His Girl Monday To Friday

His Girl Monday To Friday
Linda Miles

The tycoon…All Charles Mallory wants is a secretary who won't burst into tears at the first sign of trouble–and who won't make the mistake of falling in love with him. Unfortunately, the good-looking tycoon does seem to have a strange effect on his female staff. He needs an assistant who's Mallory-proof!…and the temp!His childhood friend Barbara seems perfect. Barbara knows him too well to ever make the mistake of falling for him. Only, working closely with Barbara is having a strange effect on Charles. Could it be that Charles is in danger of falling for the one secretary who's immune to his charms?

“I‘d just like to make sure there hasn’t been some mistake.” (#u932e8471-f7fe-5b49-b1cc-9346e7f603a1)About the Author (#u871a63b9-a680-5f90-91e7-290a6f884c3f)Title Page (#u051e7f0d-ffd4-5b04-b303-2aad8158c6f9)CHAPTER ONE (#ubbedcf7b-7a6b-5665-a739-2e5975bd326f)CHAPTER TWO (#u0126679c-88a7-5eae-85eb-2e70d1c32859)CHAPTER THREE (#uf8e56bd5-53da-560a-b2ad-aa1a6ce1c935)CHAPTER FOUR (#ua4d6a533-e8f8-567a-b304-c75d1e13505f)CHAPTER FIVE (#u73c93031-7f10-55af-b0cc-d8c9c0663a0a)CHAPTER SIX (#litres_trial_promo)CHAPTER SEVEN (#litres_trial_promo)CHAPTER EIGHT (#litres_trial_promo)CHAPTER NINE (#litres_trial_promo)CHAPTER TEN (#litres_trial_promo)CHAPTER ELEVEN (#litres_trial_promo)CHAPTER TWELVE (#litres_trial_promo)CHAPTER THIRTEEN (#litres_trial_promo)CHAPTER FOURTEEN (#litres_trial_promo)CHAPTER FIFTEEN (#litres_trial_promo)CHAPTER SIXTEEN (#litres_trial_promo)CHAPTER SEVENTEEN (#litres_trial_promo)EPILOGUE (#litres_trial_promo)Copyright (#litres_trial_promo)

“I‘d just like to make sure there hasn’t been some mistake.”

“Mistake?” Barbara said blankly.

“I’d like you to kiss me where you can see what you’re doing.” Charles grinned at her, the old heart-stopping, knee-weakening grin that he’d been turning on girls so carelessly ever since she’d known him. “It was dark in the car,” he said seriously. “You might not have realized you were kissing a selfish, arrogant swine with no consideration for his staff.”

Barbara wasn’t going to take this lying down. “Don’t be silly,” she said loftily. “It was just a kiss. I didn’t think it was necessary to ask for a character reference.”

“I’m so glad to hear you say that, Barbara,” he said gravely, the gleam in his eye belying his tone of voice. “Because I’m going to kiss you again and I’d hate for you to be kissed by a selfish, arrogant swine and not know what was happening until it was too late.”

Linda Miles was born in Kenya, spent her childhood in Argentina, Brazil and Peru, and completed her education In England. She is a keen rider, and wrote her first story at the age of ten when laid up with a broken leg after a fall. She considers three months a year the minimum acceptable holiday allowance but has never gotten an employer to see reason, and took up writing romances as a way to have adventures and see the world.

His Girl Monday to Friday

Linda Miles

www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)

CHAPTER ONE

‘NO,’ SAID BARBARA.

She buried her nose ostentatiously in Colloquial Romanian. It was the fifth time she’d said it, and the fifth time she’d read that page on the compound perfect, and for the fifth time, as with all the other four, neither of the other two people in the room paid a blind bit of notice.

Barbara was curled up in the window-seat of her parents’ sitting room. To her right were a pleasant view of a garden, rose bushes, a glimpse of Richmond; to her left squashy furniture in floral fabrics and a confusion of unfinished projects. Half-knitted jumpers, half-patched quilts, half-embroidered napkins trailed from baskets, bookshelves, the backs of chairs. Among the confusion were her mother Ruth, a woman incapable of thinking badly of anyone, and Charles Mallory, a man only a woman who couldn’t wouldn’t think badly of.

‘What a marvellous idea!’ Ruth exclaimed now, for the sixth or seventh time. ‘It’s wonderful that Barbara has so many interests, but I sometimes feel she has a tendency to pick things up and put them down. It would be good for her to see something through to the end—and what a chance to use all those languages!’

Ruth had always thought of Charles as a son; it was wonderful the way he’d thought of Barbara when he could have had anyone. ‘It seems as if it was meant!’ She beamed at Charles over the ribbing of a sweater she’d just started from a pattern out of a magazine.

Charles grinned—somehow Barbara managed to see this even though she wasn’t looking at him but at page 181 of Colloquial Romanian. It was the grin that had sent all the girls in his class weak at the knees that first year he’d come to stay with her parents fifteen years ago; she could just about remember the devastating effect it had had when she’d first seen it, age eleven.

His face was harder now—the mouth ruthless in repose, the green eyes cold and penetrating as steel, the lines of jaw and nose and forehead almost brutal now that the black hair was cropped so close to the skull—but the grin still lit up his face in the way that had been so irresistible at seventeen. Now, of course—well, now was another matter.

‘She was the first person I thought of,’ he said.

He thrust his hands in his pockets and began pacing up and down the room, his long legs tracing an awkward path through the clutter.

“This is the biggest thing I’ve done,’ he said. ‘Eastern Europe is going to start taking off any day—we’ve got to get in now. I need someone with the right skills to back me up. Not easy to find, and I can’t afford to spend six months looking.’

‘No, indeed,’ Ruth said sympathetically, finishing a row.

‘And, anyway, the hell of it is you can’t give a recipe for the right package of skills—I need a quick study. It’s going to be a roller-coaster ride and I need someone who can cope with that.’

‘Barbara would be perfect!’

‘And I need someone I can count on.’

That was the last straw. Barbara stopped pretending to read.

‘Well, you can’t count on me,’ she said. ‘I don’t want to do it I’m not interested. I do not want to work for you.’

At last she had their attention.

‘Barbara!’ her mother exclaimed reproachfully.

Charles scowled—no smiles for the Perfect Secretary. ‘Why not?’

‘Because you’re a self-centred, bad-tempered, high-handed, arrogant swine,’ said Barbara.

She lifted her chin defiantly, shook the glossy dark red fringe from her eyes and raised brilliant blue eyes to glare, furiously, at the only man she had ever loved.

‘Barbara!’

‘And that’s an understatement!’ she added unrepentantly.

‘It’s not a job for shrinking violets—’ he began.

‘It’s not a job for anyone who cares about common courtesy. There are people who think drill sergeants shouldn’t write books of etiquette because they’re too polite. I suggest you find the other one, and hire him.’

‘You only worked for me one day—’

‘It was one day too many.’

“The circumstances were unusual. It won’t usually be that bad; it should be a lot of fun.’

He’d stopped frowning. He wasn’t grinning, but there was just a fraction of a smile at his mouth. All those years as a driven man of business, self-made millionaire, had left their mark, but the smile had all its old heart-stopping charm. Who was the fool who’d said love was blind? Barbara could feel her own mouth returning the smile, her heart quickening, but she could read the temper in his eyes too. He was fighting down his impatience, partly because of Ruth, of course, but mainly because he wanted to get his way.

‘Really?’ Barbara said sceptically. ‘Does that mean you’ll do your own dirty work?’

The little spark of temper flashed in his eyes, but he was still half smiling. ‘Meaning?’

‘Meaning if you’ve got half a dozen girlfriends you don’t want to see any more you should tell them it’s over, not tell your secretary to tell them you’re in a meeting. Do unusual circumstances mean that usually you’ve only got one or two to brush off, or that you’re dealing with that yourself these days?’

There—maybe that would show Ruth what he was really like.

Annoyingly, her shot seemed to have misfired. Charles raised an eyebrow.

‘Is that what’s bothering you? I don’t remember who I was seeing then, but I don’t think I was trying to brush anyone off. I tell women not to call me at the office; I don’t have time for social calls if I’m working on something, but if you don’t like a polite lie you can tell the truth. I’ll let you know if there’s anyone I want to talk to.’

It should have been a relief that there was still no one serious. As far as she knew, there never had been. Well, in a way it was a relief. But she was chilled by his indifference, just as she’d always been.

His parents had sent him back to England to stay with her family for his last two years of school. Within days the phone had been ringing off the hook. Barbara hadn’t been surprised. She’d never seen anyone as handsome as the new guest—of course all the girls at school had wanted to call him. But because she was living in the house she’d seen the dark, handsome face change expression as he picked up the phone; seen it stiff with boredom, stifling yawns; seen him glance at the clock, make monosyllabic replies, reach for the remote control of the TV, change channels for the football.

Sometimes she’d picked up the phone herself. A girl would ask, elaborately casual, if Charles was there. ‘I’ll go and see,’ Barbara would say.

Charles would mouth, ‘Who is it?’ And sometimes, when she’d told him, he’d shaken his head or given a thumbs-down. It had been terrifying to see how little he cared, how bored he was by the adoration he won so easily, and it seemed she’d always known, as long as she’d known him, that she must never let him know what she felt.

She’d teased him and pestered him and mocked him as if she’d really been his little sister, and he’d enjoyed it in a funny kind of way—perhaps because it had made a change from the uncritical worship he’d got from girls his own age. Maybe he’d even liked her, a little, before it all went wrong.

‘It’s not the only thing I don’t like about it,’ said Barbara. ‘This could go on for months. You know I hate the idea of a permanent job; I don’t like to work anywhere for more than a couple of weeks—let alone with someone who thinks ten hours is a short working day. If I’ve worked a month I think I deserve a holiday. At least as a temp I can go away whenever I feel like it. Give me one good reason why I should give all that up to be sworn at for eleven months out of twelve by you.’

‘money,’ said Charles.

‘I don’t know how much you’re offering,’ said Barbara, ‘but it’s not enough. No can do. I’m going to Sardinia next month; I’ll send you a postcard—“Having a wonderful time, stay where you are.”’

‘How much do you want?’

‘You wouldn’t want to pay it,’ said Barbara.

This was too much for her mother. ‘Barbara!’ she protested. ‘Charles needs your help! Surely it’s not too much to ask you to put off travelling just until he has this project on its feet? He’s just like one of the family—you should be glad to help him.’

‘I’d have thought I’d be the last person he’d want to help him,’ Barbara blurted out before she could stop herself. ‘It didn’t do him much good the last time I tried.’ She met his eyes defiantly; she remembered, even if he didn’t.