“Do you find me intimidating, Ms. Miller?”
I consider that objectively. “No. You don’t intimidate me.” My attraction to him does, and so does the idea of losing this job, but he doesn’t.
His brow arches. “You’re sure about that?”
I open my mouth to assure him that I am, but the elevator dings and the doors open to a rush of people. A woman in a business suit is being shoved forward by a group of giggling females. I sidestep to avoid her, but it’s too late: She stomps on my foot. Despite the pain, I manage to catch pieces of conversation that tell me I have just become a victim of a well-lubricated bachelorette party.
I tumble backward, gasping as a hard, big body absorbs mine and strong hands close down on my shoulders. “Easy, Ms. Miller,” I hear in that deep, rough baritone I already know as my boss’s, and then he leans in even closer, his mouth near my ear, his breath warm on my neck. “Are you okay?”
“Yes,” I reply, but it comes out as more a pained pant than a confident assurance. I’m not sure if that’s because my foot has been stomped on, or I’m horribly embarrassed, or I’m tingling everywhere he is touching me—and in some intimate places he is not.
“I’m so sorry,” the offending woman gushes, looking appalled, only to be shoved toward me again as the party piles in and crowds us like sardines in a can. Desperate to stay standing, the foot stomper grabs my arm to steady herself, then quickly lets go. “So sorry.”
“It’s not your fault,” I manage.
Mr. Ward leans down again, and, Lord help me, his chin brushes my hair as he says, “I’m making an executive decision. We need to get out of the car before we are locked inside with them for who knows how many floors.”
“Yes,” I agree, and I all but gasp as his fingers curve intimately at my waist and his body urges me forward.
I don’t breathe until we break free of the elevator and he releases me.
“How’s your foot?” he asks. He is taller than I remember, towering over my five feet five inches, and he’s giving me another one of those intense inspections I tell myself I’ll develop an immunity to. Then again, no matter how many chocolate stomachaches I get, I never seem to get enough.
“Not as painful as my embarrassment,” I assure him, and laugh nervously. “What can I say? I like to make a lasting impression, and since you’re leaving I didn’t have a lot of time.”
“Do you need to sit?”
“We need to get you to the airport,” I say, and add the motto that got me back to me not that long ago. “I’m bruised, not broken.” And I intend to prove it was, and is, true.
His eyes narrow, darken. “Bruised but not broken.” His voice is softer, seeming to caress the words as he adds, “I like that.” And for some reason I’m not sure what he’s talking about or why air is suddenly lodged in my lungs.
“Mr. Ward!”
We both whirl around at the sound of his name being called, and the source appears to be a thirty-something man, with short, dark hair who is wearing a rust-colored jacket and earpiece that gives me the impression that he’s security. My new boss flicks me a look. “I’ll meet you at the car. Tell the doorman you’re with me and he’ll get you to where you have to go.”
I nod but he doesn’t notice, having already turned away from me. I’ve been dismissed. Maybe this job isn’t so unlike working as a reporter. Or, I think cynically, the Thanksgiving with my family that I plan to miss in three weeks’ time.
With a heavy sigh that comes from deep in my soul, I seek out one of the many signs hanging from the casino ceiling and head toward the exit, but something makes me pause. I turn just in time to witness Mr. Ward scrub his hand down his face and mutter a curse I can read from a distance. A second later, his gaze lifts and collides with mine, the turbulence in the depths of his stare crashing into me, a rough blast of dark emotions. For several seconds our eyes hold, and I don’t know why but I have the oddest thought. In this moment of time, I think he, too, is bruised but not broken.
As if he knows I see this, he abruptly turns away, giving me his back.
* * *
“Why aren’t you in the car?”
At the sound of Mr. Ward’s voice, adrenaline surges through me, and I am on my feet, no longer warming the bench I’ve been seated on for a good ten minutes.
“I—”
“Tell me in the car,” he says, cutting me off. “We need to go.” His hand comes down on my back, scorching away the chill of the November air and urging me toward a limo parked a few feet away.
The valet opens the back door and I slide inside. The soft leather hugs my legs, and I pull my skirt to my knees as Mr. Ward joins me, settling in directly across from me. “Why weren’t you waiting in here where it’s warm?” he demands, his voice a reprimand that nears cranky and stirs old ghosts and goblins worthy of the Halloween only a week before. I do not like that they are alive when they should be buried, and I rebel against them and his tone with me.
“I would have liked that,” I say, my voice matching his crankiness, “but the staff gave me the impression they thought I was the newest chick chasing the millionaire CEO.”
The tension vanishes from his face, and a low, sexy rumble of laughter slides from his lips. Instantly, I find myself relaxing into the sound. “You aren’t going to be a wilting flower, are you?”
“Do you want a wilting flower?”