Reluctant Mistress

Reluctant Mistress

Natalie Fox

www.millsandboon.co.uk

CONTENTS

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER ONE

ROBERT BUCHANAN was everything she had expected him to be. Cool, aloof and as arrogant as the media proclaimed.

Liza observed him through the glass panel of her office, her green eyes calculating every move he made as he toured the editorial offices with John Standish, the editor of Leisure Days magazine.

Standish was sweating. Buchanan the cause. With a deep sigh Liza turned away from the sickening scene of the staff flapping and trying to court favour with the new owner, the all-powerful Buchanan, whose reputation for pulping magazines like theirs into sawdust went before him like a flagship of destruction.

They were all scared, including Liza. As advertising director she knew she had nothing to fear as far as her work was concerned, but she had reluctantly to admit that lately it had become more and more difficult persuading advertisers to take space in the magazine. She had succeeded because she was skilled at her job, but how long would it last with Standish taking such an outdated stand on the editorial side? And what were Robert Buchanan’s plans for their future? He was fast becoming Europe’s top publisher, scooping up ailing periodicals and mutating them till they became clones. All the same, just in a different language.

‘Whose head will be the first to roll?’ Liza’s assistant Julia muttered ruefully from her desk.

Unconciously rubbing her neck, Liza stared bleakly out of the window. ‘Whose indeed?’ was all she could offer in consolation.

‘Do you believe all they say about him in the papers?’ Julia asked, her bright eyes looking decidedly interested.

Liza turned to her and smiled, knowing the tangent her man-mad assistant’s mind was veering off at. ‘Well, there’s no smoke without fire, Julia,’ she teased. ‘Flash your eyes at him the way you do at most men and you just might save your job.’

With a snort Julia tapped away at her computer. ‘Would that it were that easy. It’s always redheads with him, isn’t it? Perhaps I should whisk to the hairdresser’s lunchtime and swap my mouse-brown mop for Titian gold like yours.’

‘Are you implying mine comes from a bottle?’

‘Of course not!’ Julia laughed. ‘But seriously, he’s always being photographed with some gorgeous redhead. You’d better watch out, Liza...’ She stopped in mid-sentence as the door opened and the Buchanan entourage stepped into Liza’s office.

Julia stumbled to her feet, flushed, and pulled at her sweater nervously. Liza stood where she was, coldly unemotional, her hair brightened to flame by the light from the window behind her. If she had consciously stage-managed her impact on Robert Buchanan she couldn’t have done it more successfully. His dark penetrating eyes devoured her from head to toe, and came to rest on the aureole of marmalade frizz that cascaded around her shoulders.

It was easy to give Robert Buchanan a wide smile of welcome, easy to lift her hand and hold it out to him as John stammered out his introductions. Handsome he might be, powerful in publishing he undoubtedly was, but he wasn’t a gift from the gods as most women thought. He was a man like any other: ruthless, cold, a taker, just like another she knew.

He even resembled her former lover. He had the same jet hair as Graham, the same tall muscular build. They shared the same characteristics too, if all the papers said about the publishing giant was true: cold, calculating and a heartbreaker where women were concerned. But, whereas Robert Buchanan had maintained his bachelor existence, Graham had fallen prey—to her own sister of all people. They’d been married a year now, a year in which the pain of betrayal was still edged with a sharpness that cut into Liza’s very soul at the thought of the two of them, cosily cocooned in their Welsh cottage. Yvonne happily baking and housekeeping while Graham’s literary prowess prospered as it never had all the two years they had been lovers.

‘So, you are Liza Kay, without whose advertising sales skill this dreary magazine would have bitten the dust months ago.’

His brutal words, so softly, yet deeply, delivered with the faintest of a Scots burr, stunned everyone in the room. There was a long silence, followed by the uneasy shuffling of feet. Poor John looked waxy and gaunt. Liza held her smile with all the loyalty to John she could muster.

‘If that was a compliment, Mr Buchanan, I relinquish it on the grounds of bad taste.’ She withdrew her hand from his, yet maintained her sweet smile.

He raised a dark brow, that was all, turned from her, and left the office, his minions following, flustered and apologetic.

To Liza’s surprise she experienced a tremor through her body, a peculiar frisson she couldn’t explain away. Slumping down on to her chair, she murmured, ‘That was dumb, really dumb!’

‘You can say that again!’ Julia breathed with a mixture of admiration and awe. ‘You’ll be the first to go.’

Composed now, Liza scooped her hair back from her face. ‘First or last—makes no difference; we’re all for the slush pile if Buchanan runs true to form.’

‘Don’t you care?’ Julia quizzed anxiously.

‘Of course I care,’ Liza admitted on a sigh. ‘I’ve got as big outgoings as the next person.’

‘So why insult him in front of everyone like that? You’ve got to be out of your mind!’

How very right, Liza mused, very regretful now. She had been stupid, incredibly so. If she lost her position, which she undoubtedly would now, what then? Her mortgage was high, taken out when times with Graham had been good and she had hoped he would ask her to marry him. The terraced town house would have been perfect for the two of them. Close to town on the south side of the Embankment, in an up and coming area of Battersea, it was within easy striking distance of the West End. Theatres, restaurants, art exhibitions—everything she had wanted to share with Graham had been at hand, and yet he had chosen to end their relationship for her countrified sister and that hideous cottage in the hills!

That was the root of her insult to Robert Buchanan, she realised with a plop of her heart. She was getting back at Graham, through any man that crossed her path. Buchanan had been the target for the day. Pity she hadn’t challenged her insult in the direction of someone less influential. For a twenty-eight-year-old advertising director she was pretty dumb!

‘I’m sorry,’ Liza moaned later when Julia had skipped off to lunch and John Standish sloped into her office. His colour had returned, an infusion brought on by the exit of Robert Buchanan and his henchmen. He slumped in Julia’s seat, and rubbed his fevered brow.

‘Thanks for your loyalty, but you did yourself no favours, Liza. He stormed out of here like an enraged bull.’

‘What’s going to happen?’

‘He didn’t say; ranted on about dropping sales and restructuring the whole set-up, and we both know what that means. New editor for starters.’

Liza opened her mouth to protest but snapped it shut when John raised his hand. ‘Don’t say anything, Liza. I’ve brought it on myself. Not moved with the times, have I? He was right, you know. If it weren’t for you and your persuasive ways with the advertisers we would have sunk into oblivion a long while back.’ He stood up, stretched his long limbs lazily. ‘Can I buy you a liquid lunch to drown our sorrows?’

Liza shook her head. ‘I’ve some calls to make. Robert Buchanan hasn’t folded us yet. Life goes on.’ She reached for the phone, pausing to watch John leave her office. Those liquid lunches didn’t help him one bit. Half the afternoon he was in a hazy stupor. His secretary and a variety of assistants had carried him for months now. It was no wonder the magazine was slipping.

Impatiently Liza slammed down the phone. The calls would have to wait: she needed air. Slipping a ginger suede jacket over her dark green suit, she headed for the lift. A brisk walk down Berwick Street Market would clear her head.

February greyness greeted her as she emerged out into Beak Street, but it hadn’t put off the tourists in Carnaby Street. They swarmed like excited bees, shrieking with laughter at some of the absurdities for sale. Liza crossed the road, headed in the opposite direction, and was nearly winded as a car door jerked open in front of her. She was about to slam it shut with a suitable expletive when she recognised the back-seat occupant.

‘Get in!’ Robert Buchanan ordered flintily.

‘I’m sorry, I have a lunch appointment,’ she lied.

‘Yes, with me. Get in before I haul you in, and don’t bother making a scene; in Soho it’s not unusual for women to be picked up in a limousine.’

Flushing furiously, Liza slid in beside him and slammed the door viciously as a protest.

‘Thanks for the comparison,’ she fired sarcastically. ‘You’re obviously an experienced kerb crawler!’

‘Does nothing but hell-fire and fury ever emerge from that pretty little mouth of yours?’ he drawled as the chauffeur pioneered the huge black limousine through seething masses of lunchtimers in the narrow backstreets of Soho.

‘When there’s reason to I can charm the birds from the trees,’ she told him sweetly, her eyes straight ahead.

‘I bet you can,’ he murmured, and Liza suspected he might be smiling.

‘So what is the purpose of this pick-up?’ she asked stiffly, sure she was going to be the first sacking from Leisure Days magazine.

‘Lunch for one thing, business for another. Creda Court, Battersea, Carl,’ he directed at the chauffeur.

Swivelling to face him, Liza gasped. ‘Creda Court! But that’s where I live!’

He looked at her, dark eyes flecked with shards of silver. ‘I know. I thought a homely lunch and a chat out of the public eye a good idea; don’t you?’

‘I don’t!’ she rasped.

‘So you’d rather we conducted our business in a restaurant with the Press breathing down our necks and you making the gossip columns tomorrow morning?’

Green eyes wide with shock, Liza gaped at him. ‘Business? Gossip columns? I haven’t a clue what you’re talking about.’

She gazed blindly out of the window. Of course she knew what he meant about the Press. Every movement he made was recorded and publicised, but then he asked for it all. He did nothing by halves. Take-overs, mergers, women; they were all the same to him—a challenge! The tabloids loved all that macho action-man stuff—it sold papers. And of course he was good-looking, achingly so.

‘I don’t think my husband would approve of my picking up strange men and bringing them home for lunch,’ she offered when he didn’t enlarge on her comments.

‘A husband, eh? When was the wedding—this morning in your coffee break?’

‘What?’

‘At the close of business last night you were very much a single lady. Life moves at a great pace in London, I know, but I’d say an overnight courtship is a bit racy, even for me.’

‘You...you know I’m single?’ Liza stammered uneasily, a coil of apprehension winding inside her.

‘I know everything about you, Liza Kay. Twenty-eight years old. Ten years in publishing, seven of those on the advertising side. Born and educated in Hampstead. Parents still live there. One younger sister, married to the writer Graham Bond with whom you had a two-year relationship—’

‘How dare you?’ Liza exclaimed angrily, her fiery blood rushing to the boil. ‘How dare you pry into my private life? Where did you get all this information and, more importantly, why?’ Her heart hammered at her ribcage. What on earth was going on here?

‘I don’t employ trouble. I have a detailed profile on all my key staff.’

‘I’m not your key staff!’ she retorted. ‘You haven’t officially taken over yet. I still work for—’

‘As from four o’clock this afternoon, Leisure Days doesn’t exist. As from nine o’clock tomorrow morning you work for Magnum Enterprises; in other words, me.’

Stunned, Liza stared at him, her words of protest jamming painfully in her throat. She couldn’t, she wouldn’t work for him!

‘This should take about an hour, Carl,’ Robert Buchanan leaned forward to tell his chauffeur as they pulled up in the cobbled courtyard where a cluster of small architect-designed three-storey town houses were grouped.

‘Do you want me to wait, sir?’

‘No, Carl, take yourself off for some lunch, but be back by three—I’ve an appointment at three fifteen in Westminster.’

Somehow Liza’s long legs carried her to her front door. She fumbled with the mortice lock, so sharply aware of him standing slightly behind her that her fingers felt stiff and clumsy. She heard the limousine reversing out of the courtyard, then her heartbeat racing inside her. This was ridiculous! Panic was rising unnecessarily. He’d offered her a job, wanted to talk about it over lunch in her home, and she understood why; nevertheless...

‘A nice home you have,’ he commented as she led him upstairs to the first-floor sitting-room. She took off her jacket and watched him warily as he stepped towards the window. ‘A river view; very pleasant.’

‘It’s...it’s even better from the bedrooms upstairs.’

She could have bitten her tongue out for that. Heat scorched her neck as lazily he turned to her and, with a sardonic smile creasing across his jawline, he said, ‘Thanks for the offer but I came here to talk business, not to make love to you.’

‘I...I didn’t mean that!’ she blurted self-consciously. Oh, he was quick, too sharp and suggestive by far.

‘Didn’t you?’ He slid out of his suit jacket, flung it carelessly across her chintz Laura Ashley sofa. ‘You wouldn’t be the first woman to offer me her body within fifteen minutes of our relationship.’

Steeling herself, Liza decided there was only one way to deal with this man—bluntly!

‘Takes that long, does it?’ she iced. ‘Don’t bother to make yourself comfortable,’ she blazed as he was about to lower himself on to the sofa. ‘Pick up your jacket and march, Mr Robert Buchanan; we have nothing to say to each other, business or otherwise.’

He straightened up, a suggestion of a smile playing at the corners of his mouth. ‘You can afford to be that choosy, can you?’

‘What’s that supposed to mean?’

‘You’re turning my business proposition down without hearing it?’

‘All I’ve heard from you so far is filthy innuendoes about your carnal mating prowess!’

With a smirk he shook his left hand as if he’d been stung. ‘Quite a bite you have,’ he observed, ‘and all I deserve. I’m sorry if I’ve upset you.’

‘It would take more than the likes of you to upset me,’ she replied haughtily. ‘Like you, I get propositioned every day of my life. I can handle it; you obviously have a problem. I mean it: I’m not interested in anything you have to put to me. Shall I call you a taxi?’

She moved to the phone on the coffee-table as he lowered himself down to the sofa and settled himself back, the movement stretching his grey waistcoat across his broad chest. He was a powerfully built man and Liza was acutely aware of his physique. It disturbed her, and that was a stupid realisation.

‘I’m not going anywhere, Liza,’ he said smoothly. ‘I’ve apologised once; I’m not in the habit of repeating myself. I want you, not your body, though the thought is very delectable. I’m not a fool; I don’t mess with my employees. I want you to work for me and I don’t take you for a fool either. To refuse me would be very unwise indeed.’

‘That sounds remarkably like a threat to me.’

He looked up at her, jet eyes narrowed warningly. ‘It is. You’d be wise to heed it.’

He lunged forward as defiantly Liza reached for the phone. His fingers wrapped around her wrist, not forcibly but firmly enough to convince her he meant business. She let go of the handset reluctantly.

‘Good girl,’ he patronised. ‘Now, what about some lunch?’

Wrenching her wrist away from him, she glowered at him darkly. ‘Last night’s lasagne reheated in the microwave. It’s all I have,’ she clipped, knowing it was the only way to get rid of him. Feed him, listen to what he had to say and then, at three on the dot, slam the door after him. Thank you and goodbye, Robert Buchanan!

‘The more I see of this house, the more I like it,’ he said, following her into the small yet functional kitchen divided off from the sitting-room by a wide archway.

Liza slammed the microwave door shut on the lasagne and punched out five minutes on the digital timer. She refused to say a word. Her mouth had led her into enough trouble already.

‘The mortgage on such a desirable residence in London must be quite a millstone for a single lady.’

She swung on him then, her flame hair flying wispily around her face. Impatiently she tucked it behind her ears. ‘What’s that supposed to mean? Are you implying I might supplement my income on the streets...?’ Her voice cracked in protest at herself. He hadn’t implied anything of the sort! ‘I’m sorry,’ she murmured, turning away to put on the kettle. ‘I seem to be going slowly mad.’

‘I disagree. You’re heading for the funny farm very rapidly.’

Liza reluctantly smiled then, turning her wide green eyes to him leaning nonchalantly in the archway. ‘You could be right,’ she sighed, ‘but it’s not every day you lose your career.’

‘Your career is just about to begin,’ he told her blandly.

‘You’re going to make me an offer I can’t refuse, are you?’

‘I’d say you’re not in a position to turn any offer away. Even a month out of work these days will play havoc with your bank account.’

‘Very true,’ she conceded, reaching for plates from the cupboard above her head. ‘But you’re not the only publisher in town. I’ve enough contacts in the business to get myself another position tomorrow.’

‘Not when word gets round that Leisure Days folded because of mismanagement.’

‘On the editorial side, not mine. I know my worth, Mr Buchanan.’ She frowned suddenly. ‘So why did you buy it?’ she asked.

‘It wasn’t all bad. It has potential and it went for a song. I’ll merge it with several others...’

‘Clone it, don’t you mean?’ she retorted.

‘Call it what you will, but in six months it will be the best monthly of its kind on the news-stands, here and across the continent,’ he told her confidently.

‘I’m not sure I want to work in that sort of stable. I like a small independent concern with a bit of character,’ she told him resolutely.

The microwave pinged out its five-second warning as Robert Buchanan stated quietly, ‘I’m not offering you the job.’

‘Oh!’ Her quizzical eyes settled on his. ‘What exactly are you offering?’

‘Overall advertising directorship. Thirty-five European magazines with offices in Amsterdam, Paris, Madrid...’

He reeled off several more capital cities, but Liza’s head buzzed his words into a blur. The lasagne nearly hit the quarry-tiled kitchen floor. With shaking fingers she lowered the dish to the work-surface.

‘You’ve got to be joking!’ she breathed incredulously.

‘I don’t make jokes about business. Do you want the job or not? I can name a hundred others who would rip their hearts out for such an offer.’ He stepped forward and picked up the plates and cutlery Liza had laid out ready, and turned and took them into the dining section of the sitting-room.

Liza stood where she was, stupefied into senselessness by the thought of such a job. He couldn’t be serious! This was some sort of weird hallucination. She plunged her index finger into the centre of the lasagne and winced at the pain of the burn. Yes, she was awake and this wasn’t some crazy dream. She lifted the dish and carried it into the other room, went back into the kitchen, and made a pot of tea, hardly aware of what she was doing.

‘This is delicious!’ he enthused as he forked a mouthful. ‘You’re a good cook.’

‘I’m not,’ Liza told him, her voice a croaking whisper. ‘There’s an Italian take-away round the corner. ‘I’m not a cook and I can’t take your job...but thank you for the offer.’

The day-old lasagne was like layered cardboard in her mouth. She swallowed hard and poured two mugs of steaming tea.

‘Your hand is shaking. What are you afraid of?’

She raised her eyes to his, tried to force a smile, but her pale coral lips twisted instead. She shook her head. ‘I can’t believe you’ve just offered me such a stupendous job; I mean...it’s...it’s too much...’

‘Oh, dear,’ he sighed, laying down his fork. ‘Don’t say for the first time in my life I’ve made a wrong character judgement. You’re not going all female on me, are you?’

‘How do you mean?’ her voice came back strongly.

‘You don’t feel you’re capable of such a position?’

‘No...it’s not that.’ Oh, God, it was! She was good at her job and knew it, but this offer was out of this world. The thought of running such an empire terrified her and yet...the challenge!

Robert Buchanan’s hand reached out and touched hers across the glass-topped table. ‘Liza, I wouldn’t be making this offer if I didn’t think you were right for it.’

‘But you don’t even know me!’ Liza argued, drawing her hand away from his.

‘I don’t know half of my staff but I know about them, just as I know that your qualifications and your flair are right for the job. I’ve done my homework. You have communication talent, a shrewd head on your shoulders. You don’t take any nonsense from anyone—you proved that with your attitude towards me.’

‘I was rude to you,’ she admitted, lowering her head.

‘Not without cause. I made a tactless remark in front of people whose nerves were already on a knife-edge.’

She admired him for admitting to that, but it didn’t change her opinion of him. He was ruthless. By what she had read about him, she knew he would dispense with the majority of the staff she had worked alongside. He wouldn’t tolerate John Standish’s ineptitude; he’d be on the next dole queue without a doubt. And what would become of her if she didn’t jump when he commanded? He’d fire her without a qualm if she didn’t prove her worth. But with a negative attitude like that she wouldn’t go far in this world, she reasoned miserably.

‘I’ll quadruple your present salary.’ He picked up his fork and proceeded to finish his lunch.

Liza watched him, cat-like. Money. Did he think it could be as easy as that?

‘That’s some carrot you’re dangling.’

‘Take it, before I offer it elsewhere,’ he told her coldly.

He obviously thought she was playing hard to get. ‘Why me?’ she challenged. ‘It’s a heavyweight job, more suited to a man, I would have thought.’

‘Most of my magazine staff are women. I like women. Don’t you read the gossip columns?’ He raised a sardonic black brow, questioning her.

‘I read them, but I can hardly believe any man has the libido you are credited with.’

He smiled at that, a white smile that had melted many a foolish heart. Liza was unaffected by it, her iron resolve to stave off all men for life forcing her heart to granite hardness.

‘I enjoy the publicity more than I do the women I’m supposed to have bedded. I’m a confirmed bachelor, you see,’ he told her with a hint of a sparkle to his dark eyes.

‘And I’m a confirmed spinster, so you and I just might get along.’ She presented a sweet smile with that sweeping statement.

‘One of the lesser reasons why I picked you for the job. You have the reputation for having a hard heart, Liza. No emotional involvement, not even an occasional bonding to while away a lonely night. You’re good executive material. Graham Bond did a sterling heart-hardening job on you all right, didn’t he?’