

      ‘Everybody knows who you are,’ she told him, nodding around the crowded lobby. ‘You’re famous in York. Everyone here wants to talk to you and do business with the new expanded Watts Holdings.’

      ‘Including you?’ he asked.

      ‘Including me,’ Mary agreed. ‘Except that I was hoping to meet Steven Halliday rather than you.’

      The dark brows snapped together. ‘What’s wrong with me?’ he demanded.

      ‘There’s nothing wrong with you,’ said Mary hastily, more intimidated than she wanted to admit by his frown. ‘I just thought it would be more appropriate to talk to Mr Halliday. I understand he’s your Director of Human Resources?’

      More appropriate and a lot easier. Mary didn’t know what Steven Halliday was like, but he had to be a whole lot better to deal with than the glowering Tyler Watts, who famously gave his staff a mere thirty seconds to make their point. She would really rather talk to someone with a bit more patience, not to mention a few listening skills.

      To someone who wouldn’t insist on looming over her with that ferocious frown and those unnervingly pale, polar-blue eyes that seemed to bore into you. It was hard to keep your cool when faced with that mixture of arrogance, impatience and sheer force of personality.

      ‘He is,’ Tyler admitted grudgingly. ‘What do you want to talk to him about?’

      ‘I’m in recruitment.’

      This was the perfect time to produce one of those cards she had had printed at such expense. Mary had been dishing them out all evening, though, and she just hoped that she had some left.

      Digging around at the bottom of her bag—really, she must organise it—her fingers closed around a card just as the pressure of her hand snapped the fragile chain and the whole thing lurched downwards, spilling most of the contents over the floor, where they skidded merrily over the glossy surface.

      Mary closed her eyes. Excellent. Fall over, knock drink over him, insult his design taste and tip her handbag all over the floor…Could she look any more of a fool, and in front of the man with the power to make or break her precious agency, too?

      Pink with embarrassment and irritation with herself, she stooped to gather up keys and lipstick and business cards—there were plenty left, it appeared—plus a sundry collection of pens, safety pins, tissues, scraps of paper with scribbled lists, a couple of floppy disks, an emery board and a plastic baby spoon.

      A biscuit left in an opened packet ended up at the tip of Tyler’s perfectly polished shoe and Mary scrabbled to retrieve it. That explained all the crumbs in the bottom of her bag anyway. It must have been there for ages, and the wonder was that she hadn’t eaten it.

      Tyler bent and picked up a spare nappy, which he handed to Mary with an expressionless face.

      ‘Thank you,’ she muttered, shoving it into the bag along with the rest of the stuff and straightening.

      She was amazed that he was still there, and couldn’t think why he hadn’t walked off in disgust long ago. Why had he come over in the first place, in fact? she thought with a trace of resentment. She had been perfectly all right, minding her own business and not doing anything stupid, and then he had turned up and transformed her into a blithering idiot.

      But Tyler showed no sign of walking off. He just stood there, looking daunting, and waited for her to explain what she was doing there.

      Tyler was, in fact, bitterly regretting having come over to talk to her. He had moved instinctively to catch her when she’d fallen, not realising how heavy she would be, and he was lucky she hadn’t taken him down with her. As it was, she had managed to knock the champagne he’d had in his free hand all over him. Always fastidious, Tyler was very conscious of the stain on his shirt and, as for his tie, it was probably ruined, he thought crossly.

      Not content with that, she had criticised his floor, and he didn’t take kindly to criticism from anyone, let alone someone who wore ridiculously inappropriate shoes and evidently possessed a handbag as messy as the rest of her. Everyone had turned to look as the contents scattered over the floor, and they had probably noticed him there too with a nappy—a nappy, of all things!—in his hand and a spreading stain on his shirt, and no doubt looking a fool.

      If there was one thing Tyler hated, it was feeling ridiculous.

      Actually, there were lots of things that he hated, but looking stupid had to be way up there at the top of his list.

      He wished he had never been sucked into Mary Thomas’s chaotic orbit, but now that he was here he couldn’t think of a way to leave. If they’d been in a meeting, he could just have told her that her thirty seconds were up but, as it was, she was looking pink and flustered and he didn’t feel able to turn on his heel and walk off, no matter how much he might want to.

      ‘What sort of recruitment?’ he asked after a moment, deciding to pretend that the whole bag incident had never happened.

      Mary only just stopped herself from sighing in time. She had been willing him to make an excuse and leave, at which point she could have slunk off home and enjoyed her humiliation in comfort.

      This was a fantastic opportunity for her. Half the room would give their eye teeth to be in her position, with Tyler Watts’s apparently undivided attention. She should be making her pitch and sounding gung-ho, but it was hard when your feet were aching, your toes pinched, your jacket was gaping and you had just humiliated yourself three times in as many minutes in front of the man you had to try and impress, and when you would really much rather be stretched out on the sofa in front of the television with a cup of cocoa.

      But lying on the sofa wouldn’t get her agency off the ground. It wouldn’t get her a home of her own, or make a new life for Bea.

      Lying on the sofa wasn’t an option.

      Mary took a deep breath and, mentally squaring her shoulders, handed Tyler a business card and launched into her carefully prepared spiel.

      ‘I understand you’re expanding your operation in the north now that you’re making York your headquarters, so if you need people with accountancy, clerical, computer or secretarial skills, I hope you’ll think of my agency. I can find you the best,’ she told him with what she hoped was a confident smile.

      ‘I don’t deal with junior staffing decisions,’ said Tyler, frowning down at her card.

      ‘I’m aware of that, which is why I was hoping to meet Steven Halliday here.’ Mary kept her voice even and hoped that she didn’t sound as desperate as she felt. ‘I have worked for Watts Holdings in the past myself, so I understand the company ethos and how it operates,’ she went on. ‘That’s a huge advantage when it comes to finding suitable staff, as I’m sure you are aware.’

      But Tyler wasn’t listening. ‘You’ve worked for me?’ he said, a very faint light beginning

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