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‘Miss Smith?’ Susan Jerome’s sceptical glare bored into Harriet as she beat a chastened retreat, clearly insinuating that the ubiquitous surname must be a blatant attempt at deception. ‘One of your most experienced secretaries, you say, Marcus?’ she rapped out. ‘Experienced at what? one is entitled to wonder.’
Harriet was wondering too. From his brief description she had created a vague mental picture of Marcus Fox’s mother-in-law as a delicate flower of womanhoodgenteel, kind and devotedly maternal. This tall, square woman with her sharp grey eyes and even sharper voice wouldn’t have looked out of place as a warder in a woman’s prison. Her powder-blue suit was as severely cut as a uniform, for all it dripped with class, and her regimented, blue-rinsed curls failed to soften the formidable front. A prison pallor, the only hint of ill health in her upright bearing, completed the unfortunate impression.
Lynne Foster was the exact opposite—a voluptuous, dark-haired, dark-eyed beauty who made the most of her femininity while still managing to look impressively businesslike.
Standing next to her, Harriet’s proposed new protégée was completely eclipsed, but that didn’t seem to bother Nicola Fox. She was as quiet as a mouse, hanging back as she watched the interaction between the adults with unblinking green eyes. Her long fair hair hung in a plait down her back and she wore round wire spectacles that emphasised the smallness of her pale face. She wore a neat cotton dress and lace-up shoes with white ankle socks. She didn’t smile when she was introduced to Harriet, but at least she politely shook hands, which was more than the two older women had offered to do.
As she slipped out the door Harriet heard Susan Jerome say dismissively, ‘Really, Marcus, a man, in your position can’t be too careful of his reputation…especially with that sort—a pert little miss and no mistake! But listen, the reason we came is to tell you that Lynne and I have come up with a splendid idea for Nicola’s holiday—’
‘A pert little miss’. I suppose that’s an improvement on ‘that wretched woman’! thought Harriet ruefully as she was waylaid by Miss Broadbent and handed a set of neatly typed instructions.
Thankfully, following them had kept her well away from the chairman’s office for the rest of the day. She’d spent the morning tying up loose ends with Brian Jessop and Barbara, and the afternoon setting up her new desk and computer-link in the file room. Apart from a few lowly clerks, her only visitor had been Miss Broadbent, who’d descended from on high to deliver a box of disks containing the confidential research data that Harriet would need, and a personal memo in a thick, monogrammed envelope…
Harriet’s hands had actually been shaking as she had ripped it open, half expecting to find a polite message informing her that her services would now no longer be required. But it appeared that Mrs Jerome’s ‘splendid idea’ had not held sway, for in a beautifully precise, almost calligraphic hand Marcus Fox had written that his daughter would be starting work the next day, and could Harriet please present herself at eight-thirty a.m. sharp in the executive foyer to take her on the standard familiarisation tour for new employees.
‘Having fun?’ Marcus asked as they moved in among the dancers, and it took a moment for Harriet to realise that he was referring to their conversation in the lift that morning.
She tossed her head. ‘I was.’ Her blue eyes glittered defiantly under gold-dusted lids.
‘I’m glad,’ he murmured, his insincerity as bold as her lie. That settled, he placed his large hand lightly between her shoulderblades and gently urged her into motion. Although he was scarcely touching her, Harriet felt the delicate friction of his palm against her bare skin as if it were a brand. She shivered.
‘Are you cold?’ His warm breath stirred the blonde curls over her temple, and as she stared fixedly at his upper chest she wished that she were still wearing heels instead of low, strappy sandals. She didn’t like having to tilt her head to see his face; it made it impossible to conceal her own expression and he was far too shrewd at reading people.
‘No, I’m quite warm.’
Too warm, in fact. And she had that squirmy sensation again—the one that had haunted her in his presence ever since that New Year interview, when he had shattered her perception of him as a remote demigod, exposing instead a real man who was capable of suffering the same confusion and uncertainty as everyone else. She hadn’t wanted her perceptions altered. At that time she had looked on her workplace as her havensafe, unemotional, the one controllable aspect of her life. It would have been more than she could have coped with to acknowledge that it, too, might change…
‘You surprise me…considering how little there is to your dress—and the fact that it appears to be entirely made of metal,’ he commented drily.
She looked down at the fine gold mesh that poured like viscous liquid over the curves of her body from the deeply slashed neckline to the asymmetrical hem that revealed most of one leg. The weight of the flared skirt swung with her movements, the flat metal links turning to molten fire as they caught the fragmented lights above the dance-floor.
Harriet had chosen the most wickedly exotic new dress she owned to celebrate her official launch as a giddy socialite. All right, so perhaps it had been rather too exotic for a woman who hadn’t quite decided on the level of her sophistication, she conceded. Perhaps Michael wasn’t entirely to blame for coming to the conclusion that the woman inside the look-how-sexy-I-am dress would be a push-over…
‘But very precious metal,’ she said lightly, refusing to dwell on her mistakes. ‘I think it must have been priced by the gram,’ she added, and named a price that had given her palpitations when she had agreed to pay it. It was as much as she had previously spent on clothes in a year! ‘Do you think I got my money’s worth?’ she probed.
To her disappointment he looked unmoved by her daring. He looked down at the glamorous mask that she had carefully applied to match the dress. Her lipstick had been worn off by the constant worrying of her teeth and tongue in the last uncomfortable hour with Michael. Her naked lips were a lush pale pink, soft and vulnerable in contrast to the sultry slash of her painted eyes.
‘Undoubtedly it’ll prove a very wise investment if you continue to keep company with aggressive playboys like Fleet,’ he commented drily. ‘You may need the protection of high-fashion chain mail. Men who won’t take no for an answer can be hard to fend off, even for the most experienced coquette.’
He was lecturing again! ‘Coquette,’ she mocked. ‘What an old-fashioned word!’
‘I’m an old-fashioned man. I happen to believe that men should respect women—’
‘Even blonde bimbos?’
His stern mouth took on a definite slant. He waited a few turns before murmuring, ‘You do seem to be fixated with my attitude to blondes.’
Harriet shied away from any suggestion of personal interest. ‘Only because I suppose that in the last twelve hours I’ve confirmed all your ridiculous prejudices!’ she said carelessly.
‘Actually, you’ve exploded a few of them.’ His smile showed teeth as he invited, ‘Would you like to know which ones?’
Panic curled around her throat and the hand resting on his left shoulder clenched unconsciously into a fist. ‘No!’
A slight turn of his head, and his incisive jaw brushed against her white knuckles. ‘Afraid?’
She shrugged haughtily in a shimmer of gold, composing her face into a look of intense boredom. ‘No, merely uninterested.’
He chuckled admiringly. ‘Oh, you do that very well.’
