a snow-white, luxuriously appointed yacht bobbing on a brilliant azure sea. “Hell of a boat. Crew of fifteen just to run her. Now that’s money.”
She gritted her teeth.
“Spent a full week on her. Pretty hard coming back to nine-to-five-dom after that, I can tell you.”
“I wasn’t aware you worked nine to five,” she couldn’t resist saying. The man was always off on some stupid assignment somewhere.
He narrowed his eyes at her.
“I was speaking metaphorically. You know what that is, don’t you? As in—she was as sour as a lemon,” he said, and she sat up straighter. What a jerk!
“Actually, that’s a simile. A metaphor is more like—his ego was monumental,” she returned sweetly.
He was opening his mouth to respond when the door to Morgan Beck’s office swung open. Their heads swiveled as one and she didn’t need to look to know that Jack’s face wore the same friendly-not-too-sucky smile that hers did.
“Claire, Jack. Come on in,” Morgan said.
She stood, the smile almost slipping off her face. Up until this second, she’d been telling herself that Jack Brook’s visit to the thirtieth floor had nothing to do with her. And she’d almost been believing it. Now she gave free rein to the paranoid feminist within and began imagining half a dozen scenarios where she was shafted royally. Her stomach sunk below knee level as she followed Jack into Morgan Beck’s inner sanctum.
“Now, Jack, how much do you know about Claire’s new project for the Hillcrest Hardware chain?” Morgan asked, toying with an expensive-looking fountain pen as he leaned back in his well-padded executive chair.
“I understand it’s a custom magazine job, a monthly decorator title to be sold only in their stores at a cheaper than usual cover price to create customer loyalty,” Jack said.
She resisted the urge to stare at him. How did he know all this? She couldn’t have named a single title he worked for. Apart from Big Game Fishing, of course.
“Sounds like he’s got the important bits right, doesn’t it, Claire?”
She nodded, too anxious to trust her voice.
“Before we go any further, I want to acknowledge that this project has been yours, Claire, from the word go. But unfortunately, we’ve hit a bit of a snag. I’ve had my thinking cap on, though, and I’ve come to the conclusion that Jack might be the man to help us out.”
She swallowed hard and forced air into her lungs.
“This is a problem from Hillcrest, I’m assuming?” she asked, trying to find her feet.
“Yes, but don’t go getting too fussed about it. Old Hank Hillcrest is a dyed-in-the-wool sexist and he’s got some pretty wacky ideas. One of those is that the magazine’s outlook is too feminine.”
Claire frowned. Too feminine? Over half of the magazine’s content was aimed at offering heavy-duty building projects to experienced DIYers, along with reviews of new hardware and building products. In fact, the only feminine parts of the magazine were the decorator segments, and a small cookery section which was designed to showcase Hillcrest’s kitchen products.
She said as much to Morgan, and he nodded his head sympathetically.
“Claire, I know all this. They know all this. Hell, even cranky old Hillcrest knows all this. But he just doesn’t have it in him to let this go without putting his sticky fingerprints all over it. So, as I said, I had an idea.
“You probably don’t know this, but Jack started out his career with us in the Homes and Decorating division, writing up projects for our DIY titles. Over the years, he’s branched out, moved on. But I bet I wouldn’t be wrong if I suggested you still keep your hand in with a bit of DIY work here and there, right, Jack?”
She found herself turning to look at Jack, all the words of protest catching at the back of her throat. She was going to be sick. She was truly going to puke her guts up all over Morgan Beck’s polished walnut desk.
“Sure, Morgan, I’ve got a few projects on the go. But it sounds to me like you’ve got a done deal with Hillcrest already. And by the looks of things, Claire’s put in all the hard yards on this project,” Jack said.
Underneath the sick feeling and the anger and the dread, she managed to be surprised at this response from Jack. He actually sounded uncomfortable, reluctant.
“Let’s not get ahead of ourselves, people. I’m not suggesting for a moment that Claire be cut out of this thing. We would never do that to you, Claire—please be assured of that.”
Morgan took a moment to simply make eye contact with her, his faded blue eyes powerfully sincere. She held his gaze, wanting him to see she had what it took to survive this last hiccup.
“What exactly are you suggesting then, Mr. Beck?” she asked carefully.
“I want to assign Jack to Welcome Home as an associate editor for a while—six months, tops. Just so he can have a few meetings with old man Hillcrest, shoot the breeze, all that stuff Jack does so well. It’ll be purely window dressing. Jack’ll write up a few articles, and then we’ll just downplay his involvement until he simply disappears altogether.”
She tried to get her head around it. They wanted to give half the credit for her magazine, based on her concept, sold to the client by her, to this crinkle-shirted lothario slouching next to her?
“This…this really…” She struggled to find a way to finish her sentence that didn’t have the word “sucks” in it.
“I’ve got to agree with Claire, Morgan. Surely we can just tough this out? Once Hillcrest have the first edition of their new magazine in hand, they’ll be so dazzled they’ll forget any objections,” Jack said.
Morgan nodded, almost as though he was giving Jack’s suggestion some thought.
“We’ve gone over all this, Jack, believe me. What I’m suggesting is painless, simple and foolproof. I think we can all work together to pull this off, don’t you?”
There was no mistaking the sudden glint of steel in Morgan’s eyes now. She found herself fixating on the small tufts of hair remaining on his otherwise bald head. She’d always thought of them indulgently as pseudo teddy-bear ears, but now she realized he probably cultivated them to cover the scars from where he’d had his twin horns surgically removed.
“I’ll leave the details of all this up to you two, and I know I can rely upon you both to be discreet about this…arrangement.”
Somehow she managed to find her feet. Her legs felt numb and heavy, and the distance between her chair and the doors leading back to the reception area seemed a mile off. Morgan leaned forward and shook her hand, again going for the meaningful eye contact. He’d probably look that way as he was pushing her out of a lifeboat on the Titanic—deeply moved, but completely committed to saving his own backside.
Anger trickled into her frozen limbs. She lifted her chin, aware she must be looking like a stunned mullet. Although it felt as though her face might crack, she forced her lips into a curve that she hoped resembled a smile.
“I’m sure we can smooth this over,” she said, and she was amazed at how professional and calm she sounded. As she turned toward the door she glanced just once at Jack Brook, and she saw surprise and something else—respect?—in his deep blue eyes before she fixed her attention on the double doors ahead and concentrated on putting one foot in front of the other.
Just get me out of here, just get me out of here, just get me out of here, she begged herself, already aware that her mask of calm was about to dissolve. To show any weakness in front of these men… She’d rather charge at the plate-glass window behind Morgan’s desk and take a dive down to the sidewalk.
Jenny looked up and smiled at Claire as she approached, and again Claire