When the fax machine made its warming-up sound, Marissa left her desk with a rather desperate alacrity. She’d struggled to concentrate on her typing despite her determination to plough through as much work as possible before Rick got back.
She snatched up the first page of the fax and skimmed it, and then read it more carefully while two more pages emerged from the machine. If the large ‘urgent’ stamp on the top of the first page hadn’t been clue enough, the contents were, drat it all to pieces. She’d hoped for something to distract her thoughts, but not this way.
‘I’ll ring his mobile phone and tell him he needs to get back here. It’s not my problem there’s an emergency and I’ll be interrupting … whatever.’ She walked to her desk and pressed the speed dial for his mobile number, only to return the phone to its cradle when the thing rang from on top of his desk in the next room.
What now? Try another department head? Which one? The contents of the fax covered material from all the departments.
‘Right, so there’s no choice. It’s marked for his attention specifically, and it’s urgent.’ Marissa snatched the door key from her purse and pushed it into her pocket. If she could have thought of any other way to handle this, she’d have taken it.
The trip to the top level went by far too fast. She’d never been up here before. There seemed to be a large atrium surrounded by rooms behind closed doors.
Rick’s workaday lair? A place to come when he wanted privacy without leaving the building?
She’d crossed half the cavernous expanse of tiled floor flanked with tall banks of potted ornamental trees, the fax clutched in a death grip in her hand, before she realised the sounds of splashing weren’t from an indoor fountain.
Marissa’s gaze lifted and the view in front of her cleared just in time for her to see strong arms lift a little girl out of the water and pass her to a dark-haired woman who stood beside … a swimming pool.
Rick was in the pool, his wide shoulders and thick arms exposed and water dripping from his face and down his chest.
Just the right amount of dark hair there.
What on earth is going on here?
Child. Woman. Rick in the pool and not a sensual indicator to be detected in the room.
And finally this thought:
That’s what the swimming roster that circulates by email means, the slots for before work each day.
She’d only seen the email twice, and had thought the staff took turns booking some other swimming facilities.
Marissa’s steps faltered to a stop.
‘Thank you, Unca Rick.’ The little girl waited impatiently while the woman removed her flotation devices, only to immediately lean fearlessly over the edge of the pool, arms extended, to the man who was Marissa’s boss—in a very different guise right now.
He was a specimen of male beauty and Marissa couldn’t take her gaze from him. The child would have tumbled back in if the woman hadn’t held onto her arm. If Rick hadn’t immediately caught her by the tiny waist. Big gentle hands keeping her from harm.
The little girl planted a kiss on Rick’s cheek and his arms came around her, his hands gently patting her back before he set her on her feet again beside the pool.
‘You’re welcome.’ Oh, the soft deepness of his voice.
Marissa’s abdomen clenched in a reaction she wholly did not want to admit was happening. She hadn’t joined Blinddatebrides.com to find Mr Virile and Able to Produce Strong Children, nor Mr Gentle and Sweet With Said Children. She certainly wasn’t looking for those traits in the man before her.
‘The next time you’ll put your head all the way under the water, okay, Julia?’ His smile was gentle, encouraging and, to Marissa, quite devastating. ‘Fishes do that all the time.’
Julia …
The woman smiled and turned her head and the likeness between all three of them clicked it all fully into place.
This child was Julia—a sweet little girl about four or five years old with a shock of dark hair flattened wet against the back of her head and still dry in the front. The woman beside the pool was Rick’s sister. The entire scene was so far removed from what Marissa had expected, she couldn’t seem to find her breath or get her legs to move.
Or perhaps that was simply the impact of so much raw sensual appeal concentrated in the man in front of her, and the crazy twisting of reactions inside her.
And Rick wasn’t involved.
Now she thought about it, hadn’t Gordon said when she’d first started here that Rick was a solitary man and seemed to keep his dating low-key and … transitory?
And hello, that wouldn’t exactly make him a candidate for a relationship. Plus Marissa didn’t want to have one with him. He might be in a swimming pool, but the term ‘corporate shark’ still meant more than a boss doing laps in chlorine-scented water.
Oh, but he hadn’t looked like a boss or a shark when he’d held his niece so tenderly in his arms. Marissa clenched her teeth because she was not going down this track and that was that!
Maybe she made a sound because Rick’s head turned and his expression closed as though she’d caught him at something he hadn’t wanted her to see.
Why would he feel that way about giving a swimming lesson to his niece? Not only that, but surely he’d guessed what Marissa thought about ‘Julia’ and yet he hadn’t said a word.
‘I’m sorry for barging in.’ Sorry and quite annoyed by his hidden depths, whether that made her unreasonable or not. ‘I have an urgent fax and I thought—’ She’d thought he’d be behind one of those closed doors beyond the pool with a lover. ‘Er … I didn’t realise there was a swimming pool up here.’
‘It’s not a problem. We’ve taken enough of Rick’s time away from his work anyway.’ The woman smiled as she wrapped her daughter in a towel and gathered her into her arms. ‘I’m Faith, by the way. Rick’s youngest sister.’
‘Marissa.’ She sought the comfortable communication skills that should have flowed naturally. ‘Marissa Warren. I’m filling in while Rick’s secretary, Tom, is on sick leave.’
‘Ah, I see. For a while?’ The other woman glanced at Rick and her eyes seemed to gleam. ‘That should make for an interesting change.’
‘It’s not for all that long.’ Rick cleared his throat. ‘Didn’t you say you needed to be going, Faith?’
His sister’s mouth softened. ‘Yes. There’s a chance we might get a call from Russell tonight if things with his unit go as planned. I don’t want to miss that. I asked Mum and Dad if they’d like to come over, speak with him and then watch you-know-who while I finish the call. The deployments are hard and he doesn’t have his parents around, but Mum and Dad were too busy.’
Something in Rick’s face seemed to tighten with … sadness? Some kind of regret for his sister? A measure of long-standing anger? ‘What time? Do you want me to phone conference in from the office?’
‘No, that’s okay.’ Faith lifted her daughter higher into her arms. ‘Julia and I will be fine on our own but I appreciate the offer.’
They left after that and Marissa faced the company’s boss where he stood in the water. No tattoo on the right biceps. Just muscles that seemed to invite the stroke of questing fingers. Marissa wanted to stay annoyed at him for concealing the truth about Julia