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He reached into his pocket and then dangled a security card in her face. She quickly read the name—Carter Dodds. It didn’t enlighten her in the least; she’d never heard of him. Then she looked at the photo. In it he was wearing the black tee shirt that he had on now.
Amazingly her brain managed the simple computation. ‘You started today.’
‘Officially tomorrow.’ He nodded.
‘Then why are you here now?’ And how? Jed might be slack on the rounds but he was scrupulous about knowing who was still in the building after hours. And surely Mason wouldn’t have let a new recruit have open access to everything with no one around to supervise?
‘I wanted to see what the place was like when it was quiet.’
‘Why?’ Her suspicions grew more. What did he want to see? There wasn’t any money kept on site, but there were files, transactions, account numbers—loads of sensitive investor information worth millions. She glanced past him to Mason’s open office door, but could hear no gentle hum of the computer.
‘Why are you watering the plants at nine-thirty at night?’ he countered.
‘I forgot to do it earlier.’
‘So you came back specially?’ Utter disbelief.
Actually she’d been downstairs swimming in the pool—breaking all the rules because it was after the gym’s closing hour. But she wasn’t going to drop Jed in it. ‘New recruits don’t get to grill me.’
‘No?’
His smile sharpened, but before he could get another question out she got in one of hers. ‘How come you’re here alone?’
‘Mason wanted to get an early night before we get started tomorrow.’
‘He didn’t tell me you were starting.’
‘Does he tell you everything?’
‘Usually.’ She lifted her chin in defiance of the calculated look that crossed his face, but he missed it—his focus had dropped to her body again.
‘Mason buried his heart with his wife,’ he said bluntly. ‘You won’t get any gold out of him no matter how short your skirt.’
Her mouth fell open. ‘What?’
‘You wouldn’t be the first pretty girl to bat her eyelashes at a rich old man.’
What was he suggesting? ‘Mason’s eighty.’
His shrug didn’t hide his anger. ‘For some women that would make him all the more attractive.’
‘Yeah, well, not me. He’s like my grandfather.’ She screwed up her face.
‘You’re the one who said he likes your skirt.’
‘Only because you couldn’t drag your eyes from it.’
‘But isn’t that why you wear it?’
She paused. He wasn’t afraid to challenge direct, was he? Well, nor was she—when she could think. Right now her brain had gone all lame. ‘I don’t believe you’re supposed to be here now.’
‘Really? Go ahead and ask your boss. Use my phone.’ He pulled it out of his pocket, pressed buttons and handed it to her.
It rang only a couple of times.
‘Carter, have you already found something?’
Penny gripped the phone tighter as she absorbed the anxiety in Mason’s quick-fire query. ‘No, sorry, Mason, it’s Penny. Not Carter.’ She stuttered when she saw Carter’s sudden grin—disarming and devilish. ‘Look, I’ve just bumped into someone in the office.’
‘Carter,’ Mason said.
‘Yes.’ Penny winced at the obvious. Had the sinking feeling she was about to wince even more. ‘He’s given me his phone to call you.’
‘Penny, I’m sorry, I should have told you but Carter thought it should wait until he got there.’
Thought what should wait? Why was Carter the one calling shots? What was going on?
‘Carter heads up Dodds WD in Melbourne. I asked him to come to Sydney for a couple of weeks. I need his help.’
‘What for?’
Carter knew he was still standing too close but too bad. In fact he put both hands back on either side of her. That way she couldn’t readily escape. He was certain she would, so he made sure she couldn’t—by holding a position hat was only a few inches away from intimate.
He was having a time shutting up the temptation whispering that he should lose those few inches. He pushed his hands hard on the cool metal and watched as she pressed the phone closer to her ear and turned her head away from him.
The colour ran under her skin like an incoming tide and Carter couldn’t contain his amusement. Mason was his grandfather’s best friend. He’d seen him every few months all his life and he was on the old boy’s speed-dial to prove it. This was the first time Mason had asked him for help—and help he would. But just this moment?
Distraction. Capital D.
‘Of course.’ Penny had turned her head even further away, clearly hoping he wouldn’t hear whatever it was that Mason was saying.
Carter didn’t give a damn what the old guy said right now. He was too lost in looking at her. She had the biggest, darkest eyes he’d ever seen. They drew him in and sucked him under—like sparkling pools that turned out to be dangerously deep, the kind of eyes that you could stare into endlessly—and he was. Peripherally, bits of his body were absorbing the detail of hers and the back of his brain drew rapid conclusions.
A skirt that short, a shirt that sexy, a body that honed, lips that slicked …
This woman knew how attractive she was, and she emphasised all her best assets. Everything about her was polished to pure, sensual perfection. She was no shy, shrinking secretary. She was a siren. And every basic cell in Carter’s body wanted to answer her summons. So, so badly.
‘Hello?’
She was holding the phone out to him and he’d been too busy gawping to notice. He grabbed it and started talking.
‘Hi, Mason, sorry to bother you so late.’
‘It doesn’t matter. It’s great you’re onto it so quickly. I can’t thank you enough.’
‘So Penny’s your temp PA?’ Carter kept looking at her, still struggling to believe that conservative, eighty-year-old Mason had ever hired such a blatant sex bomb. ‘She’s working late.’
‘She always works late.’ Mason sounded pleased. ‘She’s an angel. I get in every morning and everything is so organised, she makes it a breeze.’
An angel? Carter’s suspicions sharpened again. Penny wouldn’t be the first attractive young woman to turn an older man’s head. Carter knew exactly how easy it was for an avaricious, ambitious female to use her beauty to dazzle a fool old enough to know better. He’d watched not one, but two do that to his dad. Despite her outraged reaction, who was to say that wasn’t what was happening here? ‘How long has she been with you?’ He couldn’t not ask.
There was a silence. ‘Since after the problem started.’ Mason’s voice turned arctic. ‘I thought I’d made this clear already.’
Yeah. Mason had mentioned his fabulous PA more than once—but not her hotter-than-Venus factor. Not mentioning that didn’t seem natural.
‘You tell her what’s going on,’ Mason said sharply. ‘I should have already. Carter, she’s not who you’re looking for.’
Carter stared at the temptation personified before him. Her mouth was as glossy and red ripe as a Morello cherry—and he wanted a taste. That was the real problem. Hell, he was off on a tangent before he’d even started. He owed Mason better than this. ‘You’re right,’ he said brusquely. ‘She’s not.’
Penny watched him pocket the phone. He didn’t seem to be any happier about the situation—offered no laughter or light apology. If anything he looked as angry as he had when he’d first interrogated her. What was he here to do exactly? Mason hadn’t elaborated, just told her to help him if he asked her to. They hadn’t advertised a new job—she was the one who placed the ads so she’d know. So this was cronyism, some old boys’ school network thing. But he was hardly a fresh-faced graduate getting his first contract courtesy of his father. ‘You know Mason personally,’ she said baldly, annoyed by the fact—annoyed by him—and his attractiveness.
‘Have done for years.’ He nodded.
Yeah, that was why the job, whatever it was, hadn’t been advertised. Mason had probably made something up for him to do. Still smarting from his gold-digger slur, she let her inner bitch out to taunt. ‘You don’t look like you have to pull favours to get a job.’
‘Don’t I?’ he answered too softly. ‘How would you know? Is that what you do?’ He leaned closer and whispered low, as if they were intimate. ‘What kind of favours do you pull to score a job, Penny?’
Okay, she’d crossed the line a little, but he’d just leapt it. ‘What sort of favours do you think I pull?’ she fired back before thinking.
His eyes flashed, the pupils expanding so fast the piercing colours became the thinnest of circles around the burgeoning black. Riveted, she watched the myriad greens and blues narrow out. He really did have it—perfect symmetry, angular jawbones and hair that just begged to be ruffled and then gripped tight.
The palms of her hands tingled, heated. Only it wasn’t just his hair she imagined pulling close, no, now she was pulling on hot, silky hard skin, stroking it faster and faster and—OMG where had that come from?
She gulped back the insanity. She couldn’t be thinking that. She looked down and clamped her mouth shut, swallowing both literally and mentally, overly aware her breathing had quickened to audible—basically to panting. Again.
Oh, please don’t let him know what she’d been thinking. She glanced back up at him. All the blue had gone from his irises leaving nothing but thin rings of green fire around those huge, black pupils. Dusky red tinged his cheekbones. She could relate. Blood was firing all round her body, pinking up all sorts of parts—her face included. But at least he wasn’t panting like some dog in heat, which she, unfortunately, was.
He said nothing, she said nothing. But she could see it shimmering in the air between them—razor-sharp attraction. Urges at their most basic. Urges almost uncontrollable.
‘There’s a problem in the accounts—some-one in the company is skimming,’ he suddenly said roughly, jerking his head up.
‘What?’
‘I’m here to check through all the files and find out who and how.’
Someone was stealing? And Carter was here to catch him? Mason had said he headed up some company in Melbourne, so was he some kind of CEO/forensic accountant or something?
Actually that didn’t seem to fit. Not when he wore jeans and tousled hair so well. He looked as if he had too much street cred to be a number cruncher.
‘The only people who’ll know the real reason I’m here are you, Mason and me,’ he continued. ‘We’ll spread it ’round the company that I’m a friend of Mason’s who’s borrowing an office for a couple of weeks. Which I am.’
The fiery green in his eyes dampened to cold blue serious. The sensual curve of his mouth flattened to a straight, hard line. Penny stared, watching him ice over, as she absorbed that info and the implications.
Then she realised. ‘You thought it was me?’ She basically shrieked, her temperature steaming back up to boiling point. She might be many things, but a thief wasn’t one of them. ‘I’m the best damn temp in this town. I’m hardworking and honest. How dare you storm in here and throw round your gutter accusations?’
‘I know.’ His expression went very intense. ‘I’m sorry. Mason already told me it couldn’t be you.’
He sucked the wind right out of her sails and disarmed her completely with a sudden flash of that smile. It cracked his icy cover and let the heat ripple once more. But she refused to let her anger slide into attraction. ‘You still thought it,’ she accused.
‘Well, you have to admit it looked … it looked …’ His attention wandered—down. ‘It looked …’
Her body—despite the freezing wet shirt—was burning. Okay, that attraction was impossible to stop—simplest thing now would be to escape. ‘Well, now that you’ve done your looking,’ she said sarcastically, her eyes locked on his, ‘are you going to step back and let me past?’
‘Not yet,’ he said wryly. ‘I’m still looking.’
Penny’s nerves tightened to one notch the other side of screaming. His lashes lowered and his smile faded. She looked down too. Now her silk shirt was wet it was both skin colour and skin tight and she might as well not be wearing anything. Even worse, she was aching … and horrified to realise it was completely obvious.
‘You’re cold,’ he said softly.
Yeah, completely obvious.
‘The water in the jug was from the cooler.’
‘So that’s the reason …’
All she could do was brazen this out. She tossed her head and met his eyes direct. ‘What other reason could there be?’
His lips curved. In his tanned face, his teeth were white and straight and perfect. Actually everything in his face was perfect. And in the dark tee shirt and dark trousers he looked pretty-boy pirate, especially with the slightly too-long hair. The intensity of his scrutiny was devastating and now he’d fixed on one thing—her mouth.
She saw his intention. She felt it in her lips already—the yearning for touch. But even for her that would be insane. She didn’t like the way her pulse was zigzagging all over the place. She didn’t like the way her body was so willingly bracing for impact.
‘Don’t add another insult to the list,’ she said, trying to regain control over both of them. But the words didn’t come out as forcefully as she’d intended. Instead they whispered on barely a breath—because she could barely move enough to breathe.
‘How can appreciating beauty be an insult?’
Penny’s pulse thundered. She was used to confident men. They were the kind she liked—pretty much bullet proof. But this was more than just superficial brashness; this was innate, absolute arrogance. He stood even closer, filling all her senses. Her blood rushed to all her secret places and left her brain starving of its ability to operate.
His smile suddenly flashed brighter—like how the flame flared on a gas hob when you accidentally twisted the knob the wrong way. His hand lifted and he brushed her lips with a finger. She shivered.
Shock. She was in shock. That was the problem. That was why she wasn’t resisting….
His expression heated up all the more. ‘You okay?’
‘Mmm.’
His traversing finger muffled the words she couldn’t speak anyway. She was too busy pressing her lips firmly together to stop herself from opening up and inviting him in. But somehow he got that invite anyway because he lifted his finger and swiftly replaced it with his mouth.
Oh.
It was light. A warm, gentle, coaxing kiss that promised so much more than it gave. But what it did give was good. He moved closer, not threatening, but with a hint of masculine spice and just enough pressure to make her accept him. To make her want more. Surprised that it wasn’t a full-throttle brazen burst of passion, she relaxed. Her eyes automatically closed as her body focused on the exquisite sweetness trickling into her. It had been a long time since she’d felt anything so nice—a subtle magic that melted her resistance, and saw her start to strain for what she knew he was holding at bay.
Her lips parted—she couldn’t deny herself. His response came immediate, and powerful. She heard his sound of satisfaction and his hands moved from the steel behind to her soft body. She trembled top to toe as he swiftly shaped her curves, pulling her against him. She had to grab hold of his shoulders or she was going to tumble backwards. The kiss deepened again as she felt the wide, flat planes and hard strength of him. Her neck arched back as he stroked into her mouth. She lifted her hand, sliding her fingers into his thick hair. He showed no mercy then, bending her back all the more as he sought full access, kissing her jaw and neck and back up again to claim her mouth—this time with confident, carnal authority.
She shuddered at the impact, felt him press closer still. Sandwiched between him and the cabinet, she was trapped between forces as unyielding and demanding as each other. Yet she had no desire to escape, not now.
The arrogance of him was breathtaking. But not anywhere as breathtaking as the way he kissed. It was as if he was determined to maximise pleasure for them both and the control she usually held so tight started to slide as her own desire mounted.
He was silk-wrapped steel and she wanted to feel all of him against her, slicing into her. She wanted him. Wanted as she hadn’t wanted anyone in a long, long time. Okay, ever. Hungry for his strength and passion, she kissed him back—melting against his body, delving into his mouth with her tongue, so keen to explore more.
