‘Now,’ Lesley said icily to Craig, who was sniggering at Poppy’s noisy exit, ‘while you’re wondering why Poppy’s friends aren’t rushing after her to offer support, watch Santino and learn…’
‘What are you talking about?’
‘Upsetting Poppy is not a career-enhancing move in Aragone Systems. You see, if you were a woman and in touch with the real newsbreaking gossip in this building, you would already know that Santino fancies the socks off Poppy, too—’
‘Rubbish!’ Craig snapped. ‘He binned the card!’
‘Did you check the bin at the end of the day?’ someone enquired drily.
‘Santino doesn’t know what’s hit him yet,’ one of the other women commented with immense superiority. ‘He’s more at home with his keyboard than his emotions.’
‘But when a bloke like Santino, who likes everything done by the book, starts telling poor Desmond that pink graphs are fresh and creative, he’s in very deep,’ Lesley completed.
In companionable and expectant silence, the three women then focused pointedly on Santino, who had stridden forward the instant that Poppy had sent the table flying. He swung round to speak to Jenna Delsen and not thirty seconds later left in the same direction as Poppy. Witnessing that demonstration, Craig turned the greyish colour of putty and groaned out loud.
CHAPTER THREE
WHEN Poppy emerged from the function room at full tilt, several women were entering the cloakroom across the foyer and she wheeled away in the opposite direction.
Finding herself by the lifts, she stabbed the call button with a frantic hand and gulped back a sob. She had to find a quiet corner to pull herself back together again. Selecting the marketing floor, she slumped back against the lift’s cold steel wall as the doors closed. Wrapping her arms round herself, she hugged herself tight. But it was no help, no comfort, because all she could think about was what a fool she had made of herself.
When she saw the dark reception area on the marketing floor, it looked eerie and she hit the door button again in a hurry and tried another floor. Her eyes flooded with burning tears. Of course, Santino Aragone would have laughed when he was told who had sent that card. Everybody would be laughing! After all, she was just a junior member of staff, the plump little redhead Craig had nastily labelled, ‘Tinkerbell’ and hardly competition for the gorgeous women Santino specialised in. Why on earth hadn’t common sense intervened before she’d posted that stupid card to Santino at the office? Didn’t she have sense like other people? Her throat aching, she could no longer hold back the tears and a sob escaped her. How could she have exposed herself to that extent?
In the foyer below, Santino was watching the lights that indicated which floor the lift was at. The light flicked through the levels in descent again, made several brief stops and then sank as low as the floor above before beginning to ascend again. When the lift finally reached the executive level, he waited in taut suspense to see if it moved on again.
When the doors opened on the top floor, Poppy blinked in confusion for she had lost track. But low lights were burning and the floor was not in darkness like the others. Dimly recalling that Santino’s secretary had a private washroom, Poppy stumbled out. She needed to tidy herself up and fix her face before she could go home.
But shock was still setting in hard on Poppy. Only when it was far too late to change things did she see her mistake. She should have toughed out Craig’s insinuations. Instead she had fallen right into his trap and confirmed his suspicions. He couldn’t have proved anything, yet she had virtually confessed by saying what she had and leaving the table.
Taunting, wounding images were now bombarding her mind, increasing her distress. She had left the party with all the cool of a baby elephant let loose in a drawing room. She saw Craig’s self-satisfied smile, Santino laughing, the stiff, disapproving faces of the other women. Craig might as well have stripped her naked in public. Her trembling hands braced on the edge of the washroom vanity unit and, letting her head hang for she couldn’t stand to look at herself in the mirror when she hated herself so much for her own stupidity, she began to sob.
Santino had never made it from the lift to his secretary’s office so fast. But then those heartbreaking sobs acted on him like a shriek alarm. He would usually have gone quite some distance to avoid a crying woman, but the curious automatic pilot now overruling his normal caution ensured that he strode right through the open door of the washroom and gathered Poppy straight into a comforting embrace.
The sheer shock value of a pair of masculine arms closing round her when she had believed that she was alone provoked a startled cry from Poppy. Then she looked up and focused on Santino and even more shock froze her from head to toe. Bronze-coloured eyes set below lush black lashes were trained to hers, the lean, dark contours of his handsome features taut with concern.
‘It’s OK,’ he soothed in his gorgeous accented drawl.
‘Is it?’ Poppy’s voice emerged on the back of a breathless sob, for she could not have got oxygen into her lungs at that instant had her life depended on it. What was happening should have felt unreal but, in actuality, being in the circle of Santino’s arms felt very real and very right. Furthermore, it was something she had been dreaming of for so long that no power on earth could have sent her into retreat.
‘Course it is,’ Santino asserted, not really knowing what he was talking about, then deciding it was safer to confine himself to inconsequentials rather than risk reawakening her distress. Lifting a lean hand, he curved it round the back of her head to urge her face back into his shoulder where she had started out.
Poppy’s tension evaporated and she subsided against him, feeling as boneless as a rag doll. The faint aroma of whatever shaving lotion he used assailed her and immediately became familiar to her: rather exotic, distinctively male. She sucked in a steadying breath, her fingers resting lightly against his broad shoulder, yet she could still feel the flex of his lean, powerful muscles beneath the expensive cloth of his jacket as he held her close. He could be so kind. How had she managed to forget how considerate he had been when she had hurt her finger and he had taken her to hospital? A little calmer, better able to think than she had been minutes earlier at the height of her distress, she saw how unlikely it was that Santino had been nastily indulging in a good laugh at her expense with his ladyfriend. He wasn’t like that.
‘Let’s get out of here,’ Santino urged with a faint quiver of wry amusement edging his deep voice. ‘This is my secretary’s inner sanctum and I feel like an intruder.’
In a jerky motion, she peeled herself from him again, her colour high, her eyes lowering, for she was sure she looked a total fright after giving way to all those tears. Her nose would be pink, her eyes swollen and her mascara might have run. Not that she felt that he would care either way, but she didn’t want him seeing her at her very worst. He pressed a light hand to her tense spine and turned her back into the office beyond and on into what had to be his own office.
Abandoning her in the centre of the dark room, Santino strode over to the desk to switch on the light there and indicated a door to her left. ‘You can freshen up in there if you like.’
Her eyes widened at the sight of the big luxurious office and then centred back on Santino where he was poised by his desk. The pool of illumination shed by the lamp shrank the large room to more cosy contours but simply emphasised his impact. He was so tall, so wonderfully dark and vibrant. Why was it that every time she looked at Santino he seemed more gorgeous than ever? As she encountered the onslaught of his mesmeric dark golden eyes her heartbeat thudded in what felt like the foot of her throat. She reddened, suddenly all too conscious of the emotions that had got her into such a mess in the first place. Dropping her head again, she went through the door he had indicated.
Santino released his breath in a slow, sustained hiss. He would chat to her for a while just to smooth matters over and then tuck her into a taxi to go home. Concerned employer? He grimaced, picturing he
r standing there in that green dress that defined her lush curves, the fiery luxuriance of her glorious hair tumbling round her face, bright blue eyes full of strain. He wanted to see her usual sunny smile replace that hunted look. He just liked her, that was all. There was nothing wrong with that that he could see.
Poppy winced when she saw her tousled reflection in the mirror on the wall of Santino’s opulent washroom. Breathing in deep because her head was swimming a little, she repaired her eye make-up but didn’t bother to refresh her lipstick, lest he think that she was getting tarted up for his benefit. Don’t think about that valentine card, she warned herself fiercely. What was done was done and, whether he knew she had penned that card or not, he was hardly likely to mention it. Having dried her hands, she emerged again.
‘Take a seat,’ Santino told her.
‘Don’t you have to get back to the party?’
‘No. I don’t usually stay to the bitter end. My presence tends to inhibit people,’ Santino advanced with a wry smile that lent his lean, dark face such innate charm that for several tense seconds she simply couldn’t take her eyes from him. ‘Would you like a drink?’
‘What have you got?’
‘Just about everything,’ Santino informed her, deadpan. ‘Come and have a look…’
Madly self-conscious of her own every move, but enervated by the novel sensation of being alone with him, Poppy moved closer, peered into the packed drinks cabinet and opted for what she hoped was the most sophisticated choice. She backed away with the glass until her legs brushed the low arm of one of the comfortable leather sofas that filled one corner. She sat down on the arm, too skittish to seat herself in the more normal way.
She watched him pour a brandy from a cut-crystal decanter, light burnishing his black hair, accentuating his hard cheekbones and the very faint blue cast of stubble already shadowing his strong jawline. She hadn’t seen him when he needed a shave before and she decided that it gave him a very sexy, macho look. As he straightened he shot a glance at her and caught her staring.
‘So,’ Santino murmured on a casual note intended to put her at her ease. ‘Where did you work before you came here?’
‘I was a nanny…that’s what I trained for when I left school,’ Poppy advanced, her face flushed, her voice tense as she strove to match his relaxation.
‘A nanny.’ Santino was initially surprised and then he saw her in his mind’s eye surrounded by a bunch of children and it was like the missing piece of a jigsaw puzzle suddenly sliding into place for him. Kids would adore her, he thought. She would throw herself into their games, never mind when they got dirty, fuss over them and hug them when they got hurt. Thinking of the chilly, correct sourpuss of a nanny he had had to endure as a little boy, he felt positively deprived.
‘How come you ended up in Aragone Systems?’ Santino prompted.
Poppy sighed. ‘My first placement was with a diplomat’s family and I was with them for two whole years…’
‘Did they make you work endless hours for a pittance?’ Santino enquired cynically.