In Bed with the Boss

“The biggest danger isn’t the kind you can protect me from.” Her brandy-colored eyes teased him.

He took her arm and turned her for the door. “Tell me all about it.”

“Michigan Avenue. It’s in walking distance and I’ve got plastic. Blocks and blocks of great stores. I could end up spending a whole lot of money I don’t even have.”

“So I swear I won’t take you shopping. Whew. Another bankruptcy averted. Aren’t you glad I’m here?”

She smiled again. He loved her smile. “Okay. I’m glad. Happy now?” She looked worried, suddenly. “Where’s your jacket?”

“You’re a hell of an assistant. Nothing gets by you.”

“If someone’s walked off with your suit coat…”

“I left it—along with my tie—at the office.” He guided her through the door into the warmth of the evening. “Nice out.” He kept her hand wrapped around his arm and headed north on Clark, for no other reason than that staying on the move seemed a good way to keep her with him.

They were going to be working closely together from now on and it never hurt to get a little social time with his assistant. No, he’d never walked arm-in-arm up Clark Street with Verna. But then, Verna was fifty-four and happily married. Different assistant, different approach.

Tom wanted to know more about Shelly. That seemed perfectly reasonable to him. He liked her and she was a colleague, a colleague who interested him. A lot.

In no time, they’d reached Washington Square. They walked around the park, admiring the elaborate masonry buildings erected by Chicago’s elite after the famous fire at the end of the nineteenth century. Then he led her on the path that ran diagonally through the center of the square.

He said, “I thought we ought to get to know each other better.”

She paused on the concrete walk. “How well is ‘better’?”

“Well, I don’t know. Better than we know each other now.” He guided her forward a few steps.

But she only stopped again and pulled her arm from his. They stood exactly in the middle of the square of park, facing each other. “I want this job, Tom. I love it already.”

“Good.”

“And I need it. I don’t want to do anything that could potentially screw it up.”

“I don’t see how you could screw it up. You’re very good, Shelly. Smart. Efficient. With strong office skills.”

“I’m not talking about how good I am at my job.”

Tom gave up finessing her. He looked at her steadily. “Of course you’re not.”

She caught her lower lip between her pretty white teeth. “I… This is so awkward. And I’m scared that you’re going to get offended—or worse.”

“I’m not. I promise you.”

She laughed, a nervous sound. “Men do, you know?”

He wanted to touch her. But he kept his hands to himself. “Not me.”

She pressed those soft lips together and nodded. “Well. Good. Sometimes…office romances work out fine.” She spoke slowly. Thoughtfully. “But sometimes —probably more often than not—they end with someone hurt. Or someone angry. Then working together becomes too difficult. I can’t have that happen. I really can’t.”

He got the message. Loud and clear. It was a reasonable argument, and he could understand her fears. He wanted to tell her not to worry, that no matter what, she wouldn’t lose her job as his assistant. But he had no right to promise such a thing. In the end, there really were no guarantees.

“Come on.” He touched her arm, but didn’t take it. She went with him the rest of the way through the park to a row of iron benches on the edge of the square, facing the imposing facade of the Newberry Library.

For a while they just sat there. Tom let the silence spin out. It was full dark by then, the streetlights blooming bright, the fountain in front of the library bubbling away, making those happy splashing sounds as the water shot upward and tumbled back into the fountain’s bowl. An old couple strolled past, the man frailer than the woman. He held her arm and leaned heavily on a cane. And there were others, most walking fast, in a hurry to get wherever they were going.

“You live in Forest Park, right?” he asked after a while.

She sent him a glance.

He put up both hands. “Don’t shoot me. It was on your résumé.”

An unwilling smile broke across those full lips. She shook her head. “Do you ever give up?”

“Persistence. Key to success. Tell me about your place.”

“Tom…”

“Come on. It’s getting-to-know-you time. Totally innocent.”

“Hah.”

She had him pegged. It wasn’t innocent. Tom knew that. Not innocent in the least. He was drawn to Shelly. Powerfully. She made him want to take the kind of chances he’d long ago stopped taking.

He knew he should respect the boundaries she’d just set. But when he looked into those brown eyes of hers, well, what he should be doing seemed of no importance.

“About your place…?”

She blew out a breath. “Oh, all right. It’s got three bedrooms and two baths. My parents helped me buy it. It’s small, but it’s mine.” She turned to him. In the glow of the streetlamp a few feet away, her eyes were dark velvet and her skin shone like pearls.

Tom smiled to himself. He knew she liked him. Maybe more than she wanted to like him. He’d take it a day at a time. Anything might happen.

As a rule, he would never consider seducing his secretary. But he was considering it. More than considering it. It felt…right, somehow, with Shelly. He wanted her. And he liked her. That seemed a rare thing to him. As each day passed, Tom was only more certain that, between him and Shelly, the rules didn’t apply.

She said, “You realize I know almost nothing about you.”

“Is that an accusation?”

She sighed. “Well, yeah. I guess it is. Where do you live?”

“I’ve got a great condo on East Randolph.”

“Right in the Loop.” The Loop was downtown, so named because the train system looped in a circle around it. Living space there was at a premium. She went on, “I might have guessed. And you can see Grant Park from your balcony, right?”

“Yeah. I can see it.” He nudged her with his elbow. Gently.

She shot him a wary glance. “What?”

“We could go there right now. I’ll show you my… view.”