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‘Nicola hasn’t spent much time in Auckland recently and she won’t know anyone else at work so I want you to befriend her, keep her busy during her lunch-hour—show her around…You could take her to a few cafés around the city, maybe visit some art galleries, show her the harbour, take her shopping…things like that. I’ll arrange a company credit card for you and naturally I’ll reimburse you for your time.’
Harriet was rigid in her chair, aghast at what this would do to her precious, new-found personal freedom.
‘She’s your daughter; why don’t you spend your lunch-hours escorting her around town?’ she blurted out.
‘Because, unlike my waged employees, I don’t have regular lunch-hours,’ he said crisply. ‘I have a very tight schedule over the next few weeks. If I do eat out it’ll be at business luncheons. Nicola would be bored to tears—’
‘I thought that was the general idea.’
He gave her an old-fashioned look. ‘Don’t be impertinent, Miss Smith.’
Impertinent! She’d give him impertinence! Harriet’s eyes narrowed to dangerous slits.
‘Let me get this straight. This is what you got me up here for? This is the special project for which you told Mr Jessop you needed my urgent help? You want to use me as a babysitter?’
‘I wouldn’t call it babysitting,’ he asserted mildly.
‘I don’t care what words you use; it amounts to the same thing! You’re asking me to be your daughter’s chaperon from nine o’clock to five every day, to be responsible for her personal welfare. You can’t be serious!’
He planted his palms flat on the desk in front of him, unperturbed by this display of rebellion. ‘I wasn’t asking…and I assure you, Miss Smith, I’m perfectly serious.’
She was horrified to see that he was. The humour had vanished from his blue eyes, replaced by a cool determination. ‘But I don’t want to do it!’
‘Irrelevant.’
Regrettably she realised that he was right. She had never been asked before whether she wanted a particular task or not. Why should this one be any different? She clenched her small hands in her lap, seething with frustration. ‘Surely there’s someone more suitable, someone nearer her own age—?’
‘I want someone mature—someone I know personally and whom I can trust. Come, Miss Smith, there’s obviously no one more suitable than you—you’re already in my employ, you’re available on short notice and you’re a sensible, level-headed lady who relates very well to the young people on the staff. They like you. They respect you. So will Nicola.’
Harriet’s heart sank. He had certainly done his wretched homework. ‘Lady’. ‘Sensible’. ‘Level-headed’. If she didn’t stand firm in her resolution those words would be her epitaph.
She shuddered as the familiar trapped feeling began to close in on her. The hard, smothering pressure that made it difficult to breathe, let alone articulate.
‘Why can’t Miss Broadbent do it? Or what about your other private secretary?’ she croaked desperately. ‘She often works for you at your home, so Nicola must be used to having her around—’
‘Miss Broadbent is too old and Miss Allison is in Italy on her honeymoon. She’s taken advantage of the current lull in my overseas schedule to get married and I don’t think her new husband would appreciate my recalling her for a less than life-or-death crisis. No, Miss Smith, I’ve already made up my mind.’
He had made up his mind. As if that settled the matter for all eternity!
‘And what work am I supposed to be doing while your daughter is nodding over the files?’ she said helplessly, visualising her vibrant, colourful, sexy new self withering away for lack of exposure.
‘Don’t worry, I don’t expect you to share the mundane burden,’ he offered in meagre compensation. ‘That would be a foolish waste of human resources. I’ve had an extra computer terminal installed in the file room and Miss Broadbent has a couple of research projects that you should find both interesting and challenging—’
‘Isn’t that dangerous? What if Nicola looks over my shoulder and stops yawning?’ she sniped.
‘Then you can tell her about the secretarial course you graduated from with top marks in your class,’ he replied with the glibness of one who had her personnel file open on the desk in front of him. ‘If Nicola decides that office work might be her métier after all she could do no better than to take on you as a role model…’
If he expected her to be flattered he was mistaken. His compliment was the last straw.
‘Role model! Are you crazy?’ Harriet exploded to her feet, spreading her arms angrily so that her unbuttoned jacket parted over the filmy white blouse. ‘Look at me, for goodness’ sake! Do I look as if I’m a suitable role model for a vulnerable young teenager? I’m the last person you should be asking.’
He stroked his chin in a characteristic gesture of patience. ‘Calm down, Miss Smith—’
‘No, I won’t calm down. I don’t want to calm down!’ She was aware that her soft voice had risen shrilly and didn’t care. She stood aggressively in front of his desk, her hands on her hips in defiance of his authority.
‘Whatever you think you know about me, you’re wrong. You’re way out of date! Sure, I may be levelheaded at work but in my own time I’m really quite irresponsible…I wouldn’t be a good influence on your daughter at all. I’m not good with children and it’s certainly not my idea of fun to spend my free time trailing around with some bored, rich brat and acting as if I care what she does. I’d probably lose track of her. I’m busy in my lunch-hours too, you know. I have places of my own to go, things to do, people to see…’
She trailed off as she saw that, instead of appearing disenchanted by her feverish claim to moral weakness and the insulting reference to his daughter, Marcus Fox was looking disconcertingly intrigued.
