Читать книгу Baby for the Tycoon - Emily McKay - Страница 7

Jonathon Bagdon just wanted his assistant to come home, damn it.

Wendy Leland had left seven days ago to attend a family funeral. In the time she’d been gone, his whole company had started falling apart. A major deal she’d been finessing had fallen through. He’d missed an important deadline because the first temp had erased his online calendar. The second temp had accidentally sent R&D’s latest prototype to Beijing instead of Bangalore. The head of HR had threatened to quit twice. And no fewer than five women had run out of his office in tears.

As if all of that wasn’t bad enough, the fourth temp had deep-fried the coffee maker. So he hadn’t had a decent cup of coffee in three days. All in all, this was not his best moment.

Was it really too much to ask that at this particular time—when both of his business partners were out of town and when he was putting the finishing touches on the proposal for a crucial contract—that his assistant just come home?

Jonathon stared into his mug of instant coffee, contemplating whether he could ask Jeanell—the head of HR—to go out and buy a coffee maker, or if that would send her over the edge. Not that Jeanell was at the office yet. Most of the staff wandered in sometime around nine. It was barely seven.

Yes, he could have just gone out to buy himself a cup o’ joe—or better yet, a new coffee maker—but with one deadline after another piling up, he just didn’t have time for this crap. If Wendy had been here, a new coffee maker would have magically appeared. The same way the deal with Olson Inc. would have gone through without a hitch. When Wendy was here, things just worked. How was it that in the short five years she’d been the executive assistant here she’d become as crucial to the running of the company as he himself was?

Hell, if this past week was any indication, she was actually more important than he was. A sobering thought for a man who’d helped to build an empire out of nothing.

He knew only one thing, when Wendy did get back, he was going to do his damnedest to make sure she never left again.

Wendy Leland crept into the executive office of FMJ headquarters a little after seven. The motion sensor brought the lights up as she entered and she reached down to extend the canopy on the infant car seat she carried. Peyton, the tiny baby inside, frowned but remained asleep. She made a soft gurgling sound as Wendy lowered the car seat to a darkened corner behind her desk.

She rocked the seat gently until Peyton stilled, then Wendy dropped into her own swivel chair. Swallowing past the knot of dread in her throat, Wendy studied the office.

For five years, this had been the seat from which she’d surveyed her domain. She’d served as executive assistant for the three men who ran FMJ: Ford Langley, Matt Ballard and Jonathon Bagdon.

Her five years of Ivy League education made her perhaps a tad over-educated for the job. Or maybe not, since she hadn’t procured an actual degree in any of her seven majors. Her family still thought she was wasting her talents. But the work was challenging and varied. She’d loved every minute of it. Nothing could have convinced her to leave FMJ.

Nothing, except the little bundle of joy asleep in the car seat.

When she’d left Palo Alto for Texas to attend her cousin Bitsy’s funeral, she’d had no idea what awaited her. From the moment her mother called her to tell her that Bitsy had died in a motorcycle crash, the week had been one shock after another. She hadn’t even known that Bitsy had a child. No one in the family had. Yet, now here Wendy was, guardian to an orphaned four-month-old baby. And gearing up for a custody battle of epic proportions. Peyton Morgan might as well have been dipped in gold the way the family was fighting over her. If Wendy wanted any chance of winning, she’d have to do the one thing she’d sworn she’d never do: move back to Texas. And that meant resigning from FMJ.

Only Bitsy could create this many problems from the grave.

Wendy gave a snort of laughter at the thought. Grief welled up in the wake of the humor. Squeezing her eyes shut, she pressed the heels of her hands against her eye sockets. Exhaustion had made her punchy, and if she gave in to her sorrow now, she might not stop crying for a month.

There would be time to grieve later. Right now, she had other things to take care of.

Wendy flicked on the desktop computer. Last night, she’d drafted the letter of resignation and then emailed it to herself. Of course, she could have sent it straight to Ford, Matt and Jonathon. She’d even spoken to Ford last night on the phone when he called to offer his condolences. Physically handing in the letter was a formality, but she wanted the closure that would come with printing it out, signing it and hand delivering it to Jonathon.

She owed him—or rather FMJ—that much at least. Before her life became chaotic, she wanted to take this one moment to say goodbye to the Wendy she had been and to the life she’d lived in Palo Alto.

Beside her, the computer hummed to life with a familiarity that soothed her nerves. A few clicks later, she’d opened the letter and routed it to the printer. The buzz of the printer seemed to echo through the otherwise quiet office. No one else was here this early. No one but Jonathon, who worked a grueling schedule.

After signing the letter, she left it on her desk and crossed to the closed door that separated her office from theirs. A wave of regret washed over her. She pressed her palm flat to the door, and then with a sigh, dropped her forehead onto the wood just above her hand. The door was solid beneath her head. Sturdy. Dependable. And she felt herself leaning against it, needing all the strength she could borrow.

“You can hardly blame Wendy,” Matt Ballard pointed out, a note of censure in his voice. At the moment, Matt was in the Caribbean, on his honeymoon. It was why they’d scheduled this conference call for so early. Matt’s new wife, Claire, allowed him exactly one business call a day. “It’s the first time in five years she’s taken personal leave.”

“I didn’t say I blamed her—” Jonathon said into the phone, now sorry he’d called Matt at all. He’d had a legitimate reason for calling, but now it sounded as though he was just whining.

“When is she supposed to be back?” Matt asked.

“She was supposed to be back four days ago.” She’d said she’d be in Texas two to three days, tops. After the funeral, she’d called from Texas to say she’d have to stay “a little longer.” The lack of specificity made him nervous.

“Stop worrying,” Matt told him. “We’ll have plenty of time after Ford and I get back.” As if it wasn’t bad enough that Matt was on his honeymoon during this crisis, Ford and his family were also away, at their second home in New York City. “The proposal isn’t due for nearly a month.”

Yes. That was what bothered him. “Nearly a month” and “plenty of time” were about as imprecise as “a little longer.” Jonathon was a man who liked precise numbers. If he was putting together an offer for a company worth millions, it mattered if the company was worth ten million or a hundred million. And even if he had nearly a month to work on the proposal, he wanted to know how long a little longer was.

Rather than take out his frustrations on his partner, Jonathon ended the phone call. This government contract was driving him crazy. Worse still was the fact that no one else seemed to be worried about it. For the past several years, research and development at FMJ had been perfecting smart grid meters, devices that could monitor and regulate a building’s energy use. FMJ’s system was more efficient and better designed than anything else on the market. Since they’d been using them at headquarters, they’d cut their electricity bills by thirty percent. This government contract would put FMJ’s smart grid meters in every federal building in the country. The private sector would follow. Plus the meters would boost sales of other FMJ products. How could he not be excited about something that was going to cut energy consumption and make FMJ so much money?

Everything he’d been working for and planning for the past decade hinged on this one deal. It was the stepping-stone to FMJ’s future. But first they had to actually get the contract.

Once he snapped his laptop closed, he heard a faint thump at the door. He wasn’t optimistic enough to imagine the temp might come in this early. But did he even dare hope that Wendy had finally returned?

He pushed back his chair and strode across the oversize office he normally shared with Matt and Ford. When he opened the door, Wendy fell right into his arms.

Though unexpectedly falling through an open door seemed an apt metaphor for her life at the moment, nevertheless Wendy was surprised to find herself actually falling through the doorway. Jonathon’s arms instantly wrapped around her, cradling her safely against his strong chest. One shoulder was pressed against him and her free hand automatically came up to the lapel of his suit jacket.

Suddenly she was aware of several things. The sharply crisp scent of his soap. The sheer breadth of his chest. And the clean, just-shaven line of his jaw, which was the first thing she saw when she looked up.

Normally, she did a decent job of ignoring it, but Jonathon Bagdon was the stuff of pure, girlish fantasies. He always looked on the verge of frowning, which lent his expression an air of thoughtful intensity. Though he rarely smiled, when he did, deep dimples creased his cheeks.

At just shy of six feet, he wasn’t too tall, but his physique more than made up for what he lacked in height. He had a build more suited to barroom brawls than boardroom negotiations. He was strong and muscular. She’d never seen his naked chest, but he had a habit of shucking his suit jacket and rolling up the sleeves of his white dress shirt when he worked. Obviously she spent too much time looking at him. But until this moment, she’d never noticed he had a single mole on the underside of his perfectly square jaw.

Staring up into his green-brown eyes, she felt something unexpected pass between them. An awareness maybe. Some tension she’d never felt before. Or perhaps something she was too smart to let herself feel.

He swallowed. Fascinated, she watched the muscles of his throat shift mere inches from her face. She flattened her palm and pushed herself out of his arms.

She was all too aware of Jonathon’s gaze following her every move. And even more aware that her outfit was inappropriate for work. He’d never seen her in jeans before. Certainly not topped with her favorite T-shirt, a retro Replacements concert T-shirt she’d bought online as her twenty-first birthday present to herself. It was old and ratty and she’d cut the neck out of it years ago. But somehow the shirt was all comfort. And today, she needed comfort more than she needed professionalism.

But, dang it, she wished he would stop looking at her with that hungry look.

It wasn’t the first time in the five years they’d worked together that she’d seen him look at her like that. As if she was a temptation he had to resist. But it was the first time she’d allowed herself to feel even the faintest bit of need in return. Jonathon may be the stuff of feminine fantasies, but he was hell on women. She’d watched up close and personal as he’d trampled countless female hearts. She’d promised herself long ago that she’d never join the legions of women crushed by Jonathon Bagdon.

She could only hope that this new awareness she felt for him was the result of her exhaustion. Or perhaps her emotional vulnerability. Or maybe some bizarre hormone malfunction. At any rate, she wouldn’t be around long enough for it to matter.

Jonathon wanted to pull her back into his arms. He didn’t, of course. But he wanted to.

Instead, he held open the office door with one hand and shoved the other deep into his pants pocket, hoping to hide the effect her nearness had had on his body. As ridiculous as it was, in the few seconds he’d held his tempting little assistant against his chest, his body had responded. Only her shoulder and her palm had touched him and he’d still gone rock hard.

Of course, he’d felt that punch of desire for Wendy before. But normally he was better at schooling his response to her. Then again, she was usually dressed in blandly professional, business casual clothes. Not today. Her faded jeans were skintight and her T-shirt hung loose on her, its wide neck baring a tempting swath of collarbones, part of one shoulder and a hot pink bra strap.

He swallowed again, forcing his gaze back up to her face, searching for something to say. Something other than “Lose the shirt.”

“I trust your trip went well,” he finally ventured.

She frowned and took another step back.

Then he remembered she’d been to a funeral. Hardly the kind of trip that would go well. “I’m sorry for your loss,” he added. Her frown deepened. Were those tears in her eyes? “However, I am very glad to have you back.”

He sounded like an idiot. Which was not wholly unexpected. He didn’t deal well with emotional women.

“I—” she started.

Then she broke off again. She turned away from him and pressed her hands to her face. If the tension in her shoulders was any indication, she was about two seconds away from bursting into tears.

In five years, Wendy had been nothing but completely professional. If she was going to break into tears, why couldn’t she have done it when Ford was here to deal with her? Ford had three sisters, a mother, a stepmother, a wife and a daughter. Surely all of those women in his life had better prepared him for dealing with this sort of thing.

Jonathon followed her into the front office and placed a hand on her back. He meant it to be comforting, but he was instantly aware that he’d placed it on the shoulder bared by her shirt. She twisted to look at him, her eyes wide and surprised, damp with unshed tears, but lit with something else as well. Beneath his hand her skin was hot, the strap of her bra silky and tempting.

She bit her lip again before pulling free of his touch.

And then he heard it. The unmistakable sound of crying. But not a woman crying. And it wasn’t coming from Wendy.

Confused, he walked in and scanned the room for the source of the sound. It wasn’t all-out screaming. More of a soft, mewling noise. Like a puppy might make. The room appeared empty. He moved toward the sound as Wendy rushed up behind him and practically threw herself in his path.

“I can explain!” She held up her hands in front of her as if warding off an attack.

“Explain what?” He dodged around her to look behind the desk. Her chair had been shifted to the side and where Wendy normally sat was an infant’s car seat. And in that was a pale pink bundle.

He turned back to Wendy. “What is that?”

“That’s a baby.”

Jonathon’s shock was palpable.

If she didn’t know better, Wendy would have thought he’d never even seen a baby before. Though she imagined they were rare in his life, surely he had encountered at least one. After all, Ford had one himself. Jonathon must have been in the same room as his best friend’s child at some point.

She dashed around him and squatted beside the car seat. She gave the back of it a gentle nudge but Peyton continued to fuss. Peyton’s sleepy eyes flickered open, blinked and then focused on Wendy.

Something inside of Wendy tightened into a knot. A gut-level reaction to those bright blue eyes. Perhaps the only thing she’d ever felt that was actually stronger than that burst of attraction she’d felt for Jonathon just now.

Of course, she couldn’t have Jonathon. She wasn’t stupid enough to try. But for now, she did have Peyton. And she’d do anything in her power to keep her.

She unfastened the buckle strapping Peyton in and picked up the pink cotton bundle. Snuggling the baby close to her chest, she pressed her lips near Peyton’s ear and made shushing noises. Then she drew in a breath scented like tear-free shampoo and pure love.

Suddenly feeling self-conscious, she looked up to find Jonathon watching her, a frown on his face.

She tried to smile but felt it wavering under the weight of her shifting emotions. “Jonathon, meet Peyton.”

“Right,” he said bracingly and he looked from her to the baby and then all around the room as if searching for the spaceship that must have dropped off this strange creature. “What is it doing in our office?”

“She’s here because I brought her here.” Which maybe hadn’t been the smartest move, but she and Peyton had only gotten in the previous evening, after driving from Boulder, Colorado. With less than seventy-two hours of parenting experience under her belt, Wendy hadn’t known what else to do with Peyton. “I didn’t have anyone to watch her. And I don’t think she’s ready to be left with a stranger yet anyway. I mean, I’m strange enough, right? And—”

Jonathon cut her off. “Wendy, why do you have a baby?” His gaze dropped to her belly, suspicion lighting his gaze. “She’s not… yours, is she?”

She was glad he’d cut her off, because she’d been babbling, but at the same time dreading the conversation to come, because he was not going to like what she had to say. Still, when she glanced down at the sixteen-pound baby, she had to laugh.

“No, I didn’t go away for seven days and miraculously get pregnant, gestate and deliver a four-month-old. She’s—” Her throat closed over the words, but she forced herself to say them. “She was my cousin’s. Bitsy named me guardian. So she is mine now.”

There was a long moment of silence during which Jonathon’s expression was so blank, so unchanging she thought he might have suffered a stroke.

“I—” he began. Then he looked down at Peyton, his frown deepening. “Well—” He looked back at her and cocked his head to the side. “It turns out Jeanell was right. On-site childcare was a good idea. I’m sure she’ll be just fine there.”

Dread settled in Wendy’s belly. As well as something else. Sorrow. Nostalgia maybe. She didn’t want to leave FMJ. Even though she was just an assistant here, she’d never felt more at home anywhere else. Professionally or personally. Working at FMJ had given her purpose and direction. Something her family had never understood.

“I’m not going to bring Peyton to work,” she began. And then decided there was no point in pussyfooting around this. “I’m not coming to work anymore. I came in today to resign.”