With all that activity, the morning should have passed quickly, but the hours dragged by with Hailey dreading her meeting with Tyler Scott more and more every minute.
At twelve-thirty she put Charlene in charge and left the office. The weather was still hot and humid, but she slipped a white blazer over her green uniform blouse. In any event, she would appear professional.
Harmon Sanders, general manager of the park, wasn’t in his office, but his efficient secretary greeted Hailey as she walked into the carpeted office. It seemed far away from the clamorous noise of the amusement park. “Hi, Hailey.”
“Hello, Nancy. Where is everyone?” Usually the office was crawling with department directors competing for a minute with the general manager.
“Everyone’s lying low because of…” Her voice trailed off, but she indicated the closed door with an inclination of her head. “Him,” she whispered. She crooked her finger at Hailey and leaned over the desk. “Can you believe that after three years, he suddenly decides to put in an appearance? Hailey, he’s absolutely gorgeous! Wait till you see him! My God, I nearly died when he walked through that door and calmly introduced himself.” She drew a deep breath, as though the memory of that moment still affected her.
“He asked me to send you in as soon as you arrived. Are you ready?” she asked with a compassion reserved for the hopelessly doomed.
“Yes,” Hailey answered with more composure than she felt. She walked to the heavy walnut door and turned the brass knob. Tyler Scott was leaning over a wide desk, studying a computer readout that cluttered its glossy surface.
“Come in, Miss Ashton,” he said, though he hadn’t raised his head to confirm who had entered the room. How had he known it was she?
“Your Chanel precedes you,” he answered as though he had read the question in her mind. He looked up at her from under the thick slash of eyebrows that bridged his forehead. “Sit down, please.”
So his approach was to be friendly, not formal. He wouldn’t have remarked on her perfume if he intended to be formal. When had he gotten close enough to her to know the fragrance she wore? How had he become so knowledgeable about perfume? Her knees were trembling as she went to one of two deep leather chairs in front of the desk and sat down, chastely crossing her legs and tugging on the hemline of her skirt.
His indignation over his rudeness on the telephone had been judiciously banked. What good would it do to antagonize him further? He was a cad, a chauvinist with a low opinion of women and a locker-room mentality. Nothing she would say could change that. It was far more prudent to ignore what he had said last night. She would keep the interview on a strictly professional basis.
A full minute went by before he rolled up the computer charts he was reading and sat down behind the desk. Strange that he hadn’t assigned such a tedious task as going over statistics about Serendipity to a subordinate, but it was obvious that he had been working on them himself.
The cuffs of his starched white shirt were rolled up to his elbows. A pair of gold cuff links—with his initials in lower case—lay discarded on the desk. His striped tie had been loosened around his neck and the top button of his shirt was undone. The coat to his suit hung on a hall tree behind him, but he still wore the vest. Its snug fit accented his trim torso.
He leaned back in the chair, raised his feet onto the desk, and crossed one ankle over the other as he stared at her. “How are you, Miss Ashton?”
If he intended to confuse her, he was succeeding. She hadn’t expected the casual civility. “I’m fine, thank you, Mr. Scott. How is Faith? Did the bee stings cause her any more pain?”
“No.” He smiled. “Of course I’ve been banished from her bathroom, so I can’t be certain, but I assume that all is well.”
Hailey returned the smile and relaxed—but only a trifle. “Good. I’ve been worried about her. I would have called her this morning, but I didn’t know where you were staying.”
“At Glenstone Lodge. I’ve leased a suite of rooms there for the next several weeks.”
That took her by surprise and it must have showed, for he continued. “My company is based in Atlanta. We have a home there, but I needed to come up here and do some revamping on the park. I also thought the change of scenery would be good for Faith. She hasn’t been … comfortable … with me since her mother died.”
“Shouldn’t Faith be starting school in Atlanta?”
“Normally yes, but not this fall. Last spring after Monica’s death, she began showing signs of stress. Her counselor thought it might be best to let her rest for a while. I’ve had her tutored this summer, but I don’t think I’ll enroll her in regular classes again until after Christmas. She should be able to catch up quickly enough since she’s an ‘A’ student. I feel her emotional stability is more important than schoolwork just now.”
“You’re probably right.” Why was he telling her all this? Not that she wasn’t interested in the girl, who had seemed so eager to please her rather intimidating father. She had been touched by Faith’s apparent insecurity. But it wasn’t like a man as busy as Tyler Scott to divulge his family affairs to an employee he was about to fire.
“Do you like your work at Serendipity, Hailey?” he asked, changing the subject abruptly.
Had he called her Hailey? “Yes.”
“You don’t see any need to expound on that succinct answer?” There was a teasing glint in his gray eyes.
“Not really. I’ve been here for four years. I was here when the park was sold to you. Harmon … Mr. Sanders … has made it worth my while to stay. I’ve gotten periodic pay increases from him.”
“From me, not Sanders.”
“Oh,” she floundered. “I’m sorry, I thought—”
“You thought that the man in Atlanta was too high up, too detached, to know each person in his employ? Not so with me, Hailey. I knew of you and your capabilities even before I purchased the park.”
Capabilities? Would he say that if he were about to fire her?
“There was only one thing missing in my file on Miss Hailey Diane Ashton, twenty-eight years old, social security number 462-89-1002. Nowhere in the file did it say what a beautiful woman you are.”
Her heart had long since leaped from her chest to settle somewhere in her throat. Now it began to pound, blocking off her breath. She tore her eyes away from the hypnotic allure of his gaze and concentrated on the hemline of her skirt.
When she braved another glance at him, he, too, was studying the hemline of her skirt, which revealed her smooth, nylonclad knee. His eyes went further and took in her long, shapely calf and slender foot She dared not move. Her head was spinning. What was he up to? Sexual harassment? Would she have to placate him to keep her job?
Etiquette forced her to respond. “Thank you,” she said huskily.
“You’re welcome,” he said, standing up and walking around the desk to lean negligently on its corner. He sounded amused. Was he moving in for the kill?
“Have you ever thought of leaving Serendipity?”
She shook her head before she answered. “No. I like my job here.”
“What if I offered you another job?”
He wasn’t going to fire her! She looked up at him. “What kind of job?” she inquired curiously, though she doubted that she’d really be interested.
“I have a computer company. It needs someone like you in customer relations. I would like you to train my employees how to deal with people.”
“But I don’t know anything about computers!”
“You don’t have to. You know about people. That’s the expertise I’m looking for. Unfortunately some of my employees know every intricacy of a computer but have a difficult time relating to a customer—satisfied or irate. Would you consider it?”
She looked at him levelly for a moment and then down at her cold, damp hands. “I don’t think so, Mr. Scott. I’m really very happy here at Serendipity.”
“I see.” He stared down at his highly polished shoes and frowned. The telephone in the outside office rang. They heard Nancy’s muffled answer. Otherwise the heavy silence reigned in the air-conditioned room.
“I suppose you should continue in your present position then,” he said, finally looking up at her. “Actually, your staying here will make it much more convenient.”
“More convenient? Make what more convenient?”
“Your seduction,” he said, piercing her with razor-sharp gray eyes.
I
f he had suddenly sprouted wings, he couldn’t have shocked her more. For long moments she couldn’t speak, couldn’t move. She could feel her mouth hanging slack in an expression usually attributed to the very stupid.
“What?”
she asked on an incredulous gasp.
“You heard me correctly.”
“But I don’t believe what I heard.”
“I’m going to seduce you.”
“Of course you’re not serious.”
“I’m always serious,” he said. Then, as though to belie his own statement, he laughed a deep, masculine laugh, a pleasant sound she couldn’t help but appreciate even though she was still stunned by his audacity.
“You seem surprised,” he said. “Why? I think we’d make exceptional lovers. Our ages are compatible—I’m just a decade older than you. I can afford to give you anything you might want, but at the same time you don’t have to depend on me for financial security. We’re both well-educated and reasonably intelligent. My looks, to my knowledge, have never revolted anyone, and I’ve already told you that I think you’re beautiful. We are ideally suited.”
Furiously, Hailey sprang to her feet. She couldn’t believe that a man, any man, would insult her so shamelessly. “I hope this is a joke, Mr. Scott,” she flared.
“I assure you it is not. I intend to be your lover. Soon.”
“I don’t give a damn about your intentions except as to how they pertain to me professionally. I realize that I was rude to you the other day. I apologize. But I think your form of punishment is in the worst of taste. Your proposal flatters neither of us. Sexual harassment is the lowest form of abuse to a working woman. I’m not in the least bit interested in engaging in any kind of affair with you. If a simple ‘no’ doesn’t discourage you, then you may put all your jobs in the hand basket and go straight to hell, Mr. Scott.”
She spun on her heels and stormed toward the door. “Hailey,” he said with such authority that she halted in spite of her haste to leave him. “Look at me.” Not wanting him to think she was intimidated, she turned to face him again, haughty disdain exuding from every pore.
“Sexual harassment? I hadn’t thought you’d take it like that but since you seem to be under that mistaken impression, I’ll set you straight. You will not be harassed but persuaded.”
“Semantics. It’s the same thing.”
He smiled. “Not quite. At least not the way
I
persuade. When we come together, you’ll want me as badly as I want you.”
“Don’t hold your breath.”
“I won’t have to. You’re already attracted to me.”
“Oh!” she ground out through clenched teeth. “You’re … I’m … I never—”
“You never thought for a moment that this was sexual harassment. Sexual harassment is an employer using an employee’s job to blackmail him—or her. Your job is secure. Even if you weren’t my employee, if we’d met under entirely different circumstances, I’d be just as determined to have you.”
“But it doesn’t hurt your depraved campaign that I happen to owe you a certain allegiance.”
“You’re a valuable employee. I wouldn’t risk losing you to gratify a sudden explosion of lust. If I were the kind of man to do that, most likely, I would have already forced you into submission with threats against disclosure. And I wouldn’t have wasted the past half hour talking, either.
“I was driven by panic yesterday. If any other guest had acted like that during an emergency, I would have expected my Director of Guest Relations to respond efficiently and expediently, just as you did. Your top priority was to take care of the distressed guest—in this case, Faith. You did exactly what you should have done.”
She was momentarily disarmed by this flattery. “Thank you,” she said stiffly.
“But,”
he stressed as he pushed himself away from the desk and started toward her, “your being a competent employee has nothing to do with this.”
He was within inches of her now, forcing her to tilt her head back to look at him. Her instinct for self-preservation screamed at her to run, but the fervor in his eyes compelled her to stay. His hands came up to settle on her shoulders. His mouth was perilously close to hers as he bent over her and whispered, “I want you in my life and I want you in my bed, Hailey.”
She would have expected his mouth to be firm, hard, greedy, even brutal. But it was none of those. The lips that captured hers were soft and suppliant. He sipped at her lips, moving over them with infinite care, as though he feared she might disintegrate before he could drink his fill.
Hailey neither responded nor resisted. Shock had rendered her immobile. Yet with each heartbeat she felt her rigid control relaxing. Her lips parted as she felt his tongue gliding along them, slipping between them teasingly, but not breaching them completely. From far away she heard a small whimper and didn’t even realize she had made the sound until her hands found their way to his waist where she sought support.
She swayed slightly and he caught her to him with a gentleness that was nonetheless ruthless. His arms wrapped around her like bands of steel—no, like velvet ribbons. In any event, she was powerless to escape them.
She made no conscious decision to open her lips to the persistent, tender probing of his tongue, but she did. Then he was inside her mouth, molding his lips with hers in a kiss that splintered her with pleasure.
She knew she should stop this. It was insane for her to stand there kissing this man, and it was also completely out of character. Yet only last night, in a moment of loneliness and depression, she had convinced herself she should do something wildly spontaneous, if for no other reason than for the sake of experience. Why not indulge that fantasy? She could stop it anytime. This was a harmless kiss. Nothing more.
Expertly and thoroughly, Tyler tasted, explored, and enjoyed her mouth. He drew from it secrets she hadn’t known were harbored there. She moved closer to him, instinctively responding to the pressure of his tongue against hers.