Tempting the Billionaire (Love in the Balance 1)

“Last,” Lori said, pausing to drink down half of her martini. “Home shopping. I’d like to be on QVC by the end of this summer.”

“Home shopping,” Crickitt said. “Who’s handling that aspect of your marketing?”

“Why, you, of course. I wouldn’t hire a company other than Shane’s for my baby. He’s the best.”

“We appreciate your business,” Crickitt said, ignoring the suggestion lacing Lori’s voice. She jotted a note on her yellow pad to Google how to negotiate a television deal.

“You’re pretty.”

Crickitt lifted her head and met the older woman’s shrewd, dark eyes. “Um, thank you.” Crickitt could have paid her a similar compliment. Lori was beautiful.

“I always wanted Shane to settle down with a nice girl,” she said in a motherly fashion.

“Oh, we’re not—”

Lori made a rude noise and waved one bejeweled hand dismissively. “Don’t even. That boy has been mouthwatering for ten years,” she said, her voice trilling in a not-so-motherly fashion. Then Lori said something that drove Crickitt’s suspicions home. And parked them in the detached garage. “He’d be worth it, you know. Even if you lose this job. Although, I suspect if he found the right girl”—she speared Crickitt with a look that made her want to fidget—“he’d forget about being so damn formal all the time and allow himself to finally enjoy life.”

After their meeting concluded, Crickitt saw Lori as far as her office door. Lori promenaded down the corridor and ticked down the stairs in her pointed, heeled shoes. Crickitt felt as if she’d been visited by the ghost of Katharine Hepburn. Or Mae West. She still didn’t know if Lori was someone she liked, but she did have an undeniable “I am woman, hear me roar” quality Crickitt could appreciate.

“She’s really something, huh?”

She turned from Lori’s retreating figure to see Shane leaning on his door frame, his arms crossed over his chest. It wouldn’t have surprised her to see interest, even blatant appraisal for Lori, reflected on his face, but as much as she tried to imagine it there, it wasn’t. What she saw was admiration. Respect.

It didn’t keep a catty remark from tumbling out of her mouth. “She thinks you’re something, too.”

Shane’s eyebrows went up and with them the corner of his lips. “You think so?”

Ignoring his fishing, she spun toward her office and tore a page from the legal pad where she’d been making a list of Lori’s requests.

Shane stood in front of her desk. “That was a long time ago.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Crickitt said, avoiding his eyes to make unnecessary notes on the paper in front of her.

“Yes, you do.”

She forced herself to look at him.

Shane crossed his arms over his chest and regarded her. “There’s nothing between us now,” he said.

Bristling, she clutched her pen. Was she this transparent? “It wouldn’t matter to me if there was.”

Shane stared down at her, a scowl on his cleanly shaven face. Crickitt felt her face warm under his scrutiny, abruptly reminding herself that she was his employee. She was way overstepping her boundaries. And not in a fun-roll-around-on-a-picnic-blanket way.

“I’m—I didn’t mean for that to come out that way,” she said. “Your past and Lori’s is none of my business. I was out of line. It was…”

She stalled, even though she knew exactly what it was. A surge of jealousy paired with regret. Lori knew what Shane meant by “something casual,” and Crickitt was far too unadventurous to find out.

“…unprofessional,” she finished.

Shane held her eye for so long, heat crept along her collar. Just when she was sure he’d call her out, he said, “I’m leaving for a meeting in a few minutes.”

Instinctively, she glanced at her desk calendar.

“You don’t know about it. I’ll be out of the office the remainder of the day.”

“Okay,” she said. She should be relieved Shane was discussing his agenda instead of whatever continued to brew in the air between them. She should be. But she wasn’t.

“Feel free to take off early if you need to. You work too much.”

She didn’t respond, studying his blank face for signs of anger. Or desire. She saw neither.

He peered at the floor for one endless minute before concluding the conversation with a clunky, “Okay, I’ll, uh, let you get back to it.”