The Ex Who Hired Her

So it was his family business. ‘And now you’re the CEO. Following in their footsteps.’ That much she could work out for herself. ‘But it doesn’t quite add up. Since it’s a family business, why isn’t your surname Field?’

He shrugged. ‘It’s my middle name. My father refused to change his surname when he married my mother.’

Oh. So the store belonged to his mother’s family. With a heritage like that, no wonder Vanessa Smith had been so confident. And maybe she could understand now why Vanessa had made that accusation when Alexandra had gone to her for help—an accusation that even now made a red mist swirl in front of Alexandra’s eyes because it had been so unfair and so unjust.

Jordan looked at her. ‘Speaking of names, I notice you’ve changed yours.’

Was that a roundabout way of asking her if she was married? Under employment law, he couldn’t ask her; marital status was nothing to do with someone’s performance in their job. On the other hand, it wouldn’t hurt if he thought she was still married. Just in case he was under the very mistaken impression that she wanted anything from him other than this job. ‘It’s my married name.’ And she’d kept it after the divorce.

‘Even your first name’s different,’ he mused. ‘I knew you as Alex.’

When she’d been a very different person. Naïve, believing that she’d been lucky enough to find her soul mate at the age of seventeen. Except she’d kissed her handsome prince and he’d turned into a slimy toad. She shrugged, affecting a cool she definitely didn’t feel—even thinking about kissing when Jordan Smith was sitting right in front of her was a mistake. ‘Xandra is a perfectly valid diminutive of Alexandra,’ she said crisply.

‘Very “marketing”.’

Which was what her tutor had told her when she’d started doing the evening class. Look the part, sound the part, act the part, and you’ll get the part. She’d followed that to the letter. ‘Is that a problem?’

‘No.’ He paused. ‘I told Harry and Gina I knew you.’

Knew her. Yeah. He’d known her, all right. In the Biblical sense. ‘Didn’t that put me out of the running?’

‘They liked you.’

And he’d made it very clear that he didn’t. Definitely guilt talking, she thought.

Meeting his gaze was a huge mistake. The man had proved to her years ago that he had no integrity where personal relationships were concerned. He’d abandoned her when she’d needed him most, let her down in the worst possible way. How could she possibly still find him in the slightest bit attractive? She reined her thoughts back in.

‘If Field’s were to offer you the job, would you take it?’

If that was his idea of an apology, Alexandra thought, it was much too little and much too late.

Then again, this was a real opportunity: to be the marketing manager of a traditional, well established department store, with a brief to bring it bang up to date. If she was offered the job, it’d be a real plus on her CV. If she turned it down just to spite him, she’d really be doing herself a disservice. ‘I’d consider it,’ she said.

‘The job would mean working with me.’

‘Is that a problem for you?’

He looked straight at her. ‘Not if it’s not a problem for you.’

In other words, it could work if they didn’t talk about what had happened ten years ago. Could she do that, for the sake of her career?

She took a deep breath. ‘That depends on what you offer me.’

Pretty much what she’d said to his mother.

Alexandra might look different and have a different name, but deep down she was still the same person. Still on the make. Jordan had to fight not to scowl at her and to keep his voice even. ‘That depends,’ he said, ‘on what you can offer us. We’ll see you here tomorrow at three.’

‘I’ll be here,’ she said.

Yeah. And he’d just have to hope that this time she managed to show her true colours and put Harry and Gina off.

CHAPTER TWO

‘SHE’S the one,’ Harry said the following afternoon, when Alexandra left the room after her second interview. ‘No question about it.’

‘I really like her ideas for taking the store card to a new level, especially combining it with an app so customers can have instant access to all their account information wherever they are,’ Gina added. ‘And her presentation was flawless as well as enthusiastic. You’d never believe she only got the brief yesterday. She’s going to be a real asset to Field’s. The Board’s going to love her.’

Jordan couldn’t think of a single argument to change their minds. Mainly because they were right. Much as he hated to admit it, she was the best person for the job.

Maybe that huge ambition of hers could be harnessed to work in their favour.

Maybe.

Well, he’d never been a coward. He’d always stepped up to the mark, always shouldered his responsibilities. That wasn’t going to change now. ‘Let’s call her in and give her the good news.’

The serious look on Jordan’s face confirmed Alexandra’s gut reaction. She hadn’t got the job. Given that he was on the interview panel, that wasn’t so surprising. Hopefully the debrief would tell her where she’d gone wrong; though she had a feeling that the real reason for her rejection lay ten years in the past.

What an idiot she’d been, putting herself in a position where he could reject her for a second time.

‘Ms Bennett. Do sit down.’

She thought about defying him and remaining on her feet; but she was very glad she had taken the seat when he added, ‘Welcome to the team.’

She’d got the job?

It surprised her so much that she was actually lost for words.

But her silence didn’t seem to faze him. He continued, ‘Mr Blake will sort out the details with you—when you’re able to start, setting up an induction day so you can meet the rest of the team, sorting out your security for the store and the computer network.’

‘Thank you.’

‘Do you have any questions?’ Harry asked.

‘At the moment, only one.’ She paused. ‘Is the culture here always this formal? I’m more used to working on first-name terms.’

Jordan looked at her. So she was going to start challenging him already?

OK. He’d let her think she’d won this one, because it really wasn’t an issue. ‘No, it’s not. Everyone here calls me Jordan.’

‘Jordan,’ she repeated.

It was the first time he’d heard her say his name in a decade, and he felt the colour rise through his face because he could remember a completely different tone to her voice, back then. When she’d cried out his name as she’d climaxed.

What an idiot he’d been. Not an issue, indeed; suddenly she’d made it one. And she hadn’t just won this round, she’d completely flattened him. He needed to get out of here before he said something stupid. He glanced at his watch. ‘I’m afraid I need to be somewhere. Excuse me. Thank you for your time, Ms B—Xandra.’ He deliberately didn’t meet her gaze and turned instead to the personnel manager. ‘Harry, would you mind debriefing the other candidates?’

‘Sure.’

Jordan walked out of the room without looking at her; when he reached his office he sank into his chair and closed his eyes. How the hell was he going to cope with having her back in his life?

Lots of cold showers, he answered his own question. And he’d better hope that the icy water would wake up his common sense. Because this particular woman was absolutely off limits, whatever his body might like to think.

A week later, Alexandra walked into Field’s.

From today, this was hers. And she was going to take it from being a quiet, slightly old-fashioned department store to one that was buzzing. One that hit the news for all the right reasons. One that could deliver cutting-edge products, yet back them up with solid tradition.

And she could hardly wait.

She smiled as she swiped her store ID card through the slot by the staff entrance door, and stepped through.

Harry was there to meet her and introduced her to all the office staff, then took her round to meet the manager of each department. Jordan was conspicuous by his absence. She wasn’t sure whether to be more relieved or cross; was he deliberately avoiding her? Well, he’d have to face her eventually, and she’d make sure that he didn’t have a single thing to complain about. She was going to make a real success of this job.

A couple of days later, Jordan was doing his daily walkabout through the store—not so much checking up on his staff as making sure that he was visible rather than a faceless boss, and so he could see for himself if there were any issues that needed tackling or where his staff needed more support.

His body prickled with awareness and he glanced round. Alexandra—he still couldn’t think of her as Xandra—was there, talking animatedly to the staff on one of the perfume counters. She was wearing another beautifully cut business suit that emphasised her curves and those high, high heels that made her legs look even longer.

As if she sensed him watching her, she glanced up and caught his gaze. She gave him a shy smile, and for a moment he was transported back to being nineteen years old, catching her gaze across a crowded party. She’d smiled like that at him back then, her brown eyes huge and slightly wary behind her spectacles.

And then she’d reeled him in. Hook, line and sinker.

He had to remember that. The shyness had been just an act, and she’d fooled him.

Though he was a fast learner. Nobody fooled him twice.

He gave her a cool, formal nod and turned away.

By the end of the week, Alexandra was absolutely certain that Jordan was avoiding her. He never seemed to visit the staff canteen—or, at least, not when she did; he hadn’t dropped in to see how his newest manager was coping in the role, delegating that task to Harry; and he hadn’t acknowledged her once on his daily walkabouts in the store, even though she knew damn well he’d seen her talking to customers and staff and setting up the customer audits.

Worse still, even when her back had been to him, her body seemed to have developed some kind of radar system that told her exactly where he was. And it was infuriating that she was still so aware of him.

If she was honest with herself, she knew the old attraction between them had never really gone away. But she’d just have to ignore it, because she didn’t repeat her mistakes. Apart from the fact that Jordan Smith had been the second-biggest mistake of her life, her marriage had taught her just how rubbish her judgement was when it came to men. As far as she was concerned, from now on, she was married to her career. At least her career wasn’t going to let her down or try to control her or make her feel bad about herself.

Though Jordan was the CEO here, and she was planning to make quite a few changes. Which meant that they were going to have to work together. They’d need to discuss her plans. Since he clearly wasn’t going to make the first move and establish a decent working relationship between them, then she was going to have to be the one to do it. ‘Stubborn, annoying, ridiculous man,’ she muttered, and printed out the report she’d been working on.

It was late enough on a Friday evening for the rest of the office staff to have gone home, but she knew that Jordan would be working late. He put in a crazy number of hours—a work schedule that would strain just about any marriage to creaking point. Which wasn’t her problem; she wasn’t in the slightest bit interested in whether Jordan Smith was married and how happy he was. But his working habits did mean that she’d be able to talk to him this evening without anyone else being able to overhear.

Just in case it got awkward.

She walked down to the far end of the corridor—had he deliberately made sure that her office was as far away as possible from his? she wondered—and looked through the open door. He was seated at his desk, working at his computer. She’d never seen him wearing glasses before, and it made her catch her breath; right now he looked incredibly clever and incredibly sexy.

But she had to remember that she couldn’t trust him as far as she could roll a ten-ton boulder up a slope.

OK, as a boss he seemed reasonable enough, and everyone she’d talked to in the department store had spontaneously mentioned what a nice guy he was and how he really cared about the staff; but when it came to personal stuff she knew he wasn’t in the slightest bit reasonable or reliable. She had the physical scars to remind her. Scars that only a surgeon would see, but they were most definitely there. The physical ache had gone, but the emotional ache was something she’d learned to live with over the years.

She rapped on the door jamb.

He looked up, and his eyes widened in surprise. ‘Is there something you need?’

‘I just thought you might like to know what I’ve been working on for the last week.’

He shrugged. ‘I don’t believe in micromanagement. I know my managers are perfectly capable of doing their jobs.’

Ha. Considering he clearly hadn’t wanted to give her the job in the first place, that was rich. ‘Well, I’m telling you anyway, because I believe in good communications.’ Neatly pointing out his own failings in that area, without actually saying the words. ‘This is the stuff about the social media. It’s a quick win and a small budget.’ She walked over to his desk and handed him the report.

‘You could’ve emailed this to me. Or given it to my PA.’

‘So I could.’ He wasn’t even going to try meeting her halfway, was he? ‘I’ll remember that in future.’ She gave him a cool smile and walked away.

Jordan almost called her back. Almost. But, until he’d managed to inure himself against those beautiful brown eyes, he needed to keep some distance between them.

Even so, instead of putting her report in his in-tray for later, he read through it.

There was a concise summary at the beginning, then each section had figures to back up her recommendations. She was definitely as bright as he remembered. And she was a team player: she’d acknowledged the input of every member of staff from the shop floor who’d made a suggestion. She’d suggested who would be good at hosting each of the community forums she’d recommended, and why. All the store’s departments were included: home, garden, fashion, beauty, kitchen, technology, sport. She wanted sections on the website for articles giving ‘how to’ advice on everything from choosing lighting in a room or the right pillow for you through to make-up demonstrations and fashion tips, and she already had people in mind to write them or be filmed in action for a demonstration.

In one short week, she’d managed to spot the strengths of the team, and reinforce them. It was exactly as Harry and Gina had said: she’d be a real asset to the firm.

So why did he feel so antsy around her?

Not wanting to answer that question, he typed her a swift email instead. Headed ‘Social media’.

I’ll talk to the Board next week and recommend that they agree your plans. JS.

Nicely formal.

And now he could go back to what he’d been doing before she’d torpedoed his concentration.

Easier said than done, Jordan thought wryly the following day, when he saw Alexandra balanced precariously on the top of a ladder in the toy department. She was standing on tiptoe, for pity’s sake. ‘What do you think you’re doing?’ he demanded.

‘Putting up a banner in the department to publicise the first story-time session, next week,’ Alexandra said. ‘What does it look like?’

‘Dangerous, with a flagrant disregard for health and safety. You could hurt yourself, as well as customers or colleagues. Why didn’t you ask Bill—or anyone taller than you, for that matter—to do it?’

‘Bill was busy, and I wanted the banner up as soon as possible. The kids have worked hard on this.’

‘Kids?’ Jordan wasn’t following.

‘My friend Meggie’s Year Two class.’

Meggie? He narrowed his eyes. He remembered Meggie. Alexandra’s best friend. Ten years ago, she’d had great pleasure in telling him that Alexandra was married to someone who would treat her properly, and he could go and take a running jump. Or words to that effect. ‘I see,’ he said crisply.

But he noticed that the banner was composed of the words ‘story time here Monday 10 a.m.’, with each letter carefully cut out, painted and glued to the banner. And all around them were glued drawings of book covers, clearly the children’s favourite books. The children had obviously worked really hard to make the banner bright and colourful. To make it special, for Alexandra.

Year Two. The children in the class would all be aged seven. If things had been different, he and Alexandra might’ve had a child of their own in that class, as well as another in Year Five …

The thought made him snap at her. ‘Will you get down from there before you fall?’

‘I won’t fall.’

In a suit and high heels? He wasn’t going to take the risk. ‘Get down,’ he said again. ‘I’ll put the damn thing up for you.’

For a moment, he thought she was going to defy him, but then she shrugged. ‘Fine. Thank you.’

He had to take his eyes off her legs as she descended from the ladder, carefully holding the banner.

Then she handed him one end. He’d just finished fixing it to the ceiling when he glanced down at her, and realised that she had a camera in her hands. ‘What are you doing?’

‘Taking shots for social media. To show that our CEO isn’t afraid to get his hands dirty.’

‘You’re photographing me?’

‘I’ll let you vet the pictures, first.’ She gave him a wicked grin. ‘Maybe.’

Infuriating woman. He was about to say something cutting, when she asked, ‘Would you mind putting the other end up for me, too, please, as you’re here?’

After the fuss he’d made about her being up the ladder, he could hardly say no. He gave her a speaking look, but did so.

‘My hero,’ she purred.

‘Don’t push it,’ he warned.

She just batted her eyelashes at him. And it made him want to grab her shoulders and …

Kiss her.

Shake her, he corrected himself. ‘Don’t take unnecessary risks again,’ he said when he got down from the ladder.

‘No, sir.’ She gave him a smart salute.

He resisted the provocation, just, and stomped back to his office.

Later, his email pinged. The message contained a picture of him up the ladder, and a note from her.

Using this one. If I don’t hear back within the hour, will assume OK.

He went straight to her office. ‘How exactly are you intending to use that photograph?’

‘Here.’ She flicked into a screen on her computer and indicated the monitor so he could see the web page.

‘What if I said no?’

‘Let me see. This shows you as hands-on. All the mums are going to go weak at the knees and want to be here in case you walk by. All the grandmothers are going to think of their own sons and warm to you. The grandfathers will do the same, and the dads will see themselves in your shoes. So you’re generating customer warmth. Plus you’re creating links with the local community, as a local school worked on the banner—using material that Field’s supplied. Now, why would you say no to that kind of PR?’

He didn’t have an answer to that, because he knew she was right. ‘Just stay inside health and safety guidelines in future,’ he muttered.

She rolled her eyes. ‘I’m not planning to have an accident and sue Field’s or anything like that. I’m part of the team here. And I like being hands on.’

Hands on. He wished she hadn’t used that phrase. He could still remember the feel of her hands against his skin. ‘Whatever,’ he said, annoyed by the fact that she could still unsettle him like that. ‘If you’ll excuse me. I have things that need sorting.’ And he left her office before he did or said anything really rash.

On Monday morning, Jordan headed for the toy department. It was the first of their story-time sessions, and Alexandra had managed to get a minor children’s TV presenter in to do the first one.

Except it seemed that the presenter had gone down with tonsillitis and wasn’t able to appear. And Alexandra had stepped into the breach.

Jordan stood on the sidelines, watching her. She was sitting on a bean bag, with the children gathered round her and the mums sitting on chairs that looked as if they came from the staff canteen—no doubt she’d asked very nicely, with those huge eyes and the sweetest smile, and charmed the catering manager into helping. She was reading a rhyming story for the younger ones; some of them were clearly familiar with it, because she got them to join in on the chorus sections. She had a gorgeous voice, he thought, and he wasn’t surprised that all the children were hanging onto every single word.

And then he found himself imagining her with their child. If she hadn’t had the termination, would she have sat curled on the sofa with their toddler on her lap, pointing out the pictures and the words, gently teaching their little one to recognise letters?

Their child would’ve been ten, now. Nearly ready for high school. Would they have had a boy or a girl? And would they have had more children? A boy with his own dark hair and blue eyes, a girl with Alexandra’s huge brown eyes and sunny smile …

Jordan was cross with himself for even thinking about it. It was pointless dwelling on what might have been, because you couldn’t change the past. And right now children weren’t part of his future in any case.

Quietly, without catching her eye, Jordan moved away. Alexandra was doing just fine on her own; she didn’t need any support from him. And he wasn’t going to crowd her.

Though he did return right at the end, just as Alexandra was finishing the story, with a camera.

She glanced up at him and for a moment he could see laughter in her eyes; she clearly recognised this as a bit of tit-for-tat. And he took more photographs of the line of children thanking her for the story and the queue of mums at the tills with books under their arms, before sliding the camera back into his jacket pocket and starting to stack the chairs.

‘I saw that camera, you know,’ she said, joining him in the chair-stacking.

‘My marketing manager is very keen on social media and taking every photo opportunity we can,’ he said.

‘Good man. You’re learning.’ She patted his arm. ‘Though I’m afraid we’ll need to get all the mums to sign a release form before we can use those pics.’

Just as well there was a jacket sleeve and a shirt sleeve between his skin and hers. As it was, his skin was tingling where she’d touched him. How could she affect him like that, when he knew what he did about her?

He cleared his throat. ‘I don’t think anyone missed the TV presenter. You did a good job.’

‘Thank you. I’m getting the staff to do a rota; they’re all going to read their favourite stories.’ She smiled. ‘It’s lovely that everyone in the store wants to get involved, whether they’re from the shop floor or behind the scenes. Maureen from the canteen’s even coming in on her day off to read her granddaughter’s favourite story.’

‘Was that a hint that you’re expecting me to read a story?’ he asked.

‘Could be.’

She smiled again, and he noticed the dimple in her cheek. Cute. How had he forgotten that? And it really made him want to touch it. Touch her. Dip his head and brush his mouth against hers. Kiss her until they were both dizzy.

‘Jordan?’

‘Uh—sorry.’ He felt the colour rise in his cheeks. She’d just caught him staring at her like a fool. ‘You know me. Mind always on the next project.’

‘I said, it might be a hint. If you want to read a story for the kids, that is. If you’re not too busy.’

‘I’ll think about it.’ Again, he found his thoughts coming back to the baby. Did she ever think about their baby? Did she ever regret what she’d done? Did she ever wonder what it might’ve been like, making a family with him?

And just what was wrong with him, suddenly thinking about having a family? Since the break-up of his marriage, he’d pushed all that sort of thing to the back of his mind and concentrated on making Field’s the best department store he could.