Cinderella and The Playboy

“You can’t fire me.” Jeff Rhodes grinned widely. “I’m too valuable…your CFO and your friend.” He slid a fax across Tanner’s massive desk. “And speaking as both, I see no other way. Two other corporations are chomping at the bit for this deal, and both CEOs have wives. It looks to me like Frank Swanson wants an honest, good old-fashioned family man. So if you’re hell-bent on acquiring the Swanson Sweets Candy Company, you’d better consider producing a Mrs. Tanner ASAP.”

Swiveling around in his chair, Tanner turned to face the floor-to-ceiling windows. From his offices on the thirty-first floor, he stared out across the city of Los Angeles and beyond to the ocean. It was a crystal-clear Wednesday in October—no smog, perfect sunshine—but he barely saw it. His mind raced to find another solution to the problems plaguing what should have been an easy purchase. He wanted that candy company. Hell, he wanted every company that posed a challenge to him. Acquisitions seemed to fill a hole in him, even if the feeling was only temporary.

Jeff was right, though. Acquiring Swanson Sweets was going to take more than quick thinking, clever strategies and Tanner’s trademark never-say-die negotiating style.

Friday morning he was flying to Minneapolis. He was the last of the competitors to stay with the Swansons for the weekend. It was a chance for each man to see how the company was run, tour the plant, and get to know the family behind the chocolate.

“I spoke with Harrison this morning,” Jeff said, breaking off Tanner’s thoughts.

Tanner inhaled sharply. Mitchell Harrison was as ruthless a businessman as they came. He also wanted to own Swanson Sweets—and would be willing to pay top dollar for the honor. Harrison’s own candy company was a longtime rival to Swanson Sweets, and he was looking to eliminate the competition. But the man was three times divorced and a notorious womanizer. Tanner had heard through the acquisition grapevine that Swanson wouldn’t even review a bid from Harrison—no matter how high he went. And Tanner couldn’t help but assume that the reason was rooted in Harrison’s spotty reputation.

Jeff cleared his throat. “He’s willing to pay a hefty premium to buy Swanson Sweets from you once you get it from Swanson.”

“I’m still considering it,” Tanner answered tightly.

Tanner ground his teeth. What the hell was he considering anyway? Buying and selling. It was his standard M.O. But in this case, taking a man’s life’s work and selling it to the highest bidder—to someone who only wanted to dissolve the company—well, for some reason this time that wasn’t sitting very well with him.

For forty-two years, Frank Swanson had poured everything he had into his candy company, built it from the ground up, with his family by his side. He was ready to retire and had two married daughters who weren’t interested in taking over. He was willing to sell, but his actions seemed to verify Jeff’s assumption that Swanson would only sell to someone with values similar to his own.

Tanner rubbed his jaw. Why any man would choose to settle down, get married and have children was beyond him. All investment and no return. Perhaps if you could see into someone’s heart, know their motivations, predict their actions, it might work. But you couldn’t. Family was trouble with a capital T.

He had little room for opinions in this matter. If a wife was what it was going to take to win, Tanner would sure as hell do it.

He leaned back in his chair. “So the question now becomes who.”

“How about Olivia?” Jeff prompted.

“I don’t think so.”

“Karen?”

“Too aggressive.”

“What about that actress you were seeing?”

Tanner chuckled and stood up. “And have every conversation reduced to liposuction and fat grams?” He walked over to the bar and poured himself a glass of water. “This woman can’t be anyone I see socially, Jeff. I don’t want my female friends thinking marriage is ever an option with me. I need a simple woman, sweet, elegantly dressed. Educated, but not snobbish. No party girls.”

Jeff muttered an oath. “This is L.A. Where are you going to look? The library?”

Tanner drained his glass. “Why not? I can turn a sparrow into a swan if I have to.”

Jeff laughed. “Hell, if you’re looking for a sparrow, why not try your mail room?”

Tanner’s head came up with a snap. “What’s in the mail room?”

“My secretary informs me that the hardworking ladies down there run a sort of daily Tanner Watch. Most of them have quite a crush, apparently.” With a snort, he added, “Well, all except for one, she says.”

Tanner sat down on the edge of his desk, fascinated by Jeff’s knowledge of the downstairs machinations of Tanner Enterprises. “Oh, really? And who does your secretary say that one is?”

“Abby something-or-other.” Jeff chuckled.

A redhead with killer green eyes and a soft mouth snaked through Tanner’s mind. Polite and shy, the pretty lady who brought him his mail never tried to catch his eye like most of the women in the office. She wore frumpy, conservative clothes to hide whatever she felt she had to hide, but Tanner had always had a sneaking suspicion that what she was hiding was worth a look.

But he’d never know. The woman had a demeanor—a look he could spot with accuracy—that had “home and hearth” written all over it. And he stayed a million miles away from women like that.

“You know,” Jeff began, a light glowing in his eyes that made Tanner nervous. “She’d be perfect, boss.”

“Perfect for what?”

“To play the role of your wife. I hear she’s sweet and simple and smart. And she’s definitely not someone you see socially.” Jeff’s grin widened. “There’s also no chance of her wanting more from you because, hey, according to the office scuttle, she doesn’t like you at all.” He chuckled. “Hot damn, I never thought I’d see the day when a woman could resist the great C. K. Tanner. I think I might be in love with this girl myself!”

A scowl found its way to Tanner’s face. “I’ll tell you what, Jeff. How about if I give you two minutes to get back to work before I fire you?”

Jeff laughed, stood up and headed for the door. “All right, all right. It was just a thought. I guess you don’t need my help if you’re going on a wife hunt, anyway. You’ve always done just fine with the ladies on your own.”

“Damn right I have,” Tanner muttered as the door closed. But still, the idea lingered.

He leaned back in his chair. How about enlisting a woman who didn’t like him? No strings, no calls afterward. Strictly business. That would make things pretty neat and tidy when it was time for a “divorce,” wouldn’t it?

His gaze flickered to the Swanson file that lay open on his desk. Challenges made a great life even better. If his first challenge was to persuade the head of Swanson Sweets to sell him his company, why not enlist the help of the second challenge to do it?

With a satisfied, confident smile, Tanner flipped through the file as he awaited the arrival of his daily mail with grossly uncharacteristic anticipation.

Funky Latin music reverberated off the cold, white walls in the mail room of Tanner Enterprises. Abby McGrady salsa’d her cart, piled high with packages and letters, toward the elevator, grazing the edges of a few desks on her way, mumbling a “sorry” to the chipped paint.

“Say hi to my boyfriend,” Dixie Watts called from the sorting area. “Let Mr. Tanner know that he can pick me up on the loading docks at seven for our date.”

Balancing several cups of coffee on a tray as she walked past Abby, Janice Miggs put in her two cents. “And since he changes women every week, tell him I’m available next Friday.”

“Every week?” Mary Larson laughed. “Try every hour on the hour.” Then she waved over at Abby. “That certainly doesn’t mean I’m not free next hour or the hour after that.”

“Stop teasing her,” Alice Balton said. “You know how she feels about him.”

Dixie raised an amused brow. “And she knows how we feel about him.”

Laughter filled the large, windowless room. Several of the girls hooted and catcalled, while John, the mail room’s manager, rolled his eyes.

Abby danced into the elevator with a good-natured grin, calling back, “I’m here to save you from yourselves, ladies. He’s just not good enough for you.” But as the doors closed and she depressed the button for the penthouse, her smile faded.

Admittedly, C. K. Tanner was one of the most gorgeous men she’d ever seen, but he was also one of the most arrogant. He barely acknowledged anyone who didn’t have a title attached to their name, and probably hadn’t spoken more than two words to Abby in the year and a half she’d been bringing him his mail.

But her opinion of him came from more than just his lack of polite communication. C. K. Tanner was a grown-up version of Greg Houseman, the terribly charming rich kid who’d stolen a poor girl’s teenage heart, taken her virginity, then dumped her flat. She knew from painful personal experience that men like C. K. Tanner could be Sir Lancelot one moment and Blackbeard the next. And she would never forget that one rarely came without the other.

She sighed heavily. Lord, she had bigger things to think about than the workaholic Midas who hardly knew life existed below the thirty-first floor. Like how on earth she was going to open her art school on the shoestring her budget would afford her. Granted, her job in the mail room paid her full benefits and allowed her flexible hours—she was out of the office and working on her canvas by two o’clock each afternoon—but the amount of savings she’d amassed wasn’t even close to what she needed.

Every day she was receiving more and more calls from parents who desperately wanted their children in an art class but couldn’t afford the steep tuition at any of the art schools in town. The community center where Abby taught didn’t have programs for kids, and they’d told her emphatically that if she wanted to start one it would have to be held somewhere else. Now she had a waiting list a mile long and only a few thousand dollars saved.

It was beginning to look as though her dream would just have to wait a little longer.