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But not today.
Susannah darted into the lobby and pounded the elevator call button. Her reflection stared at her from the bronze doors, and she shuddered.
Lord, she was a mess!
The wind had not only dried her hair, it had churned it into what looked like finger-in-the-electric-outlet chic. There were two … three? Three buttons missing from the jacket she’d grabbed blindly on her way out the door. Her jeans, was that a paint smear from when she’d tried her hand at oils? And her sneakers. Susannah winced. Someplace between here and the subway, the safety pins had done a disappearing act. The sneaker had stayed on, though. All she had to do was remember not to make any quick moves with her right foot, and it would be fine.
She got into the elevator and punched the button for the fourteenth floor.
Okay. So she wasn’t going to score points for haute couture. And she wasn’t going to be on time or anywhere close to it. So what? It was silly to put too much emphasis on stuff like that. She had a new job title but she was still the same Susannah. She was, admittedly, just a tiny bit disorganized. But she was creative. Even old Elerbee, who’d hired and then promoted her, had understood that.
The staff knew her. She didn’t have to impress anyone, she had to give them confidence and inspire them. And she was going to do exactly that with her fantastic new idea.
She could hardly wait to hear Claire’s response, because this would be her baby. Claire was, after all, the new features editor.
The elevator doors slid open. Susannah stepped from the car.
Strange. The reception area was empty. Judy, the receptionist, was probably in the boardroom with the rest of the staff, but…Susannah smiled.
“Good girl,” she murmured.
A fresh pot of coffee stood on a little sideboard, along with a platter heaped with doughnuts. Despite the hour, Judy had put out the refreshments that were a morning staple in reception.
Susannah hurried to her own office.
“Late, late, late,” she whispered, glancing at the clock.
But not too late. It was almost eight twenty-five. All things considered, that wasn’t too bad.
Quickly, she jotted some notes on a pad, grabbed her portable computer and her I Love Cape Cod souvenir mug and dashed to Judy’s desk. Her stomach rumbled as she filled the mug to the brim. How did a person carry a pad, a computer, a mug filled with hot coffee and a doughnut without growing a third arm?
Susannah snagged a jelly doughnut, stuck it between her teeth, collected all her other paraphernalia and headed for the boardroom.
The door was closed.
That was unusual. The room wasn’t all that big. Once everybody collected around the long cherry wood table, things generally seemed a bit crowded. It was better to leave the door open.
Never mind. Once they all heard her terrific idea for boosting CHIC’s sales and revamping its image, they’d be too busy smiling to worry about crowding.
Susannah hit the door with her elbow.
“Mmmf?” she said.
Nobody answered.
She gave it another try
The door swung open.
They were all there, crammed even more closely together than usual, their eyes wide, their faces pale. Claire. Judy. Eddie, the mail-room intern. The fiction editor, the fashion gurus, the assistants and associates and staff photographers.
Everyone looked her up, then looked her down, but no one said a word, not even good morning.
At last, Claire stepped forward. “Suze,” she whispered, and made a funny little motion with her head.
Did Claire have a crick in her neck? Susannah raised her eyebrows. “Mmmf?”
“Suze,” Claire hissed.
“What Miss Haines is trying to say,” a deep male voice said, “is that you’re late, Miss Clinton.”
Susannah stood absolutely still. She had never heard that voice before. She’d have remembered it if she had. Not many men could put a chill into the phrase, “You’re late, Miss…” Clinton? Who was Miss Clinton? And who was the man doing the talking?
Her gaze flew to Claire’s. Help me, Susannah pleaded silently
Claire grimaced, chewed on her lip, puffed out her breath, rolled her eyes. It was a performance that would have made Susannah giggle any other time. But now—now, Claire’s strange mannerisms were an entire speech made without words.
The implication, though, was absolutely clear.
Warning! Claire was saying, warning! Whoever the man was, he was trouble with a capital T. But Susannah had already figured that out. Who else could enter the CHIC offices and position himself at the head of the conference table in the boardroom but a man who was trouble?
But who was he? Who could he be?
Someone from Update. There was no other possibility
Susannah swallowed dryly. Of course! This was the bean counter she’d been expecting, the one she’d known would march in, demand access to all CHIC’s records, intimidate the staff and then, a few days later, take off his bifocals, clean them with the tip of his tie while he informed her that he was going to recommend that CHIC be shut down.
But the voice at the head of the table didn’t sound as if it went with a skinny little man who wore bifocals.
“Well, Miss Clinton? I’m waiting to hear your excuse for your lateness.” The deep voice took on a silken purr. Susannah had a sudden mental image of a big cat—a puma, maybe, or a jaguar—wearing a pair of horn-rimmed glasses. “We’re all waiting, Miss Clinton. Won’t you enlighten us? Tell us why you called your staff in for a meeting to be held promptly at eight o’clock when you yourself didn’t think it important enough to appear until—” there was a brief pause, as if the cat were peering through its horn-rims at its watch “—until twenty minutes of nine?”
Susannah threw one last, desperate look in Claire’s direction.
“Mmmf?” she breathed, past the doughnut, the damned stupid doughnut, still clutched between her teeth.
Claire gave her a wan smile, lifted a hand and made a slicing motion across her throat.
Oh, God, Susannah thought, as everybody stepped back, parting like the Red Sea so the conference table, all twelve feet of it, came into view.
And so did the man seated at its head.
No, Susannah thought dizzily. He wasn’t a jaguar. He wasn’t a puma. He was a hawk. A magnificent hawk, with the fierce look of the predator in his eyes. And those eyes… Her stomach clenched.
Those blue, blue eyes were fixed coldly on her.
She felt her knees wobble. This was no skinny, middle-aged bean counter with bifocals. This was not the man from Update. This was—
“Good morning, Miss Clinton,” Matthew Romano said.
Susannah’s mouth dropped open. The doughnut left a snowfall of sugar across Beethoven’s face as it tumbled to the shiny tile floor. Bright red jelly oozed across the toe of the sneaker that had been held together by safety pins.
Romano smiled.
“Charming,” he said, almost purring, as his gaze swept over her. “Is this a new style, or what?”
A muffled sound, half laugh, half groan, broke the silence. Susannah glared at Claire, who clapped her hand over her mouth and shook her head in mute apology.
“Nothing to say?” His smile tilted, became as icy as his eyes. “What a pity, Miss Clinton. I didn’t expect you’d ever find yourself at a loss for words, particularly where I’m concerned.”
Susannah’s stricken gaze followed him as he rose lazily to his feet.
He looked as if he’d just stepped from the pages of Gentleman’s Quarterly. The dark, expertly cut hair. The hard, handsome face. The perfectly tailored suit, pale blue shirt and elegantly knotted tie. She couldn’t see his shoes, but she knew they’d be as polished as mirrors.
Quickly, she shifted her weight, trying to hide the jelly-covered toe of the laceless sneaker.
Romano folded his arms and laughed.
Color flew into Susannah’s face. What was Romano doing
here? Why was he trying to humiliate her? Well, he wouldn’t succeed. She’d act like a lady, even though it was obvious that he was no gentleman.
“How nice to meet you, Mr. Romano. Perhaps you’d be kind enough to explain your presence here.”
Matthew arched one eyebrow. For a woman who looked as if she were dressed for the rag pickers ball, a woman who surely hadn’t expected to find him camped on CHIC’s doorstep, so to speak, Susan Whatever was certainly managing to seem cool and collected.
She wasn’t, of course. He could see it in the bright flush in her cheeks and in the almost imperceptible tremor that had gone through her body when she’d first seen him sitting at the conference table.
His gaze drifted over her again. This was the editor-in-chief of the magazine? The person Elerbee had entrusted with the formidable job of turning CHIC into a money-making property? The old man must have gone soft in the head. Nothing else could explain it. Susan…Clinton? Truman? The woman looked as if she’d picked her clothes out of a bin at the nearest Goodwill, styled her hair by sticking a finger into an electrical outlet, and her sneakers…
Unless he was losing his mind, the one that had jelly on it had no laces.
“You are Matthew Romano, aren’t you?”
Matthew’s gaze met hers. She’d had time to gather herself, he could see. The hot color had left her face. She was, in fact, pale—except for her eyes. They were so bright they looked almost feverish. Were they hazel? Green? Actually, he’d never seen a color quite like them, almost golden, but flecked with chips of jade and tourmaline.
“Claire?”
Susannah spoke without looking away from Romano. Her heart was banging in her chest, but her voice was clipped. Claire’s, on the other hand, was a paper-thin whisper.
“Y-yes?”
“Call security.”
