he’d lost his nerve—Marcos gave her an answer.
“I don’t like people who have had everything handed to them and expect that to continue for the rest of their lives.” He looked her straight in the eye. And was mildly impressed when she didn’t look away. She was either very gutsy, or too dumb to know what he was talking about. And he was beginning to suspect, from what he’d witnessed, that she wasn’t dumb. “I also don’t like people who don’t know what it means to work.”
Wendy nodded, waiting for him to be done. So that she could begin. “Anything else?”
“Oh, there’s a lot more,” he assured her, even though he hadn’t phrased it properly in his mind yet. “But that’ll do for now.”
Wendy nodded, seeming to accept his response. But rather than get up and leave in a huff the way he’d expected, she slid forward in her chair, fixed him with an unabashed, penetrating stare and asked, “Has anyone complained about me? Has anyone told you I was doing a bad job, or not carrying my weight?”
Because he couldn’t in all honesty say yes to any part of her question, he tried to approach it in a different way. “Half the kitchen staff is tripping over their feet, rushing to help you.”
So now he was going to blame her for that? He had to know that was completely unfair.
“I can’t help it if you hired a bunch of polite people. I never asked one of them to do anything for me. I don’t palm off my work or expect anyone to carry my load,” she told him pointedly.
But there had been more to his dissatisfaction with her, so while she was at it Wendy decided to address that, as well.
“And as for what you said about having everything handed to me, yes, I was born a Fortune and, yes, my parents are rich. And yes, I don’t really know exactly what it is I want to do with my life right now,” she threw in, even though he hadn’t said anything about that. She assumed that one of her parents had probably complained about her lack of direction to the Mendozas, who in turn might have told Marcos.
“But I know that whatever I do decide I want out of life, I’m going to have to get it on my own, because otherwise it doesn’t really count. And I also realize that the only person I know I can count on is me,” she said with feeling.
Channing had taught her that one and she had learned her lesson the hard way. She’d put all her faith in him, expecting Channing to provide her happily-ever-after for her. When he’d pulled the rug out from under her and told her that he no longer loved her, that he was in love with someone else, she definitely hadn’t been prepared to land on her butt in full view of her so-called friends. None of whom offered her any real sympathy.
While the whole humiliating experience hadn’t turned her into a bitter person, it certainly had taught her not to be so trustingly naive.
It also taught her to keep her eyes open so that she didn’t run the risk of being mowed down like that ever again. One supremely humiliating experience in a lifetime was more than enough.
She straightened in the chair, giving every indication that she was ready to leave. “Now, if you don’t have anything else that you feel you have to chew me out about, I’d like to make a suggestion.”
Oh she did, did she? Did she think that working here for a couple of months qualified her to become his assistant? Or better yet, to take his place?
“Which is?” Marcos challenged.
“Since you’re putting Eva on the smaller tables, I’d like to volunteer to take over her station.”
Eva’s former station contained the party-size tables. Tables that accommodated office luncheons to celebrate a promotion or someone’s final day at the company. Stations like that were intended for more experienced waitresses who worked smoothly and efficiently. Waitresses who didn’t drop trays.
Granted that up until now Wendy hadn’t dropped a tray—if he didn’t count the one she accidentally knocked over just before she’d begun working here—but as far as he was concerned that was just a freakishly fortunate streak of luck. And there was just so much luck to go around.
“We’ll see,” he answered.
Wendy frowned. She was still sitting in the chair, her hands on the armrests as if she had abruptly changed her mind and was ready to propel herself up to her feet. She’d thought she’d made some headway with Marcos. Apparently not.
“That means no, doesn’t it?” It wasn’t really a question. Marcos’s tone had already given away his intention.
“No,” he contradicted, his eyes narrowing slightly as he looked at her again, “that means we’ll see.” This just wasn’t going to work out, was it? He bit his tongue to keep from saying as much. Instead, he told her, “You know, we might get along better if you didn’t keep trying to get under my skin.”
Wendy looked at him for a long moment, as if debating saying something. Instead, she rose to her feet. “I’m not trying.”
For someone who wasn’t trying, he thought, she was having remarkable success.
“Still accomplishing the same thing,” he told her. The way to deal with this woman, he decided, at least for now, was to ignore her. “Now, if you don’t mind, I’ve got some work to do.”
“I don’t mind at all,” she told him breezily. “Maybe we can talk later to clear the air some more,” Wendy said as she crossed the threshold.
Just what he needed. A threat.
“Maybe,” he murmured, having no intentions of doing any such thing unless he was forced to. “Don’t forget to close the—”
The door met the jamb abruptly just as he said the word door.
Abandoning the computer temporarily, Marcos leaned back in his chair and rocked for a moment.
Or two.
He didn’t know what to make of her, he thought, annoyed.
Oh, he knew what he wanted to make of her. He wanted to continue regarding Wendy Fortune as a spoiled, self-centered little brat because the negative view helped him block out an utterly annoying growing attraction he was becoming increasingly aware of. An attraction to the woman that was completely undesired on his part. But he had to admit, however grudgingly, that spoiled, self-centered, selfish little brats didn’t give away their tips to their less fortunate coworkers without asking for something in return.
They also didn’t eavesdrop because they wanted to make sure a coworker wasn’t “raked over the coals” because they’d had a slip of the tongue. Moreover, they didn’t wait around to offer comfort to said coworker.
Wendy Fortune was a damn enigma, a confounding puzzle. Ordinarily, he’d just put her out of his mind, dismiss her as not worth the time nor the effort to try to solve that puzzle.
But the fact was that she was his puzzle, assigned to him by an uncle and aunt who were much too softhearted for their own good—and his. And he wanted to tell them so, but it wasn’t his place.
Putting up with the heiress was apparently part of his new job description.
Marcos frowned to himself.
He was spending way too much time and energy thinking about this woman and trying to figure her out. There was nothing to figure out. She was the devil, plain and simple, sent to torment him. She was here just to throw him off, lull him into complacency.
Even the devil was capable of a good deed every century or so, Marcos reasoned. That didn’t mean he wasn’t the devil. And just because Wendy Fortune gave away her tips, something she undoubtedly viewed as small change, to someone who needed every penny didn’t change the fact that she still had enough faults to fill up the Grand Canyon. The sooner he was rid of her, the better.
Chapter Four