Private Confessions

“What about Phil? What was wrong with him?”

Trisha’s expression went blank as she stared at Adrienne for an extended beat. “He’s never had a job.”

“He’s in med school.”

“He’s a thirty-four-year-old professional student. He already has a law degree but does he try for the bar? No. He decides to go into medicine. I swear. He’ll never amount to anything. He just stays in school so his parents will keep supporting him.”

“His parents are filthy rich, which means he’s filthy rich. What does it matter? You certainly wouldn’t end up in poverty.”

“I have no respect for a man who doesn’t attempt to make his own way through life.”

Adrienne sat back in her seat and let out a long huff. “Well, you’ve got to do something. Using a pimply kid to fantasize about Logan isn’t getting you anywhere. You’re just going to give yourself a nervous break-down.” She gave Trisha the once-over. “Look at you, you’re a mess,” she added, pulling the pad of notes from the desk and pointing to the last few entries. “You’ve written the same sentence three times. Are you planning to stutter?”

“I’m just a little distracted.”

“Because of Cyber Man.”

“No,” Trisha declared, but the tone didn’t sound at all convincing.

Adrienne tossed the notes back to Trisha. “Cyber Man is a pimply teenager. Just repeat that in your head. Wipe out whatever fantasy the guy fed you and replace it with pimply teenaged kid.”

Trisha doubted that was possible. She’d so thoroughly burned last night’s sex chat in her mind, surgery couldn’t remove the image of Logan Moore pleasuring her at his desk. Thank God, she hadn’t worn her navy-blue skirt today, but if Logan wore the crisp white shirt she’d envisioned, she was going to be in trouble.

Hopefully, they would conduct the meeting at his conference table and she was considering bringing enough materials to require it, though it wasn’t technically necessary.

Adrienne’s comment repeated in her mind. The woman was right. Her cybersex idea was beginning to interfere with her work and she would have to get over it fast before she soured her reputation and destroyed her career.

“I just need to get through this project and I’ll be free to go,” she said.

“You’re seriously going to quit?”

“I don’t have any other choice. I need to distance myself from Logan before I ruin my reputation and once I land Tyndale Resorts, I’ll have the reference I need to get a good job at another agency.”

“As good as what you’ll have here?”

Adrienne knew something. Trisha could always read the woman like a book, especially this particular look that said she had inside information she was dying to share. She was casually glancing around the office as if she’d never seen it before while her finger tapped a countdown on the arm of her chair, as if to tick off the seconds before she burst with her news.

“What do you know?”

Adrienne’s grin widened in that I-thought-you’d-never-ask smile. She straightened in her seat and leaned forward to whisper. “Well, rumor has it Logan’s planning to promote you to vice president.”

“Who says?”

“Came straight from Human Resources.”

Reliable source, but she still found it hard to believe. She’d only been with the company two years. She was the newest marketing director on staff. But then again, none of her peers had landed the accounts she’d recently brought in the door.

She sat for a moment, trying to let the repercussions of the notion sink in.

She decided there were none.

“Well, he’s wasting his time. I’m not staying. I can’t,” she said, but even she could hear the uncertainty of her tone.

Adrienne’s expression turned to shock. “Trish, we’re talking VP. What other agency is going to make a twenty-eight-year-old woman a VP? You’d be crazy to walk away from an opportunity like that.”

She hated when Adrienne was right.

“I’m going to have to give it some thought.”

“You’re going to have to dump Cyber Man and either make a move with Logan or get over him and find someone else.” She glanced down at Trisha’s hands, which had begun trembling again. “Look at you. You’re a disaster. The cyber thing isn’t working. You were handling Logan much better before you linked up with pimply kid.”

Trisha breathed a sigh of agreement. “I know. But I really like him. Sometimes when we chat, it’s like he knows me. It’s almost creepy how much we think alike.”

“Creepy being the operative word.” Adrienne tilted her head and flashed a warm sympathetic smile that bordered on pity. “Trisha, this cybersex thing isn’t for you. Dump pimply kid, get over Logan and take the VP job. Don’t trash your career over a man. You can handle Logan. You just have to try.”

“You’re right. I know you’re right,” she replied.

Unfortunately, knowing and doing were two different things.

2

“HEY! WHAT ARE YOU DOING tomorrow night?”

Logan looked up from his notes to see Bill Jeffries strolling into his office with a bag of beer nuts in his hand.

He glanced at the date on his Rolex. “What’s tomorrow, Thursday?”

“All day,” Bill said, plopping down on one of the maple chairs that faced Logan’s desk.

Without thinking, Logan muttered, “I’ve got a date.”

Bill’s eyes brightened. “Ha! I knew you couldn’t swear off women forever.” The stocky blonde tossed the bag of nuts on Logan’s desk in a gesture of offering. “What’s her name? Anyone I know?”

Logan wished he could answer that question. He had no idea who he’d been meeting twice a week in his dimly lit den. All he knew was that the more he chatted online with Scorpio63, the more intent he was to keep their dates.

He frowned at his own stupidity for making the absent comment. “It’s not that kind of date.”

Logan had no intention of sharing his cybertrysts with Bill, no matter how close a friend Bill was. After Logan’s post-divorce escapades left him with a playboy reputation he’d never live down, the last thing he needed was the embarrassment of admitting that he was now having an Internet love affair with a woman he didn’t know.

How a man in his position had been reduced to cybersex, he’d never know. It had started as a joke, a belated birthday present from his brother, Dane. Shattered by his divorce and frustrated with his new love life, Logan had thrown in the towel on dating altogether. He’d ultimately confessed his state to Dane, who in turn, signed him up with LoveSigns.com. Logan had been handed a password and a date with what he thought would be a virtual prostitute, one of those talk-dirty ladies that advertised on late-night television.

He hadn’t intended to keep the date, but after four gin and tonics and nothing else to do, he’d decided, what the hell? He hadn’t expected to log on and find a tender, intelligent woman, just as apprehensive as he’d been. Their first chat had been close to laughable, as bungling and awkward as real sex among strangers who weren’t accustomed to such things. If he hadn’t been sauced, he would have never made it through the hour. But something about the sexy, sensitive woman on the other end had him coming back and before he knew it, he was under her spell.

Sure, he told himself she was most likely some frustrated housewife. But for some reason, he simply didn’t care. Scorpio63 had become the image of everything he wanted in a woman, and as pathetic as it seemed, he couldn’t bring himself to let her go.

“What is it, a business meeting?” Bill asked.

“Something like that.” He grabbed the bag of nuts and casually tossed one in his mouth. “So how’s Megan doing with the Puffy Cream Doughnut ads?” he asked, hoping to quickly change the subject before Bill pressed him for details.

Bill didn’t bite. “You’re really done with women?”

Logan’s beer nut turned to paste as the moisture left his mouth. He didn’t want to talk about his love life. “Puffy Cream, Bill. How’s it going?”

Bill snatched the bag from Logan, tipped a few nuts into his hand and tossed it back onto the desk. “Why don’t you ask Trisha out? She’s perfect for you.”

Logan nearly choked. Trisha Bain was the last woman he cared to get involved with. And the fact that his body had other ideas made her all that more dangerous.

“She’s a carbon copy of my ex,” he explained.

Bill gave a sharp laugh. “Oh, come on. Trisha’s nothing like Virginia.”

No, Virginia Matthews, formerly Virginia Moore, was one of a kind, but she and Trisha both shared that spark to succeed at any cost, which made Trisha Bain a woman he’d need to keep far from his heart.

“She wants to do well, not take over your business,” Bill added.

Logan didn’t intend to give her the opportunity. He’d been a stupid young executive when he’d married his ex-wife, stupid enough to let his smaller head make the decisions and hand over control of half his business. Business she’d taken with her when she’d walked out the door. It had taken the Moore Agency three years to recover its position as one of the top ad agencies in San Francisco, but it would take longer than that for him to recover his trust in women, especially women with the looks and brains of Trisha Bain.

“She is doing well,” Logan said. “I’ve seen the briefs of her ads for Tyndale Resorts. She’s nailed him. Landing Tyndale will be the feather in our cap that puts us back on top.” And sticks it in the craw of the lovely Virginia Matthews. Oh, what he’d give to be there when Tyndale pulled the rug out from under his ex. He’d pay money to see the look on that surgically enhanced face when they told her she’d lost her account to the man she screwed over three years ago.

“You two make a great team.”

He shot a glance at Bill. “In business, and that’s where it ends. I’ve been there, remember? We both almost lost our jobs thanks to my brilliant choice in women.”

And the fact that Trisha kept haunting his thoughts was proof he hadn’t learned a thing.

After Virginia, he’d sworn off dating women in advertising, especially women at his firm. It was the only way to be sure he’d never threaten his company again. But after two years working with Trisha, he’d nearly broken the rule, the brain in his pants apparently having a shorter memory than the one between his ears. Trisha was everything that had attracted him to Virginia—a bundle of smarts, a clever wit, a killer smile, all rolled up in one tantalizing body.

It all came together as one bright neon “No” and no matter now much he tried to see their differences, the similarities between Trisha and Virginia were too obvious to ignore.

“You’re forgetting one thing,” Bill said. “I know Trisha. She’s Adie’s best friend. She’s not another Virginia. And if you recall, I was the one who told you to watch out for Virginia in the first place, but you didn’t listen.”

No, he hadn’t, Logan thought. He’d been too smitten by Virginia and too stupid to care. She’d wrapped him in such a fog, he’d believed every word she’d uttered between the sheets, her lies about wanting a family, how much she’d loved him, all the dreams about their future. And in the end it had all been a ploy to gain stake in his budding agency.

Virginia hadn’t wanted a family or a husband. She’d only wanted her own agency and figured marrying a man who had one was easier than building one of her own.

The two were going to form a partnership, in business and in life. But the moment they’d made their mark, she’d dropped the bomb. Children weren’t her future, marriage wasn’t her bag and the only thing she wanted from him was a divorce and half his business.

He’d had to sink into debt to buy her out, giving her the money and status she needed to start a business of her own and then slowly snatch his accounts, one by one. He’d managed to restore his business, but the damage she’d done to his faith in his instinct was irreparable. How he’d been so colossally blind was a question for the ages, but he’d bought it all at a hefty price tag.

And it was a mistake he wouldn’t repeat.

“I’m not interested,” he said.

“Suit yourself, man. But one of these days, you should start listening to your old buddy here. I know what’s good for you.”

“So why are you asking me about tomorrow night?” Logan asked, trying once again to change the subject.

“Adie and I are going to a club to listen to some band she discovered. We were trying to get a few people to go along with us.”

Logan raised an eyebrow. “What few people?”

“Nobody, just a couple friends, that’s all.”

The caged look on Bill’s face told him those couple of friends included Trisha Bain.

“Stop trying to fix me up with Trisha,” Logan insisted.

“I’m not. Trisha’s not even going.”

Confusion set in. If Bill’s plans didn’t involve matchmaking, then something else was up.

Logan narrowed his eyes. “What are you really doing tomorrow?”

Bill opened his mouth, but nothing came out. He stuttered a moment before finally confessing through a long exhale, “Okay, so it’s some sort of…poetry reading.”

Logan threw his head back and laughed.

“Oh, come on, man. Adrienne’s mom is making her go. I guess it’s something special and she wants the whole family to be there.”

“I’m not family.”

“There will be music afterward.”

“What, a sitar?” Logan asked through his chuckle.

“Probably.”

“I don’t think so.” Although the thought of watching Bill trying to order a beer in some hippie tea house was tempting.

“Aw, come on. Help me out.”

Logan looked at Bill in amazement. “Are you kidding? My ears are still bleeding from that punk rock festival you dragged me to last year.” He shook his head in disgust. “What was her name?”

“Fawn and it was alternative rock, not punk.”

“It’s all the same to me.”

“You’re just an old fart.”

“And you’ve got bizarre taste in women,” Logan added under his breath. “At least Adrienne’s a move in the right direction.”

“And so is Trisha. I don’t know why you don’t go for her. You two would make a nice conservative couple, elevator music and all.”

Logan ignored the slam and shook his head. “Forget about me and Trisha. I have plans for her and none of them include sleeping with her.”

Bill perked. Insider information was his favorite joy in life. The man relished being in on a secret, and sometimes Logan truly believed that Bill was a thirteen-year-old girl in a past life.

“Spill, big guy. Don’t keep me in the dark.”

Logan smiled and paused, dragging out the tension. He loved toying with Bill, just as Bill loved toying with him. It was a little game they’d been playing since they’d met ten years ago.

Bill held up his hands. “Well?”

“Tyndale’s going to be big. He’s got six resorts along the west coast, with plans to open another in the Caribbean. If we get the account, we’ll need to hire more staff.” He picked up the bag of nuts and studied them for a moment, extending Bill’s agony for as long as possible. “I think Trisha would make a good candidate to head up a new travel segment.”

“So the VP rumor is true.”

Logan slammed the bag on the desk as Bill’s smirk told him he’d just been duped. “Son of a bitch. I can’t trust Sally with a goddamned thing.” He was more annoyed by losing his match with Bill than the knowledge that his Human Resources manager had loose lips.

Bill’s heavy chest rumbled as he laughed. “Sor-a-mundo, buddy boy. I already knew.”

“Well, keep it to yourself, although that’s probably pointless. I haven’t made my decision yet, and if we don’t get Tyndale, we don’t have enough business to form a separate segment. I don’t want Trisha disappointed if it doesn’t happen.”

“Don’t worry about it. You’ll get Tyndale and everything will work out as planned. I’m sure of it.”

PIMPLY KID, pimply kid, pimply kid.

Trisha hesitated outside Logan’s door for a beat as she repeated the mantra in her head, trying to lose the nerves that held on like an angry cold. She’d hoped some miracle would have brought Devon back in time to join her in Logan’s office, but her last-minute check found him still sitting in O’Hare.

She was on her own.

She took one giant breath, exhaled the memory of the previous night’s chat and stepped into the office.

One look at Logan behind his desk sucked the image back to her mind. Not only was he wearing the starched white shirt she’d envisioned the night before, but he’d removed his tie and unbuttoned the top two buttons, showing a faint hint of dark hair that told her his rocklike chest had the perfect blend of curls that made him masculine but not too hairy.

He’d rolled up his sleeves to the elbows and his hands were planted firmly on the arms of his chair, his fingers splayed over the ends, just as she’d seen it in her head.

She briefly made eye contact. Just enough to catch him sweep his dark eyes over her body in a manner that stopped short of lustful appreciation. He kept it professional, but sincere. Just a glance that made her wonder if he was interested, but didn’t reveal enough to answer the question.

It still sent a blizzard of tingles through her chest that twirled down to the spot between her thighs.

Her hands went numb, as if she’d just been shot with a local anesthetic. She attempted to wiggle her fingers, but they remained cemented to the files she clutched to her chest.

He lifted his hand and waved to her. “Come on in.”

For a brief millisecond her feet wouldn’t move. She didn’t want to sit at his desk. The image of sitting on it kept elbowing to the front of her thoughts. But she couldn’t come up with a plausible reason to ask him to move to the table.

Reluctantly she stepped inside, trying to keep her eyes focused on anything other than Logan Moore and those lips that, just last night, had been planted firmly between her—

Another clench between the legs told her to calm down and let it go. She was a professional. She hadn’t made it to where she was by lusting over something as silly as a few open shirt buttons.

She picked up her pace and casually took a seat across from him. She just wouldn’t look at him. They were here to discuss her ad campaign, not to gaze into each other’s eyes.

Without a word of greeting, she dropped the folders onto the desk and opened the first. She pulled the now sweaty pen from her left hand and flipped open her notebook preparing to get down to business.

“So this is what we’ve got,” she said. “I think Tyndale is going to like these ads.”

“Good afternoon to you, too, Trisha.”

She slowly brought her eyes from the ads to his face. His mouth was cocked in a half-smile, she could swear his gaze had just been planted on her chest, and when their eyes locked, a bolt of lightning shot through her, curling her toes.

Don’t look at his eyes.

She quickly glanced to his hair and those dark, wavy curls that she’d had her fingers threaded through on a number of imaginary occasions.

Hair, bad.

She shot her eyes down to his chest.

No, not the chest.

His ear, she could focus on his ear, she thought, before remembering she’d nibbled on it last Tuesday.

As her eyes shot around his features like a pinball, she realized she was sinking without a net. She needed to pull it together. She quickly glanced at the bronze Remington statue that stood on the credenza behind him. A team of wild horses. How fitting. She’d need a team of horses to jolt the lust from her head.

“You’re always business, aren’t you, Trisha?”

Her eyes met his as she mentally slapped herself in the face. It was time to act like a grown woman, like a company director who was supposedly slated for a VP position at the prestigious Moore Agency. And if she wanted that spot, she was going to have to prove to herself that she could overcome this lust for her boss and act maturely instead of being some sort of flustered teenager.

She cleared her throat, took a deep breath and began acting like a woman who belonged in the business world.

“I’m just excited about this campaign. I think we’ll get the contract. We’ve come up with some ideas that match the tone of the resorts and the image Marc Tyndale wants to portray. You’ll be impressed.”

He glanced down to the files. “I’m always impressed when it comes to you.”

Not helping.

“I appreciate that.”

With his elbows propped on the armrests, he laced his fingers together and tilted back his chair, relaxed, casual and entirely sexy. His movement caused a light breeze of his aftershave to sweep up her nose, sending another intoxicating wave of heat through her midsection.

“I only have one problem when it comes to you, Trisha.”

That iced her down and grabbed her attention.

She studied him, waiting for an explanation.

His brief grin let her know he’d noticed the look of concern on her face. “Trisha, you work too hard. There’s only a couple nights a week you leave here on time.”

Those would be the nights she cut out to have imaginary sex with her boss.

He pulled up his chair and leaned his arms on the desk, moving a little too close for her comfort.

“What I’m getting at is, I don’t want to be responsible for ruining your personal life.”

Too late.

“If you need another assistant,” he continued, “please just say the word.”

She exhaled the breath she’d been holding and forced herself to relax.

“I appreciate that, but Devon and I are fine.”

He raised an eyebrow.

“Really,” she insisted. “If I feel it’s too much, I’ll tell you, but for now, I’m fine.”

“Uh-huh. And I assume your boyfriend would agree?”

She opened her mouth, but any attempt at words would have only resulted in a low gurgle in her throat. Logan had never made reference to her personal life before. He’d always remained strictly business, and being that he was the reason she had no boyfriend, she wasn’t sure how to answer.

His smile turned to reluctance. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to pry into your personal life.”

“No, please.” She couldn’t let her silence make him feel like a cad. “It’s just…I don’t have a boyfriend, that’s all.”

Logan’s eyes darkened. She couldn’t tell if it was disbelief, or suspicion, but something inside him turned, and for the life of her, she didn’t understand why.

Why would Logan care that she was unattached? And why would he react with such obvious distaste? Plenty of people in the office were single. Logan himself was single, uninvolved in a serious relationship.

What did it matter to him?

And without a doubt, it mattered.

It was written all over his face.

She opened her mouth to inquire, but he cut her off.

“There’s more to life than work. You’re already doing a great job, you don’t need to do more and I need to know that you can delegate responsibility.”

Well, there it was. The hint that Adrienne’s VP rumor might actually be true.

“I’m just giving extra attention to Tyndale. I know how important this particular account is to you.”

A faint smile crossed his face. “It is important, but I won’t sacrifice my staff to get it. Besides, I need you rested for the sales pitch next week.”

A lump formed in Trisha’s throat. This was exactly the glimpse inside Logan Moore that snatched her heart and twisted it in knots. It was this caring, supportive side of Logan that he didn’t often show, but when he did, it made her want to unpeel those layers of stoic professionalism to see what was truly inside.

“I appreciate that,” she said. “And I promise, once these go to print, I’ll take some time off.”

He cleared his throat and took the folder in his hands. “I suppose that’s a reasonable deal. So let’s get the ball rolling.”

“SORRY I’m late.”

Trisha dropped her purse on the kitchen counter of her parents’ Tiburon home, pressed a kiss to her mother’s cheek and took a seat at the bar next to her brother Mark.