And unrequited.
Oh, wasn’t she pitiable? The poor, lowly nanny lusting after her handsome, beyond-reach boss? She should take this opportunity to insist on handing in her resignation. But she couldn’t afford to leave until another job came up. She was simply going to have to harness her emotions and get on with things for now.
With a nod Meg replied, ‘Understood.’ She prayed her hormones got the message as well.
***
‘Carlton, I asked if you had any cause to see things differently than the rest of the board.’
Stanley Donaldson’s peevish tone snagged Bryce’s attention when his monotone report on the proposed changes to the organisation’s structure had not. Not that he had needed to listen. Bryce had read all the documentation necessary to make his own report, and had his own opinion about what should be done to improve DCA’s share price.
Still, it wasn’t like him to take a mental holiday during a meeting of the board of directors, even given their tendency to be overlong and not nearly as productive as he wished. At least, it hadn’t been like him until he had made the rash decision to hire Meg Lacy. Ever since, daydreaming about her had become his new hobby.
Forcing his attention to the business at hand, Bryce eyed the older man levelly. ‘I’m sure you won’t be surprised to hear I do see things differently, Stanley. You’re already well aware of my opinion on the subject of cutting staff in our branches and focussing more on online customer service. I think it’s a mistake, and that the staff that have been loyal to DCA despite the recent merger and several management overhauls deserve better.’
A chorus of wearied murmurs broke out amid the sound of gold-plated pens being tossed on the lacquered boardroom table. Bryce remained composed in his leather chair and waited for the ruckus to die down, knowing he would spend the next hour or more trying to convince the board of his position and that the meeting would likely end without resolution.
Aside from himself, there was only one other board member who originated from Carlton and Associates. The remainder of the eight-strong board had been installed from Drake International, the larger wealth management company with whom Bryce had merged his own two years ago. The fact that his father had started Carlton and Associates forty years ago and built it into one of the most successful and respected wealth management companies in the country meant Bryce’s seat on the board was assured, as was his position as CEO.
But it certainly didn’t guarantee smooth sailing when it came to implementing operational decisions of his choice. Most of the board members were a good twenty years older than he and considered him rash and inexperienced. Little did they know how mightily he tried to rein in his rash impulses. Especially where his daughter’s nanny was concerned.
As much as he tried to put all thought of Meg Lacy from his mind, she remained firmly entrenched in his thoughts after the board meeting broke up and he headed back to his office. He remembered the feel of her skin, sun-warmed and soft against his fingers as he’d held her wrist by the pool on Saturday. He remembered almost admitting in his frustration the real reason behind his reservations about hiring her; that he was immutably attracted to her, despite all his efforts to combat the inconvenient feeling.
Having her in his house while knowing he could never touch her was a particularly masochistic type of self-torture. Especially when she walked around in those impossibly fitted jeans and jaunty T-shirts of hers, her slim thighs encased in soft denim, her breasts outlined by worn cotton, the imprint of her bra visible…
Bryce muttered a gruff curse just as his assistant, an elegant woman in her fifties named Claudia Wilkins, knocked on his partially open office door. ‘Mr Carlton, is something wrong?’
Nothing a long cold shower, or better yet, a willing woman wouldn’t fix.
‘No…nothing out of the ordinary, Claudia,’ he sighed. ‘What can I do for you?’
‘I have some papers for you to sign’ She traversed the expanse of plush beige carpet toward his oak desk, carrying a pile of documents. ‘And you have that meeting at four-thirty with Maree from Human Resources.’
Darn
. The meeting had slipped his mind. Something else he had never done before that he was starting to do a lot of lately — forget his schedule. If he weren’t so vexed by persistent fantasies of Meg wearing one of her tiny cotton T-shirts and little else…
‘Where is it you buy your outfits, Claudia?’
His sudden question made his demure, impeccably presented assistant’s jaw drop. Her brown eyes widened behind her frameless spectacles. ‘Excuse me, sir?’
‘Your clothes.’ Bryce tilted his head at her prim navy pantsuit and low-heeled shoes. A perfectly modest outfit that didn’t skim the woman’s curves or for that matter let a man know whether she even had any.
Claudia was almost twenty years older than he was, and he had never thought of her in that way, but he felt quite sure that if Meg wore clothes like
that
around the house — perfectly staid, perfectly functional and perfectly boring — she would prove not nearly the tenacious distraction she had thus far.
‘You want me to tell you where I shop for clothes?’
Claudia eyed at him warily, as though he were about to go mad and run screaming through the building. Deciding the less explaining he did about his odd query the better, Bryce merely smiled in a way he hoped would assure the woman of his sanity. ‘If you don’t mind.’
***
On Tuesday afternoon, Meg ascended the stairs from her room to the living area, where she found Mrs Dunkirk sitting forward on the edge of the couch, leaning toward the television with a look of avid interest on her face. On the screen a woman was hiding in a cupboard while a shadowy figure paced the room just beyond her to the background sound of suspenseful music.
‘What are you watching?’
At Meg’s question the other woman almost leapt off the couch, whirling around to face her. ‘Blimey girl, you scared me! I thought you were out.’
‘I’ll be leaving soon to collect Phillipa.’ Meg glanced again at the television. ‘Mrs Dunkirk, are you watching the soaps?’
Meg thought she saw an almost guilty flush infuse the older woman’s features. ‘I just turned on the television and the show happened to be on.’ Her face rearranged into her more familiar menacing scowl as she gave up the façade. ‘Oh, hush up will you? I’m just about to find out who the “Sunrise Valley Strangler” is.’
Smothering a smile, Meg moved to sit with dutiful quiet on the couch beside Mrs Dunkirk. She hadn’t seen this show in years, not since the last time she had been rugged up in bed with a stomach bug.
Meg watched, feeling Mrs Dunkirk’s tension as the shadowy figure continued to stalk through the room. The dramatic music reached a crescendo when the cupboard door swung open and the woman who had been hiding gasped in shock. ‘It’s you!’ she exclaimed, just before the screen froze on her face and the end credits began.
‘Blast!’ Mrs Dunkirk swore animatedly. ‘I really thought today was the day we’d find out.’
‘Ah, but this way you’ll be sure to watch tomorrow.’
Mrs Dunkirk narrowed her eyes. ‘It’s not polite to make fun of your elders, young lady.’
‘I wasn’t,’ Meg swiftly denied. ‘My mother used to watch this show whenever she got the chance. I remember watching it days I was home sick from school.’
‘My mother watches it too.’ Mrs Dunkirk’s scornful expression settled back into one of mere irritability. ‘She tapes it for me while I’m here and we watch it together at night. But today, I couldn’t help taking a peek.’
‘You live with your mother?’
‘She has a bad hip,’ she said testily, flicking off the remote control and rising swiftly to her feet. ‘She needs help getting around, and my no-good brother’s no help.’
Meg didn’t know what to say. She’d only been trying to make conversation with the woman. ‘I’m sorry to hear that. It’s very nice of you to help your mother out.’ In fact, the thought of Mrs Dunkirk sitting at home with her mother watching taped episodes of the silliest soap opera on television made her seem more human than she had appeared at any point up until now.
Mrs Dunkirk harrumphed. ‘Haven’t you got anything better to do than skulk around here bothering me?’
‘Actually, when Phillipa’s in school and you do all the housework, there doesn’t seem to be all that much to occupy me. What did the other nannies do?’
‘Sat around mostly.’ Mrs Dunkirk picked up a rag and bottle of cleaning spray and began polishing the coffee table’s surface. She made another sound in the back of her throat that conveyed displeasure. ‘Made themselves comfortable and took advantage of the cushy working conditions Mr Carlton provides. A few even spent their time devising ways to catch the boss’s attention. I’m sure you know what I mean.’
Meg could hardly miss the implication. A man like Bryce was sure to have even the most sensible person dreaming that he might sweep them off their tired, working-girl feet.
Not that
she
dreamt of any such thing, Meg assured herself, and almost believed it.
‘The young miss sorted those ones out pretty quickly,’ Mrs Dunkirk continued, a look very much like smug pride causing her mouth to curl. ‘She’s a clever girl, that one.’
‘Do you mean to tell me Phillipa has been purposely scaring away nannies she thinks might have eyes for her father?’ No wonder the girl had gone through so many carers. Is that why she had been so resistant to any attempts Meg had made to build a civil relationship?
Did Phillipa think
she
was after Bryce?
‘Saves me having to get nasty.’ Meg experienced a moment’s horror at the thought of the perennially cranky old woman getting any nastier. ‘That young man has been through enough, the last thing he needs is another gold-digging witch to dig her talons into him.’
‘I hope you don’t think that
I
fall into that category,’ Meg began, feeling her shoulders square as she met the other woman’s prickliness. ‘I have no interest in catching Bry — Mr Carlton’s attention in any way other than as an employee. And I’m not the kind of girl who can just hang around loafing all day. So if there’s ever anything you’d like me to do to help you, Mrs Dunkirk, say the word.’
The doorbell rang. To prove her assertion that she would help the housekeeper out wherever she could, Meg said, ‘I’ll get it,’ and sailed out of the living room toward the foyer.
She opened the door to a pile of tastefully wrapped boxes so high they obscured the face of the delivery person. All Meg could see was layer upon layer of pastel wrapping paper, gauzy ribbon and a clipboard and pen held out to one side. ‘Delivery for a Miss Lacy.’
‘For me?’ Meg thought there had to be some mistake until it occurred to her the delivery might be addressed to her on behalf of Phillipa. She took the clipboard and indicated the delivery person should place the boxes on the table in the foyer. The man waited while Meg signed the bottom of the form he’d handed her, then left with a wordless nod.
‘Well, aren’t you going to look inside?’
The gruffly issued question came from Mrs Dunkirk, who was now standing behind her eyeing the boxes with as much speculation as Meg.
‘They must be for Phillipa.’
‘They came addressed to you.’ She stepped forward to lift the lid on the box sitting on top of the pile. A moment later the older woman gasped and stepped back.
‘What is it?’ Meg asked, stepping forward to look inside the box. What she saw made it clear the delivery was not for her charge after all.
A woman’s blouse lay folded neatly inside, the eggshell-white material so tasteful and fine-looking Meg knew it had to have cost as much as a week’s salary, in her terms. Moving the box aside, Meg opened the second box to find a finely tailored pair of black slacks.
‘There has to be a mistake.’ She lifted the lid on all the boxes. They were filled with clothes, clothes so exquisite Meg was afraid to touch them. She picked a garment up nonetheless, holding it against her body with tentative fingers. The blouse was beautiful and she could see it would fit her perfectly.
Her heart dropped. She would never get the chance to wear it. For if these clothes had come from the person she thought they had, the only person who
could
have sent them, then they definitely had to go back where they came from.
The look on Mrs Dunkirk’s face when Meg looked up confirmed the fact. The woman watched her as though she were a lioness defending the perimeter of her lair. ‘So you don’t have your eye on Mr Carlton then?’
‘I don’t…I didn’t know about this. I didn’t ask…’
The housekeeper wasn’t there to hear Meg’s sputtered denials. She had already left the room in a huff, muttering all the way and drawing her own conclusions.
Later that afternoon Meg was on her hands and knees, scrubbing the grouting between the tiles in the upstairs shower, when she felt Bryce’s presence in the bathroom doorway a second before he spoke. ‘I could have sworn I left this bathroom in a clean state this morning,’ he said with some amusement lighting his voice. ‘You don’t have to invent work, you know.’
Meg continued to scrub at the miniscule spot of mould she had discovered in the corner of the shower, her vigorous actions fuelled by the memory of the housekeeper’s mistrusting glare. ‘Actually I’m getting a jump on Mrs Dunkirk’s work for tomorrow. She thought I didn’t mean it when I said I’d help out around here. That I wasn’t the type of girl who…well, she’ll get a shock tomorrow. I’ll show her.’
‘Uh-huh,’ Bryce murmured carefully. ‘Where’s Phillipa?’
‘She’s in her room, doing her homework.’ Satisfied at last that all grime had been banished from the shower, Meg sat back on her haunches and wiped her brow with the part of her forearm that wasn’t covered in rubber gloves. It felt good to do some physical work. She muttered to the tiles, ‘Take that you old battle-axe.’
‘Meg…are you all right?’
Meg looked at Bryce at last. He was leaning comfortably against the door frame, his arms looped indolently across his broad chest. His tie was loosened, two shirt buttons undone to reveal the smooth, golden skin of his throat. His hair had freed itself from the controlled, brushed back style it had been trained into that morning, and was now resting in a soft sweep against his forehead. He looked slightly rumpled, very much a man and enormously appealing.