His Executive Sweetheart. Christine Rimmer

skirt—brighter colors, hah! Like wearing fire-engine red and Jolly Rancher green could make him love her. She tucked her yellow legal pad under her arm, grabbed her pencil and her miniature tape recorder and crossed to the high, wide door that led to his private office.

      She paused there to smooth her hair and tug on the hem of the jacket that matched the fawn-colored skirt. I’m okay, she thought. Pulled-together. Calm. Collected. Ready to do it.

      She pushed open the door and there he was, right where she expected him to be, at his big glass desk in front of the wall of windows, engrossed in something on his computer screen.

      She quietly turned and made sure the door was shut. Then she marched across the room and stepped between the two black leather visitors’ chairs that faced his desk, planting herself in front of him.

      It took him a moment to stop punching keys and look up. His bronze-kissed dark brows drew together. “Celia?”

      That was it. All he said. It was way too much. It was, Is there a problem and do we really need to address it right now?

      No. They didn’t.

      She sidled to the right, dropped into one of the two chairs, indicated her legal pad and chirped brightly, “Ready when you are.”

      Jane called next. On Thursday, after midnight. “Did you do it?”

      “Oh, Janie.”

      “You didn’t.”

      “I almost did.”

      “But you didn’t.”

      “It’s really…hard for me.”

      Jane let out a long breath. “Look. I’ve been thinking….”

      Celia clutched the phone as if it were a lifeline. “Yeah?”

      “Maybe you’re not up for reality right now. Maybe you’re not ready to face him with the truth.” That was sounding pretty reasonable—until Jane went on. “Maybe you’re enjoying this a little, kind of reveling in your misery.”

      “Jane!” That hurt. It really did. And partly because it had the sharp sting of truth.

      She was getting kind of…used to being miserable. Yesterday was two weeks since V-day. Two weeks of suffering. She’d kind of gotten into a groove with it now, hadn’t she?

      “Celia Louise, you are the classic middle child, you know that you are.”

      “Is this a lecture coming on?”

      “You are a middle child and you know how to be…ignored. Passed over. You don’t get out and make things happen like a first child. You don’t expect all good to come to you, as the baby in the family always does. You…accept being in the middle. You can easily become stuck.”

      “And I’m stuck right now, is that what you’re saying?”

      “Yes. You’re stuck in the middle, sitting at the trestle table, clutching your sad little bowl of gruel, knowing when you finish it, you’ll still be very, very hungry—and yet unwilling to get up and ask the headmaster for more.”

      “My bowl of gruel?”

      “Come on. You remember. Dickens. Oliver Twist. In the orphanage. We read it in Mrs. Oakley’s freshman English class.”

      She remembered. “Shall we go into what happened when Oliver actually got up and asked for more?”

      Jane was silent for a count of two. “Okay,” she conceded. “Bad analogy.”

      “No kidding.”

      “But in the end, Oliver succeeded in life. Because he was someone who could get up when he had to and ask for more.”

      “Hooray for Oliver.”

      Jane made a small sound in her throat—one that spoke of fading patience. “I’m merely saying, if you don’t want to tell him, fine. Maybe you should quit working for him. It wouldn’t be the end of the world for you to have to get another job. And at least that would be taking action, which I sincerely think it’s time for you to do.”

      There was no getting around it. Jane had it right. “I’ll tell him. I will.”

      “Good. When, exactly?”

      “Tomorrow…”

      Tomorrow came.

      Celia went to the office tower a determined woman.

      And when she got there, she learned her boss had taken off for New Jersey on a site-scouting trip with Tony Jarvis. He wasn’t due back until Sunday. He’d left her an e-mail.

      TO: Celia Tuttle, clerical/PA

      FROM: Aaron Bravo, CEO

      SUBJECT: Trip to New Jersey

      Back Sunday. Take a three-day weekend. Aaron.

      And that meant, unless something came up and he really needed her, she wouldn’t see him face-to-face until Monday.

      Reprieved, she thought. And felt mingled relief and despair—tinged faintly with worry. As his assistant, it was part of her job to be at his side when he traveled. Why hadn’t he wanted her presence on this trip?

      She told herself not to make something of nothing. Now and then, he traveled without her. This was probably just one of those times.

      She considered going home for another weekend. But she didn’t think she could bear facing Jane again until she had done what she’d sworn to do. And there were plenty of projects for her to dig into. She worked all day Friday and half a day on Saturday.

      Every time she returned to her rooms, she expected to see the message light blinking on her phone—a call from Jane or Jillian to find out if she’d finally done what she’d vowed to do.

      But her friends didn’t call. Maybe they’d given up on her. She could hardly blame them if they had.

      Sunday, she woke early, thinking, He’s due back today….

      But she didn’t know what time.

      And what did it matter what time? She wasn’t going to ask him for a private meeting until tomorrow, anyway.

      She lasted until noon and then she called his rooms. His machine picked up. Quietly, stealthily—without leaving a message—she returned the phone to its cradle. Then she went to her computer, logged onto the company system, and used her employee code to look up his itinerary. It was unethical, really. Celia Tuttle, secretary/personal assistant didn’t need to know exactly when her boss would arrive back in town. But Celia Tuttle, woman hopelessly in love, did.

      He was due in at eight that night. Which meant he wouldn’t get to his own rooms till nine or ten at the earliest.

      It helped to know that. Made it marginally easier not to keep dialing his number and hanging up when his machine answered.

      The day dragged by on lead feet. She read the Sunday paper, watched a movie on cable, her mind hardly registering what her eyes were seeing. In the afternoon, she called down to Touch of Gold, High Sierra’s full-service luxury spa, and booked the works—mud bath, massage and two-hour facial. Maybe it would help her relax.

      It did, while she was down there. And it took up four hours she would have spent stewing. She didn’t return to her own rooms until after six.

      The rest of the evening was downright unbearable. As eight and nine came and went, she wondered.

      Where was he now?

      Had he reached the hotel yet?

      Was he already in his tower suite—or was he down in the casino somewhere, or in one of High Sierra’s luxurious bars or fine restaurants, maybe having a last drink with Tony Jarvis, or possibly courting some recently arrived high rollers?

      There was no way to know.