Strapless

“I didn’t lose?”

“Darcie, you need confidence. Why would you assume—”

“Desperation.” Greta Hinckley, she thought.

“Take my advice. In the corporate jungle, never let ’em see you sweat.”

“Walt, I need a raise in order to eat. I need this assignment to Global so my brain won’t rot.” She paused, not daring to hope. “You’re my boss. Tell me. The board meeting…”

“Went to hell in less than five minutes.” He glanced up again from the paper. “Four minutes after we dealt with your presentation. Order anything you like. I’m told the daily special—coq au vin—is pretty good. Chicken,” he said when Darcie just blinked.

Blindly, she took the menu she was handed. She couldn’t decipher a word, but not because it was in French. Even the translation didn’t register. Her mind whirred in circles. Walt had warned her only yesterday that as a relatively junior employee it was unlikely the board would approve her appointment. And, Darcie knew, with Greta Hinckley in contention…

Hope skipped inside her. She scanned the entrees for the most expensive item, testing the waters. “How about lobster Newburg?”

“Go for it.”

Her pulse sped. “You mean…”

He laid the newspaper beside his salad plate. His lips twitched. “Let’s order wine. Or would you prefer champagne?”

Her mouth went dry.

“I…don’t like champagne.”

Could it happen? More money…a future? As if signaling the start of her imagined prosperity, Walt snapped his fingers. The waiter appeared with a bottle of chilled Chardonnay. Darcie watched him pour a pale-golden stream into her glass after Walt had tasted the wine. Her heart hammered harder than it did whenever Gran’s pet Persian cat cornered Darcie in a surprise attack. When they were alone again, he lifted his stemmed goblet.

“Here’s to my new Assistant to the Manager of Global Expansion for—”

“Walt! I love you!” She shouted it through the whole restaurant.

“—Wunderthings International.”

“Oh. Oh Jesus. God. Oh—” She knocked over her wine. “I can’t believe this.”

She had talent, ability, good ideas. She wasn’t (except with Greta) afraid to speak her mind. But fickle luck, actually coming her way? Darcie tried not to grin. I’ll never be hungry again, Scarlett.

Walt sopped up the wine with his napkin. She knew he hated messes. Hated the display of emotion for which Darcie had become justly famous in his department.

“Don’t get your panties in another twist,” he said, scowling at the wet tablecloth. “There won’t be a lot more money.”

Giddy, Darcie didn’t care. She could manage. The opportunity, a title…

“A title, Walt.” She grinned. “Can I have that on my office door?”

“What office?”

“I don’t get an office?”

“Honey, I have an office. You’re still on the cubicle farm…until next year when the board can see how you’ve done with this first assignment.”

“I’ll prove to them—” she waved an airy hand “—whatever they need me to prove.” Had they actually accepted her plan? “I’ll work twenty hours a day.”

“You’ll have to,” he said.

“I can do that. Jeez, I can do anything.” She drew herself up straighter. What was it Gran said? “‘I am Woman, hear me roar.’” Her voice rose again over the room full of diners. Heads turned—well, whaddya know? Some New Yorkers weren’t that jaded.

Walt laid a hand over her lips. “Christ, keep it down, will you? I went to bat for you over Hinckley, and I expect you to slave for me. I expect to be pleased.”

Pleased? For a single instant Darcie thought she’d discovered the worm in the apple of paradise. Was he propositioning her? She fought back a mental image of herself on her knees in front of Walt at his desk. Her face on a level with his swollen lap. No, never. Despite Greta’s possible fantasies about him, Darcie doubted that Walt, who was a widower, had a sex life at home or at work. If he did, she sure didn’t want to be part of it.

“Your wish is my command.”

Fighting a smile, he shook his head. “You’re so full of shit.” After the waiter took their orders, he poured more wine into her empty water glass. New York in the midst of a torrential winter downpour was also under a water rationing edict. Darcie couldn’t imagine why—something about the reservoirs—but you had to beg for the stuff, even in five-star restaurants. As if she knew about those. Walt raised his glass. “Congratulations, Darce. Others may doubt but I have every confidence you’ll do a fine job—make me proud. Make sure you do,” he said, then, “I hope your passport’s in order.”

“Passport?”

He nodded toward the front windows where icy rain slid down the glass.

“I said, Global.” He grinned. “Isn’t that what you wanted? The Pacific Rim. It’s like a reprieve from hell. Nancy told me what happened—and tipped the balance in your favor. Hinckley stays here. Good presentation, Baxter—for which you get your fondest wish—the opening of Wunderthings, Sydney. It’s summer there.”

Chapter

Two

“Balmy ocean breezes,” Darcie told her grandmother. “Hot sun…”

“That’s a shame.” In the early evening after her trip home from Wunderthings, she watched Eden Baxter fluff another Oriental pillow on the oyster-white sofa. “I doubt you’ll have time for the beach. Corwin will expect you to work.”

True. She had her chance now to prove herself—much to Greta Hinckley’s dismay—and didn’t intend to blow it, but excitement still flowed through Darcie’s veins.

“The guidebooks tell me I can spend nine to five in the city, then be lying on the sand at Manly after a thirty-minute ferry ride.” Her specialty, Darcie supposed, owing to her daily commute across the Hudson. She might be new to this assignment, but she was a pro with ferries.

Eyeing Gran’s huge gray Persian cat, which had just entered the room, Darcie felt her pulse hitch. She stepped back into the dining area. She never relaxed until she pinned down Sweet Baby Jane’s location—and took up her own position as far away as possible.

“Maybe I’ll reverse commute into the city. Then I could run in the mornings at the beach, grab a few rays—”

“Ah, to be young-er.”

Eden flicked a feather duster over a spotless walnut end table. Another perk of living with Gran, Darcie acknowledged. She didn’t have to clean. Neither did Gran but that didn’t bear pointing out. Nor did the fact that in the glow of light from the end table lamp, her grandmother’s carefully groomed, rich auburn hair had an apricot cast. And white showed at her roots. She needed a touch-up.

“You’ll always be young, Gran.”

She couldn’t see a grin from her position by the dining table, well away from Sweet Baby Jane’s predatory feline prowl, but she heard her grandmother’s cheeky tone of voice. “My men keep me that way.”

“You have more boyfriends at eighty-two than an entire block of apartment-dwelling single females on the Upper East Side.”

“Isn’t that bad?” Meaning good. Darcie eased away from the table. In the living room Eden rubbed a slender finger over a gold picture frame, checking for dust. The eagle in the expensive print seemed to glare back in disapproval, as Darcie’s mother might.