Taken by the Boss: His Very Personal Assistant / In the Banker's Bed / The Takeover Bid

‘I had a feeling you might,’ Penny acknowledged wryly. ‘I’ll see you later, Kit?’

She gave a thankful shake of her head; she needed to get her own thoughts about this weekend into some sort of order before subjecting herself to Penny’s obvious interest in finding her kissing Marcus! ‘I’m going to see my parents this afternoon,’ she explained economically. ‘I’ll be back late tomorrow.’

‘I’ll look forward to it,’ Penny assured her. ‘Nice to meet you, Mr Maitland,’ she added warmly.

‘Marcus,’ he insisted. ‘Nice to meet you too, Penny.’

A smile remained on his lips only long enough for Penny to get into her car and drive away with a friendly wave of her hand.

At which time he looked down at Kit with accusing eyes. ‘Yesterday you deliberately let me think your flatmate was a man.’

‘I did not,’ Kit defended. ‘I simply didn’t say one way or the other.’

‘Exactly,’ he sighed impatiently. ‘But you knew I had assumed it was a man.’

‘I knew no such thing!’ she denied calmly. ‘If you chose to think that, then—’

‘Kit, why are we arguing again?’ He winced. ‘The last thing I want to do at this moment is argue with you!’

One look at his face, at the glitter of intent in his blue gaze as it fixed on the pouting softness of her mouth, was enough to tell her what he did want to do with her!

But they simply couldn’t continue to behave in this way, not if they were to continue working together. A break away from each other, to get things back into perspective, was exactly what they needed.

‘I really do have to go, Marcus,’ she told him after a glance at her wrist-watch. ‘My train leaves in just under an hour,’ she added pointedly.

He drew in a sharply disapproving breath at her haste. ‘I had better let you go, then, hadn’t I?’

That urge to ask him to come to Cornwall with her after all returned with a vengeance, the words actually on the tip of her tongue. A tongue she bit with sharp purpose, deliberately saying nothing.

‘Fine,’ Marcus said abruptly. ‘Thank you for your help this weekend, Kit. I appreciate it.’

She gave a rueful smile. ‘I don’t think, with the situation that developed with Mike Reynolds, that I was much of an asset!’ More of a liability, really!

He shook his head. ‘Forget Mike Reynolds,’ he dismissed. ‘Desmond was the main reason for going this weekend, and he liked you very much.’

Her eyes widened. ‘He did?’

‘Oh, yes,’ Marcus confirmed. ‘I believe you had a word with him yourself before we left…?’

Actually, she had had several words with their host before leaving earlier, having decided she would probably never see Desmond Hayes again, so she might as well tell him exactly what she thought about his separation from his wife, and the reason for it. But she hadn’t realised he had mentioned that conversation to Marcus…

She gave a self-conscious grimace. ‘Did he say that I had?’

‘He did.’ Marcus nodded approvingly. ‘On your advice, he’s going to call Jackie this afternoon and hopefully meet up with her to discuss having half a dozen kids or so!’

‘Half a dozen—!’ Kit gasped. ‘I don’t think I said anything about six children…!’

Marcus grinned. ‘Whatever you said, it was the right thing. I have a feeling that Desmond and I are going to have quite a healthy business relationship in future.’

Then Kit had fulfilled her role as his personal assistant. Because that was all she was to him, no matter how much she might wish it were otherwise.

‘What did you say to him to make him act so quickly?’ Marcus looked at her searchingly.

‘I think it was something along the lines of life being too short, and love being too hard to find to let it go because sometimes the commitment of that love might frighten us.’

Marcus’s gaze became guarded. ‘You sound like someone who has had experience of the emotion…?’

Only as regards her own parents. If her mother hadn’t been so determined to be with the man she loved, if her father hadn’t been that man, then Kit knew she would never have been born.

‘Maybe,’ she answered noncommittally.

Marcus stepped back from her. ‘I’ll let you get off, then.’

‘Yes,’ she agreed, knowing that one of them had to make a move. But also realising that neither of them seemed to want to do that. ‘I have to catch my train,’ she reminded Marcus firmly, giving him a quick smile before turning to run lightly up the stairs to open the door to her apartment building, determined not to look back, knowing it could be her undoing if she did.

All the time feeling as if she were leaving the biggest part of her standing outside on the pavement…

CHAPTER ELEVEN

‘GOOD weekend?’

Kit looked up at the sound of Lewis Grant’s voice. ‘Not particularly,’ she answered honestly.

‘Oh?’ He leant against the side of her desk, obviously in no hurry to go to his own office down the corridor.

She put aside the papers she had been working on for the last half an hour to give him her full attention. ‘Those sort of house parties aren’t really my scene.’

Lewis grinned understandingly. ‘Lots of glitz and glamour on the surface—and knives being wielded behind the backs!’

‘Something like that,’ she said noncommittally.

To be perfectly honest, she really wasn’t quite with it this bright and sunny Tuesday morning, was wishing herself anywhere but here.

Luckily, Marcus hadn’t arrived in the office yet. Kit usually arrived half an hour or so before he did so that she could deal with any urgent correspondence and put it on his desk.

Lewis chuckled. ‘I quite enjoy them, actually. But I can understand why some people wouldn’t,’ he sympathized.

Especially someone like her, Kit silently added. Prim Miss McGuire, the PA from No-Nonsenseville, was back in place this morning; after the intimacy that seemed to have developed between herself and Marcus over the weekend, she had thought it for the best. Not that she for a moment thought she would have Marcus chasing her around the desk at every opportunity; no, prim Miss McGuire was for her own protection—from her feelings towards Marcus!

‘It was okay.’ Kit returned her attention to Lewis.

‘Any success with Desmond Hayes?’ he enquired with interest.

‘Not particularly,’ she returned. ‘I’m really not being a lot of help this morning, am I?’

‘Probably tired after the weekend.’ Lewis smiled understandingly.

‘I still don’t understand why Marcus didn’t take me with him,’ he mused. ‘But there you are. I suppose—’