Letting go of his arm, she nodded firmly while biting down on her lower lip to stop it from trembling. If the price of naïveté was the death of the starry-eyed dreamer then the job was done. And she was about to receive her punishment on a grand scale, wasn’t she?
‘I’ll tell them. It’s because of me they’re out there in the first place.’
‘You don’t have to.’
‘Yes, I do.’ An inward breath caught on a hint of a sob so she closed her eyes and willed it away, promising it: later. Later when no one could see. ‘Jamie might not care about them but I do. They’ll hear it from me.’
When she opened her eyes and glanced up, she saw what looked like respect in his eyes. And for some unfathomable reason she felt laughter bubbling up in her chest again—hysteria, probably. Possibly a hint of irony that it took something so completely degrading to earn respect from the man who had never approved of her in the first place.
When she lifted the front of her long skirt in both hands, he stepped back and opened the door for her, towering over her as she took a deep breath and hovered in the gap.
‘I’m here if you need me.’
She smiled at him through shimmering eyes and then stepped forwards, her gaze focused on the flower-decked arch at the top of the room instead of the sea of faces turning her way.
It was the most humiliating day of her life.
‘I’m afraid there won’t be a wedding today…’
CHAPTER ONE
‘I’LL CALL YOU.’
‘Do.’
Quinn opened his office door and looked up from the file he’d been reading, not entirely sure if it was the tail-end of the conversation or the sight of his personal assistant being hugged so tightly by some guy he’d never set eyes on before that brought a frown to his face. He should be aware of everything that happened in his own offices after all, shouldn’t he? And he had the distinct niggling feeling he was being left out of the loop somehow—something he never, ever let happen.
Leaning his shoulder against the doorjamb, he watched with narrowed eyes until the stranger cut her loose.
‘New boyfriend?’
The familiar lustrous sparkle of emerald eyes locked with his as the main door closed behind her mystery man. ‘And when exactly do I have time for a boyfriend?’
‘You know what they say about all work and no play.’
With a shake of her head, Clare bent to retrieve a sheet of paper off her desk. So Quinn allowed his gaze to make a cursory slide over her tailored cream blouse and simple linen trousers, watching the subtle grace of her movement. If he’d been a romantic of any kind he’d have said Clare moved like a ballerina. She certainly had a ballerina’s body: fine-boned and slender—a few more curves maybe, not that she ever dressed to flaunt them or that Quinn had ever looked closely enough to confirm their presence.
But since Quinn Cassidy had graduated with honours from the school of hard knocks he was somewhat lacking in anything remotely resembling romance. So if forced to use a word to describe the way she moved it would quite simply be feminine.
One of the things he’d liked right from the start was the fact she never felt the need to do anything to bring that femininity to a man’s attention. It was also one of the many reasons she’d survived so long working as his PA. The one before her had barely had time to take off her jacket before she’d started leaning her cleavage towards him. It had been like sharing an office with a barracuda.
He shuddered inwardly at the memory.
‘Speaking of work—’ she calmly handed him a sheet of paper when he nudged off the doorjamb and took a step forwards ‘—here’s a list of all the places you have to be today and when. Try and make a few of the appointments on time if you can—for a wee change.’
When she accompanied the words with a sideways tilt of her head and a small smirk that crinkled the bridge of her nose, Quinn couldn’t help smiling, even though technically he was being told off. In fairness he didn’t think his timekeeping had ever been bad, but in the year since Clare had come to work for him she’d been determined he should be at everything at least ten minutes early. He reckoned, however, that if he was early for every single meeting, and had to twiddle his thumbs while he waited for people to turn up, it would add up to a whole heap of wasted time in the long term.
So he rebelled regularly on principle.
He glanced over the neatly typed list before lifting his chin in time to watch Clare perch on the edge of her desk, a thoughtful expression on her face while she swung her feet back and forth. So he waited…
Eventually she spoke in the softly lilting Irish accent she hadn’t lost since she’d come to New York. ‘On the subject of play—it’s been a while since I had to make a trip to Tiffany’s…’
Quinn cocked a brow. ‘And?’
She shrugged one shoulder. ‘I just wanted to make sure I wasn’t falling behind. Up till recently I’d been considering keeping a stock of those wee blue boxes here to save me some time.’
He watched as out of the corner of her eye she caught sight of an errant pen lying on the edge of the desk, giving it a brief frown before she dropped it into a nearby container with a satisfied smile. It never ceased to amaze him, the amount of pleasure she derived from the simplest of things.
‘You’re just missing your trips to Tiffany’s.’ He shook his head and looked her straight in the eye. ‘I can’t run all over Manhattan breaking hearts just so you can while away a few more hours down at your favourite store, now, can I?’
‘Never stopped you before.’ She thrust out her bottom lip and batted long lashes at him comically.
True. But he wasn’t about to get drawn into another debate about his love life when he was suddenly much more interested in hers. ‘So who was the Wall Street type?’
‘Why?’
‘Maybe I need to ask him what his intentions are towards my favourite employee…’
‘So you get to vet all my boyfriends now, do you?’
Quinn folded his arms across his chest, allowing the corner of the sheet of paper to swing casually between his thumb and forefinger. ‘You said he wasn’t your boyfriend.’
Another shrug. ‘He’s not.’
She lifted her delicate chin and rose off the desk to walk round to her swivel chair, swinging forwards before informing him ‘He’s a client.’
Quinn knew what she was getting at, even if it apparently meant her part-time hobby had morphed into something bigger when he wasn’t looking. ‘This matchmaking game of yours is a business now, is it?’
‘Maybe.’ She drummed her neat fingernails on the sheaf of papers in front of her. ‘Problem?’
Two could play at that game—she should know that by now—and her poker face wasn’t worth squat, so Quinn continued looking her straight in the eye. ‘Maybe.’
‘Because it’s during working hours or because you still think the whole thing is a great big joke? I’m not falling behind with my work, am I?’
The thought had never crossed his mind. Thanks to Clare, his working life ran like a well-oiled machine. Not that he hadn’t managed to get things done before, but with her around everything was definitely less stressful than it had been before. There’d once been a time when he’d thrived on the adrenaline of being under pressure, but he’d outgrown those days. And, frankly, the matchmaking thing was starting to grate on him.
‘I’d have thought you of all people would understand the