The Boss's Proposal (12 page)

‘Of course,' Max said, magnanimous in victory. He felt himself sag with relief. He hadn't known what he would do if she'd stuck to her decision to resign. In fact, it was
true to say that he hadn't known a number of things until she'd come along and turned his world upside down, because there was no use pretending otherwise. He felt like a man clinging onto a piece of driftwood in the middle of a stormy sea, with no real clue as to where he was going or when his ordeal would end.

‘Fine,' she said quietly, looking away from him while he continued to stare at her. He wondered how much or how little their lovemaking had meant to her. Certainly, her averted profile wasn't giving much away, and he was overcome by a primal urge to force her to submit to him, to confess that he had made the earth move for her, to acknowledge that she'd never been as aroused by anyone in her life as she'd been aroused by him. In fact, he was assailed by a ridiculous, puerile desire to hear her tell him that he was the best.

He irritably began tapping his fountain pen on the desk, while his mind threw its leash and travelled joyously down memory lane, rearing up at the volcanic turn-on the sight of her naked body had been for him. Every bit of her uncovered had been a revelation without compare. The taste of her nipples still lingered on his tongue, making him feel worryingly unsteady. Sleeping with her, instead of diminishing his fantasies, had succeeded in making them proliferate. Right now, at this very moment, he could quite easily have locked the outside office door, whatever the hell anyone who came along might think, and taken her. Stripped her of her neat little grey outfit, a libido-quencher of the highest order, and laid her on his desk, naked and exquisitely open to his mouth and hands. He would have liked to have suckled on her delicious breasts at this very moment, with the fax machine going outside, the light on his phone informing him that he'd calls waiting and the computer terminal begging to be downloaded
of its important messages. He couldn't think of anything more erotic than letting the world of high finance wait until their needs were satisfied. He cleared his throat and hastily rummaged pointlessly through some of the paperwork lying in his open briefcase. With great effort, he managed to get his mind to operate on a more relevant level and, with even greater effort, he succeeded in speaking to her about work and what had been happening in the office since he had been away.

She was leaving when he thought to ask, ‘What did Andy Griggs have to say about your house?'

Vicky, with one hand on the doorknob, turned to face him. Andy Griggs had slipped her mind. ‘I'm seeing him this evening. I had to cancel our previous appointment,' she said, ‘but of course I shan't go ahead with anything, not until I know one way or another…'

Max felt an unsteadying combination of impotence, panic and anger. ‘Naturally,' he said calmly, making himself smile and giving a rueful but utterly understanding shrug of his broad shoulders. ‘Have you decided what you would like to have done anyway?'

‘Well…' Vicky hesitated. ‘I…I
have
noticed, ever since this all came up, that the house is in desperate need of renovation. I never gave it much thought when I first got back to England. I was too busy sorting out other aspects of my life. But last weekend I had a walk around the place and—' she sighed ‘—things need changing. The rooms need rearranging. It worked when it was rented out because most of the time the tenants were students, so four small bedrooms was an attraction, but now I think I'd like to make the master bedroom much bigger, perhaps with a little sitting area, and I could do something about having a pl—' She'd very nearly said
playroom
, but in time she swallowed the word down, although the near-slip had
jolted her. ‘A place to work. I could put my computer in there…' She gave her head a little shake and smiled apologetically. She hadn't meant to say so much. As usual, she had ended up rambling on. ‘I have no idea why I'm planning all this,' she said firmly, ‘There's a good chance I won't remain with the company—' she looked down when she said that, because the reasons for her departure were close enough to the surface of her mind to make her tremble ‘—and, even if I do, I haven't got the money.'

‘Money isn't a problem.'

‘Not for you perhaps.' She pulled open the door, not wanting to become embroiled in a conversation that was only serving to remind her of yet something else she would be giving up when she left. ‘Will that be all? I think I should be able to cover most of this by this afternoon and the rest I'll do first thing in the morning, if that's all right with you.'

‘Fine. I'll be out of the office this afternoon.' He paused. ‘I take it there won't be any surprises waiting for me tomorrow morning when I get in?'

Vicky flushed but didn't say anything and, after a few seconds, he gave her a curt nod of the head, which she read as her dismissal, and she went back into her office, breathing a sigh of relief that she was out of his presence, even though things had not gone according to plan. The plan had
been
that she would now be on her way to yet another employment agency, clutching her CV and prepared to do a typing test. Instead, here she still was, ensconced in her leather swivel chair, and she was edgily aware that a part of her was relieved that she wouldn't be leaving. It was, in fact, the same part that had encouraged her to remove her jumper a few nights previously and to offer herself to the man she kept reminding herself she needed to escape from. And it was the same part that re
sponded to his wit, his humour, the part that had, she acknowledged shakily, become addicted to his every mood, every shift in his expression, every change in his voice. Her fingers continued to fly across the computer keys and her eyes scanned the document she was typing, but her mind played its dangerous games somewhere else. Somewhere in a land of No Return, where her heart seemed to have wandered when she wasn't looking.

She was so absorbed in her thoughts that she jumped when he strode into her section an hour later, slinging on his jacket and checking his pockets in an unconscious and automatic gesture which she had grown to expect. She stopped with her hands hovering fractionally over the keyboard. She could feel nervous perspiration prickling under her arms and above her lip. She even thought she could feel the rush of blood through her veins. Hot, boiling blood, surging like a toxin. She'd fallen in love with him and it was like feeding off poison. He had to repeat three times that he would see her in the morning before she came to her senses and nodded, not daring to open her mouth because she knew her voice would give her away. Her eyes drank him up, though. She felt like a guilty sinner, gorging on temptation as she took in the lean hungry power of his body—the body she had touched!—the angles of his face, the full, sensual lower lip that promised so much more than fulfilling sex.

When the door slammed behind him, she could feel her body slump, and it was blessed relief to finally leave the office at a little before five so that she could rush to her daughter and try and regain some of her lost sanity. Chloe would be a tonic, with her incessant chatter and her innocent preoccupation with her school day. It wouldn't leave room in her head for Max.

Unfortunately thoughts of him plagued her all through
her daughter's tea, and by the time she had settled Chloe upstairs and opened the door to the architect she felt wrung out.

It didn't help that the expression on his face as he was shown through the house made her realise, dejectedly, that the house really
was
in need of a serious overhaul and that it was now out of the question that any such overhaul would be forthcoming.

‘You do realise,' he said thoughtfully, rocking on his heels and tapping his lips with his pen, ‘that you have damp.' He led her across to one of the offending walls in the sitting room, fiddled around with a gadget and then held it up for her to see. ‘If something isn't done about it fairly soon, the walls are going to deteriorate. Your idea about knocking through a couple of rooms would be a good way of clearing up the problem because we can do some damp-proofing at the same time.' Over a cup of coffee, he continued to elaborate on her ideas, tossing in more enticing ones of his own, which Vicky listened to with a sinking heart.

‘I haven't got money for all of that,' she finally confessed bluntly. ‘I mean, I might just have to do a superficial job, at least for the time being. A paint job here and there, some wallpaper, maybe get some new furniture.'

‘Won't take care of the damp.'

‘Well, what can you do about that?' She frowned irritably, thinking that she hadn't eaten her dinner as yet and her stomach was beginning to feel hollow. ‘You must be able to patch it up somehow.'

‘Patch-up jobs never really do the trick,' he said gently. For an earnest, middle-aged architect he certainly had a winning salesman's technique, she thought drily.

‘Well, I shall think about everything you've said.'

‘And I'll send my detailed report through shortly,' he
told her, getting to his feet and handing her the cup of coffee. ‘I say go the whole way,' he advised, walking ahead of her to the front door and throwing one last professional and withering glance around the hall. ‘It'll cost you a fraction of what you would have to pay if you looked outside the company, and you wouldn't have to wait months before work could begin.'

Vicky opened the door swiftly before she could be further undermined by this subversive talk.

‘In fact,' he said, pausing to look at her thoughtfully, ‘I've been told that the go-ahead for this particular project could be as early as next week. Just think, in less than four weeks you could turn this into the house of your dreams.' The brown eyes crinkled at her and she laughed.

‘Go away before you win me over completely! I'll think about it.'

Which she did, as she made herself some beans on toast and untied her hair, running her fingers through its length, idly thinking that she really ought to go and get it all chopped off into a tailored hairstyle more suitable for a mum.

Andy Griggs did a good line in persuasion, she thought. He hadn't been pushy, but his assessment of the house and what it needed had been professional and honest. It was hardly his fault that some of his suggestions were so tempting that she had to stop herself salivating at the mouth at the thought of them. At one point, he'd even managed to persuade her that altering her staircase completely would transform the overall aspect of the house, and she'd inanely found herself agreeing. He would send his detailed analysis through, she thought, and she would promptly put it somewhere safe and out of sight. In a drawer somewhere. From which she might occasionally extract it, if only for the purpose of drooling. She certainly couldn't see her way to chancing upon enough money to turn the
project into reality, especially if the costs were non-subsidised, but who could tell what might happen in the future? There was always the Lottery. Should she ever decide to play it.

She was washing her plate and glass, with the radio playing quietly in the background, when the doorbell went.

He must have forgotten something, she thought irritably, because at a little before nine she was already beginning to wind down to her usual night-time routine of the news on television, followed by her book, followed by sleep. Or maybe he'd read the longing in her eyes at all his renovating proposals and in an act of pure sadism had written up all his plans in record time and intended to present her with them while she appeared vulnerable.

She smiled at the thought of that and was still smiling when she pulled open the front door and saw Max Forbes standing on her doorstep, still in his working clothes, although he'd removed his tie and undone the top button of his shirt. The breeze had ruffled his dark hair and the darkness outside made his face appear more angular than usual.

What was he doing here?

She had to resist the temptation to peer behind her towards the stairwell, to make sure that Chloe hadn't heard the ring of the doorbell and was drowsily making her way down the stairs.

A series of futile
whys
pounded in her head like the blows of a hammer.
Why
had she ever applied to the wretched company for a job?
Why
had she stupidly accepted the job with him when it had been offered?
Why
had she somehow found herself persuaded to stay on, even though her common sense had repeatedly lectured her on the foolhardiness of her actions? And, most searingly brutal of all,
why, why, why
had she yielded to him in every
possible way? Made love with him? Fallen in love with him?

‘Oh, hello,' she said. ‘What are you doing here?' Her hair, curling down her back, was an unwelcome reminder of her femininity, as was the clinging short-sleeved top which she had flung on minutes before Andy Griggs had rang her doorbell, and the tight faded jeans.

‘I was in the area and decided to come along and see how you had fared with Andy.' He leant against the doorframe, supporting himself with his arm, invading her space so that she stepped back a few inches, though not enough to give him any room to enter.

‘You were in the area
again
? You seem to be in this area an awful lot.'

‘Warwick is a small place.' He shrugged. ‘Some friends live near here and asked me over for a drink. I think they want to make a match with their daughter. She's dull, rambling and conversationally unexciting. So, what did Andy say?'

‘Well, he had a lot of good ideas.' Vicky gave in, though she still continued to block any possible sign of entry. ‘I told him that I'd give the whole thing a great deal of thought and then get back to him.'

‘But you won't commit yourself to anything because of what happened between us,' he prodded. ‘One of the reasons I had to see you was to ask you something that's been on my mind for the past couple of hours. Do you feel unsafe when you're around me? If you do, then you might as well move on. Do you think that if we're alone together for more than five minutes I might grab you? Just because we happened to make love together once?'