The Billionaire's New Year Gift

Today would be the true test, though, because in less than forty-five minutes, he would begin his new job at HuntCom’s main distribution center.

New job.

New apartment.

And new name.

He’d also decided that for the duration of his “hunt” he would be known as Alex Noble. It would be different if he were going to go to work somewhere that wasn’t associated with HuntCom, but at the distribution center there was no way he could be Alex Hunt without someone questioning the coincidence of the shared name.

So he’d decided on Noble, which was the surname of a previous stepfather. Alex’s mother, Lucinda Parker Hunt Noble Fitzpatrick, was on her third marriage and Alex had once cynically figured it wouldn’t be her last, although he’d finally conceded that maybe Terrence Fitzpatrick was the real deal. He and Alex’s mother had recently celebrated their twenty-fourth wedding anniversary.

There were things about Terrence Alex didn’t like, namely his penchant for thinking money could solve any problem, but he’d done one thing right. He’d given Alex a much-loved younger sister, Julie, although Terrence was doing his level best to spoil her with the enormous amounts of money and gifts he lavished upon her.

Thinking about Julie and her recent escapades, Alex frowned. He wished he could get through to her, but she laughed off his concern, telling him he was “stodgy” and “old-fashioned” and had forgotten what it was like to be young.

Her scorn, even though delivered with affection, had hurt. Alex didn’t think he was stodgy. He was just sensible and practical. So he didn’t worship at the altar of money and power. Did that mean there was something wrong with him? He guessed in his little sister’s crowd, it probably did.

He was still thinking about Julie when he pulled into the employee parking lot at the HuntCom Distribution Center. But when he emptied his pockets and passed through security, he deliberately put her out of his mind. Today he couldn’t afford to be distracted by Julie or anything else. He would need all his wits about him to pull off a successful masquerade.

It took an hour to fill out necessary paperwork and watch an orientation film in the human resources department, but by nine o’clock—he was on the first shift which began at eight in the morning—the HR manager’s assistant, who made a point of telling him her name was Kim, walked him down to the gigantic storage center, which was a beehive of activity.

Alex couldn’t help grinning when a young girl with purple spiked hair whizzed by them on roller blades. At his quizzical look, Kim said, “That’s Ruby. She’s also a picker.”

Alex frowned. “Picker?”

“Sorry. Merchandise rep. Same job you’re going to do. You know, pick the merchandise from the shelves so it can be shipped to the company or person who placed the order.”

“Ah.” It amused Alex to think what his colleagues at the foundation would say if they could see him now. Most, he knew, were in awe of him. After all, he was one of the mighty Hunts. They respected him, because he worked as hard or harder than they did, and they knew he cared about the work they were doing, but they still couldn’t manage to treat him the way they treated the others on staff. To them, he was out of their league.

“I’m sure you’ll be great at the job,” Kim said, giving him an admiring glance.

Alex wasn’t interested; he’d seen her wedding band. So all he said was, “Hope so.”

She led Alex toward a cluster of several people who seemed to be arguing about something. When they spied him, the conversation abruptly stopped and a young woman—a very attractive young woman, Alex noticed—with wildly curly red hair tied back with a navy-blue ribbon and dressed in snug jeans and a white blouse open at the throat, broke away from the group and strode toward them. Very blue eyes filled with intelligence gave him a quick assessment before turning their intensity on Kim.

“Um, P.J.,” she said, “this is Alex Noble, the new member of your crew. Alex, this is P.J. Kincaid, the floor supervisor.”

Alex wondered if P.J. had adopted initials in lieu of her first name for the same reason J.T. had adopted his, because she hated her given name. J.T. had said Jared was a sissy name and he would kill anyone who insisted upon using it.

“Hello,” P.J. said, thrusting out her right hand. “Welcome to HuntCom.”

Alex took her hand and gave it a firm shake. Hers was just as firm. “Hello,” he said.

“Good luck,” Kim said. She smiled at him, then turned and walked off.

When Alex’s attention returned to P.J., her eyes met his squarely. Something about their steady scrutiny disturbed Alex. Did she suspect something? He forced himself not to drop his gaze.

“I’m told you have experience,” she said.

Yes, that was definitely a hint of doubt in her voice. Deciding brevity was his best bet, Alex nodded. “Yes, I do.”

“And you worked…where…before?”

Sticking to what it said on his fake résumé, Alex answered, “At a warehouse in Sacramento.”

She looked at him thoughtfully. “What kind of products?”

“Household appliances.”

Her eyes remained speculative. “Why’d you leave?”

He made his voice light. “Couldn’t very well commute from here.”

She nodded, but instinct told him she wasn’t completely buying his story. “You’ve completed all your paperwork?”

“Yes.”

“Had your physical and drug testing?”

“Yes.” That wasn’t true, but on paper, it said Alex had done so and passed.

“So…you ready to go to work?”

“Yes, I am.”

Turning, she gestured to one of the men in the group still gathered nearby. “Rick.”

A dark-haired, dark-eyed man Alex judged to be in his late twenties or early thirties walked toward them. Like P.J. and Alex and almost everyone Alex had seen so far, except for the employees of the HR department, he wore jeans. His black T-shirt hawked a Red Hot Chili Peppers concert.

“Rick,” she said, “this is Alex Noble. You’ll be training him.” Meeting Alex’s eyes again, she said, “Alex, this is Rick Alvarado. He’s been with the company seven years and can answer any questions you might have.”

The two men shook hands. Rick’s eyes were friendly. Alex liked him immediately and sensed he could turn out to be a friend.

“Follow me,” Rick said. “I’ll give you a tour of the place so you can get a general idea of where everything is stored.” He kept up a running commentary as they headed down the nearest aisle. “You know much about the company, Alex?”

Alex nodded. “Quite a bit. I researched it when I knew I was going to be working here.”

“So you know old man Hunt started out by coming up with a new software and things escalated from there?”

Alex nodded.

“Now we manufacture just about everything in the computer field,” Rick continued. “We have over three thousand products that we ship from this location.”

“That many?” Alex said, although he’d already known this.

“Keeps us hopping 24/7. We run three shifts. Eight to four, four to twelve, twelve to eight. Lots of the guys like the afternoon and night shifts, but me, I like days.’ Course, I work the other shifts anytime they need extra hands,’ cause it’s overtime, and with three little girls and a wife who likes to give those old charge cards a workout…” He laughed. “I can always use the money.”

“Three little girls, huh?”

Rick grinned. “Yeah, we had ’em pretty close together. My oldest is eight, the youngest is four.” Pulling a wallet from his hip pocket, he took out several photos. “I’ll only do this once,” he promised, handing Alex the pictures.

Alex smiled at the likenesses. All three girls had curly dark hair and dark eyes. “They sure are cute.”

“Yeah,” Rick said proudly. “They’re good kids, too. Maria, she’s been a stay-at-home mom, but in September Jenny, she’s the youngest, starts school, so Maria’s going to go back to work.”

“What does she do?” Alex asked politely.

“She’s a preschool teacher. She’ll be teaching at Jenny’s school.”

By now, they’d stopped in a densely stocked aisle.

“You don’t have to remember everything I’m gonna show you,” Rick said. “I’m just giving you an overview. You’ll get a diagram of the place and a product list showing where each of the different products can be found. It’ll take you a while, but after a couple of weeks, you’ll be an old pro at this.”

Alex hoped so. The last thing he wanted to do was fuel that doubt he’d seen in his new boss’s eyes. He was going to have a hard enough time of it remembering to keep in character without worrying about keeping her happy, too. “This place is huge. Do we fill orders from all over or just in certain areas?”

“The center’s divided into four quadrants,” Rick said. “Our unit fills orders for Quad B. I’ll show you. We’ll walk the whole quad. Actually, you’ll probably want to become familiar with all the quads eventually.”

“Why is that?”

“Sometimes certain products sell heavily, like when we’re running a special promotion or something, and you might be asked to fill in at one of the other quads.”

Alex nodded. That made sense. “Does P.J. supervise all the quads?”

Rick nodded. “Yep. She’s the boss. Only one higher than her here is Steve Mallery, the GM.”

Just then, the girl with the purple hair skated by.

“Ruby,” Alex said.

Rick laughed. “You know about her, huh?”

“The clerk who brought me down from HR told me her name.”

“Ruby looks like a punk rocker with those tattoos and all the body piercings, but she’s okay. She’s one of our best pickers.”

“I admit I was surprised to see the roller blades.”

“A couple of the kids use them. Wish I could skate. I’d wear ’em, too. You can sure get around faster. But I’d probably kill myself. Or if not that, break a leg or something.”

“I know what you mean,” Alex said, although he prided himself on being physically fit. Still, he wasn’t a skater. Never had been.

Rick smiled and turned his attention back to the merchandise. “Okay, Alex, lesson number one. Here’s how we stock the products….”

Frat boy.

It was the first thing P.J. thought when she was introduced toAlex. What was he doing there? All P.J.’d had to do was look at him to know he didn’t belong. He was too good-looking and way too polished. His hands alone told the story. No calluses. No rough skin. Clean, manicured nails. Long, elegant fingers.

And then there were his teeth. P.J. always noticed people’s teeth, for they indicated class and financial status more than anything else. And Alex’s teeth were gorgeous—straight and white. Obviously, they’d been well cared for.

She wondered if he’d once held a top-level job, maybe lost it due to drugs or alcohol. Or maybe he’s a corporate spy, sent here to find out if we’re doing a good job. If I’m doing a good job.

The thought was sobering. It also pissed her off. Because P.J. worked hard, harder even than her crew. She had to. She was a woman supervising mostly men. She constantly had to prove herself.

Geez, if corporate wanted to know what was going on here, all they had to do was talk to Steve, or better yet, be above board and come and observe the center openly. They’d soon see what a tight ship she ran.

Well, she’d keep a close eye on Alex Noble. And if he was a spy, she’d soon find out. In the meantime, she wouldn’t trust him as far as she could throw him. And yet, even as she was telling herself all of this, she couldn’t deny the frisson of attraction she’d felt when they shook hands. Acknowledging this, she was infuriated with her body’s betrayal.

What’s wrong with you? Alex Noble was so not the kind of man she wanted in her life. Ever since she was old enough to know better, she’d envisioned herself with a man who held the same beliefs she did: say, a union boss or champion of migrant workers. Someone she could respect and admire for his ideas and not how well he filled out a pair of jeans.

Certainly not for his sexy dimples or his thick, wavy hair or his dark-chocolate eyes.

Dark chocolate!

Had she really thought that?

But even as she chastised herself for the gushy term, she knew it applied. His eyes really had reminded her of dark chocolate. Sweet, melt-in-your-mouth dark chocolate. The kind of eyes a woman could lose herself in. Just remembering the way he’d looked at her gave her a funny feeling in her stomach.

Oh, man, Kincaid, you’ve been celibate way too long. You really need to get laid.

“P.J.”

P.J. jumped.

“You looked like you were miles away. I called your name twice.”

The speaker was P.J.’s best friend at work—Anna Garcia. Actually, for the past six years, Anna had been P.J.’s best friend, period. P.J. smiled at the pretty brunette. “What’s up?”

“We having lunch together today?”

“Sure.”

“Great. Want to eat in the cafeteria or outside?”

“It’s a nice day. Let’s eat outside.” When the distribution center had been built, HuntCom had made sure the area surrounding was beautifully landscaped and that there were pockets of trees and flower beds interspersed with walkways and areas with picnic tables. Employees were urged to use the grounds on their breaks, although the smokers grumbled that there were too few places for them to indulge in their habit. Although P.J. didn’t admire many corporate titans—she’d grown up around too many of them—Harrison Hunt actually seemed to care about his employees.

Be fair. So does Dad.

Well, yes, her own father also treated his employees fairly and sometimes even generously. But he and Harrison Hunt seemed to be the exceptions.

After Anna had headed back to the mailing center, which she supervised, P.J. printed out the newest batch of orders that had come through in the past hour. After sorting them, she handed the orders for Quads A, C, and D to Chick Fogarty, her assistant, to distribute, then walked toward aisle 24, where they stocked some of the peripherals in their inventory. She knew this was where Rick would have started Alex’s training.

Sure enough, the two men were standing in front of the section where the eighteen different mouses they sold were stored, and although P.J. stood well back as she watched, she could hear Rick naming them as he pointed out how they were arranged by model number.

“I can’t believe there are so many different kinds,” Alex was saying. “Do we really sell all of them?”

“Yeah, we do,” Rick answered. “Hey, I personally have three at home. A wireless, a basic USB plug-in, and a mini for when I travel. You got a computer?”

Alex nodded. “Yeah. I bought myself a laptop last year.”

“One of ours?”

“Uh, no. I guess I shouldn’t say that too loud.”

“Not if you don’t want the boss lady to hear.” Rick glanced over at P.J. and grinned. “’Course, it’s too late. She already did.”

Alex whipped around.

P.J. almost laughed at the guilty expression on his face. Walking over to them, she said, “It’s okay, Alex. Buying a Hunt computer is not a prerequisite for working here. However, we do give a hefty discount to our employees, so if you decide to upgrade or buy something else in our product line, you’ll save quite a bit of money.”

Deciding Rick had everything under control, P.J. handed him half the stack of new orders. “You can get started on these whenever you feel Alex is ready.”

Rick gave her a salute. “Okay, boss.”

Alex’s eyes met hers briefly before he looked away. And once again, P.J. felt that unwelcome spark of awareness and attraction.

She frowned. Damn. She had to get control of herself and quit acting like a silly teenager.

Quickly striding away, she decided the best thing for her would be to give Alex Noble a wide berth. A really wide berth. On the other hand, that wouldn’t be the best thing for HuntCom.

In fact, she should probably keep a close eye on him these first few weeks. Make sure he was actually doing the job he’d been hired to do.

But for the rest of the morning, she kept her distance. She would quiz Rick later, see what he thought. Maybe she was just paranoid about Alex because he was so attractive. Face it, she chided herself, you’ve been exposed to too many good-looking, self-centered, arrogant men in your lifetime and now you think they’re all like that.

Maybe Alex Noble would prove to be the exception.

Yeah, right.

But P.J. wasn’t going to hold her breath.

Chapter Two

“I thought there was a hiring freeze.”

P.J. made a face. “Yeah. That’s what I thought, too.” She and Anna were just finishing up lunch.

Anna popped the last bite of her tuna-fish sandwich into her mouth, then wiped her mouth with her napkin. “But Jimmy said you’ve got a new picker.”

P.J. nodded.

“So what’s the deal?”

“You tell me.”

“Me?” Anna laughed. “You’re kidding, right?”

“Well, you usually hear all the gossip, so I thought if anyone would know what’s going on, you would,” P.J. pointed out. That was the other thing about Alex Noble—maybe even the most important thing—the fact he’d been foisted on her without any warning.

“I haven’t heard a word,” Anna said. “Not a peep.” She reached for a plastic bag filled with cut-up apple.

P.J. polished off her turkey sandwich, accompanied by a handful of potato chips—she was a junk-food addict, much to her mother’s chagrin. “Not even from Ben?” Ben Garza was the HR Director and he’d had a thing for Anna for a while.

Anna made a face. “I’ve been avoiding Ben.”

P.J. refrained from saying something trite like you could do worse. She knew how sick she was of people trying to pair her off with guys who didn’t interest her in the slightest. Still, she almost felt sorry for Ben. He wasn’t the best-looking guy in the world, but he had a good job and he seemed really decent. But Anna simply wasn’t interested. She’d gone out with him twice and told P.J. that the thought of going to bed with him actually turned her stomach.

“So what’s he like?”

“The new guy?”

Anna laughed. “Yes, P.J., the new guy.”

P.J. frowned and finished chewing and swallowing before answering. “I don’t know. He doesn’t seem to belong here.”

“What do you mean?”

“He’s too good-looking. Too…sophisticated or something.”

Anna chewed thoughtfully on a piece of apple. “Tina said he’s a hunk.”

“Tina? When did she see him?”

“She snuck down to your area earlier this morning. Said she wanted to check him out.” Anna grinned. “We don’t get that many eligible guys here. Handsome eligible guys. Every woman in the place is going to be checking him out. Maybe they already have.” Anna’s grin turned sly. “So if you want him, P.J., you’d better stake your claim early.”

“Want him? I have absolutely no interest in Alex Noble. Believe me, he’s not my type.”

“What’s wrong with him?”

“I told you. He’s too good-looking.” The truth was, Alex looked like he belonged in her sisters’ crowd. The country club, golf and tennis crowd. The Armani crowd. The kind of men P.J. had wanted to get away from.

“Tina says he looks like Colin Firth.”

“Who the hell is Colin Firth?” Irritation made P.J.’s voice increase in volume.

Anna looked at her as if she’d suddenly grown two heads. “You mean there’s a female alive on this earth who doesn’t know Colin Firth?” Her voice was laced with astonishment.

“What is he? A movie star? You know I don’t pay attention to those people.” In P.J.’s opinion, movie stars were only a cut above rock stars, and P.J. considered them the armpit of the universe, with no redeeming social value whatsoever.

Anna sighed. “Honey, Colin Firth is way more than a movie star. He’s the most gorgeous guy to come along in years. He’s British and has one of those upper-crust accents that is sooo sexy. He also has dreamy dark eyes, he’s tall, and he lives in a villa in Tuscany.” She sighed again. “Unfortunately, he’s married.”

P.J. rolled her eyes. Honestly, even sensible Anna could be an airhead at times. “Alex Noble isn’t that good-looking.”

“No? Well, with your ideas about men, I don’t think I can trust your judgment, P.J. I think I’ll have to have a look myself.”

P.J. abruptly stood and began clearing up her trash. “Oh, for God’s sake. Come and drool all over him. I certainly don’t care. Just make sure you don’t distract him from his work.”

“Somebody certainly is testy all of a sudden,” Anna said, giving P.J. a knowing look.

P.J. knew she’d overreacted, and for the life of her, she didn’t know why. All she knew was, she was heartily sick of the subject of Alex Noble.

Alex was beat.

He’d thought he was in great physical shape. Hell, he worked out three times a week at the gym and played tennis at least three times a week. But he had a soft job at the foundation, mainly sitting on his butt. And today, for the first time since he’d spent a summer building houses with Habitat for Humanity, he’d done physical labor, with lots of stretching, kneeling and lifting. He’d used muscles he hadn’t even known he had. So by the time four o’clock rolled around, he was more than ready to leave.

Other than that, he was satisfied with how the day had gone. He found it interesting seeing how many orders came through during his shift and how much work was involved in filling them and getting the merchandise shipped out. Although before he started this job, he’d studied the numbers associated with HuntCom and its myriad arms, actually seeing all the products they manufactured and sold was a real eye-opener.

Whether you worshiped at the altar of money and power or not, you had to admire what Harry had accomplished. It wasn’t as if he’d come from money. Just the opposite, in fact. Alex’s Hunt grandparents had been squarely middle-class. His grandfather Hunt owned a small hardware store; his grandmother had been a stay-at-home mom.

And Harry had been a too-tall, just-this-side-of-weird, geek.

Yet look what he’d accomplished. He’d developed ground-breaking software that had changed the personal computer industry practically overnight and followed that by designing cutting edge hardware that was as good as or better than anything else on the market.

Now he was worth billions.

And he employed thousands of people.

Alex had met a couple of dozen of those people today. Among them several attractive women. Two of those women seemed promising as far as his bride hunt went—one worked in the mail room, one was a picker from a different quad—although he’d have to know more about both of them before he could make any kind of decision. After all, he was talking about the future mother of his children.

Too bad P.J. Kincaid didn’t have a more agreeable personality, because she was definitely the most intriguing of the women he’d met. But she hadn’t even made his short list. He didn’t have time to win over someone who obviously didn’t like him.

She’d certainly made no secret of her feelings. In fact, as the day wore on, she’d seemed to be more suspicious of him rather than less, even though he’d worked hard and given her no cause to look at him the way she had.

What was her problem, anyway?

Why did she seem to always be watching him?

Alex knew she’d asked Rick about him, because he’d seen the two of them talking and Rick kept glancing Alex’s way the whole time. In some ways, this amused Alex, because Rick was obviously not the cloak-and-dagger type. In other ways, it didn’t amuse Alex at all.

Alex didn’t think P.J. could possibly know who he was or why he was there, so why was she acting so weird? Was it because she hadn’t hired him? Did she resent the fact he’d been presented to her as a fait accompli? Alex grimaced. He’d bet that was it. She felt he’d been pushed on her. Well, in that case, maybe he could change her mind about him.