“I’m happy to be here.” The assignment back in L.A. that she was supposed to have started this week had been cancelled when the company went under last month; otherwise she wouldn’t have been available until much later this year.
“Is this your first visit to Chicago?”
“It is. From what I’ve seen it’s a beautiful city. The snow will take some getting used to, though.” The hall was silent and most of the offices they passed were dark. “Is it always this quiet?”
“We’re not technically back from the holiday break until next Monday,” he said. “The holiday season is a very busy time for us so we give everyone the first week of the year off.”
At the end of the hall he opened a door marked “Conference Room” and Carrie held her breath as they stepped inside. In front of a bank of windows that spanned the entire length of the room stood a strikingly beautiful young woman who looked more suited to a fashion runway than a company boardroom. On one side of a marble-topped table long enough to seat a dozen-plus people sat two dashing older men and opposite them, two younger men, who frankly buried the needle on the totally hot-and-sexy scale.
Well,
damn,
the Caroselli family sure did grow them tall dark and sexy.
She assumed one of them was Robert Caroselli, the man whose department she was there to analyze and pick apart. In her experience, that didn’t typically go over very well, and resulted in a certain degree of opposition. Especially when the person in charge was a man.
“Caroline,” Demitrio said, “these are my brothers Leo, our CFO, and Tony, our COO.”
The two older men rose to shake her hand. Tony was shorter and stockier in build. Leo was the tallest of the three and very fit for a man his age. Despite their physical differences, there was no mistaking the fact that they were related.
“Nice to meet you, gentlemen.”
“And this is my niece, Elana. She heads up our accounting division.”
Elana sauntered over to shake Carrie’s hand. Her firm grip was all business, her smile cool and sophisticated, but her dark eyes were warm and friendly. Carrie was fairly adept at reading people, and if she had to guess, she would say that Elana was incredibly intelligent, though underestimated at times because of her beauty.
“On this side we have my nephew, Nick,” Demitrio said. “He’s the genius behind our new projects.”
Nick, the one on the left, rose to shake her hand. He was charmingly attractive in a slightly rumpled I’m-sexy-and-rich-therefore-I-can-wear-a-wrinkled-shirt sort of way. The twinkle in his dark eyes, and slightly lopsided grin as he shook her hand said he was a flirt, while the wedding band on his left hand said he was very likely a harmless one.
“And last but not least,” Demitrio said, while Carrie braced herself, “this is Tony Jr., director of overseas production and sales.”
What about Robert?
Tony Jr. stood so tall that even in three-inch heels Carrie had to crane her neck to meet his eyes. His professional nod and distracted smile said that he had something other than the business at hand on his mind.
“Please have a seat,” Demitrio said, gesturing to the empty chair beside Nick. “We’re waiting for one more, then we can get started.”
She’d barely settled in her seat when behind her she heard the door open, and a deep voice say, “Sorry I’m late. My secretary isn’t back today, so I had to pick these reports up on my way in.”
Something about that voice made the hair on the back of her neck shiver to attention. She’d definitely heard it before. But where…
The breath she had just inhaled backed up in her lungs. Oh no, it
couldn’t
be.
She glanced up at him out of the corner of her eye as he approached the table, his attention on the pile of folders he carried, and when she focused on his face…
She swiftly looked away, heart pounding. He had the same smoldering black eyes, the solid, square jaw, the full lips that had kissed her senseless. At first glance the resemblance was uncanny. But it couldn’t be him. Could it?
He mumbled an “excuse me” as he laid a folder in front of her. On his right hand was a college ring identical to the one she had seen the other night, and as the scent of his aftershave drifted her way, the wave of familiarity was so strong that her heart skipped a beat.
She stared at the folder cover, unable to focus. Hell, she could barely
breathe
.
It’s not him,
she assured herself.
It just looks like him, and smells like him, and
sounds
like him…and wears the same ring as him.
But it
had
to be a coincidence, her mind playing tricks on her.
She had a strict rule of never sleeping with a coworker. Especially one she would be working with directly. And definitely not one whose work she would be putting under the microscope. She’d made that mistake once before, on her first high-profile job with a previous client. Previous because the affair had ended in disaster, the aftermath ugly.
It wasn’t necessary for the entire team to like her, but maintaining their respect was crucial. When she recalled the things she and Ron had said to one another, the things she let him do…the sheer mortification made her want to curl inside her own skin and hide, or slide down out of her chair under the table.
As he rounded the table she kept her eyes on the folder, pretending to read, afraid to lift her head. Maybe if it was Ron, he wouldn’t recognize her. They had both been pretty drunk.
“Rob,” Demitrio said, “this is Caroline Taylor. Caroline, this is my son Rob, our director of marketing.”
She had no choice but to look up, to meet his eyes, and when she did, her head spun and her heart sank.
Unless “Rob” had an identical twin, he was in fact Ron, her New Year’s bang.
* * *
Rob blinked, then blinked again. In the conservative suit that hid her pinup model figure, with her granny hairstyle, he almost didn’t recognize Carrie. But the slightly too-large clear gray eyes were a dead giveaway.
She sat frozen, watching him expectantly, and his first thought was that this had to be some sort of prank. Were Nick and Tony screwing with him? He’d bragged to them about the blonde beauty he’d spent the night with. Which his cousins knew was completely out of character for him. He didn’t do drunken one-night stands. Typically, he didn’t do drunken
anything
.
Was this some twisted practical joke? Had they gone to the hotel to look for her, maybe paid her to pose as Caroline Taylor to mess with Rob’s head?
He looked from Nick to Tony, waiting for someone to say something, for everyone at the table to burst out laughing. And when they didn’t, when they all watched him, looking increasingly puzzled by his lack of a response, he began to get a
very
bad feeling.
“Rob?” his dad said, brow creased with concern. “Is everything all right?”
“Fine,” he said, a bit too enthusiastically, and forcing a smile that felt molded from plastic, he told Ms. Taylor, “It’s a pleasure to meet you.”
Not.
When he’d slipped out of her bed, he’d had no intention of ever seeing her again. Talk about dumb freaking luck.
Caroline nodded in his general direction, her head held a little too high, her shoulders too square and her back too straight, as if she’d been cut out of cardboard and propped up in the chair. She was clearly no happier to see him than he was to see her.
“Well, why don’t we get started,” his dad said, and everyone opened their folders. Rob tried to concentrate as they went over the contracts, and discussed Ms. Taylor’s credentials and her projected time line, but he found his mind—and his eyes—wandering to the woman across the table. She downplayed her looks for work, he assumed in an attempt to gain respect from men who might otherwise objectify her or see her as too pretty to be smart. But he knew what she was hiding under that shapeless suit. The siren’s figure and satin-soft skin. He knew the way her hair looked cascading down her bare back in silky ribbons, pale and buttery against her milky complexion, and how it brushed his chest as she straddled him. Even though parts of that night were a bit fuzzy, he knew he could never erase from his mind the image of her lying beneath him, wrapped in his arms, her breathy moans as he—
“Rob?”
his dad said.
Rob jerked to attention. “Yeah, sorry.”
“It seems we’ve covered everything.”
Already?
“Why don’t you take Caroline on a tour of the building while the rest of us have a short discussion. I’ll call you when we’re ready.”
They had covered everything, and he hadn’t heard a word of it. Now they would make the final decision, and they were going to do it without him. He’d been clear from day one that he considered her presence there a waste of time and money, and he had never once swayed from that opinion. Still it was a slap in the face to be excluded, not just for him, but for the entire marketing staff that he represented.
Or maybe, getting her alone for a few minutes wasn’t such a bad idea. And meeting her wasn’t “dumb luck” after all. Maybe a little time alone would give him the opportunity to make her see reason. See that she didn’t belong here. Then she would no longer be his problem.
With a smile—a genuine one this time—he rose from his seat and said, “If you’ll follow me, Ms. Taylor.”
She stood, spine straight, shoulders back, flashing the others a confident smile, as if she already knew she had it in the bag. “I look forward to your decision.”
Rob held the door for her, then followed her out, closing it firmly behind him. He turned to her and said in a low voice, “I think we need to talk.”
Her eyes shooting daggers, her voice dripping with venom, she said, “Oh, you think so…
Ron?
”
He gestured down the hall. “My office is this way.”
They walked there in silence, but he could feel her anger reverberating against the walls like an operatic vibrato.
His secretary’s chair was unoccupied as they walked past, and when they were in his office he shut the door. He turned to face her and thought,
Here we go
. “I can see that you’re upset.”
“Upset,” she said, her voice rising an octave. “Not only did you
lie
about your name, but did you have to skulk away in the middle of the night?”
If that’s all she was mad about, he considered himself lucky. “First off, I did not lie to you about my name. I said it was Rob. You called me Ron and I saw no point in correcting you.”
“I can’t believe you didn’t make the connection. Carrie Taylor, Caroline Taylor? You didn’t at least suspect we might be one in the same person?”
“It was loud in the bar. I didn’t even hear your last name. And we never discussed what we do for a living, so how was I supposed to guess who you were? I’ve met a lot of people named Carrie. You don’t have a monopoly on the name.”
“And as for skulking off in the middle of the night?”
“It was not the middle of the night. It was early morning and I didn’t want to wake you. You were so drunk I’m not sure I could have if I tried. And I did not skulk. I got dressed and left, end of story.”
“First off, I wasn’t
that
drunk. And didn’t it occur to you to at least leave a note?”
“Why would I? We agreed it would never be more than one night. It was over.”
She rolled her eyes. “You know
nothing
about women do you? You could have said goodbye, told me that you had a good time.”
“I assumed, in our case, actions spoke louder than words.”
She didn’t seem to have a snarky reply for that one. She couldn’t deny it had been damned good for her, too.
“What I don’t understand is why we’re in here,” Rob told her, “when you should be in the conference room telling them you can’t work here.”
Her brows rose. “Why would I do that?”
“Well, first, despite what my family believes, your services are not required or desired by anyone on my staff. And considering the circumstances, I don’t think your presence here would be appropriate.”
“What circumstances are those?”
Was she kidding? “The ones we’ve been discussing since we stepped in here. It’s unlikely either of us could be objective in light of what happened the other night.”
“I don’t know about you, but now that I know what a macho jerk you are, it isn’t going to be an issue for me. In fact, I think I’m going to enjoy it.”
He had been accused of being inattentive, arrogant and at times insufferable, but macho jerk was a new one. “Are you sure about that?”
“Absolutely.”
“You can remain completely objective?”
“Yep.”
Rob was not the type of man to behave rashly. He never made a move before he’d had time to completely think through a situation, weigh the pros and cons. So maybe it was pride that propelled him forward, or the satisfaction of proving her wrong, or just compromised judgment that motivated him to take her by the arms, pull her to him and crush his mouth down on hers.
Carrie made an indignant sound and pushed at his chest. She resisted for all of three seconds, then her fingers curled into the lapels of his jacket and her lips parted beneath his.
Having made his point, he should have let go. Instead he wrapped his arms around her, pulled her closer. It had been just like this on New Year’s, his brain shutting down the second he kissed her, his body reacting on pure instinct, a carnal need to overpower and dominate. One that he’d never felt with a woman before her. Because despite her claim, he was not a macho jerk. Of all his cousins and uncles, he was probably the least chauvinistic man in the family. Her gender had no bearing whatsoever on his professional opinion.
Carrie slid her hands up his chest, tunneled them through his hair, taking two fistfuls and jerking his head back so she could kiss—
ow
—make that
bite
his neck. Growling, he backed her against his office door, cringing as her head hit the surface with a
thunk,
cushioned only by the ugly bun in her hair, but it only seemed to fuel her desire.