His Secretary Mistress(24)

‘I’ve got a sandwich in my bag—cheese and pickle,’ she added, before he could find fault with her lunch.

‘It wasn’t a request, Jenna, it was an order. So save your breath and let’s go.’

She grudgingly had to admit that she felt better after a plate of lasagne, and at his request filled him in on the week’s events, knowing that he would accuse her of sulking if she did not.

After lunch he steered her into a department store, and she frowned as he led the way to the designer ladieswear section. If he intended to ask her opinion on titillating lingerie for his girlfriend he would find himself sporting a pair of silk cami-knickers on his head!

‘My companion would like to see a selection of formal daywear, and she also needs a couple of evening dresses,’ Alex explained to the assistant, and Jenna glanced over her shoulder, looking for the said companion.

‘We’ll need to look at the petite section,’ the assistant said, smiling at Jenna, and realisation suddenly dawned.

‘They’ll never fit you,’ she snapped at Alex furiously. ‘And no way on this earth will I allow you to buy my clothes.’

‘I had a feeling you’d say that. The trouble with you, Jenna, is that you’re so predictable. Now, there’s an easy way of doing this or a hard way. The easy way is for you to go with the assistant and choose a suit and something for the evening. The hard way entails me coming into the changing rooms with you.’

His eyes flashed with steely determination, and, mindful that they were causing a scene, Jenna could only glare at him.

‘You’re my boss, Alex, not God himself,’ she hissed.

‘Same thing,’ he told her urbanely. ‘At least as far as you’re concerned. I’ll be back in an hour,’ he informed the assistant, who visibly wilted under the full charm of his smile, and then he was gone, leaving a stunned silence in his wake.

The assistant did her best, but Jenna could only be coerced into choosing a soft ecru-coloured suit and one black evening dress—which, she had to admit, was to die for. Even then she found that she needed shoes, handbag and a black beaded purse to match the dress, and when Alex returned she was frantically trying to tot up the cost in her head.

‘Stop fretting,’ he told her bluntly. ‘Think of the clothes as part of your uniform. Many companies provide their staff with suitable work clothes, and if it really bothers you so much, consider them on loan from Morrell and Partners. You can hand them back at the end of your contract.’

He handed over his credit card to the sales assistant and Jenna paled as the total flashed up on the till. She would repay him every penny, she vowed. It might stretch her overdraft to the limit, but she would not be beholden to Alex Morrell.

They walked back to the office in silence, Alex seemingly lost in his thoughts, but as the lift whisked them up to the top floor he turned to Jenna. ‘Will the clothes cause a problem with Chris?’

‘I doubt he’ll even notice them,’ she replied honestly, forgetting for a moment that he thought Chris was her husband.

There was something strange about her marriage, Alex decided. He had tried to ignore the gossip circulating round the office that Jenna’s marriage was an unhappy one, and the fact that she pointedly avoided talking about Chris. If nothing else her husband must be blind, he thought grimly. She was achingly beautiful, even when angry, he thought with a wry smile. Right now she was positively bristling with outrage at his heavy-handedness, but it was better that she was furious with him than embarrassed by her lack of suitable clothes when they dined with the elite of Parisian society.

‘Miss Carter-Lloyd is here to see you,’ Margaret announced on their return, and Alex stifled a groan. A dose of Selina he could do without.

‘If the lovely Selina has her way, Alex will be tied up for the rest of the day,’ Margaret whispered to Jenna, as Alex closed the interconnecting door between the offices. ‘Not literally, of course—although knowing Selina anything’s possible. I don’t suppose she was very happy when he took off to Cannes without her.’

‘Pity he didn’t stay there,’ Jenna muttered, and Margaret threw her a curious glance.

‘I thought he was going straight from Cannes to Paris to see his client, and I had the shock of my life when he walked out of his office first thing this morning,’ she confided. ‘I wonder why he came back.’

Jenna didn’t know, and certainly didn’t care. Tucked away at the bottom of one the carrier bags, beneath her new dress, she had discovered a set of exquisite underwear, its sheer black silk blatantly sexy. A new suit for work was one thing, and the black evening dress was pushing it, but she drew the line at underwear.