Penny Rawley is exactly the woman you need in your life.
Was the old girl playing matchmaker? he wondered as he glanced over at his secretary, who sat before a computer terminal at the end of his credenza, transcribing from tapes the data he’d recorded during his meetings in Japan.
He quickly looked away, discarding the troublesome thought. No, he told himself. Though Mrs. H. had run roughshod over his life for more than fifteen years, ever since Red had brought Erik home with him the first time, and over Erik’s office since her husband’s death, she’d never once tried to fix him up with a woman.
He glanced up again as his new secretary rose and headed for her adjoining office. Her hand was on the doorknob when he called out, “Hold up a sec.”
Penny stopped, startled by her employer’s barked command, her heart seeming to stop, too. It leaped into a pounding, joyous beat as she turned to face him, as she was sure that he had at last remembered her. “Yes?” she asked expectantly.
“Do you have any family?”
“Well…no,” she replied, caught off guard by the unexpected question. “Other than a brother, two nieces and a nephew,” she added prudently.
“Good.” He spun his chair around and grabbed the mouse next to his keyboard and began to scroll through a complicated table of computer codes. “’Cause you’re going to California with me this afternoon.”
Her eyes widened as she stared at the back of his head. “To California? With you?”
“Yeah. Go home and pack a bag. Throw in something fancy,” he added.
She gulped a breath, trying to absorb the fact that she would be traveling with him. “Fancy?” she repeated dully.
“Yeah. You know. A cocktail dress or something.”
“B-but why?”
His brows drew together as he found the information he was looking for and clicked on the accompanying file. “A black-tie thing,” he mumbled. “Supposed to bring a date.”
Two
Suzy shoved Penny’s suitcase aside and flopped down on her stomach on the bed, propping her chin on her hands. “I can’t believe Erik didn’t remember you.”
Disappointed because he hadn’t, Penny avoided Suzy’s gaze. “It’s been ten years,” she reminded her friend.
“So what? It’s been ten years for you, too, and you remembered him.”
“Yes, but that’s different.”
Suzy rolled her eyes but—thankfully—let the comment pass without argument. Instead, she craned her neck and peered over the side of the suitcase, poking through the items Penny had already packed. “So how long will y’all be gone?”
“A week.”
“Are you planning on jumping his bones?”
Penny whirled from her closet. “Suzy!”
Arching a brow, Suzy held up a plastic case, taunting Penny with the damning evidence she’d found. “Why else would you have started taking the Pill?”
Her cheeks flaming, Penny snatched the packet of birth control pills from her friend’s hand and shoved it back into her suitcase, burying it beneath a stack of underwear. “That’s none of your business. Besides, I started them over a month ago.” Just about the time she’d applied for the job as Erik’s secretary, she thought but didn’t say.
Chuckling, Suzy sat up, plumping pillows at the headboard before sinking back against them. “Just trying to help you face the facts.”
“If you want to be helpful,” Penny replied irritably, “you can tell me what I should wear to a black-tie affair.”
“What are your choices?”
Penny turned to study the row of clothes hanging neatly in her closet. “Well, there’s the floral dress that I wore Easter Sunday three years ago,” she offered, then glanced at Suzy. “You know. The calf-length dress with cap-sleeves and Puritan-style collar?”
Groaning, Suzy covered her face with her hands. “Please tell me you’re not seriously considering wearing that old thing?”
“What’s wrong with the floral dress?”
“Nothing, if you were going to be herding a gaggle of toddlers at an Easter egg hunt. Jeez, Pen,” she complained. “You gotta stop dressing like somebody’s mother. Think bold. Daring. Go for shock value. I guarantee you, if you do, not a man in the room will be able to take his eyes off you. Not even the Cyber Cowboy himself.”
Penny turned to stare at the clothes hanging in her closet, all of which seemed more appropriate for a PTA meeting at one of her nieces’ or nephew’s schools than for a cocktail party escorted by Erik Thompson.
Not that he would notice her, anyway, she thought, swallowing back a swell of tears.
“I don’t have anything else,” she said, sniffing as she dragged the floral dress from its hanger. “It’ll just have to do.”
Suzy vaulted from the bed. “Then let’s go shopping. We’ll buy you something sinfully expensive. Something totally outrageous that will have Erik Thompson’s eyes bugging out of his head.”
Tempted, Penny glanced at the bedside clock, and the tears pushed to her eyes. “There isn’t time. I have to meet him at the office parking lot at five.” She swept a hand across her cheeks, then carefully folded the floral dress and placed it in her suitcase. “This will just have to do.”
Suzy moved to stand beside her and slipped an arm around her shoulders. “The dress’ll do fine. And so will you,” she added, giving Penny a reassuring squeeze. Drawing away, she sighed as she scooped her purse from the foot of the bed. “I guess I’d better go so you can finish packing. Call me the minute you get back in town.”
“I will.”
“You’d better,” Suzy warned as she headed for the bedroom door. “I want to hear every intimate detail. Oh, and Penny?”
Penny turned to look at her. “What?”
“Don’t forget to take your pills.”
Erik lounged against the hood of his truck, his arms folded over his chest and his buttocks braced against the grill guard, watching as his new secretary steered her beige sedan into her assigned space in the building’s underground parking garage. The vehicle was as plain and nondescript as its owner, he thought, with a woeful shake of his head.
What was Mrs. H. thinking when she hired the woman? he wondered again. Penny Rawley was a mouse, afraid of her own shadow. The first time he lost his temper—which, he admitted, he was prone to do on occasion—she’d probably run from his office, bawling. And he didn’t have the time or patience to deal with a crybaby.
Scowling, he watched her flip up her sun visor, eject a cassette tape from the player on the dash, then carefully slip the tape into its plastic case and tuck it neatly into the console. Her movements were as methodical as a pilot’s, clicking off controls after a landing…which wasn’t a bad thing, he reflected grudgingly. Erik appreciated order. Not that he managed to ever create it on his own. But that’s what secretaries were for, right? Hadn’t Mrs. H. always taken care of all the little details of his life, allowing him the freedom and time to focus on the bigger, more important issues?
Damn straight she had, he thought, swallowing back a lump of emotion. He was going to miss the old girl. She had possessed a sixth sense for determining his mood and anticipating his needs, and had managed for the most part to ignore his temper tantrums…but was unafraid to give him a good tongue lashing when she felt he deserved one.
And