tone implied that the idea was too absurd to consider.
The skin over her cheekbones burned. So she’d been wrong. He wasn’t in the least tempted by her unremarkable body, but he needn’t rub it in.
“I was thinking along the lines of time payment,” he told her.
Riley swallowed her unreasonable humiliation. “That’s very considerate. I…I am sorry about your car. I hope you’re not going to be too inconvenienced.”
“It’ll be a couple of days in the panel shop, I guess. I’ll have to find some other way of getting into the office, that’s all.”
“Where do you live?”
“Kohi,” he answered. “Why?”
Kohimarama, one of Auckland’s more expensive suburbs, was twenty minutes or so from her shared flat in Sandringham. Perhaps thirty in the rush hour. “I could take you to work and drive you home afterward while your car’s being fixed.”
He looked at her tired little car, and she said quickly, “It’s actually quite respectable when it’s cleaned up, but I suppose you’d prefer not to be driven round in this. It was a dumb idea.”
His expression said he was going to refuse again, but he paused. “What about your job?”
“I work from one till five. If you don’t need to leave your office on the dot of five then it’s not a problem. Just let me know when you want to be picked up and where.”
“All right,” he said abruptly. “I accept.”
Riley broke into another smile. “Good!”
“I just hope you’re right about being a good driver—usually. I’ll phone you.” He gave her a curt nod and climbed into his car.
Riley got into hers and waited until he’d left before backing out again, unwilling to run any risk of making another mistake in front of that man.
She didn’t even know his name. His card was in her back pocket, but she’d scarcely glanced at it when he gave it to her.
After driving home more cautiously than usual, she drew into the lopsided double garage outside an old, much-repainted-and-renovated villa.
The driver’s window closed without a hitch, and she muttered at it darkly before hauling grocery bags from the back seat, slamming the door with an elbow and then going up the worn back steps to tap on the door with her sneaker-clad toe.
Linnet Yeung opened the door to the big old-fashioned kitchen, her pretty, golden-skinned face breaking into a smile as she reached for one of the bags.
Riley smiled back. One reason she liked Lin so much was her helpful nature. Also she was the only one of Riley’s friends who was shorter than she was.
As they unpacked the groceries, Lin said, “Harry found a new girl so he won’t be eating here tonight.” She grinned and rolled her brown eyes. “He does look tasty when he’s all togged up.”
“Mmm,” Riley agreed, taking out a packet of pasta from a bag. Harry was part Samoan, part Maori and part Irish, and the rest was anybody’s guess—which made him a pure full-blooded Kiwi, he joked, New Zealand being such a racial melting pot. “Logie and Sam?” she inquired, placing the pasta on the counter.
“They wouldn’t miss dinner when it’s your turn to cook.” Lin opened the fridge to stow some butter. “How was your day?”
Riley lifted a red string bag of onions. “I pranged someone’s car at the shopping center.”
“Ooh!” Lin winced in sympathy. “Was it bad?”
“A scratch, really, but it was a BMW. The owner was quite decent about it considering I’d just bitten him.”
“You what?”
The explanation sent Lin into giggles as she folded the empty bags. “So what’s his name?”
Riley fished in her pocket for the card she’d shoved in there. “Benedict Falkner,” she read aloud, then squinted, trying the name against the face that came vividly to mind. She’d never have guessed Benedict. “I think he’s a dentist.” Consulting the card again, she corrected herself. “No, actually, this says Executive Director, Falkner Industries.”
“And he drives a Beemer? He could probably afford to buy himself a whole new car—and he’s making you pay for a teeny little scratch?”
“He believes in people taking responsibility for their mistakes.”
Lin snorted down her delicate little nose. “Pompous git!”
Riley laughed. “A good-looking one.”
“How old?”
“Um, thirtyish, probably.”
Lin tipped her head to one side inquiringly, her sloe eyes dancing.
“He was big,” Riley said. “Well…not tall for a man, but…he seems to need a lot of room.”
And yet he hadn’t allowed her much room, she recalled. Until she’d asked him not to crowd her and he’d stepped back.
“You fancied him, didn’t you?” Lin teased.
“No chance,” Riley retorted. But it wasn’t really a denial. More a resigned acknowledgment that even if she had fancied Benedict Falkner, there was precious little hope of anything coming of it. He’d made his lack of sexual interest in her almost insultingly clear.
Besides, the man was out of her league, with his tailor-made suit and his expensive car and his business card embossed with the title Executive Director.
Chapter Two
The following evening Logie poked his long-faced, shaggy blond head around the door of the big lounge where Riley was watching television with Lin and Harry. “For you, Ri.” He held out the portable receiver.
Riley jumped up from the floor where she’d been sitting with her back against the well-worn sofa and took the phone. “Hello?” She followed Logie’s lanky form into the wide passageway, away from the sound of the TV, and he ambled back to the room he shared with his girlfriend, Samuela.
“Riley Morrisset?”
She’d have recognized the deep male voice anywhere. “Yes, Mr. Falkner.”
Maybe she’d surprised him. It was a moment before he said, “My car’s going to the panel beaters tomorrow. If you meant what you said, you could take me home from the office after work.”
“Tell me where.”
He gave her a midtown address and said, “Can you make it by five-thirty? There’s a private car park under the building. My space is on the left, marked with my name.”
Next day when she headed the car down the short, steep ramp, he was already waiting, holding a black briefcase.
Riley was fifteen minutes late.
She stopped the car and he opened the passenger door, climbed in and put the briefcase in front of him on the floor.
“Sorry,” she said, “I got held up.” One of the children at the day care center had mysteriously disappeared, and the entire staff and the little girl’s parents had spent twenty anxious minutes searching before she was discovered, sulking under a pile of dress-up clothes in a large carton.
He didn’t answer, pulling the seat belt across his chest and clipping it into the housing. Today the shirt with his dark suit was pale lavender and his tie a deep plum color.
She tried to tell herself it was dandified, but truthfully he looked terrific. And Riley hadn’t changed out of her paint-stained yellow T-shirt and comfortable brown stretch leggings with a half-dried muddy patch on one knee.
“Do