Heating Up the Holidays 3-Story Bundle(5)

“Not as painful as my embarrassment,” I assure him, and laugh nervously. “What can I say? I like to make a lasting impression, and since you’re leaving I didn’t have a lot of time.”

“Do you need to sit?”

“We need to get you to the airport,” I say, and add the motto that got me back to me not that long ago. “I’m bruised, not broken.” And I intend to prove it was, and is, true.

His eyes narrow, darken. “Bruised but not broken.” His voice is softer, seeming to caress the words as he adds, “I like that.” And for some reason I’m not sure what he’s talking about or why air is suddenly lodged in my lungs.

“Mr. Ward!”

We both whirl around at the sound of his name being called, and the source appears to be a thirty-something man, with short, dark hair who is wearing a rust-colored jacket and earpiece that gives me the impression that he’s security. My new boss flicks me a look. “I’ll meet you at the car. Tell the doorman you’re with me and he’ll get you to where you have to go.”

I nod but he doesn’t notice, having already turned away from me. I’ve been dismissed. Maybe this job isn’t so unlike working as a reporter. Or, I think cynically, the Thanksgiving with my family that I plan to miss in three weeks’ time.

With a heavy sigh that comes from deep in my soul, I seek out one of the many signs hanging from the casino ceiling and head toward the exit, but something makes me pause. I turn just in time to witness Mr. Ward scrub his hand down his face and mutter a curse I can read from a distance. A second later, his gaze lifts and collides with mine, the turbulence in the depths of his stare crashing into me, a rough blast of dark emotions. For several seconds our eyes hold, and I don’t know why but I have the oddest thought. In this moment of time, I think he, too, is bruised but not broken.

As if he knows I see this, he abruptly turns away, giving me his back.

* * *

“Why aren’t you in the car?”

At the sound of Mr. Ward’s voice, adrenaline surges through me, and I am on my feet, no longer warming the bench I’ve been seated on for a good ten minutes.

“I—”

“Tell me in the car,” he says, cutting me off. “We need to go.” His hand comes down on my back, scorching away the chill of the November air and urging me toward a limo parked a few feet away.

The valet opens the back door and I slide inside. The soft leather hugs my legs, and I pull my skirt to my knees as Mr. Ward joins me, settling in directly across from me. “Why weren’t you waiting in here where it’s warm?” he demands, his voice a reprimand that nears cranky and stirs old ghosts and goblins worthy of the Halloween only a week before. I do not like that they are alive when they should be buried, and I rebel against them and his tone with me.

“I would have liked that,” I say, my voice matching his crankiness, “but the staff gave me the impression they thought I was the newest chick chasing the millionaire CEO.”

The tension vanishes from his face, and a low, sexy rumble of laughter slides from his lips. Instantly, I find myself relaxing into the sound. “You aren’t going to be a wilting flower, are you?”

“Do you want a wilting flower?”

“No. I do not want a wilting flower, Ms. Miller. Nor do I want a ‘chick chasing the millionaire CEO.’ I’ll end that perception immediately.”

“It’s not a big deal,” I say, softening with his vow.

He, on the other hand, seems to do the opposite, his humor fading, the hardness returning. “Actually,” he corrects, “it is. I’m leaving, and you have to be able to function when I’m gone.”

“I will,” I say, certain he needs to hear this, though I don’t know why. “You can trust me to get the job done.”

There is a slight tensing of his jaw that I read as skepticism. The car engine starts and he proves I’m right in my assessment by declaring, “I have concerns about you, Ms. Miller.”

Cotton lines my throat. “Concerns?”

“You’re a reporter.”

“By trade, yes.”

“You’ve never worked as a secretary,” he comments, and it’s not a question.

“Do you want just a secretary or someone with extra skills to bring to the table?”

“Clearly, you excel at asking questions and not answering them.”

“You didn’t phrase it as a question, and zipped lips should be one of my job requirements anyway.”

His cell beeps and he pulls it from his pocket, staring at the text message for what seems like forever. Finally, without typing a reply, he sets the phone on the seat and his gaze goes to the window.