LITMIR.BIZ

Скачать книгу

mentoring me for a few days, of course, but I’m pretty keen to get started on my real work. Forge my own direction, so to speak.’

      She gave a small laugh but he didn’t join in. In fact, his brows drew together in disapproval. ‘I think you’ll find that working with Ryan will show you the ropes twice as fast as you could learn them on your own.’

      ‘Oh, I’m sure. Though I am quite a fast learner.’

      His black lashes flickered infinitesimally. ‘I remember.’

      A silence fell. Nerve-racking seconds ticked by that grew excruciating.

      Why had she said that? She racked her brains for something warm to say that would ease the tension. ‘You know, Joe, I’ve often thought of you—since… Wondered—how you were.’ She smiled, nearly put out her hand to touch him, but, jarred by the flicker in his cool blue gaze, controlled the impulse.

      There was a definite warning in that glinting glance. Don’t go there, it read, as stern and uncompromising as if it had been emblazoned in official lettering.

      What a fool she was. Of course he didn’t want to be reminded of his past, not here in this austere place surrounded by his employees. Realising she’d opened herself up to another rejection, she flushed outright then and her speech died, hanging her out to dry at the critical moment.

      He stood frowning while her discomfort mounted, then he said, ‘Look, Mirandi. You’re here on probation, same as any new employee. I hope you understand that any personal history between us is of no relevance. All that matters here is how well you perform your job.’

      Her insides jolted as if she’d stumbled blindly into a rock face. In a wave of mortification it occurred to her he might think she had hopes of him again. That she might have taken the job with a view to reviving their old connection.

      Perhaps he read her embarrassment, for his tone softened a little. ‘To be brutally honest, I’m surprised to see you here. Investment banking is a tough world to survive in. I’m not sure this work will suit someone of your temperament.’

      ‘My—temperament?’ came from her dry throat.

      ‘Well…’ He hesitated, then scratching his ear, said, ‘I think you’ll find that in finance an excess of emotion and, er, sensibility are luxuries we can’t afford.’

      She bristled all over. Sensibility indeed. Did he think she was still that gormless idiot who’d broken her heart over him a thousand years ago?

      Lucky she was of a proud disposition and could think on her feet while being eviscerated.

      ‘Oh,’ she said, ‘please don’t worry about me, Joe. I’ve toughened up. Every night I sleep on a bed of nails.’ She spread her arms. ‘Go on. Dish it out. I can take it.’

      A muscle twitched in his gorgeous jaw, then he said drily, ‘Very dramatic. I suggest you pour all that passion into your work.’ There was slight inflection in the way he said the word that reminded her he was no stranger to its various applications.

      For a minute or perhaps an hour or two his blue gaze seemed to burn through her face, then he snapped out of it and looked at his watch. Brisk, unemotional Joe Sinclair, CEO.

      ‘Right. Ryan Patterson will be reporting on how you perform, so since we keep strict hours here you’d better drink your coffee. Oh, and, er…good luck.’

      With a curt gesture he walked away.

      So brusque. So—unwelcoming.

      Indignation threatened to overcome her. So she had an emotional side. She was human, wasn’t she? He hadn’t seemed to object to her passionate nature ten years ago. She stared after him, striding through the department like an autocrat. She could hardly recognise the guy. If he hadn’t still been oozing hotness she’d have wondered if she’d been talking to his twin. Anyone would think he’d been born with a briefcase in his hand.

      She smarted for minutes over the implication that she was too soft for the business world. Too weak. On what had he based that assessment?

      Her credentials were all there in her CV. Her years in the bank, the promotions she’d earned. Just as soon as her office was ready and she could start her own work, she’d show him how efficient she could be.

      She could have done with a few private moments to give her galloping pulse time to settle, but she noticed Patterson’s curious gaze follow Joe then shift to her, and she knew she had to glide on like a goddess and act as though nothing had happened.

      Standing here now in his apartment, searching for some lingering essence of the lazy, laughing, teasing Joe she used to know, she wondered how she could still be so affected by him. Time should have done its work by now. She was a mature woman, hardly that green girl who’d worshipped him and been his adoring slave.

      She supposed running into him again had dragged it all up again in her mind. The truth was, she’d never experienced anything like the intensity of the passion she’d had for him. Although at the time, during all the months of grieving, Auntie Mim had made the observation that Joe wouldn’t have given her up so abruptly if it hadn’t been purely about the sex.

      Mim had been right about some of it. There was no denying she’d been followed by a string of wild little hussies, as Mim had termed Joe’s other girlfriends. Hot chicks. Even so, she could never regret her wild time with him. Joining the chicks. How could she, when it had been the most exciting time of her life? The time she’d felt most alive.

      Perhaps that was why gazing into his bedroom now exerted a violent fascination, though her conscience was telling her loud and clear that a man’s bedroom—especially a boss’s—an ex-lover’s—was his fortress. Or should be.

      Sadly, while her scruples tried to assert themselves, her feet in their four inch heels were itching to push that door wide and cross the forbidden threshold, and before she was half aware of it she was in, staring at a rather severe four-poster heaped with pillows and richly draped in luxurious brocaded fabrics.

      Oh, yes. The master suite.

      Somehow Joe’s bed made her awash with sensations, not all of them positive. Its decadent appeal was amplified by its reflections in several long mirrors.

      How would it feel to lie in there at night with him? Her pulse quickened as she imagined his handsome dark head on those champagne satin pillows. They looked soft enough, but looks could be so deceiving where pillows were concerned. For herself, she preferred hers very soft, though as she recalled the younger Joe had never worried about anything so domestic.

      A simple mattress on the floor, those green patterned sheets—that had been their passion bed, the candle shedding its glow into the small hours on their entwined bodies Joe’s concession to romance.

      She stared at the four-poster, then, on an impulse, sat on the edge and slipped off her shoes. She dragged a pillow into position, then gingerly lay her head on it. After a moment she lifted her feet onto the bed, then stretched out and, involuntarily relaxing, released a long and languorous sigh.

      Ah-h-h. She let herself sink into the bed’s soft, sensuous and at the same time buoyant embrace, her head cradled by one of the softest, most delicious pillows she’d ever experienced.

      Oh, the comfort. Fearful at first of letting herself go, she lay still a moment, imagining herself floating on a cloud. Perhaps it was inevitable, given her experiences with Joe Sinclair, but her thoughts started to drift down a certain illicit alleyway. One she’d fought and struggled to avoid ever since the coffee-room encounter.

      Imagine, for example, it was midnight. Suppose Joe arrived home unexpectedly and found her here?

      Her blood warmed to the scenario. For all his powerful six-three Joe was a quiet guy. He never raised his voice when gutting someone with a few well chosen words, and he seemed capable of walking as silently as a cat when prowling the corridors at work. It wasn’t impossible to imagine he might walk in and catch her unawares.

      Almost

Скачать книгу