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She knew more about the bank than anyone, maybe even including Grandfather, who still believed in a world devoid of computers and e-mail.
Aimee marched into the bedroom and methodically stripped off the gray wool suit and white silk blouse she’d deemed appropriate for the meeting with Grandfather this afternoon. She’d wanted to look businesslike, even though she knew damned well you could do as much business in jeans as you could in Armani.
She’d even worked up a little speech of assurance about how she wouldn’t change a thing, though she’d mentally crossed her fingers because there were things that definitely needed changing.
She’d presented herself at his office precisely at four. James was a stickler for promptness. She’d kissed his papery cheek, sat down as directed, folded her hands…
And listened as he told her he had not yet reached a decision as to who would replace him.
Be calm, she’d told herself. And she had been, or at least she’d managed to seem calm as she asked him what decision there was to make.
“You already said it would be me, Grandfather.”
“I said it would be someone capable,” James said briskly. “Someone of my lineage.”
“Well—”
The look on his face had frozen her with horror. “You don’t mean…Bradley?”
Bradley. Her cousin. Or her something. Who understood the complexities of second cousins twice removed, or whatever the hell he was? Bradley had been wimping around the bank for years, interning the same as she had, except he’d never done a day’s work, never done anything except try to grope her in the stockroom.
“Not Bradley,” she’d finally breathed.
“Bradley has a degree in economics.”
Yes. From a college that probably also gave degrees in basket-weaving.
“He’s well-spoken.”
He was, once he had three or four straight vodkas in him.
“And,” her grandfather had said, saving the best for last, “he is a man.”
A man. Meaning, nature’s royalty. A prince, whereas she was a lesser creature because she was female.
Grandfather had risen to his feet, indicating that she was no longer welcome in the royal presence.
“Be here Monday morning, Aimee. Ten o’clock sharp. I’ll announce my decision then.”
Dismissed, just like that.
Sent out the door, down the wheezing old elevator, into the street where she’d walked blindly, no idea where in hell she was or where she was going, which was why she hadn’t seen the man and he’d almost knocked her down.
That despicable, horrible man who’d insisted it was she who’d walked into him. Who’d accused her of not being a woman when, damn him, it was the very fact that she was a woman that was going to deny her the one thing she wanted in life.
What a fool she’d been. What an idiot. She’d turned down two wonderful job offers because she’d believed—she’d been stupid enough to believe—
She’d been anguishing over that when the man charged into her.
As if she were invisible, which she undoubtedly was because she was female. Oh, the arrogance of men. Of him. The way he’d clasped her shoulders and looked down at her from the lofty heights of his lofty maleness.
“Easy,” he’d said, and smiled, and that—the smile, the slight foreign huskiness to the word, the broad shoulders, the ink-black hair, the midnight-blue eyes and the face that was the male equivalent of what had launched a thousand ships, that was supposed to make up for his rudeness?
Aimee had told him what she thought of him.
Men didn’t like honesty. She’d learned that a long time ago. And this one, this—this bad-mannered stranger, had decided she needed a lesson, that she needed a graphic reminder of her place in the universe…
He’d kissed her.
