Dating and Other Dangers. Natalie Anderson
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‘Pretty conservative establishment all round, is Hammond.’
‘Do you have a point, Mr …?’ She paused deliberately, still not looking him in the eyes.
‘Rush. Ethan Rush,’ he said, as smoothly and unselfconsciously as if he were James Bond himself. ‘Do you recognise my name?’
‘Should I?’
‘Yes, I think you should.’
She blinked and pushed the pack again, to buy another moment of thinking time. Except she couldn’t really think—she could barely breathe—and her pulse was pounding. ‘Well, I’m sorry, Mr Rush, you’ll have to explain.’
‘But you’ve been warned about me.’
‘I have?’ Startled, she looked up—and found herself snared in the reddish tint of his brown eyes—the hardness of those eyes.
‘Yes, on WomanBWarned. Do you know that website, Nadia?’
In less than the micro-second it took for her to gasp, shock had covered her body in goosebumps. Every inch of her skin screamed with sensitivity; every cell was shot with adrenalin. She let another second slide, and as it did she decided to avoid—then feign ignorance. And if that failed she’d deny, deny, deny.
‘Was there something you needed today, Mr Rush?’
‘Yes, I wanted to be sure about the internet policy here at Hammond, and apparently you’re the HR expert on it.’ He didn’t seem to move, but he was somehow even bigger, filling the room with ferocious energy. ‘Tell me,’ he said drily, ‘does your employer know you run one of the bitchiest, most defamatory sites on the internet?’
Nadia’s throat tightened as if a hangman’s noose had just been jerked, rendering speech impossible.
‘It wouldn’t do your little HR role much good if your bosses found out about your hobby, would it? Not when you’re sending out these little edicts to all their employees about online protocol. Not in a great position to give advice, are you?’
Nadia firmed her jaw—she resented the “hobby” description.
He pulled a paper from his pocket and unfolded it, placing it in the table. She glanced at the heading, and then back up to his simmering countenance. She didn’t need to read more because she’d written most of it. The internal memo on internet access and computer use, explicitly detailing that social networking sites, forums and such, were forbidden. She’d drafted the updated policy before getting it approved by Legal and her supervisors.
‘Where did you get that?’ And how on earth had he tracked her down?
‘I find it so ironic that you deliver seminars to the other employees about protecting their online presence and reputation when you’re so vicious in cyberspace yourself.’
‘Do you have a point, Mr Rush?’ She curled her toes and tensed her muscles. She wanted to escape but refused to run away. Because she really needed to know what his point was. Despite her hammering heart, she told herself to keep calm. She was safe. She’d never used Hammond computers for her forums and she never would—her job mattered too much.
‘What do you think, Nadia? Why am I here?’
She shrugged her shoulders slightly. ‘No reason I can think of. Unless you wish to discuss possible employment at Hammond, I don’t think we have anything to say to each other.’
He smiled as he surveyed her. Sitting back in his seat, he was now completely at ease, as if he was the one who worked here, and not total stranger who’d just come in off the street. And he was completely gorgeous, in an all-male, all-arrogant way.
Oh, yes—woman be warned. She knew his type—too good-looking for his own good. A spoilt playboy who’d been outed as a two/three/four or more timer for sure. And he wasn’t happy about it? Too bad.
His eyes compelled her to answer his challenge. Fire burned in them—literally a touch of russet in the cinnamon iris—impossible to ignore.
But she’d damn well try. ‘You might be twice my size, but you don’t intimidate me. You can take your threatening attitude elsewhere.’
‘Threatening?’ He laughed. The sound spiked the air with danger. ‘I’m not here to threaten, Nadia. I’m here to extract a promise.’
She quickly touched her tongue to the inside of her dry lips.
‘The thread about me is defamatory,’ he said bluntly.
‘Well …’ She forced a smile. ‘The defence to defamation is truth.’
‘That’s right,’ he agreed.
‘So you’re saying what’s on there isn’t the truth?’
‘That’s right.’
She shrugged. ‘So prove it.’
Six seconds passed by. Her senses had suddenly grown so acute she could hear the hand of her tiny watch ticking, so she knew exactly.
‘You don’t think that’s the wrong way round Nadia? In a free and just legal system a man is innocent until proven guilty. But in the little world you’ve created he’s guilty until proven innocent. You don’t see a problem with that?’
She shot him a look designed to wither. ‘The men detailed on my site are guilty.’
His answering glare was withering and then some. ‘You don’t accept that it might be open to abuse? You don’t think a woman with a vendetta might take advantage of it?’
‘A woman with a vendetta? Please—men like you made up that kind of stereotype.’
‘So you’re not a woman who was hurt by some man and seeking payback? That isn’t why you set this thing up?’
Her temper flared. ‘I set this up so people had access to information. All kinds of information.’
‘Because all men are bastards?’
‘Information about dating in the modern world,’ she corrected. But this conversation was futile. He was never going to understand—clearly his outsize ego was too bruised. ‘I don’t need to justify myself to you.’
‘Oh, I think you do.’ He leaned forward. ‘I think you need to justify your actions to a lot of people. And why won’t you come clean about it? Why hide behind online anonymity? Your employers here don’t even know.’
She glanced out of those windows, wishing they were solid walls now. Of course they didn’t know. They’d totally disapprove. They stressed online responsibility and reputation—it was what she taught every new recruit. And she did not want to jeopardise her job. She’d worked too hard to get it.
‘I don’t cheat,’ he said firmly. ‘And I don’t swindle naïve girls out of their life savings. So why am I on there?’
‘You’ve obviously hurt someone.’ And she’d be reading the thread to find out how, the second she got the chance.
‘So where’s my right of reply?’
‘You can post a rebuttal. You just have to register and log in.’
‘What? And give myself an anonymous identity like the shrews on there?’ He shook his head. ‘I think you need to take ownership of the site that you’ve created. You need to take responsibility for the accuracy of the content and for the damage that can ensue from it.’
‘In what way has it damaged you?’ He struck her as bulletproof.
He paused. ‘Reputation is an unquantifiably precious thing.’
She knew that. ‘So what do you want?’
He sat back in his seat, the back of his fingers brushing his mouth and jaw. She tried very hard not to follow the movement and