were quietly boring a hole in the back of his neck, and that all those subdued voices would be eagerly anticipating his departure so that they could lay into her with a thousand and one questions?
Having never been the focus of gossip, the thought of it now was enough to bring Ruth out in a cold sweat.
She could hardly tell him to lower his tone, though, so she compensated by reducing the level of hers so much that he had to bend down to hear what she was saying.
‘I am paying attention, to every word you’re saying,’ she whispered furtively, feeling like a dodgy character in a third-rate movie.
‘I’ve spoken to Alison about my little proposition…’
‘What little proposition?’
‘Do you have any concentration span at all?’ he snapped.
He glared down at her. Most of the women he knew—had ever known, for that matter—achieved a near perfect complexion through generous, skilful application of make-up. This girl, staring up at him, her teeth anxiously worrying her lip, had the most perfect complexion he had ever clapped eyes on, without the aid of any make-up at all. God, he could feel his mind beginning to drift, again, and he glared even more ferociously at her, further maddened by the glaringly obvious fact that although she was hearing every belligerent word he was saying she wasn’t seeing him at all.
Who was that boy who had been playing with her hair? Was there something going on there?
He fought to impose a bit of self-control and managed a stiff, artificial smile which appeared to alarm the object of his attentions even more than his aggression had done a minute before.
‘Maybe we could continue this conversation in Alison’s office. A bit more private.’
‘Oh, yes!’ Ruth breathed a sigh of relief. She had just managed to accidentally catch Jack’s eye and had quickly looked away when he had grinned and winked at her.
‘After you,’ he said, stepping aside so that she could precede him.
Ruth, in her usual uninspiring attire of neat powder-blue skirt and long-sleeves blouse, was acutely conscious of his eyes behind her, following her movements. She was also conscious of Jack shooting her telling, questioning looks from where he was seated at an angle away from his desk, and with a sidelong glance she smiled at him and flashed him the smallest of waves. A conspiratorial wave that combined bewilderment at Franco Leoni’s inexplicable shepherding of her into Alison’s office and dread at what it indicated.
‘Mind if I have a word with Ruth alone?’ Franco asked, as soon as they were in the office, and Alison obligingly exited at speed, either relieved to be out of his presence or else frantic to obey his every command.
‘Take a seat.’ He indicated the black chair in front of the desk and Ruth sat down, only to find that he had remained standing, so that to look at him she had to crane her neck.
He strolled across to the bay window which opened onto the busy view of a London street in full swing, and, after idly staring out for a few seconds, he turned to face her, relaxing against the windowsill, arms folded.
‘I won’t be telling you anything that the rest of your colleagues will not hear for themselves very shortly, but the gist of my chat with Alison concerns what we briefly discussed last Friday evening. The magazine seems to have found itself in something of a rut. As you rightly pointed out, neither one thing nor another.’
Ruth felt a sudden warm glow at the unexpected compliment.
‘We have three talented reporters with good, solid styles of writing, but their subject matter is too disparate. Sport, fashion, natural disasters. Are you following me?’
‘Of course I’m following you. I’m not a complete idiot, you know!’ She felt a sudden flash of anger at his patronising attitude. Why had he called her in on her own to give this little speech? He hadn’t made it clear, unless it was to sack her, but she couldn’t really see why he would do that. Her contribution had nothing to do with the actual running of the magazine. She was a gofer, and a pretty good one at that, with lots of enthusiasm.
No, the only reason she could see for this one-to-one chat was to given him a chance of shooting down everything she said in flames. Maybe her soft nature was just too much of a temptation for a man like him. He simply couldn’t resist walking over her.
However soft she was, Ruth had no intention of being walked over. When pushed, there was a stubborn streak in her that made her dig her heels in and refuse to budge.
‘Sorry,’ he said, with a shadow of a smile. The apology, so unexpected, was enough to pull her down a peg or two, and she responded helplessly to the sincerity in his voice.
‘That’s okay,’ she said with a half-smile, lowering her eyes and then belatedly realising that all this timidity was no way to deal with this man. She looked at him fully and he stared back at her in silence for a few seconds.
‘I don’t suppose you were familiar with the magazine before we took it over?’
Ruth shook her head.
He went to the desk, but instead of sedately sitting on the chair he perched on the surface of the desk, so that he was still staring down at her—though from a lesser height, and infinitely closer.
‘It failed because there simply wasn’t enough money to pay any half-respectable reporter, and as a result, the articles were shallow and superficial. But, as far as I am concerned, the essence of the magazine was good. It dealt solely with topical problems. Drugs in the schoolyard, corruption in local politics, that sort of thing.’
‘Oh. Yes,’ Ruth said faintly, wondering what this had to do with her.
‘I think we need to drag it back to that formula, but handle it better than our predecessors.’
‘What does Alison think of your idea?’ Ruth asked, leaning forward to rest the palms of her hands on her knees and staring up at him.
The pigtails were a mistake. She had not expected to be confronted with Franco Leoni first thing in the morning or else she would have tried for a more sophisticated look. She could tell from the way that he looked at her that he was finding it difficult not to click his tongue impatiently at the image she presented.
‘Oh, she agrees entirely,’ he said. ‘In fact, she’s probably out there explaining all of this to your colleagues…’ he looked at her for a fraction longer than necessary ‘…and friends,’ he ended on a soft note, which made Ruth frown.
‘Well, I hope you don’t mind my asking, but why have you taken me to one side to explain all this when I could have been out there hearing it along with everyone else?’
‘Because…’ He inclined his head to one side and, worryingly, appeared to give the question quite a bit of thought. ‘Because there’s a further little matter I wanted to discuss with you…’
‘What?’ She inadvertently stiffened at the tone in his voice.
‘I think you could be a great deal of help in getting this magazine back on the straight and narrow.’
‘Me…?’ Ruth squeaked. She almost burst out laughing at that, and managed to contain the urge in the nick of time.
If he thought that she was, mysteriously, a wonderful and gifted reporter labouring under the disguise of a dogsbody, then he was way off target. The most she had ever written were essays at school, and she’d occasionally helped her dad to write the odd sermon for Sunday’s congregation.
Hard-hitting articles on topical issues were quite outside her realm of capability.
‘Yes, you. And there’s no need to sound so shocked. Don’t you have any faith in your abilities?’
‘I couldn’t write to save my life!’
‘Why not? Have you ever tried?’ There was curiosity etched on his dark, handsome face as he leant a little closer