Meet Mr. Prince / Once a Cowboy.... Patricia Kay

the things Deborah had told her, even as she unpacked her satchel and arranged the supplies piled upon her desk. She hoped she was wrong. She hoped Zach Prince would turn out to be just as great as Alex had made him out to be. But she had a bad feeling that Alex had kept things from her.

      And even if he hadn’t, even if he really thought Zachary Prince was terrific, there was always a first time to be fooled, especially when you were operating long distance from each other. In fact, maybe the reason they so desperately needed to hire an assistant here was because the assistant actually did all the work. And who knew? Maybe down deep, Alex suspected as much, even if he wouldn’t, or couldn’t, put his suspicions into words.

      Georgie had just finished setting everything up to her liking, booting up her company-issue laptop and logging on to the employee section of the foundation’s website, where she’d begun reading the reports of weekend activity posted by various field agents and other foundation employees, when she heard a male voice talking to Deborah, then the footsteps of someone coming down the hall.

      Mr. Gorgeous had finally arrived, she guessed.

      Sure enough, a few seconds later, the Patrick Dempsey lookalike stood in her open doorway. “Good morning,” he said.

      Bad night, she thought, eyeing his rumpled, longish black hair and tired eyes. Probably out way too late. “Good morning.”

      “Zach Prince,” he said, walking in. He wore a dark business suit under a black topcoat.

      Georgie stood. “Georgie Fairchild.” They shook hands. His handshake was firm but not crushing, a minor point in his favor. Georgie hated when men tried to show you how strong they were with a handshake from hell.

      He looked at her desk. “Sorry I wasn’t here earlier, but I see Deborah has taken care of you.”

      “Yes, she has.”

      “Give me a half hour or so to get some things organized, then we’ll talk.”

      If Georgie had been him, she’d have been here an hour before the new person was scheduled to arrive. She’d have been ready to talk immediately. “All right,” she agreed.

      Not a good beginning, she thought as she watched him walk across the hall and into his office. When he shut the door behind him, she shook her head. Not a good beginning at all.

      Hell, Zach thought. He could see, just from the way she looked at him, that Georgie Fairchild was judging him and finding him wanting. He could easily imagine what she thought. Not only was he later than usual—10:30 by his watch—but he probably looked like he’d been out all night. Added to that was the way he looked, which caused people who didn’t know him to think he was a lightweight.

      One look at Georgie Fairchild and anyone could see that she wasn’t a lightweight. Her height alone—Zach guessed she was about five ten or eleven—would be intimidating to a lot of people. It wasn’t to Zach—he was well over six feet himself—but he would imagine it gave her an advantage in a lot of situations.

      In addition to her height were businesslike clothes, a utilitarian watch, no jewelry except tiny diamond earrings, thick wheat-blond hair pulled back into a no-nonsense ponytail, cool green eyes, subtle makeup—it was obvious to anyone that here was a young woman who was capable, efficient and self-confident.

      Zach groaned inwardly. All his reservations about Georgie Fairchild bubbled up. He’d been right to be concerned. Having her here was not a good idea. Zach felt like picking up the phone and calling Alex right now and saying, “No way, José.” So what if she had an honorary seat on the HuntCom board?

      In fact, if she gave him one bit of trouble, she was going to be out of here. But if worse came to worst, if Alex really had sent her here for some ulterior motive, then Zach’s ongoing work-versus home dilemma might solve itself.

      Feeling better now that he’d decided on his modus operandi, he booted up his laptop and opened his email account.

      It was almost 11:30 before Zach—she couldn’t keep referring to him as Zachary Prince, even in her own mind—called Georgie into his office. She kept telling herself to keep an open mind, but if she was being honest with herself, she’d admit she’d pretty much formed her opinion of him already. Maybe he was as good as Alex had said he was, but his work habits told another story.

      He stood as she walked into the office. Okay, so he’d been taught nice manners and they extended into the workplace, but as far as Georgie was concerned, standing for her was another strike against him, because all the gesture meant was that he thought of her more as a woman than a colleague.

      “I understand you got here on Friday,” he said as they both took a seat—him behind the desk, her in one of the two chairs flanking it. There was also a long leather sofa along the side wall and several framed watercolors hanging above it.

      “Yes.”

      He must have noticed her looking at the watercolors, because he said, “My sister painted those.”

      “They’re lovely.” And they were. Georgie would have liked to look at them more closely.

      “Thank you,” he said, still in that rather formal voice. “So, have you been to the city before?”

      “No, this is my first time.”

      “What do you think of it?”

      “So far, I like it.”

      “How’s the apartment?”

      “It’s very nice, thank you.” Georgie hesitated, then added, “I appreciate that you stocked the pantry and refrigerator for me.”

      “That was Deborah’s doing.”

      “I’ll have to thank her, then.”

      For a few minutes, they talked about the sights she’d taken in over the weekend, and just as Georgie was beginning to think he’d never get down to business, he said, “Shall we get started?”

      I thought you’d never ask. “I’m ready anytime you are.”

      He picked up a large blue bound notebook, and as he did so, Georgie noticed the two framed photos on his desk, which the notebook had partially hidden. Without staring, she could see that one was a photo of three children—one of whom looked quite young—and the other was of a very pretty dark-haired woman.

      So maybe he wasn’t a playboy type? Of course, the kids could be nieces and nephews. The woman could be the sister he’d mentioned, but she couldn’t imagine any man keeping his sister’s framed picture on his desk.

      Even though she’d thought she wasn’t obviously looking, she must have been, because he said, “My family.”

      Georgie’s eyes met his. “Nice looking.”

      “Thank you.”

      He looked away, but not before she caught a glimpse of some emotion in his eyes she didn’t quite understand. It almost looked like sadness. Surely not. But as quickly as it had appeared, the emotion, whatever it was, had disappeared.

      For the next hour they pored over the various grants the eastern division of the foundation had pledged in the past quarter and the projects they were in the process of considering, plus a list of possible beneficiaries that had had preliminary vetting but which needed in-depth research and investigation. Zach also handed her a stack of grant applications that hadn’t been vetted at all. “We call these our slush pile,” he said.

      As Zach talked, giving her background material and status reports, Georgie had to admit he seemed to know his business. He answered all her questions thoroughly and only once had to refer to another source to give her the information she requested. After a while, he seemed to warm up to her, and once or twice he actually smiled.

      Good heavens, that smile should be banned, she thought as she found herself responding to its warmth … and potent sexiness. This last thought alarmed her so much she actually backed up in her chair.