The Bedroom Business

Okay. That was it. Enough. This was ridiculous, every bit of it, starting with Jake’s nonsensical idea of introducing her to eligible men. Eligible for what? Was he going to run a Date My Assistant bureau?

All she’d wanted was to know what it was like to look forward to an occasional date but using your employer as a dating service was totally unacceptable. In the seven years since she’d come to New York, she’d heard of some strange employer-employee arrangements. She knew a secretary who baby-sat for her boss’s golden retrievers on weekends, another who read all the books on the New York Times list, then wrote up one paragraph synopses for the man she worked for so he could sound as if he were well-read. She’d once met a P.A. whose boss baked him cookies. Awful cookies, but the poor guy had never worked up the courage to tell her so.

But a boss who got you dates?

No way.

That was what she’d tell Jake, if he brought up the subject again. There wasn’t a way in the world she was going to let her boss play matchmaker for…

“Emily?”

She looked up. Definitely, the kiss had meant nothing. Jake stood in the doorway between his office and hers. He looked the way he always did. Intense. Focused. Just a little bit forbidding.

The wings of hope fluttered in Emily’s breast. Maybe she wouldn’t have to tell him she was declining his offer. With luck, he might say it first.

“Yes, Mr. McBride?”

“Emily, I’ve given this some thought.”

“Yes?”

“And I’ve decided you should leave.”

The wings of hope faltered, folded and were still. “Leave?”