“I’m not a charity case,” she told Charles. “I owe you too much already. And unlike my father, I don’t care to be indebted to anyone.”
“You’ve seen the file, Victoria. We were under no obligation to your father. Do you honestly believe we would have hired you if we didn’t feel you were qualified for the position?”
She didn’t know what to believe anymore. “I’m sorry, but I just can’t.”
“What will you do?”
She shrugged. She was in hotel management, and the Royal Inn was the biggest game on the island. She would never find a position with comparable pay anywhere else. Not on Morgan Isle, anyway. That could mean a move off the island. Maybe it was time for a change, time to stop leaning on her father and be truly independent for the first time in her life. Or maybe it was he who had been leaning on her.
“I’ll find another job,” she said.
“What will you do until then?”
She honestly didn’t know. Since the buyout, what savings she’d had were quickly vanishing. If she went much longer without a paycheck, she would be living on the streets.
“I have an idea,” Charles said. “A mutually beneficial arrangement.”
She wasn’t sure she liked the sound of that, but the least she could do was hear him out. She folded her arms and said, “I’m listening.”
“You’ve seen the shambles my life is in. Stay, just long enough to get things back in order and to hire and train a new assistant, and when you go, you’ll leave with a letter of recommendation so impressive that anyone would be a fool not to hire you.”
It was tempting, but she already owed him too much. This was something she needed to do on her own.
She shook her head. “You’ve done too much already.”
He leaned forward in his seat. “You would be the one doing me the favor. I honestly don’t have the time to train someone else.”
“I’ve been here two days. Technically someone should be training me.”
“You’re a fast learner.” When she didn’t answer he leaned forward and said, “Victoria, I’m desperate.”
He did look a little desperate, but she couldn’t escape the feeling that he was doing it just to be nice. Which shouldn’t have been a bad thing. And she should have been jumping at his offer, but she couldn’t escape the feeling that she didn’t deserve his sympathy.
“Do this one thing for me,” he coaxed, “and we’ll call it even. You won’t owe me and I won’t owe you.”
She would have loved nothing more than to put this entire awful experience behind her and start fresh.
“I would have to insist you pay me only an assistant’s wage,” she said.
He looked surprised. “That’s not much.”
“Maybe, but it’s fair.”
“Fine,” he agreed. “If that’s what you want.”
“How long would I have to stay?” she asked.
“How about two months.”
Yeah, right. “How about one week?”
He narrowed his eyes at her. “Six weeks.”
“Two weeks,” she countered.
“Four.”
“Three.”
“Deal,” he said with a grin.
She took a deep breath and blew it out. Three weeks working with the duke. It was longer than she was comfortable with, but at the very least it would give her time to look for another job. She had interviewed hundreds of people in her years at the Houghton, yet she had never so much as put together a résumé for herself. Much less had to look for employment. She barely knew where to begin.
“I’ll have Penelope post an ad for the assistant’s position. I’ll leave it to you to interview the applicants. Then, of course, they’ll have to meet my approval.”
“Of course.”
“Why don’t we catch an early lunch today and discuss exactly what it is I’m looking for?” His smile said business was the last thing on his mind.
Were they back to that again?
If she was going to survive the next three weeks working for him, she was going to have to set some boundaries. Establish parameters.
“I’m not going to sleep with you,” she said.
If her direct approach surprised him, he didn’t let it show. He just raised one brow slightly higher than the other. “I don’t know how you did things at the Houghton, but here, lunch isn’t code for sex.”
On the contrary, that’s exactly what it was. Practically everything he said was a double entendre. “I’m not a member of your harem.”
One corner of his mouth tipped up. “I have a harem?”
Was he forgetting that she’d listened to his phone messages? “I just thought I should make it clear up front. Because you seem to believe you’re God’s gift to the female race.”
He shot her a very contrived stunned look. “You mean I’m not?”
“I’m sorry to say, I don’t find you the least bit attractive.” It was kind of a lie. Physically she found him incredibly attractive. His personality, on the other hand, needed serious work.
He shrugged. “If you say so.”
He was baiting her, but she wouldn’t give him the satisfaction of a response. “Have a list of employment requirements to me by end of day and I’ll see that the ad is placed.” She already had a pretty good idea of the sort of employee he was looking for. More emphasis on looks than intelligence or capability. But she was going to find him an assistant who could actually do the job. And she would hopefully be doing it sooner than three weeks. The faster she got out of here, the better.
“You’ll have it by five,” he said.
“Thank you. I should get back to work.” She still had a backload of e-mail and phone messages to sort through.
She was almost to her office when he called her name, and something in his voice said he was up to no good. She sighed quietly to herself, and with her hand on the doorknob, turned back to him. Ready for a fight. “Yes?”
“Thank you.”
“For what?” she asked, expecting some sort of snappy, sarcastic comeback or a sexually charged innuendo.
Instead, he just said, “For sticking around.”
She was so surprised, all she could do was nod as she opened the door and slipped into her office. The really weird thing was, she was pretty sure he genuinely meant it. And it touched her somewhere deep down.
If she wasn’t careful, she just might forget how much she didn’t like him.
It was almost four-thirty when Charles popped his head into her office and handed Victoria the list of employment requirements. And early, no less.
“Are you busy?” he asked.
What now? Wasn’t it a bit early for a dinner invitation? “Why?”
“You up for a field trip?”
She set the list in her urgent to-do pile. “I guess that all depends on where you want to go.” If it was a