Bittersweet Love

‘Don’t you think we’ve known each other too long for small talk?’

It was the sort of remark that, in different circum-stances, might well have sounded quite intimate, but here, in the clinical severity of his office, she knew what he meant. They had worked together for so long that they operated with the kind of familiarity that came to old, married couples.

‘Besides,’ he was saying, moving on from his offhand observation, ‘if we’re going to play that game, let’s at least talk about something slightly more interesting. Like what the hell has happened to you?’

‘Not a great deal,’ Natalie informed him, deliberately misunderstanding his question. ‘I’ve taken up squash and swimming. My sister has made me godmother to her little boy. And, of course, I’ve pretty much kept on top of the workload, you’ll be pleased to hear, although, as you suspected, that Grafton deal is proving trickier than was originally anticipated. But I discussed all that on the telephone with you a couple of days ago. The file is on my desk, if you’d care to see it.’

She rose to get it, too nervously conscious of his eyes on her to remain in the room any longer.

‘Sit down,’ he barked. ‘I haven’t laid eyes on you for six months, dammit, to find that you’ve gone and got yourself overhauled. You haven’t found yourself a man, by any chance, have you?’ There was a thread of suspicion in his voice.

Natalie gave him a look that would freeze water, and he laughed.

‘Good. I can’t afford to have you besotted with any man. There’s too much work on here at the moment for that little luxury. The Hong Kong operation is going to have a massive knock-on effect on our outlets over here.’

He began rooting through some paperwork on his desk and she glared at the downturned dark head. She had become quite accustomed to this trait of his. He would pick up a topic, explore it for a while, like a child with a plaything, and then when he was satisfied that there was nothing left to discover about it, or when it began to bore him, he would drop it without a backward glance.

It was how he treated the women in his life, and there were enough of them. Blonde, brunette, red-haired, all perfectly proportioned Barbie doll look-alikes who adorned his arm for just as long as he wanted them to, before boredom set in.

It never failed to amaze her that she had fallen in love with someone whose character she was quite capable of assassinating with a few easy strokes. How could anyone with a scrap of common sense actually love a man whose idea of involvement was a diamond necklace and a weekend in Rome, work permitting, and whose attitude to parting was a philosophical shrug of the shoulders?

Now, she thought acidly, he had sized up her transformation, made sure that it would not cause any ripples in her work life, and, that done, was quite content to get back to the business in hand.

For once, though, Natalie was not going to accept his change of direction with equanimity. Maybe six months of freedom from his engulfing, mesmeric personality had taken their toll in more ways than one after all.

She looked at him, her grey eyes level, and said coolly, ‘You can rest assured that the presence of a man in my life would not affect my work here in the slightest’

He glanced up from what he was doing, his black brows drawn together in a frown.

‘But there is no man, is there?’ He looked at her doubtfully, and she could read what was going through his head.

Natalie Robins, prior to reconstruction, plump, unappealing, was safe and reliable. Now he wasn’t too sure. She had moved on from that image and there was the niggling suspicion that men might actually begin to feature on the scene.

She smiled expressionlessly at him. ‘And if there were? Do the hordes of women in your life interfere with your ability to work?’

He sat back in the chair and clasped his hands behind his head, his green eyes giving her their full attention. There was interest in his face, as though the nature of her question had startled him slightly, but not enough to deter him from responding.

‘Nothing interferes with my ability to work. You, of all people should know that.’

“Then why should you assume that it would be any different for me?’

‘Women are a part of my life,’ he said bluntly, his green eyes roving over her face. Then he leaned back and stared at her from under those thick black eyelashes. ‘I know how to handle them. I can put them into perspective.’

There was no need for him to say anything further. Natalie knew well enough what he was getting at. The unspoken implication was that she had no experience with men, so how could she possibly handle something as extraordinary as a love-affair?

She looked at him coldly and when she spoke her voice was well modulated and perfectly controlled, even though inside she was bristling with anger.

‘Can’t you just?’ She lowered her eyes and began flicking through her typing pad.

‘And what exactly does that remark mean?’ He circled round his desk to perch on the edge of it in front of her, and she wondered whether this was as casual as it appeared to be. She wouldn’t put it past him to subconsciously use body language like that to addle her.

‘It means that your treatment of women, from what I’ve seen, leaves a great deal to be desired.’ She stared straight ahead of her, her profile neat and clean.

‘Well, thank you for that remarkable piece of insight into my love life.’ His voice was still threaded with amusement ‘I had no idea that you disapproved so strongly of it. Or maybe I had.’ He rubbed his chin thoughtfully and Natalie gritted her teeth together because she knew that he was laughing at her. ‘Yes,’ he continued slowly, ‘your disapproval was always there in that tight expression you wore every time a woman walked through the door. But you never actually came right out and said anything. Perhaps your new body image has brought on a change of personality?’ The question hung in the air, and Natalie sincerely hoped that he didn’t expect any answer, because she had no intention of providing one.

‘Well?’ he pressed. ‘Has it? I hope not. I liked you the way you were. My life’s too complicated without you suddenly deciding that you need to discover yourself.’

‘In that case,’ she said calmly, ‘I’ll make sure that I discover myself outside working hours.’

What an arrogant, selfish swine, she thought. How could I have ever fallen in love with you?

She thought that they had killed the subject. What else was there to say?

His movement when he leaned over to twirl one long strand of hair between his finger surprised her so much that her body jerked around and she faced him angrily. He laughed, his eyes mocking, and folded his arms.

‘I still can’t get over this transformation,’ he murmured. ‘What prompted it? If it wasn’t a man, then what?’

Natalie stood up, working on the theory that she would feel far less disadvantaged if she was at least on eye level with him, and then instantly regretted it because that brought her far too close to his dark, handsome face.

Was it really any wonder that women found him so irresistible? Even with all her defences in full working order Natalie could feel that intangible pull be exerted over the opposite sex. He had that particularly lazy, self-assured brand of sexuality that could conquer without a great deal of effort. She had seen even the most hardened of feminists fall victim to it, and every time she saw it, it made her annoyed. It just didn’t seem fair that one man should be so shamelessly magnetic.

‘That,’ she said frozenly, ‘has to be the most chauvinistic remark I have ever heard.’

He laughed. ‘Really? That just goes to show how little experience you have of the opposite sex.’

She looked away quickly to hide the faint flush that had crept up her cheeks. God only knew why she had allowed this sort of personal conversation to sneak up on her and catch her unawares. It never usually happened.

‘Well,’ she bit out defensively, ‘if you are anything to go by, then I’m heartily glad about that.’

She looked at him, horrified by what she had just said.

‘Are you?’ His eyes were curious, and she realised that her remark, rather than ending their conversation, had had just the opposite effect.

‘I am, as a matter of fact,’ she muttered under her breath. She could hear her heart hammering away in her chest, and would have given anything to have been able to sit back down, but if she did that might delude him into thinking that she was actually interested in this conversation.

‘I’m mortally offended,’ he said, his eyes gleaming with suppressed amusement, and she could have hit him. What a keen sense of humour. Was this his idea of getting back into the routine? By starting off the morning with a little laugh at her expense?

‘Mortally?’ she said, refusing to share the joke. ‘In that case, I’ll try and make time to come to the funeral.’

He laughed and threw her an appreciative look.

‘I can’t tell you how nice it is to be back here, at the mercy of that vicious tongue of yours. The secretary I had out there was awful. She spent six months complaining and generally acting as though working for me was on a par with enforced labour. If she hadn’t come with a personal recommendation, I would have got rid of her so fast she wouldn’t have known what had hit her. But I didn’t want to offend my man over there, so I stuck it out. Just.’

He moved back to his chair and Natalie released a sigh of relief.

Poor girl, she thought sympathetically. She could have understood the reaction. Kane Marshall could be very intimidating at times. When it came to work, he could be unforgiving, and his peculiar ability to grasp complex matters quickly made him short-tempered and impatient with anything he saw as ignorance.

These were not lovable traits—not that Kane would see it that way.