Читать книгу Taken by the Boss - Кэрол Мортимер - Страница 12

CHAPTER FIVE

‘WILL you stop pacing up and down like that?’ Marcus said as he lay back on the bed watching her. ‘I feel exhausted just watching you!’

Kit spared him an annoyed glance, but didn’t hesitate in her pacing. This whole situation was intolerable, and all he could do was lie there looking—looking—utterly desirable!

His dark hair was ruffled, his eyes sleepily sensual—and the fact that he was completely relaxed as he lay on the bed certainly didn’t help to allay that impression!

‘Look on the bright side, Kit—’

‘Is there one?’ she groaned, moving to stand next to the bed. ‘And will you please get up?’ she demanded. ‘This is where I have to sleep tonight.’ Something that was going to be virtually impossible for her to do now she had the image of this man lying back on her pillow!

‘Sorry!’ Marcus sat up slowly, eyeing her with amusement. ‘But surely that is the bright side?’ he encouraged. ‘At least we have adjoining bedrooms rather than having to share one.’

Oh, yes, that was really comforting! The connecting door between the two bedrooms stood wide open at the moment, with no key on either side to lock it even when it was closed. Kit knew this, for she had already looked for one!

The half an hour or so of torture Marcus had spent downstairs socializing with the other weekend guests before coming up to change for dinner was nothing compared to finding that they had been given connecting bedrooms.

‘Personally, I think it was pretty decent of Desmond not to have just assumed that we—well, that we—’

‘Are lovers?’ Kit finished forcefully, way beyond being reasoned with.

Marcus shrugged. ‘Well, you have to appreciate that it’s good of him, given the circumstances, and the amount of other people here for the weekend. After all, this isn’t a hotel; I could hardly phone on ahead and book two single rooms!’

She didn’t have to give Desmond Hayes anything. Or Marcus Maitland, either, for that matter!

‘You wouldn’t have done it anyway—I would!’ She sighed, her nerve endings feeling so frayed she wanted to scream.

The hour since they had arrived at Desmond Hayes’s home had been filled with one shock after another, so much so that all Kit wanted to do right now was lock herself in the en suite bathroom and stay there until it was all over. She certainly wasn’t in the mood to be teased and cajoled!

She glared at Marcus, her hands clenched at her sides, so agitated that she felt as if she wanted to hit someone, if not physically then verbally would do. ‘Is this the usual practice when you’re away with your PA? Was that the reason that Angie Dwyer told me about you, the reason she decided to leave? Did she object to—?’

‘Careful, Kit,’ Marcus cut in with quiet intensity, his eyes narrowed. ‘I may be feeling pretty mellow at the moment, but I would advise you not to forget exactly what the two of us are doing here.’

She breathed deeply. ‘That’s the problem; I’m no longer sure what I’m doing here. If this really is a working weekend, then that’s okay. But if you expect me to—to—’ she made an agitated gesture towards the rumpled bed that he still sat on ‘—then I’m afraid you’re going to be sadly disappointed, because I—’

‘Stop right there,’ he commanded harshly, standing up so abruptly that Kit took an involuntary step backwards. He gave a humourless smile as he saw the movement. ‘To put the record straight, the reason Angie Dwyer decided to leave had nothing to do with my behaviour—and everything to do with her own!’ He grimaced. ‘To be ungentlemanly about it—’

‘Oh, do!’ Kit invited agitatedly.

He gave her a warning look. ‘To be ungentlemanly about it,’ he repeated tautly, ‘Angie was the one who decided our relationship could be a little more—intimate, shall we say? I don’t get involved with employees. For goodness’ sake, Kit,’ he implored as she still looked unconvinced. ‘Need I remind you that until a couple of hours ago you looked as desirable as someone’s maiden aunt. I certainly didn’t give you the job because of the way you looked!’

Of course he hadn’t, she realised self-disgustedly. She was just so upset by whom she was expected to spend this weekend with that she had gone completely off on a tangent. As if Marcus would ever find her attractive, even without the severe hairstyle and glasses, when there were women like Andrea Revel falling all over him.

And that was something else…!

‘Okay,’ she dismissed tautly. ‘I suggest we forget about that side of things for the moment.’

Especially as she had been completely wrong in her conclusions about his relationship with Angie Dwyer. She should have known from her conversation with Angie that she’d had some sort of chip on her shoulder about Marcus. From the other woman’s catty remarks about his private life, namely the women who populated it, perhaps it should have been obvious what that chip had been.

‘Big of you,’ he muttered.

Her eyes glowed deeply grey. ‘You have no idea how big.’ She sighed, remembering only too well those awful months she had spent working for Mike Reynolds. ‘But what are you going to do about Andrea Revel?’ she challenged.

Marcus raised dark brows. ‘Do about her?’

Kit gave him a frowning glance. ‘As in her being here this weekend at all.’

‘But she’s not here with me, is she?’ he reasoned. ‘You are.’

‘Yes, but—but—’

‘We’re back to that broken record again. The fact that Andrea is here has absolutely nothing to do with me,’ he told her clearly. ‘She came with Derek Boyes; she’s his problem.’

Kit couldn’t agree with him, on either statement; he and Andrea had ended their relationship because he had told her he was bringing Kit instead of her, and if Andrea was anyone’s problem, then she was definitely Marcus’s!

‘Mr Maitland—’

‘I thought we had agreed that, for this weekend at least, it’s to be Marcus and Kit?’ he reminded her dryly.

‘But that’s my whole point!’ she said frustratedly. ‘Andrea—Miss Revel—knows that the two of us aren’t a couple.’

‘Does she?’ He looked at her with steady blue eyes.

Kit blinked. ‘Doesn’t she?’

He shrugged. ‘A little hard to tell, wouldn’t you say, considering the changes in your appearance, and the fact that we’re sharing a suite?’

‘Yes, but—okay, let’s just forget the broken-record remarks,’ she offered. ‘Until yesterday the two of you were—well, you were!’ she accused.

‘And now we’re not,’ he dismissed unconcernedly. ‘Life moves on very fast sometimes, doesn’t it? And at other times…’ he stood up, moving purposefully towards her ‘… it moves very slowly…’ Before Kit even had time to gauge what he was doing, his head lowered and his mouth claimed hers.

There was no thought of denial on her part as she melted into his hardness, her lips parting beneath his.

She had longed for this all those months of working beside Marcus, had lain awake at nights wondering what it would be like to be kissed by him. And now she knew.

It was wonderful!

His arms moved about the slenderness of her waist as he moulded her body against his, his tongue moving in exploration of the sensuous warmth of her bottom lip, her groan of capitulation all the encouragement he needed to deepen the kiss.

Kit felt like liquid fire in his arms, her body pressed against his, groaning low in her throat as she felt the caress of his hand against the curve of her breast.

Quite what would have happened next, Kit had no idea, if a door banging noisily shut further down the corridor hadn’t made her start back guiltily to stare up at Marcus with disbelieving eyes.

His expression was unreadable, his blue eyes shuttered as he looked back at her.

Kit swallowed hard, her tongue moving to moisten her lips as she searched for something to say. What could she say? Except the obvious!

‘Didn’t you just violate your own rule where employees are concerned?’ she ventured—desperately hoping to divert his attention from the fact that she had very definitely responded to him!

His mouth quirked. ‘I read somewhere once that “rules are made for the guidance of wise men and the blind obedience of fools”!’

Kit raised auburn brows. ‘And which are you?’

‘At this moment? Anybody’s guess!’

She couldn’t help it—she laughed. A light, relieved laugh that seemed to release some of the tension that had surrounded them.

Marcus’s smile was sheepish as he ran a hand through the dark thickness of his hair. ‘I apologize, Kit. I suppose it’s no good asking you to forget it ever happened?’

Well… she could try. But did she really want to? As regards the two of them continuing to work together, she knew that she had to, but as Kit McGuire… she had enjoyed the kiss too much to ever really want to forget it had happened.

‘We could try,’ she answered as noncommittally as she could, her gaze not quite meeting his now. ‘But for the moment,’ she added briskly, ‘shouldn’t we be changing for dinner?’

Marcus sighed heavily. ‘That was the plan.’

‘Well…?’ she prompted as he made no effort to go to the adjoining bedroom.

He gave a perplexed frown as he looked at her. ‘Incredible!’ he exclaimed. ‘And after my self-righteous claim of never becoming involved with my employees…’

‘I promise not to tell anyone if you don’t!’ Kit’s cheeks burned with embarrassment.

‘Kit—’

‘I really do need to change,’ she reminded him firmly before turning away.

But she could sense his presence in the room behind her for several more long seconds before he moved away, the adjoining door closing softly behind him and telling her when she was at last alone.

What had they done?

What had she done?

Her obvious course of action should have been to have stopped the kiss before it had even started. If she hadn’t been enjoying it so much she might just have done that!

But it had been wonderful. All she had ever thought kissing Marcus would be. And she had spent quite a few hours during the last six months wondering exactly that.

Besides, the kiss had certainly taken Marcus’s mind off discussing her ‘friend’, Mike Reynolds!

She paused from unpacking the black dress she intended wearing this evening. Mike Reynolds, of all people. And he’d had the cheek to greet her as if the two of them hadn’t parted on such bad terms seven months ago!

And just how much longer was she going to delay thinking of that other—even less welcome!—guest? Kit asked herself candidly.

The rest of her life, she could have hoped. But it was no good trying to deny the fact that Catherine Grainger was also a weekend guest here.

But would the lady have a clue as to who Kit was? If she did, Kit knew only too well that the other woman wouldn’t be interested.

Kit’s mouth tightened. Irrational though it was, how she disliked Ms Grainger! Her arrogance. Her coldness. Just her complete air of superiority.

But what would Marcus say if he were to know Kit’s secret? Especially since there seemed to be a security leak in his company where Catherine Grainger was concerned… He could think it very odd that Kit hadn’t told him the truth in the first place. But other than telling Marcus everything—something she had no intention of doing unless forced—there was no way she could explain away her knowledge of the older woman. She would just have to keep hoping—and praying!—that Catherine never guessed the truth.

If only she could avoid so much as talking to Catherine for the brief time they were here!

Something she didn’t look like doing when the first person she saw as she came down the stairs twenty minutes later was—Catherine Grainger, who was standing in the entrance hall talking on her mobile telephone.

Kit had knocked on the adjoining door between Marcus’s room and her own a few minutes earlier, only to find that he had just come out of the shower, wearing nothing but a towel wrapped about his waist.

After a first glance Kit’s eyes had remained fixed on the picture on the wall behind him, wings of colour burning in her cheeks. ‘And they say women take a long time to get ready!’ she joked weakly.

‘I was delayed by a telephone call,’ he came back swiftly.

Kit glanced at him. ‘Andrea?’

He gave an acknowledging inclination of his head. ‘How very astute of you!’

‘Not really,’ she assured him; Marcus might have calmly dismissed Andrea’s presence here as being none of his business, but it was a certainty that Andrea, having had time to think about the abrupt end of her relationship with him, wasn’t going to do the same where he was concerned. ‘I’ll wait for you downstairs, shall I?’

‘Unless you want to sit down and wait while I get dressed?’ he taunted, dark brows raised in invitation.

‘No, thank you,’ Kit came back stiffly, already turning towards the door as she heard him chuckle under his breath.

Which accounted for why she was completely on her own now as she descended the stairs to meet Catherine Grainger, the only other person in the huge entrance hall…