Flirting With the Boss

“To what do I owe this unexpected visit?” Max asked.

“I’m here to ask you out to dinner.”

He couldn’t have been more shocked if Ashley had walked into his office and started a striptease. “Why?”

“Do I need a reason?” she asked, hedging.

Throwing caution to the wind, he stood and walked around his desk. He was close enough to pull her into his arms. She met his gaze and took several steps back.

“Yeah.” He crossed his arms. “Why don’t you sit down and tell me what information you’re trying to worm out of me?”

She nodded.

As she settled herself, the whisper of her nylons as she crossed one shapely leg over the other sent sparks skipping through him. Her skirt hiked up several inches on her thigh.

She didn’t have to buy him dinner to find out his secrets.

All she had to do was sit there looking like sin-in-waiting.

Flirting With the Boss

Teresa Southwick

www.millsandboon.co.uk

TERESA SOUTHWICK

lives in Southern California with her hero husband who is more than happy to share with her the male point of view. An avid fan of romance novels, she is delighted to be living out her dream of writing for Silhouette Books.

The Fortune-teller said…

Money and power are not what they seem. Love is the sweetness that brings you your dream.

If the three born on February twenty-ninth rub the magic from the lamp and make a wish—on that day that comes only once every four years—each shall receive her most coveted desire.

But there is peril.

Each of the three must see beyond the evident. Look into the soul of the one her heart has chosen. Only then will she find the truth that is hers alone.

Contents

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter One

Sweet Spring, Texas—June 4, 2004

All that glitters…

Is not gold, Ashley Gallagher thought. She stared at the gold-wrapped chocolate coins on her desk—one of Caine Chocolate Company’s specialty items. Bentley Caine, owner, president and her mentor, had recently promoted her to manager of the specialty and seasonal department.

Touching the red ribbon tied around the cellophane package, she thought about the man who was also her friend. He was in the hospital recuperating from a heart attack. After collapsing at work, he’d insisted she contact his estranged grandson.

Max Caine wasn’t the last person she’d wanted to talk to, but he was among the bottom three. Only her respect and affection for his grandfather had compelled her to make the call.

She’d given him the facts. Max had made no attempt to draw out the conversation so she’d said goodbye. That had been two days ago. She wasn’t sure what she’d expected from him, but her expectations hadn’t included nothing. Surely by now Max should have—

“Knock, knock.”

Ashley looked up at the sound of the masculine voice. Her stomach knotted when she recognized the good-looking specimen of manhood in the doorway. Just the man she’d been thinking about. A stress-inducer if she’d ever seen one. Unfortunately she’d seen her share. This one had just been the first.

“Hello, Max.” Her voice was breathless. Considering she’d barely gotten the two words past the constriction in her throat, breathless delivery was a win.

“Ashley.” Max Caine moved into the room. “How are you?”

How brazen was he? Acting as if it had been ten days instead of ten years since she’d last seen him. Swallowing hard, she met his blue-eyed gaze. If only she could say she’d forgotten how blue his eyes were, but she couldn’t. Not if she was truthful.

And darn her heart for thumping so hard. The fact that he was even better looking than the last time she’d seen him was no excuse for this reaction to him. She could only chalk it up to the fact that she was a serial non-dater.

But gosh darn it, Max Caine had actually come back. She hadn’t thought he would. Neither had Mr. Caine. While they’d waited for the paramedics, he’d said he wanted to see his grandson. But he didn’t think Max would come if he did the asking. He’d insisted she make the call to bring Max home. Mission accomplished.

“How am I? How do you think after your grandfather’s heart attack? How is he today?”

“I haven’t seen him yet.” Max rested his palms on her desk and leaned forward, frowning as he studied her. “I’m here looking for my grandfather, Ashley.”

“Have you looked for him at Sweet Spring General Hospital?” she asked.

“He’s not there.” Exasperation coated his words.

“That’s impossible. He was just moved to a regular room from the cardiac care unit yesterday. The doctor said he wanted to keep Mr. Caine in the hospital at least a few more days.”

“Apparently he left.”

She blinked. “Why would he do that?”

“Your guess is as good as mine.” Max lifted one broad shoulder. “I’m just passing on the information I was given.”

Ashley stared at him, then picked up her phone. “Bernice, get Mr. Caine’s cardiologist on the phone.”

“Right away,” came the female voice on the other end of the line.

Ashley set the receiver back in the cradle and looked up. “I don’t understand. Who did you speak to at the hospital?”

“Does it matter?”

“Maybe. Patients get moved. It’s possible you were given the wrong room number.”

“Are you suggesting I should have searched every room?”

“I’m just saying, maybe you only talked to someone at the information desk who hadn’t been updated yet about a move.”

“A move that happened yesterday? News in the hospital travels by pony express?”

He had a point, but wild horses wouldn’t compel her to tell him that. “I can’t believe he would do this.” The phone buzzed, and she picked it up. When she was told the doctor was on line two, she pressed the button and said, “Doctor Davis? Ashley Gallagher here.”

“How can I help you, Miss Gallagher?”

“It’s about Mr. Caine.” She looked up at the other Mr. Caine staring intently at her and tried to ignore the jittery feeling his gaze generated inside her.

“Yes?”

“I’ve just been told he’s no longer in the hospital.”

“That’s right. He walked out.”

“But how could you let him do that?”

“I can’t force a patient to stay. I can only make sure he understands the seriousness of his condition. Are you calling from work?”

“Yes.”

“So he’s not there?”

Her eyes widened. “I haven’t seen him, but that doesn’t mean—”

“If he is, I advise you to make him go home.”

“And what makes you think I would have more luck with him than you did?”

The chuckle on the other end of the line was tinged with dark humor. “Good point. I wish you luck anyway. He’s a stubborn old man. But I like him.”

“Me, too,” she said.

“If there’s anything I can do, let me know.”

“Can I call on you if I need some muscle?” She looked at the muscular man whose gaze had been superglued to her this whole time. But Max had disappeared from Bentley Caine’s life ten years ago. There was no reason to believe she could count on him for help now.

The doctor laughed, this time in genuine amusement. “I’ll do whatever I can, Miss Gallagher.”

“Thank you,” she said, then hung up the phone. Looking up at Max she said, “You’re right. He’s AWOL. Have you checked the house?” she asked.

“Right after the hospital. No sign of him,” he said, sliding his big hands into the pockets of his suit slacks.

Expensive slacks unless she missed her guess. The supremely masculine movement upset the sleek, perfect line of the costly matching jacket. His beige dress shirt and coordinating geometric-patterned tie were immaculate, unlike the memories he’d left behind.

“Have you checked his office?” She stood up.

Her simmering exasperation at the senior Mr. Caine escalated. If he ignored his cardiologist’s advice to rest in the hospital after a heart attack, what would prevent that stubborn old man from sneaking back to work against his doctor’s orders? Without waiting for an answer, she rounded her desk and headed out the door.

Max Caine fell into step beside her as she walked down the hall. He was tall, much taller than his grandfather, about six feet to her five feet three inches, unless she missed her guess. He was more filled out through the chest than she remembered. And his hair was different. Unlike the too-long shaggy style she’d last seen, now his sandy blond hair was short and neatly combed. But his strong, square jaw and the nose that was neither too big nor too small for his face were the same. He was still very attractive, but now instead of radiating bad boy boldness, he was too-smooth, too-GQ, too-businessman chic.

She admitted to herself that she was judging him without mercy. That couldn’t be helped. Men who left without saying goodbye didn’t deserve mercy. Granted, she’d been a fourteen-year-old with a raging crush, but his indifference had cut deep. She’d gotten over it. What she couldn’t forgive was not a single word to his grandfather in a decade. That indifference had devastated the older man who was her friend as well as her boss. Anyone who hurt him had to answer to her.

She stopped at the end of the hall in front of the receptionist. “Bernice, have you seen Mr. Caine today?”

The thirty-something brunette met her gaze, then slid an appreciative, appraising look to the man beside Ashley. “Isn’t he still in the hospital?”

Ashley glanced up at Max. “Apparently not,” she said grimly.

“He’s supposed to be.”

“I know,” Ashley admitted.

“Who’s he?” Bernice asked, nodding toward Max.

“Max Caine,” he said, extending his large hand.

The secretary’s eyes widened as she put her palm in his. “The rebel?”

“Is that what they call me?” he asked Ashley.

“Among other things,” she admitted.

“What other things?”

She felt the heat crawl up her neck. The question made her uncomfortable in spite of the fact she didn’t feel the slightest inclination to spare this man’s feelings or impress him. Unfortunately, she couldn’t seem to stop the blush. She blew out a breath. “To everyone over thirty-five in this town you’re the ingrate.”

He glanced at Bernice who was barely concealing the fact that she thought he was hot. “And to everyone under thirty-five I’m the rebel?”

“You gotta love small towns.” Ashley decided the opinion poll regarding Max Caine was skewed because she’d pitched her tent in the over thirty-five camp. “Bernice, it’s come to my attention that Mr. Bentley Caine is unaccounted for. I’ll just take a peek in his office in case he slipped past you.”

“Be my guest,” she said.

Ashley, with Max beside her, walked to the closed door and opened it. The oak-panelled, hunter green carpeted room was empty.

“Darn.” She glanced up at Max who had easily looked over her head and came to the same conclusion she had. His grandfather wasn’t there. “Now what?” she said to no one in particular.

A muscle in Max’s jaw contracted. “Now we go look for him.”

“What’s this ‘we’ stuff?” she asked.

“Do you know his routine? His hangouts? His habits?”

“Yes, some, but—”

“Then I need you,” he said, encircling her upper arm in his firm grip. “We is you and me.”

“Where are you taking me?”

“To join the search party.” Max frowned as he studied her, but it was impossible to tell what he was thinking.

“That’s presumptuous. You don’t know me from a rock—”

“Sure I do. You’re the one who called and got me into this. Besides, I recognized you right away.”

She knew better than to be pleased by that piece of information. But pleased she was. She reminded herself it didn’t mean anything. “I didn’t mean my looks. Besides, I haven’t changed all that much.”

“Sure you have. You’ve grown up since that summer we were friends.”

She’d thought they were friends, but she’d found out differently. Her stomach clenched, and she pushed the feelings away. “The past isn’t important.”

“You won’t get any argument from me about that. And now I’m asking for your help to find him.”

“How come you’re so concerned all of a sudden?” she demanded.

“How do you know it’s sudden?”

She shrugged. “Logical conclusion based on your actions.”

“My actions? Like coming back?”

“Your actions—as in you left and haven’t been back in ten years. Why show up now? And I don’t buy it’s because you care that he’s sick.”

Lines creased his forehead, and he seemed lost in thought. “That’s a very good question.”

“And I’m waiting for a very good answer.”

“I don’t really have one. But when I do, you’ll be the first to know.”

“Actually your grandfather deserves the answer, not me. But if we don’t find him—”

“We will.”

Ashley thought there was an edge to Max’s voice. In anyone else, she might think it was caused by worry. But this was the guy who had turned his back a decade ago.

“I need to get my purse,” she said, as they stopped outside her office. She was choosing to go with Max Caine because it was almost quitting time and she wouldn’t get any work done now anyway. Not until her boss was located. “And my organizer.”

“Does he use a cell phone?”

He? What did Max call Bentley Caine? Grandpa? Grampy? She looked at the tension in his square jaw and decided that would be a negative on Grampy. Grandfather?

She thought back to their conversations in the employee lunch room. At fourteen, she’d vented feelings of frustration about being grounded and having to go to work with her mother when she wasn’t in summer school. Max had called her Mona the Moaner. He’d done his share of moaning. His grandfather was the source of major frustration. He’d talked about—Bentley.

He’d called the older man by his given name, and she’d thought it very cool—sophisticated. She’d had stars in her eyes because the larger-than-life rebel and hunk, Max Caine, had actually spent time with her. Then his actions had said loud and clear that she wasn’t worth the spit it would take to let her know he was leaving town.

Now he had to ask her if his grandfather had a cell phone. Max should have come back. Then he would know the answer to that question.

“Ashley? It’s not that difficult a question.”

“No, your grandfather doesn’t have a cell phone,” she finally answered.

Max’s mouth thinned to a grim line. “I had a feeling.”

“A feeling?” The man was his family. He shouldn’t have to rely on feelings. He should have been around all these years to know the facts. Then he wouldn’t need her to steer him to his grandfather’s hangouts. And just maybe if Max hadn’t left, his grandfather wouldn’t have worked himself into a heart attack. “You haven’t seen him for ten years. How can you have feelings?”

“A figure of speech. It’s more like informed intuition. Ten years ago he was stubborn, opinionated and dictatorial. And those were his good qualities.” Max politely opened and held for her one of the double glass doors in the lobby. “I have no reason to believe he’s changed.”

“Is that so?” She walked past him and wasn’t certain if the heat she felt was from him or the June air that made Sweet Spring, Texas, feel as hot as the face of the sun.

Ashley met his gaze. “Hmm. Stubborn, opinionated and dictatorial. Has anyone ever told you the fruit doesn’t fall far from the tree?”

Chapter Two

Scrappy. Max looked down at Ashley Gallagher and that was the first word that came to mind. She was scrappy, all right, and if not for her phone call, he wouldn’t be here.

Studying her he said, “Did you just insult me?”

“If you have to ask, I was too subtle.”

He took her elbow and steered her toward his car parked in Caine Chocolate Company’s lot. Heat was radiating in waves, and he couldn’t decide if it was only from the blacktop or if some of it was coming from his companion.

“I’ll drive,” he said, stopping beside the silver BMW he’d rented at the airport. He opened the passenger door and Ashley slid inside. “You tell me where to go.”

She looked up at him and rolled her eyes. “At least make it interesting. Don’t just hand me gift-wrapped zingers.”

He wanted to ask why she felt the need to zing him. But that was a conversation he didn’t want to have while the Texas sun was frying his brain. “I’ll rephrase. You keep your eyes open for the old man.”

When she opened her mouth, he shut the door, then walked around the back of the car and let himself in on the driver’s side. After cranking up the A/C full blast, he pulled out of the lot and headed for downtown Sweet Spring. Whatever she’d been about to say remained a mystery. Ashley didn’t utter a word, but he could almost feel her thought waves vibrating.

He put on his left blinker, then stopped at the red light. Sliding a glance toward the passenger seat, he noticed she was rigid enough to snap. A few freckles dotted her turned-up nose, her pale skin looked perfect, making the red curls brushing her cheek blaze even brighter. Her profile was delicate and feminine, at odds with the unisex navy blue business suit she wore. The last time he’d seen her, she’d been a kid in the company cafeteria. Now she worked for his grandfather. He wondered if she’d ever disappointed Bentley Caine.

“Why did you call me?” he asked.

“Because your grandfather was ill, and he asked me to.”

“He was well enough to walk out of the hospital. One has to assume he could have managed a phone. So why did you do the honors?”

She glanced over at him, then her gaze slid away. “Because he wanted to see you, and he said if he called, you wouldn’t come.”

He was right, Max thought. He was only here now out of a sense of duty. The same reason his grandfather had taken him in after his parents died. His conversation with Ashley had been short. She’d informed him that his grandfather’s heart attack had put the old man in the cardiac care unit at Sweet Spring General Hospital. Then she’d given him the facility’s phone number and told him Bentley Caine would like to see him.

Max’s initial reaction had been to hang up. But some quality in Ashley’s voice—a hint of gravel mixed with whiskey and liberally laced with hostility—had stopped him. After leaving town, he hadn’t thought much about her. But when she identified herself on the other end of the line, memories had flooded back. He remembered a sweet, smiling kid. The picture in his head didn’t mesh with the cool, cranky woman beside him.

She turned suddenly to look at a pedestrian on her side of the car, then faced front again. “I think we should go to the sheriff and file a missing person’s report.”

“It’s my understanding that we have to wait at least twenty-four hours before he’s officially considered missing.” He glanced over at her. “Where does he like to go?”

“For fun?”

“My grandfather doesn’t do fun. At least he didn’t used to. I meant is there a favorite restaurant we can check? A hangout?”

The corners of her full mouth curved up. “I can’t picture Mr. Caine hanging out. But his top three favorite places are Tiny’s BBQ, Dairy Queen and The Fast Lane—it’s a coffee shop in the bowling alley.”

They were just passing the bowling alley, and he made a hard right turn into the driveway. “Let’s take a look.”

When the BMW was parked, she got out and gave the lot the once-over. “I don’t see his car.”

“Maybe someone inside has seen him.”

As they walked side by side to the double glass doors, she glanced at him curiously. He could almost hear the questions echoing in her head. It was just a matter of time until she started asking them.

“Why are you doing this?” she asked.

And there was the first one. “Define this.”

“Don’t play dumb, Max. We both know you’re not. And before you ask, that wasn’t a compliment. Just a statement of fact. Why are you bothering to look for your grandfather?”

“I came here to see him because I owe him that much. As soon as we find him, I can leave. It’s that simple.”

Before she could make something out of that, they stopped at the bowling alley registration desk.

Ashley put her hands on the counter. “Hi, Sam.”

“Ashley.” The fit and forty-something dark-haired man standing there, studied him, openly curious.

“Sam Fisher this is Max Caine,” she said.

“Sam,” he said, shaking hands. “I’m looking for my grandfather, Bentley Caine. Ashley tells me he likes to come in here.”

Sam’s face flickered with recognition, but unlike Bernice, he managed to hold back the ingrate remarks. “I know who he is. My wife works over at the chocolate factory.”

“I see. Have you seen him in the last twenty-four hours?”

Sam looked surprised. “Isn’t he in the hospital? I heard he had a heart attack.”

Ashley tucked a strand of copper-colored hair behind her ear. “Mr. Caine walked out of the hospital sometime last night and no one has seen him. We’re checking out the places he might have gone.”

“Sorry. He hasn’t been here since I came in this morning. But I’ll ask around.” The other man shrugged. “If he comes in, I’ll let you know.”

“Okay,” she said.

They started to back away when Sam added, “He’s a good guy. Always says we have the best fried chicken he’s ever tasted.”

Max looked at him. “And afterward, he can bowl a couple of games to counteract the blast of cholesterol.”

“Thanks, Sam.” Ashley took Max’s arm and aimed him toward the door. “Way to get the sympathy vote, Ace. You could have gone all day without telling Sam Fisher his chicken is a heart attack waiting to happen.”

“Even though I said it with a great deal of charm?” he asked.

“Here’s a suggestion. When we check out the Dairy Queen and Tiny’s BBQ, either we just cruise the parking lot or I go in alone. If you tell them they’re a hotbed of heart disease, you’re not likely to enlist their help in this endeavor.”

“Whatever you say.”

When they were back in the car driving through downtown Sweet Spring Ashley sighed like a balloon losing air.

“Spit it out before you implode,” he said.

She didn’t even pretend to misunderstand. “You know, diet isn’t the only contributing factor in a heart attack.”

“Lack of exercise, maybe?”

“I was thinking more along the lines of the strain of running Caine Chocolate all by himself.”

“He’s not alone. He’s got you.”

“True. I’m part of the administrative staff in place to manage the company. But I think you know that’s not what I meant.”

“How long have you worked there?” he asked.

“Since I was sixteen. It was my first job.”

He glanced over at her. “So you worked your way through the ranks.”

“Yes. And I try to take some of the stress off him. But I’m not family.”

“I feel a zinger coming on.”

“Another source of tension and pressure could be the desertion of a family member and his subsequent refusal to return home.”

That was damned irritating. Her version of events was so slanted he couldn’t help wondering if she was merely being a devoted employee paid to recite the company line. Or if she believed what she was saying. Because there was another side to the story. His side.