Prelude to a Wedding (6 page)

He glanced at her as he made the turn into
her street and she knew he didn't agree.

"What's the use of having your own. business
if you let it run you? The whole idea is to not have a boss looking
over your shoulder, telling you what to do and when to do it.
Work's fine, but there are other things in life. Ambition can take
over."

She bristled a little at the implied
criticism at the same time she wondered if anyone could really be
that offhand and still make a go of a business. Experience had
taught her the demands of a successful business. And she had done
sufficient homework on Paul Monroe to know his business was
successful . . . even if her research had left out exactly what he
did.

"This is it," she said coolly, "the one in
the middle of the block with the light on."

He pulled into the driveway. "A house? You
own it?"

"No. I'm renting this one, but I'm starting
to look for a place to buy." The next step in her plan. With the
business apparently on its feet, it was time to stop wasting money
on rent and start building equity.

"It's nice, but you could use a
jack-o'-lantern."

"Jack o'-lantern?"

"You know, a pumpkin, carved to look like a
face, with a candle inside,"

"I
know
what a jack-o'-lantern
is."

"Good. Because that front doorstep of yours
could definitely use one. You know Halloween's getting close."

"Yes, I know, but a pumpkin has not been at
the top of my list of priorities. I've been busy at—"

"At work," lie finished for her.

She glanced over, but saw no sign of the
humor she might have expected. His gaze was fixed with great
concentration on her bare front step.

She prepared to say her thank-yous, but he
turned the engine off. For a blood-thundering instant she thought
he was going to turn to her, reach across the bucket seats, take
her in his arms and . . .

Before her imagination could get too carried
away, he'd gotten out and come around to open her door. She thanked
him, but ignored his hand.

She'd known him less than eight hours, but
sometimes that was all it took to see the flaws. He'd made no
effort to hide them. From his own words she'd learned he hated
schedules and put fun ahead ahead of responsibility. He hadn't
learned that achievement followed a plan.

It all added up to one message: he was a man
to stay away from.

Too bad her hormones didn't agree.

"A hatchback, huh?"

She followed the direction of his gaze to the
garage door windows. Hatchback. Car.

"That's right. A total suburbanite, that's
me. It comes in handy for hauling things from the hardware
store."

"But you don't drive in to the city?"

"Not if I can help it. It's more efficient to
take the train. That way I can work during the commute and don't
have to worry about parking. You always drive?"

"I like the freedom."

Stepping within the pool of light at the
front door, she took a slow, steadying breath as she unlocked the
door then turned to him, holding out her hand.

"Thank you, Paul. I enjoyed the evening.
Dinner was wonderful, and Mama Artemis's is a real find. I—"

He ignored the hand and the speech. Grasping
her upper arms, he turned her to face him, startling her into
silence. He bent his head, so slowly she thought she might explode
from the waiting before he ever reached her lips.

And then, when the waiting had finally ended,
all he did was brush his mouth against hers—top lip, bottom, top
lip again. Softly, quickly.

"Good night, Bette."

He turned her around and headed her inside.
Automatically, she closed the storm door and wooden door behind
her. But she couldn't move any farther. She heard his car door
shut, heard the engine start, heard his car back up and pull away,
and still she stood, leaning against the door's wooden panels,
staring into the hallway's familiar shadows.

One thought; filled the yawning emptiness his
touch had made of her mind.

Uh-oh.

Chapter Three

Paul turned the corner and caught one last
glimpse of the neat neighborhood. A neighborhood where all the
corners were squared, all the houses in a straight line, all the
lawns trimmed and the trees big. Someone with a ruler had probably
plotted out the whole thing, including the flower beds filled with
yellow mums.

It suited Bette Wharton right down to the
ground.

A vague vision of his apartment rose in his
mind as he accelerated onto the tollway and headed north. Although
he'd lived there several years he couldn't form a clear picture of
it. The walls were light, maybe white, and the windows good-sized
so a good bit of tree-dappled sunlight made it into the rooms. He
had an old couch his mother gave him when she redecorated the room
over the garage. But he could envision it better in that hideaway
of his teen years than in his own living room. Books, a TV and
stereo equipment rested on shelves of boards and bricks, smacking a
bit of college days. But he'd been reluctant to put up shelves.
That seemed too permanent, too attached.

He rolled into the exact-change lane for the
tollbooth, flipping coins in left-handed with practiced ease.
Merging into the traffic, which couldn't be considered light even
at this hour, he found his mind repeated his earlier thought:

That seemed too permanent, too attached.

Maybe that was what bothered him about the
museum deal.

Jobs he'd done for several museums around the
country as one-shot deals had worked out fine. In fact, he'd
enjoyed them. The people sure weren't in the business for money,
and he liked that about them. Plus, he appreciated that museums
these days were acknowledging the lighter side of everyday life,
the toys, the games, the hobbies. And he enjoyed visits to
Washington, especially since they gave him a chance to visit
Tris.

But now, with the Smithsonian talking about a
regular arrangement . . . He just didn't know.

Someone like Bette Wharton would probably
jump at this kind of opportunity. He suspected that, to her, it
would be a building block in some great life plan.

He checked the rearview mirror as he steered
toward the exit, caught sight of his half smile and turned it into
a grimace. All right, so he was attracted to Bette, despite the
suspicion she actually had one of those god-awful five-year plans
the yuppie magazines always wrote about. Why? What was so great
about Bette Wharton?

She wasn't classically beautiful or a sex
goddess knockout. And he found himself absurdly glad she wasn't
either one. Anybody could spot a woman like that, but he'd made a
discovery not every man would be astute enough to make.

He'd listened to the crisp coolness of her
voice and heard that hint of spiciness beneath. He'd touched the
no-nonsense wool of her suit and felt the softness of her skin.
He'd acknowledged the common sense coming from her mouth and
recognized the uncommon sensuality of that maddening upper lip.
He'd looked into the forthright navy blue of her eyes and seen that
she had secrets there.

Secrets
. Maybe that was it. Maybe that
defined the whole thing. This feeling that she'd hidden her teasing
and laughter beneath a life ruled by an appointment calendar, and
the challenge of luring that teasing and laughter out of
hiding.

So, maybe what he felt came more from the
challenge of making her see that other side of herself, the free
spirit. He could handle that.

A challenge . . . Yeah, he could enjoy
that.

* * * *

"Paul Monroe's on line two, Bette."

Bette sidestepped Darla's curious look, just
as she'd sidestepped earlier questions with a simple statement that
she and the client had had an enjoyable business dinner. "Thank
you, Darla."

She waited until her assistant closed the
door behind her, took a deep breath and lifted the receiver. "Good
morning, this is Bette Wharton. May I help you?" It was chicken to
pretend she didn't know who was on the other end of the line, but
she wanted an extra second to remind herself of how she'd decided
to deal with him.

"Hi, Bette. It's Paul."

So much for formality, she thought with an
unwilling and wry smile. "Good morning, Paul. I hope everything's
going smoothly so far with Sally."

"Sally? Oh, the temporary temporary
secretary. Yeah, everything's fine. In fact, you know what she
did?"

"What?"

"She made me fresh coffee." He sounded so
impressed she couldn't help but chuckle.

"No! Really?"

"Go ahead and laugh, but Jan never does that
for me. She says anybody who comes and goes as much as I do
deserves to drink whatever's available."

"She has a point."

"Well, just don't go telling Sally, okay? I
usually only get fresh coffee about twice a year, so this is a
treat."

"1 promise not to tell Sally, but she won't
be there much longer."

"How'd you know?"

"How'd I know what?"

"That Sally won't be here much longer."

"Because she'll be replaced by your permanent
temporary as soon as you make a selection."

"Oh. I thought maybe my reputation had
already gotten to her. Isn't that an oxymoron?"

"Isn't what an oxymoron, and what
reputation?"

" 'Permanent temporary.' I think that's an
oxymoron—you know, a built-in contradiction."

"1 guess it is." She hated herself for it,
but she couldn't resist repeating, "And what reputation?"

"For going through a lot of secretaries
fast."

She wondered if the reason for this was only
his business habits. In her line of business she couldn't help but
know that a certain breed of men viewed temporary secretaries as a
two-birds-with-one-stone dating service. She'd have been surprised
if Paul Monroe was one; she'd also have been too disappointed for
her own comfort.

In her coolest, most neutral tones, she said,
"I understand that's the reason Jan Robson contacted us in the
first place, isn't it?"

"I guess it is." If she thought she caught an
echo of sheepishness, she could also imagine a grin lurking.

"And that, I'm sure, is why you're calling
this morning." She thought he mumbled "not exactly," but ignored
it. "I've just messengered the files over to you, since they
somehow ended up back with my papers, uh, last night. You can look
them over, then let my office know before the close of business
today whom you have selected and we'll make every effort to have
that person in place tomorrow morning."

"I don't like the sound of that."

What was there not to like? She was being
more than reasonable; getting someone lined up overnight qualified
as above and beyond the call of good customer service. She decided
to quell him with a single syllable. "Oh?"

"Particularly that part about the messenger
and then notifying your office." He sounded singularly unquelled.
"I thought we could meet for lunch and discuss the whole thing
then, say about one—"

"I'm sorry, lunch won't be possible." Not if
she hoped to catch up with yesterday's leftover chores.

"But you've got to eat. All I'm saying is
spend that time with me. And, of course, going over these
files."

"I don't eat lunch." Now why had she said
that? There were certainly times she'd skipped the meal to finish
work, but she'd also had her share of business lunches. She was
reacting almost as if she were afraid of Paul Monroe.
Ridiculous.

"You don't eat lunch? Well, no wonder you're
thin. I tell you, Bette, my mom would definitely worry about
you."

"It's very kind of your mother to be
concerned." What a damn fool thing to say! His mother didn't know
of her existence. She was becoming a blithering idiot. "But I must
go now. I'll wait for your decision on those files, Mr. Monroe.
Goodbye."

She hung up before she could hear any answer,
then stared at the instrument as if something might leap out of it
to snatch away the final shreds of her composure.

Jerkily, she picked up a pencil and rammed it
into the small sharpener from her drawer.

Why did she react that way? All right, Paul
Monroe made her a little nervous. Yes, she felt an attraction to
him, although clearly nothing serious, since she had a firm fix on
the man's faults. Even though that eye-dancing smile could make the
clearest of faults a bit fuzzy around the edges. But she hadn't
turned him down because of that . . . exactly. She'd turned him
down because she had a lot of work and he'd disrupted her schedule
yesterday. It was only logical to make up the time today. Refusing
his invitation constituted an ordinary, reasonable business
decision.

Then why did she feel so flustered? And why
had she just methodically sharpened her pencil to exactly half its
previous length?

She shook her head, trying to jostle her
thoughts into acceptable order.

She felt so flustered because Paul Monroe was
not an ordinary, reasonable business associate. No wonder she had
an odd reaction—he was odd.

Satisfied with that analysis, Bette turned to
her delayed tasks from the day before, and tried to concentrate.
All day she tried.

An annoying anticipation edged into her
afternoon, lifting the edges of her concentration and peeling it
away like a label that was coming unstuck. By six-fifteen she had
sharpened every pencil at least twice, and accomplished little
else.

At the opening squeak of her office door, she
jumped, a hand to her heart. Her pulse burst into a sprint, then
slowed. Only Darla. She frowned fiercely.
Only Darla?
Exactly whom had she been expecting?

"Bette? Are you all right?"

"Yes, I'm fine. What is it, Darla?"

"There's someone here—"