The Ex Who Hired Her

He gave her a cool, formal nod and turned away.

By the end of the week, Alexandra was absolutely certain that Jordan was avoiding her. He never seemed to visit the staff canteen—or, at least, not when she did; he hadn’t dropped in to see how his newest manager was coping in the role, delegating that task to Harry; and he hadn’t acknowledged her once on his daily walkabouts in the store, even though she knew damn well he’d seen her talking to customers and staff and setting up the customer audits.

Worse still, even when her back had been to him, her body seemed to have developed some kind of radar system that told her exactly where he was. And it was infuriating that she was still so aware of him.

If she was honest with herself, she knew the old attraction between them had never really gone away. But she’d just have to ignore it, because she didn’t repeat her mistakes. Apart from the fact that Jordan Smith had been the second-biggest mistake of her life, her marriage had taught her just how rubbish her judgement was when it came to men. As far as she was concerned, from now on, she was married to her career. At least her career wasn’t going to let her down or try to control her or make her feel bad about herself.

Though Jordan was the CEO here, and she was planning to make quite a few changes. Which meant that they were going to have to work together. They’d need to discuss her plans. Since he clearly wasn’t going to make the first move and establish a decent working relationship between them, then she was going to have to be the one to do it. ‘Stubborn, annoying, ridiculous man,’ she muttered, and printed out the report she’d been working on.

It was late enough on a Friday evening for the rest of the office staff to have gone home, but she knew that Jordan would be working late. He put in a crazy number of hours—a work schedule that would strain just about any marriage to creaking point. Which wasn’t her problem; she wasn’t in the slightest bit interested in whether Jordan Smith was married and how happy he was. But his working habits did mean that she’d be able to talk to him this evening without anyone else being able to overhear.

Just in case it got awkward.

She walked down to the far end of the corridor—had he deliberately made sure that her office was as far away as possible from his? she wondered—and looked through the open door. He was seated at his desk, working at his computer. She’d never seen him wearing glasses before, and it made her catch her breath; right now he looked incredibly clever and incredibly sexy.

But she had to remember that she couldn’t trust him as far as she could roll a ten-ton boulder up a slope.

OK, as a boss he seemed reasonable enough, and everyone she’d talked to in the department store had spontaneously mentioned what a nice guy he was and how he really cared about the staff; but when it came to personal stuff she knew he wasn’t in the slightest bit reasonable or reliable. She had the physical scars to remind her. Scars that only a surgeon would see, but they were most definitely there. The physical ache had gone, but the emotional ache was something she’d learned to live with over the years.

She rapped on the door jamb.

He looked up, and his eyes widened in surprise. ‘Is there something you need?’

‘I just thought you might like to know what I’ve been working on for the last week.’

He shrugged. ‘I don’t believe in micromanagement. I know my managers are perfectly capable of doing their jobs.’

Ha. Considering he clearly hadn’t wanted to give her the job in the first place, that was rich. ‘Well, I’m telling you anyway, because I believe in good communications.’ Neatly pointing out his own failings in that area, without actually saying the words. ‘This is the stuff about the social media. It’s a quick win and a small budget.’ She walked over to his desk and handed him the report.

‘You could’ve emailed this to me. Or given it to my PA.’

‘So I could.’ He wasn’t even going to try meeting her halfway, was he? ‘I’ll remember that in future.’ She gave him a cool smile and walked away.

Jordan almost called her back. Almost. But, until he’d managed to inure himself against those beautiful brown eyes, he needed to keep some distance between them.

Even so, instead of putting her report in his in-tray for later, he read through it.

There was a concise summary at the beginning, then each section had figures to back up her recommendations. She was definitely as bright as he remembered. And she was a team player: she’d acknowledged the input of every member of staff from the shop floor who’d made a suggestion. She’d suggested who would be good at hosting each of the community forums she’d recommended, and why. All the store’s departments were included: home, garden, fashion, beauty, kitchen, technology, sport. She wanted sections on the website for articles giving ‘how to’ advice on everything from choosing lighting in a room or the right pillow for you through to make-up demonstrations and fashion tips, and she already had people in mind to write them or be filmed in action for a demonstration.

In one short week, she’d managed to spot the strengths of the team, and reinforce them. It was exactly as Harry and Gina had said: she’d be a real asset to the firm.

So why did he feel so antsy around her?

Not wanting to answer that question, he typed her a swift email instead. Headed ‘Social media’.

I’ll talk to the Board next week and recommend that they agree your plans. JS.

Nicely formal.

And now he could go back to what he’d been doing before she’d torpedoed his concentration.

Easier said than done, Jordan thought wryly the following day, when he saw Alexandra balanced precariously on the top of a ladder in the toy department. She was standing on tiptoe, for pity’s sake. ‘What do you think you’re doing?’ he demanded.

‘Putting up a banner in the department to publicise the first story-time session, next week,’ Alexandra said. ‘What does it look like?’

‘Dangerous, with a flagrant disregard for health and safety. You could hurt yourself, as well as customers or colleagues. Why didn’t you ask Bill—or anyone taller than you, for that matter—to do it?’

‘Bill was busy, and I wanted the banner up as soon as possible. The kids have worked hard on this.’

‘Kids?’ Jordan wasn’t following.

‘My friend Meggie’s Year Two class.’

Meggie? He narrowed his eyes. He remembered Meggie. Alexandra’s best friend. Ten years ago, she’d had great pleasure in telling him that Alexandra was married to someone who would treat her properly, and he could go and take a running jump. Or words to that effect. ‘I see,’ he said crisply.

But he noticed that the banner was composed of the words ‘story time here Monday 10 a.m.’, with each letter carefully cut out, painted and glued to the banner. And all around them were glued drawings of book covers, clearly the children’s favourite books. The children had obviously worked really hard to make the banner bright and colourful. To make it special, for Alexandra.

Year Two. The children in the class would all be aged seven. If things had been different, he and Alexandra might’ve had a child of their own in that class, as well as another in Year Five …

The thought made him snap at her. ‘Will you get down from there before you fall?’

‘I won’t fall.’

In a suit and high heels? He wasn’t going to take the risk. ‘Get down,’ he said again. ‘I’ll put the damn thing up for you.’

For a moment, he thought she was going to defy him, but then she shrugged. ‘Fine. Thank you.’

He had to take his eyes off her legs as she descended from the ladder, carefully holding the banner.

Then she handed him one end. He’d just finished fixing it to the ceiling when he glanced down at her, and realised that she had a camera in her hands. ‘What are you doing?’

‘Taking shots for social media. To show that our CEO isn’t afraid to get his hands dirty.’

‘You’re photographing me?’

‘I’ll let you vet the pictures, first.’ She gave him a wicked grin. ‘Maybe.’

Infuriating woman. He was about to say something cutting, when she asked, ‘Would you mind putting the other end up for me, too, please, as you’re here?’

After the fuss he’d made about her being up the ladder, he could hardly say no. He gave her a speaking look, but did so.

‘My hero,’ she purred.

‘Don’t push it,’ he warned.

She just batted her eyelashes at him. And it made him want to grab her shoulders and …

Kiss her.