His Executive Sweetheart. Christine Rimmer

the boss and ruin everything.

      Now, it was all changed. Now, it was the agony and the ecstasy and Celia Tuttle was living it. Everything about being near him excited her—and wounded her to the core.

      By the fourth day, she felt just desperate enough to consider telling him of her feelings.

      But what for? To make it all the worse? Make her humiliation complete? After all, if he were interested, even minimally, wouldn’t he have given her some hint, some clue, by now?

      She told him nothing.

      By the sixth day, she found herself contemplating the impossible: giving notice. Less than a week since she’d fallen for the boss. And she’d almost forgotten how much she used to love her job.

      Now, work seemed more like torture. A place where she suffered constantly in the company of her heart’s desire—and he was totally oblivious to her as anything but his very efficient gal Friday.

      Maybe she should quit.

      But she didn’t. She did nothing, just tried to get through each day. Just reminded herself that it really hadn’t been all that long since V-day—yes, that was how she had started to think of it. As V-day, the day her whole world went haywire.

      She hoped, fervently, that things would get better, somehow.

      The seventh day passed.

      Then, on the eighth day, Celia got a call from her friend Jane in New Venice.

      It was after midnight. Celia had just let herself into her rooms. A group of Japanese businessmen had arrived that afternoon. High rollers, important ones. The kind who thought nothing of dropping a million a night at High Sierra’s gaming tables. The kind known affectionately in the industry as whales.

      Aaron had joined these particular whales for their comped gourmet dinner in the Placer Room. He’d asked Celia to be there, too. She’d been in what she thought of as “fetch-and-carry mode.” If there was anything he needed that, for some reason, the wait staff or immediately available hotel personnel couldn’t handle, Celia was right there, to see he got it and got it fast.

      The phone was ringing when she entered her rooms. She rushed to answer it.

      And she heard her dear friend’s voice complaining, “Don’t you ever return your calls?”

      Celia scrunched the phone between her shoulder and her ear and slid her thumb under the back strap of her black evening sandal. “Sorry.” She slipped the shoe off with a sigh of relief, then got rid of the other one and dropped to the couch. “It’s been a zoo.”

      “That’s what you always say.”

      “Well, it’s always a zoo.”

      “But you love it.”

      In her mind’s eye, she saw Aaron. “That’s right,” she said bleakly. “I do.”

      “Okay, what’s wrong?”

      “Not a thing.”

      “You said that too fast.”

      “Jane. I love my job. It’s not news.” Too bad I also love my boss—who does not love me. “What’s up?”

      “You’re sure you’re all right?”

      “Uh-huh. What’s up?”

      Jane hesitated. Celia could just see her, sitting up in her four-poster bed in the wonderful Queen Anne Victorian she’d inherited from her beloved Aunt Sophie. She’d be braced against the headboard, pillows propped at her back, her wildly curling almost-black hair tamed, more or less, into a single braid. And she’d have a frown between her dark brows as she considered whether to get to why she’d called—or pursue Celia’s sudden strange attitude toward her job.

      Finally, she said, “Come home. This weekend.”

      Celia leaned back against the couch cushions and stared up at the recessed ceiling lights. “I can’t. You know I can’t.”

      Jane made a humphing sound. “I don’t know any such thing. You work too hard. You never take a break.”

      “It’s Thursday. Home is five hundred miles away.”

      “That’s why they invented airplanes. I’ll pick you up in Reno tomorrow, just name the time.”

      “Oh, Jane…”

      “There will be wine. And a crackling fire in the fireplace. The valley is beautiful. We had snow, just enough to give us that picture-postcard effect. But there’s none in the forecast, so getting here will be no problem. And Jilly’s coming.”

      Jillian Diamond, Celia’s other best friend, lived in Sacramento now and got home almost as rarely as Celia did.

      “Also, I’m cooking.” Jane was an excellent cook. “Come on, Ceil. It’s been way too long. You know it has. At some point, you just have to put work aside for a day or two and come and see your old friends.”

      Celia gathered her legs up to the side and switched the phone to her other ear. Why not? She thought. She hadn’t had a weekend to herself in months. And she could certainly use a break right about now. Yes. A change of scenery, a little time away from the object of her hopeless desire—and everything connected with him.

      “Celia Louise?”

      “I’m here—and I’m coming.”

      Jane let out short whoop of glee. “You are? You’re serious?”

      “I’ll get a flight right now, then e-mail you my flight schedule. But don’t worry about picking me up.”

      “I don’t mind.”

      “Forget about it. I’ll rent a car, no problem.”

      “I’m holding you to this,” Jane said in a scolding tone. “You won’t be allowed to back out this time.”

      “Don’t worry. I’ll be there. Tomorrow afternoon. Expect me.”

      “I will.”

      Celia hung up and ran upstairs to her loft office nook, where she scheduled a flight online—quickly, before she could start thinking of all the ways her unexpected absence might be inconvenient for Aaron. She sent Jane a copy of her itinerary.

      Jane e-mailed her right back: Since you’re driving yourself, I’ll go ahead and stay at the store until six.

      Jane owned and operated a bookstore, the Silver Unicorn, in the heart of New Venice, right on Main Street. It was next door to the Highgrade, the café/saloon/gift shop that Caitlin Bravo, Aaron’s mother, had owned and run for over thirty years.

      Celia stared at the computer screen, remembering….

      Aaron and his brothers used to hang around on Main Street. They all three worked on and off at the Highgrade—in the gift shop or in the café, where they bussed tables or even flipped burgers on the grill. But they were a volatile family. People in town said those boys needed the influence of a steady father figure and that was something they would never get with Caitlin Bravo for a mother.

      They were always getting into trouble, or just plain not showing up when it was time to go to work. Caitlin would pitch a fit and fire them. Then they’d end up hanging out on the street with the other wild kids in town—until they got into some mischief or other. Then Caitlin would yell at them and put them to work again.

      Once, when she was eight, Celia had borrowed her big sister’s bike and ridden it over to Main Street. It was twenty-six inches of bike, with thin racing wheels, and she’d borrowed it without getting Annie’s permission. But she figured she wouldn’t get in trouble. Annie was over at the high school, at cheerleading practice. By the time Annie got home, the bike would be back on the side porch where she’d left it.

      It was a stretch for Celia’s eight-year-old legs to reach the pedals and she kind of wobbled when she rode it.