He came around the desk, enfolded her in a quick, tight hug, then stepped back to look at her. Impeccable as always, she wore a Chanel suit of icy-blue and her nearly all-white hair was swept up into an intricate knot on top of her head.
"So," she said, eyeing her son, "my question stands. Why so crabby, Shane?"
He frowned and shifted a look at Rachel, still standing in the doorway.
"Just … busy."
"Then I won't keep you long," his mother said, half turning to motion Rachel into the office. "I just wanted to stop and tell you the news!"
Rachel came closer and Shane swore he caught a whiff of her scent. Just enough to tantalize. To tweak his memory of their last night together. To remind him there wouldn't be any other nights like it.
He bit back a scowl and focused on his mother, practically vibrating with energy. "What is it?" he teased. "Win the Mrs. America pageant, did you?"
"Ah, you were always the smooth one," she said, laughing. "No, no. Much better news. Our Erika's had her baby. A beautiful little girl she is, too. I'm a grandmother!"
"That's terrific," Shane said, meaning every word.
"Wonderful," Rachel added, smiling. "How's the new mom doing?"
Maeve smiled even wider. "Erika's doing just fine. It's Gannon who's having the breakdown. Poor love. Apparently being a witness to his wife's labor has left him flattened."
"Did he faint?" Shane asked, hoping for some good ammunition to tease Gannon with in the future.
"Of course not," Maeve said with a sniff. "It's just very hard seeing someone you love in pain."
"Yeah," Shane said, slanting a look at Rachel only to find her gaze on him. "It must be."
A second or two of silence stretched out between them and hummed with energy until even Maeve was affected by it. As she looked from one of them to the other, one perfectly arched brow lifted slightly. Delicately she cleared her throat until she had her son's attention again.
"I'll let you get back to work now, Shane darlin'," she said. "I'm just on my way to see your father and force him to take me to lunch."
Shane tore his gaze from Rachel and scrambled for equilibrium. Blowing out a breath, he took his mother's arm and said, "Why don't I join you? You can tell me all about the new Elliott."
"That would be lovely," she said, lifting one hand to touch his cheek. Then she turned to Rachel. "Would you like to accompany us as well, Rachel?"
"No," she said quickly, with a shake of her head. "I'll, um, just stay here and get a few things finished."
"Shame," Maeve said thoughtfully, then walked from the office, her son and Rachel right behind her.
With Shane gone for at least an hour, Rachel did something she'd never done before in all the four years she'd worked at The Buzz.
She rifled Shane's desk.
"For pity's sake, where would he put the blasted thing?" She yanked open the first two drawers in his desk, quickly thumbed through the folders and looked under the books and magazines stored there.
Nothing.
The bottom file drawer yielded no happier results.
She zipped through the stacks of folders atop his desk, her fingers flipping through the pages as her gaze swept the printed pages. But the new Tess column was nowhere to be found. Which left only one possibility.
Her gaze drifted to the locked drawer on the bottom left of the big desk. There was no way for her to get inside it. And if she did lose her mind and try to pick the lock, Shane would notice and then the jig would be up, anyway.
"How could I have been so stupid?" she wondered aloud and just managed to keep from thumping herself in the forehead with the heel of her hand.
Shane would read the column, know exactly who wrote it and would probably fire her on the spot. Of course, since she'd already resigned, it wouldn't carry a lot of weight. But oh, God. The embarrassment quotient was just too high to think about!
Mentally she raced back over the other columns she'd turned in for publication.
All the times she'd talked about her boss in less than stellar terms. All the times she'd complained about his too active social life.
Her toe stopped tapping against the floor and her mouth dropped open. And the last column, where she'd admitted to feeling too much about him.
"This is a disaster."
Dropping her head into her hands, she wished for a hole to open up under her feet and swallow her.
By the time Shane returned from lunch, tension bubbled inside him like a thick, poisonous brew. Luckily enough, Rachel was gone from her desk, probably taking a late lunch herself. Just as well. He was in no mood for yet another stiff, polite exchange of empty pleasantries.
Especially after spending the last two hours dodging Maeve Elliott's questions.
God knew he loved his mother, but there was nothing the woman liked better than digging into her children's lives. Whether they welcomed it or not.
He'd been able to dodge her thinly veiled questions about his and Rachel's relationship-but just barely. And if his father hadn't insisted on talking about the company, Maeve wouldn't have given up until she'd pried every last ounce of information from him.
He stepped into his office, closed the door behind him and gratefully went back to work. At his desk, he unlocked the bottom drawer, pulled out the latest columns sent to him by Production, and leaned back in his chair to flip through them.
When he found the Tess column, he smiled to himself, put the other articles aside and started reading. After the first paragraph, he was frowning. At the second, he was muttering to himself.
And by the third paragraph, the words were blurring beneath the red haze covering his vision.
Heart jumping, stomach twisting, temper spiking, Shane crumpled the edges of the paper in his fists and forced himself to keep reading.
Sex with the boss is never a smart move,
Tess wrote,
but in my case, it was imbecilic. I've spent the last year or more writing about how hard it is to work with a man who never sees you as anything more than an especially fine tuned piece of office equipment. But now that Shane actually has seen me-naked of all things-the situation is completely untenable.
So here's a word of warning for all of you assistants out there. When the boss smiles and says "Let's celebrate," remember that celebrating usually means hangover.
Or worse.
For your own sakes, if the boss starts looking too good to you … run.
"Rachel," he muttered thickly, staring at the page in front of him as if he still couldn't believe what he'd read. "All this time, it's been her. All this time."
He swallowed hard, choking back the knot of fury in his throat. When he thought he could speak without growling, he snatched up the phone on his desk and punched in a number.
"Circulation and archives."
"This is Shane Elliott."
"Yes, sir," the female voice snapped out, and he could almost see the woman jerking to attention in her chair.
"Get me a copy of every one of our magazines that contains a Tess Tells All column."
"Oh, sir, I just love that column."
"Great," he muttered, thinking now about all of the people who'd read every word Rachel had ever written about him. Hell, people all over the world had been laughing at him for more than a year.
And he'd wanted to give the mysterious Tess a raise!
"I want those copies here in thirty minutes."
"Yes, sir."
Shane tossed the receiver back into the cradle, gave up on trying to rein in the temper nearly strangling him and started reading the most recent column again.
Chapter 10
When Rachel came back from lunch, she was feeling a little better. She'd done a little Christmas shopping, wandered through the windy, cold streets and lost herself in the crowds.
Hard to keep feeling sorry for yourself when you're reminded that you're simply one cog in a very large wheel.
Now, back at The Buzz, she was simply determined to survive the rest of her two weeks notice and then move on with her life. Smiling at the people she passed, she headed right for her desk and noticed Shane's door standing open.
As she glanced inside, she saw that he'd been watching for her. And he didn't look happy.
"Everything okay?"
"Not really," he said, waving one hand at her. "Would you come in here please?"
A quick twist of apprehension tightened in her belly before she made a titanic attempt at smoothing it out. Oh, God. He saw the column.
Her brain raced, coming up with explanations, excuses, anything. She'd had a glass of wine at lunch, knowing that this confrontation would be headed her way.