The Boss's Bride

Giving her a sharp glance, his voice very soft, he asked, ‘Meaning?’

‘Meaning stupid women can sometimes be very dangerous. Mrs Staple Smythe is a snob of the worst kind. She expected you to have a suitable wife that she could manipulate.’

‘Instead of which, she found you.’

‘Yes. No background. She’d never heard of the Newmans,’ she added with slight dryness. ‘An unmarried mother…’

‘I beg your pardon?’

‘She assumes the baby is mine,’ she explained. ‘Which might have been forgiven if I’d had any semblance of style, and had answered her pertinent questions.’

‘You want to tell her the truth?’

‘No,’ she denied. Not only because she knew how much Adam hated people to know his business, but because Mrs Staple Smythe had put her own back up, and she now didn’t want her to know. ‘But I’ll bet you anything you like to name that she will cause trouble. One way or another, I’m going to be punished.’

She didn’t know how right she was.

He didn’t say anything for a while, merely watched her, eyes slightly narrowed. ‘If you can’t deal with it…’

‘Did I say that?’ she queried as she walked across to her desk and switched on her computer.

‘No.’

‘But when your grass verges remain uncut, when your access is repeatedly blocked…’

‘I’m not sitting on any committees, Claris.’

‘No,’ she agreed. ‘But I begin to wonder if that isn’t why your father left the house empty all these years.’

‘What a pity you can’t ask him,’ he drawled. ‘Unless you can communicate with the dead. Can you?’

‘No.’

‘Then we’ll never know. Do you mind?’

‘Mind what? Not being able to communicate with the dead?’ she asked flippantly.

‘No,’ he denied patiently, ‘being thought my partner.’

‘No, why should I? Do you?’

‘No. I’ll be at the hospital if you need me.’ Pushing open the garden door, he walked out.

Eyes slightly unfocused, Claris stared after him for a moment. No help there. Had she expected it? No, she thought wryly. She was paid to solve his problems, big or small. She suspected this problem wasn’t going to be small. And it was all her own fault; she should have treated Mrs Staple Smythe with the deference she clearly expected. Maybe explained that Adam was paranoid about his privacy.

Partner? She gave a half-laugh. She doubted anyone would seriously think her his partner. Not that she wanted to be. The attraction she felt for him was entirely reluctant and very, very unwanted. A complication she didn’t need. Adam wouldn’t be attracted to someone like herself in a million years, and if he ever discovered how she felt…Dismissing it, suppressing it, she turned away. Funny how things turned out, though. At school all she had wanted out of life was to be a games mistress. She’d done her teacher training, but had then been unable to find a post. Several temporary jobs later, she had discovered a rather bewildering ability in herself to understand computer systems and the stock market. Figures, numbers, information technology, were as familiar to her now as her own face. A far cry from hockey sticks.

She had also discovered that she had an extraordinary talent to make money. One day she would be rich. Not as rich as Adam Turmaine, perhaps, but maybe not far behind. Tempting offers from top companies had come her way, all of which she had turned down. To work for Adam. She still didn’t know if she’d been wise. She’d convinced herself she could cope with the attraction she felt for him, and so far she had managed just that. But living in the house with him, being with him constantly, was straining her feelings to the limit.

With a little sigh, she picked up the phone and rang Neville at the London office.

‘You look nice,’ Adam commented.

She crossed her eyes at him.

‘You do,’ he insisted. ‘Purple is perhaps not totally your colour…’

‘It’s burgundy.’

‘Oh.’

She laughed. ‘I don’t have many eveningy things.’

‘Best get yourself some, then. Feeling better?’

She gave him a look of puzzlement.

‘You were angry earlier.’

‘Oh, not really angry,’ she confessed. ‘More cross with myself. I encountered Mrs Staple Smythe and one of her cronies in Rye this morning. She—annoyed me.’ She’d more than annoyed her; she’d deliberately parked across Claris’s car in the car park preventing her from leaving. She couldn’t prove it was deliberate, though, and she hadn’t known at first that it was Mrs Staple Smythe’s car.

‘I don’t want to be bothered with it, Claris.’

She gave a small smile. ‘You think I don’t know that? And give that here before you break it.’

He obediently extended his wrist for her to fit his cufflink. ‘What would I do without you?’

‘Find some other poor fool.’

‘Is that how you think of yourself?’ he asked quietly. He sounded abnormally serious.

‘No, and if you don’t hurry up we’ll be late.’

Pulling a face, he turned away to pick up his jacket and slip it on. ‘Did I tell you that Arabella was coming down?’ he asked casually.

‘No,’ she denied drily, and neither by look, nor deed did she let him see how jealousy curled unwanted in her insides. ‘When?’

‘Tomorrow.’

‘I’ll take Nathan out for the day,’ she offered. ‘Is she staying the night?’

Amusement in his brown eyes, he shook his head. ‘Don’t know. Ready?’

‘As I’ll ever be. Who’s driving?’

‘You are.’ Handing her her car keys, he escorted her out. ‘How are you getting on with Lydia?’

‘Fine, we understand each other very well.’