The Cinderella Mission

His face blanked. “Help me out here.”

She forged ahead. “Can you imagine how embarrassing it was for me?”

Still he didn’t move or speak. No emotion showed at all, darn his strong, stubborn chin. He was going to make her spell it out.

“That you don’t want to work with me.”

He scooped up her Eiffel Tower paperweight, studying it as if the snowglobe held answers. “You’re a top-notch informations agent, but you’re still operational support. You’re a rookie in field craft. If you can’t pull your own load, it puts me in danger.”

That gave her pause. The story of the mythological Aries teased through her mind, how the ram was sacrificed after his mission to save the Greek twins. She wouldn’t be able to live with herself if Ethan died or ended up with a bullet in his back because of her. Old insecurities marched over her.

Careful, Kelly. You know how easily you break things.

Watch your step, Kelly. Don’t trample Mama’s flowers.

After a litany of warnings, the dance had left her feet altogether until she found her sedentary refuge in books, the one place she never stumbled.

Cubicle walls threatened to close in on her with a familiar loneliness. Something she refused to let happen again. She wasn’t thirteen anymore, and no one would ever steal the dance from her steps again.

Kelly snatched the paperweight from Ethan and slammed it on her desk. Did he even remember he’d bought it for her? Was he laughing inside over her keeping it?

She launched to her feet. “Director Hatch wouldn’t have put me on the assignment if he didn’t have faith in my abilities.”

The cubicle closed in on them both now in a totally different way. She tried to inch away from the insistent heat of him radiating toward her belly.

Kelly backed farther until she bumped the wall. A picture on the other side rattled, then thumped. Kelly winced at her clumsiness. She would apologize to Carla later.

Ethan rose from the desk, brows pinched and his eyes filled with concern or sympathy. She didn’t know which but couldn’t bear either.

She’d had enough of that from Carla and everyone else in the office. No more hiding behind her hair and her fears. Kelly flipped the too-convenient camouflage of her brown mane over one shoulder and met him nose-to-nose.

Well, nose-to-neck actually, given their height difference. “Can’t you at least be honest with me?”

“About what?”

Damn him, always the agent on the job answering a question with a question. She would give him some answers guaranteed to knock him on his fine butt. “About why you don’t want to work with me.”

His jaw flexed with his gritted teeth for a few telling seconds too long.

Fine. She wanted it out there and acknowledged so they could sweep it away. “It’s because of that ridiculous moment before you left for Gastonia.”

His head angled toward her, his voice lowering. “Kelly, there’s no need to—”

“My work is the most important thing in my life.” This assignment offered hope for finding her voice. She refused to give ground, even though the scent and heat of him swirled through her until she could have sworn she’d pirouetted herself dizzy. “There’s no great risk in saying you feel the same about your position here. That being the case, there certainly is a need to discuss anything that interferes with job performance.”

He glanced down the length of twenty cubicles, then grabbed her elbow. “Okay, you want to talk, we’ll talk. But not here.”

She jerked free. “Why not here?”

“Geez, Kelly.” The force of his whisper caressed over her. “Do you really want to unroll this for everyone to overhear? Even if they’re polite enough to slap on their dicta-phones, every word spoken in this building is taped.”

“So what?” She rubbed her tingling elbow.

“Kel, I’m just thinking of your feelings here.” He reached toward her hair, then stopped midair.

That ripped it.

There was only so much pity a woman could be expected to take in one day, even a woman well-versed in submerging her feelings. First Ethan in Hatch’s office. Then Carla. Even Cupid in his fuzzy felt heart, mocking her from behind his Post-it Note mask.

She hated the way her body reacted to Ethan almost as much as she hated the new awkwardness between them. She wanted this dead-end infatuation gone so she could move on with her life and her dreams.

Kelly cursed Cupid yet again for threatening to ruin what should be an incredible day. Nothing, especially not Ethan Williams, would stand in her way. She wasn’t the studious mouse any longer, afraid to leave her room for fear of causing ripples in her mother’s perfect world. She wasn’t the shy student afraid to report a pervert professor to the dean. Time to take charge of her future.

Kelly climbed up onto her chair and filled her lungs for a proper roar.

Ethan watched Kelly climb up on the chair and wondered what he’d missed. He liked to think he understood women, but this had him stumped.

Other than the fact he’d somehow managed to piss her off. A lot.

Fiery resolve crackled from Kelly in surprise heat waves that had Ethan taking a second look to verify what he saw. Back straight, she smoothed her skirt, tugged the hem of her sweater—outlining the most perfect pair of breasts Ethan had ever seen.

Well, damn. His mouth dried right up. She definitely had his attention.

“Hey, gang,” Kelly projected down the line of cubicles.

He tore his gaze back up to her face where it belonged.

“You all know Ethan Williams, right?”

Heads popped over the cubicle walls, prairie-dog style. Carla Juarez rolled back six inches.

“Is there anyone here who doesn’t know that I have the hots for him?”

Ethan choked on his tongue.

All eyes zeroed in on him. Silence reigned supreme. Ethan resisted the urge to squirm like a spider pinned to a science-project board.

“No? Nobody?” Kelly turned on her chair, her skirt swirling around her scrunched socks and tennis shoes as she checked for the consensus. “That’s what I thought. Can you believe he only just figured it out? Doesn’t say much for his operational skills, if you ask me.”

He had to stop this train wreck in the making. “Kelly, you don’t want to do this.”

She peered down at him with eyes full of steely black resolve. “Since when are you an expert on what I want, Agent Doesn’t-Have-a-Clue?” She returned her attention to her captivated audience. “Now, I suspect I’m not the only one who’s appreciated his fine bod. I’m just not too sly about checking out a man.”

She jumped down from her chair and planted her hands in the small of Ethan’s back. Her shove propelled him into the aisle with surprising strength.

Ethan shot a frown over his shoulder. “Kelly—”

“Of course, what’s not to drool over? Killer-blue eyes. And all that hair.” She whistled long and soft. “Man, I’ll be sorry to see it go.” Arms crossed over her chest, she circled him in a slow perusal. “Hmmm, let’s talk body specifics.”