The Mistress Contract. HELEN BROOKS
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she answered smartly.
‘Really?’ He raised his dark head and the hard sapphire gaze homed in. ‘Tell me what you know.’
She considered for a moment or two, trying to pull her thoughts into concise order, and then spoke quietly and fluently as she outlined what had been a disastrous endeavour from the start, due to a series of mistakes which Sephy felt could be laid fair and square at Quentin Dynamics’ door.
He looked down at his desk as she began talking, a frown creasing his brow as he listened intently without glancing at her once. As she finished speaking the frown became a quizzical ruffle, and he raised his head and said, ‘Brains and beauty! Well, well, well. Have I found myself a treasure, here?’ And then, before she could respond in any way, ‘So, you think we should take the full hit on this? Reimburse for engineering call-out charges as well as a free upgrade for the software?’
It probably wasn’t very clever to tell him his company had made a sow’s ear out of what should have been a silk purse within the first half an hour of working with him, but Sephy took a deep breath and said firmly, ‘Yes, I do.’
‘And Mr Ransome’s report, that recommends we merely reduce the cost for the new software?’
Mr Ransome was trying to cover his own shortcomings with regard to the whole sorry mess, but Sephy didn’t feel she could be that blunt.
She didn’t answer immediately, and the blue eyes narrowed before she said quietly, ‘He’s wrong, in my opinion, and although the firm might save a good deal of money in the short term, I don’t think it will do Quentin Dynamics’ reputation any good in the long term.’
He gave her a long hard look. ‘Right. And you think that is important?’
‘Very.’ Now it was her turn to hold his eyes. ‘Don’t you?’
He folded his arms over his chest, settling back in his seat again as he surveyed her thoughtfully. The white sunlight streaming in through the plate glass at the back of him was picking up what was almost a blue sheen in his jetblack hair, and Sephy was aware of the unusual thickness of the black lashes shading the vivid blue eyes as she looked back at him.
He had something. The thought popped into her consciousness with a nervous quiver. Male magnetism; a dark fascination; good old-fashioned sex appeal—call it what you will, it was there and it was powerful. Oh, boy, was it powerful!
‘Yes, I do,’ he said quietly. He stared at her a moment more and then snapped forward, speaking swiftly and softly as he outlined various procedures he wanted put into place. ‘Internal memos to Customer Services, Marketing and Research,’ he added shortly. ‘You can see to those, I presume? And a letter to Einhorn stating what we have decided. And I want a complete breakdown from Accounts of all costs.’
‘You want me to write the memos and the letter?’ Sephy asked quickly as he paused for breath.
‘Certainly.’ The piercing gaze flashed upwards from the papers on the desk. ‘That’s not a problem, is it? I need my secretary to work on her own initiative most of the time, once I’ve made any overall decisions. I can’t be bothered with trivialities.’
Sephy nodded somewhat dazedly. She could see Madge earnt every penny of her salary.
He continued to fire instructions and brief guidelines on a whole host of matters for some few minutes more, and by the time Sephy rose to walk back to Madge’s desk she felt as though she had been run over by a steamroller.
She had enough work to last her two or three days and she had only been in there a matter of minutes, she told herself weakly as she plopped down on her chair. He was amazing. Intelligent—acutely intelligent—and with a razor-sharp grasp of what was at the heart of any matter that cut straight through incidentals and exposed the kernel in the nut.
And he scared her to death.
She worked solidly for the rest of the afternoon, her fingers flying over the keys of the word processor as the pile of papers for signature grew. Apart from telephone calls and a brief stop for coffee—delivered on a silver tray from the small canteen at the basement of the building by one of the staff and drunk at her desk—she didn’t raise her head from the screen, and it came as something of a shock when she glanced at her wristwatch just after half past five.
She quickly gathered up all the correspondence awaiting signature and knocked at the interconnecting door, hearing the deep ‘Come in’ as butterflies began to flutter in her stomach.
He glanced up from his hand-held dictating machine as she entered, his expression preoccupied. He had been running his hand through his hair, if the ruffled black crop was anything to go by, and the tie had gone altogether now, along with a couple more buttons being undone, which exposed a V of tanned flesh and dark curling body hair.
The butterflies joined together in an explosive tarantella, and Sephy forced herself to concentrate very hard on a point just over his left shoulder as she smiled brightly and walked across to his desk. ‘Correspondence for signature,’ she squeaked, clearing her throat before adding, ‘The post goes at six, so if you could look at them now, please? I didn’t realise what the time was.’
He glanced at the gold Rolex on his wrist. ‘Hell!’
‘What’s the matter?’ Sephy asked guardedly.
‘I’ve a dinner engagement at seven,’ he muttered abstractedly. ‘Look, ring her, would you? Explain about Madge, and that things are out of kilter here, and say I’ll be half an hour late. She won’t like it—’ he grimaced slightly ‘—but don’t stand any nonsense.’
‘Ring who?’
‘What?’ He clearly expected her to be a mind-reader, as no doubt the faithful Madge was. ‘Oh, Caroline de Menthe; the number’s in here.’
He threw the obligatory little black book which he’d fetched out of a drawer across the desk.
‘Right.’ She took a deep breath and let it out evenly. She had heard of Caroline de Menthe. Everyone in the world had heard of the statuesque French model, who had the body of a goddess and the face of an angel and who was the toast of London and every other capital city besides. And she was his date. Of course she was. She was the latest prize on the circuit so she’d be bound to be, wouldn’t she? Sephy thought with a shrewishness that surprised her.
Once back at her desk she thumbed through the book, trying to ignore the reams of female names, and then, once she had found Caroline de Menthe, dialled the London number—there were several international numbers under the same name. She spoke politely into the receiver when she got through to the Savoy switchboard.
It was a moment or two before Reception connected her, and then a sultry, heavily accented voice said lazily, ‘Caroline de Menthe.’
‘Good afternoon, Miss de Menthe,’ Sephy said quickly. ‘Mr Quentin has asked me to call you to say he is sorry but he’ll be half an hour late this evening. His secretary has been taken ill and he is running a little behind schedule. He will pick you up at about half past seven if that is all right?’
‘And you are what? An office girl?’ The seductive sultriness was gone; the other woman’s tone was distinctly vinegary now.
‘I am standing in for Mr Quentin’s secretary,’ Sephy stated quietly, forcing herself not to react to the overt rudeness.
There was a moment’s silence, and then the model said curtly, ‘Tell Mr Quentin I will be waiting for him,’ and the phone went dead.
Charming. Sephy stared at the receiver in her hand for a moment before slowly replacing it. Caroline de Menthe might be beautiful and famous and have the world at her feet, but she didn’t have the manners of an alley cat. She glanced at the interconnecting door as she wrinkled her small nose. And that was the sort of woman he liked? Still, it was absolutely nothing to do with her. She was just his temporary secretary—very temporary.
The telephone rang, cutting off further deliberations, and