The Boss's Bride

‘I wasn’t aware I was talking to anyone.’

In other words, Claris thought wryly, mind your own business. ‘What did you think of your aunt?’

‘I don’t think I thought anything,’ he denied. ‘Why the remark about the baby?’ he asked, in the sort of voice that had often reduced past secretaries to tears. He’d had a great many secretaries, or so she’d been told. None of them had lasted very long.

‘I was being naughty,’ she said simply.

‘Then I would appreciate it if you would learn to contain it, and not make injudicious remarks.’

‘It wasn’t injudicious,’ she denied, without offence. ‘Your aunt had already asked me about it.’

‘And you told her?’

She slanted him a glance of derision.

‘Sorry,’ he apologised.

‘Accepted. She said she didn’t intend to live in your pocket.’

‘I’m very glad to hear it.’

‘But I suspect the same couldn’t be said of Mrs Staple Smythe.’

‘Then you had best make sure my pockets are always unavailable, hadn’t you? And don’t sigh.’ With one of his quicksilver changes of moods, he promised humorously, ‘I’ll let you look after the baby tomorrow.’

‘How kind. Sadly, I will be unable to take you up on your generous offer. If you want your printer replaced, I shall have to go to London and bully someone.’

‘Bully them over the phone.’

‘But it works so much better face-to-face,’ she informed him softly as she pushed open the narrow side gate that led into the extensive grounds. ‘Anyway, I have to see the letting agent about my flat.’ She thought it might also be wise to try and change the sub-lease from long-term to short. In case she needed a bolt-hole. Having met the residents, she wasn’t entirely sure she was going to like living in Wentsham.

CHAPTER ONE

THE Secret Garden, Claris thought humorously as she all but circumnavigated the red-brick wall before finding the rear entrance. Pushing open the gate, she stepped quietly inside. Enchanted, she halted to stare about her. Trees, shrubs, ancient statuary, and a flowering vine that scrambled unchecked over an old pergola. Closing her eyes, she breathed in the heady scent of honeysuckle. The sun was warm on her face, and for the first time in days she felt at peace. She hadn’t even known this part of the garden existed, but then, she thought wryly, the last few hectic days hadn’t given her much time for investigation.

Looking after Adam’s business interests was a difficult enough job. Adding a fourteen-month-old baby to the equation made it almost impossible. Before moving to Wentsham, she had wondered how hard would it be. Hard, was the answer. She had sort of assumed that a one-year-old would sit quietly and play with his toys—when he wasn’t asleep, that was. Not true. Nathan was active. So was Adam. Apart from helping out with the baby, he had expected her to set up his office in the house so that everything ran smoothly to beg, plead, sob, in order to get another phone line put in immediately, and then, hastily and exhaustingly, remove everything from the baby’s path. A one-baby demolition derby, that was what Nathan was. She must have run miles just chasing after him to prevent an accident. Not that she’d had to do it all herself. Adam was trying to be practical. He was also desperately worried about his friends, Nathan’s parents. Paul was still in a coma, Jenny in and out of consciousness but seemingly unaware of what had happened. Jenny’s parents, who had been in the car with them, weren’t on the critical list, but it would be weeks before they could be discharged. Which left only Adam, and herself, and his housekeeper to look after the baby.

Reluctant to move on, Claris spent another few moments just listening to the gentle buzzing of the bees in the honeysuckle, the call of a lone blackbird, and then began following the narrow, meandering path towards the small gate she could see ahead of her. Opening it, she stepped through into the garden proper. The manicured lawn, courtesy of an excellent gardener, looked almost emerald after the morning’s rain. A riotous profusion of flowers bordered each side, spilling lazily across the paths, and led the eye towards the old red-brick house before her. Grays Manor. Envy was as foreign to her nature as greed, but this house generated it in her. The first time she had seen it she had wanted it to be hers. Dream on.

With a wry smile she began walking along the path, past the French doors that stood slightly open, until she came to another wrought-iron gate. Pushing it open, she entered the paved courtyard. A vintage car stood before the old stable block. A pair of long legs protruded horizontally from the left-hand side—and the baby was crawling determinedly towards a cat that was lazily sunning itself beside a tub of geraniums.

‘Hello, pumpkin,’ she greeted softly, and the baby, presumably knowing he was about to be thwarted, increased his pace towards his goal. With a laugh in her eyes, she walked across to the car and gently touched her foot to one protruding leg. And no one would ever know, she thought pensively, how such a small action could set her heart beating into overdrive. With no hint of how she was feeling in her voice, she asked quietly, ‘Should that baby be crawling out here unattended?’

There was the thump of a head hitting the bottom of the car, a curse, and then the rapid emergence of the mechanic. Dark tousled hair, a filthy face, hands covered in black grease, one of which held a spanner. Dark eyes surveyed her with languid interest before he turned his head to watch the baby.

‘He’s investigating,’ Adam drawled. ‘He won’t come to any harm. Lydia’s watching him, and you’re late.’

‘Traffic was bad,’ she said mildly. Checking to see that the housekeeper really was watching him, she walked on. Some days were better than others. Some days she could get through all their working hours without actually wanting to touch him. And some days she couldn’t. With a determination she sometimes found quite frightening, she firmly dismissed the matter.

Reaching the side door of the house, which stood open, she walked quietly inside. A feeling of age enveloped her, of centuries past, and she breathed in the heady aroma of polish and musk and antiquity. A baby-gate was fixed incongruously across the bottom of the beautiful staircase.

‘I love this house,’ she murmured.

‘You can’t afford it,’ Adam said from behind her.

‘Yet,’ she said softly, and he laughed.

Turning, she watched him wiping his hands on an oily rag. She wasn’t quite sure which was doing the best job of transferring the grease. ‘I forgot to take the device to open the front gates,’ she informed him, ‘and so I had to leave my car in the lane and walk round the back.’

He grunted.

‘But if I hadn’t done that, I wouldn’t have found the secret garden. It’s beautiful.’

‘It’s a mess.’

She smiled again. ‘You have no soul.’ Her heels clipped on the tiled floor as she walked into the room on the left, and then she halted. Boxes littered the floor; files were stacked on the desk, the chair, and on one of the filing cabinets. Paper spewed from the fax machine and the computer was buried beneath the pink sheets of the Financial Times. Turning, she gave Adam a look of admonishment.

‘Neville sent down the rest of the papers I needed,’ he told her indolently as he leaned in the doorway. ‘I’ll clear them away later.’

‘Your accountant knows very well that the information is on disk,’ she countered mildly. ‘We don’t need paper.’

‘I do. What did they say?’

‘Two weeks.’

He waited, eyes amused.

She gave a slow smile. ‘You know me too well.’ In fact, he didn’t know her at all. There was a clunk from behind him, and they both turned to look. With a little tsk, Adam bent down to remove the radiator cap from the baby’s fist. ‘No,’ he said firmly.

Nathan beamed at him and crawled energetically towards Claris. Using her legs as an aid, little fingers pinching into the flesh, causing her to wince, he climbed to his feet and stared up at her. His scrutiny was as intense as hers. And then he laughed and tugged on her skirt. Dropping her large handbag, she bent to scoop him up and into her arms, and then gave a little grunt of pain as he dug his feet into her waist and proceeded to try and climb higher. All attempts at restraint failed.

‘You’re a pickle,’ she told him. ‘And don’t pull my hair.’

‘Dib, dib.’

She grinned, and he suddenly lunged forward, mouth open to reveal a row of tiny teeth. Quickly jerking backwards, she gently placed him back on the floor. ‘Piranha,’ she scolded.

‘How well do I know you?’ he prompted.

‘Well enough to know that your replacement printer will be here tomorrow.’

‘And if it wasn’t?’ he asked softly.

‘Then the order would be cancelled and we would go somewhere else.’ There was a slithering sound and she turned quickly to see the pile of files on the chair slowly topple.

Adam was faster, and scooped the baby out of the way of the avalanche just in time. She took Nathan from him before he could get grease all over the baby, and put him down the other side of the desk. Like a needle to a magnet, he headed straight for the bookcase.

‘And?’