to learn before he could live up to the responsibility that had been heaped on his shoulders.
Careful not to let his gaze tangle with Tina’s, he angled a quick peek at the door leading to O’Neal’s office. His classy would-be tutor had disappeared through there when she barreled by a while ago. The financial planner said he needed a few minutes alone with Miss Burrell to explain the position Briny had to offer. What was taking so long? He checked his watch, the case scratched and battered from working on the oil rigs. Half an hour. Explaining must have turned into convincing. Or arm twisting.
Maybe he was wasting his time. The fact that Dorian Burrell was heir to the very company that Briny had worked for, up until a week ago, had seemed like another lucky coincidence when O’Neal first mentioned what he had in mind. Now that he’d had a second look at the pampered petroleum princess, he wasn’t sure she was the best hand for the job. Oh, the cool, blond, trust-fund baby could teach him what he needed to know in order to run with society’s big dogs—Dorian Burrell had flounced into the world with a sterling silver spoon clamped firmly between her perfect, pearly white teeth—that was not the problem.
Unlike the moony young receptionist, the hoity-toity oil heiress had looked at him down that pretty nose of hers as if he was something she’d stepped in while crossing the corral.
Briny didn’t know much about the world beyond the oil fields, but he was pretty sure flat-out scorn wouldn’t help him achieve his goals. The tutoring process was meant to increase his confidence, not blast it into fifty million pieces.
“If you have a better idea, Dorian, please share.” Malcolm O’Neal leaned back in his ergonomically engineered leather desk chair and adjusted his glasses. “This job didn’t fall into your lap out of pure dumb luck, you know. It’s definitely a miracle. I should probably notify the Vatican.”
“Very funny,” she muttered. Her overwrought fingers drummed a steady tattoo on the arm of her chair. Just because she’d had time to adjust to the fact of her impoverishment, didn’t mean she had to like the idea. “I’m glad you find my misfortune so amusing.”
“Dorian, as your financial manager, I highly recommend you take the job. I rather doubt you’ll find anyone in the universe willing to pay one-tenth of what my client has offered for your services, or any job better suited to your particular, ah, talents.”
“Thanks for the vote of confidence, Malcolm.” Dorian knew he was right. She just hated that he was. Thirty thousand dollars was a lot of money for three months’ work. What was she worried about? She could handle this. Malcolm said she wouldn’t have to teach the nouveau riche Neanderthal everything. She could concentrate on appearance, etiquette, culture and the finer points of social grace while coordinating the numerous instructors, classes and training courses Briny Tucker would need to bring him up to millionaire-socialite speed.
Briny. What kind of name was that?
“As chief miracle worker, I get to call the shots, right? Run the show? Be the boss?” Otherwise she wanted nothing to do with this real-life Technicolor episode of the Beverly Hillbillies.
“Of course. Mr. Tucker has agreed to defer to your judgment in all things pertaining to his, ah, grooming.”
“Do I have to sign anything?”
“Just a standard business contract outlining your duties and terms of the agreement. Nothing to worry about.” He dismissed her concern with a hand flap and avoided making eye contact as he pushed a piece of legal-size paper across the desk. “I took the liberty of having this drawn up before you arrived.”
“Pretty darned sure of yourself, weren’t you?”
“Like I said, if you have a better idea…”
“I don’t know.” Signing a contract was a bigger commitment than Dorian had ever made before. A contract sounded official, binding. Scary.
“Three months isn’t such a long time.” Malcolm clearly wanted to close the deal, but Dorian refused to be rushed.
“Maybe not to someone with money coming in,” she snapped. The eighty dollars in her purse wouldn’t last through tomorrow afternoon. And if Malcolm thought she’d give the money back because he’d found her a job, he was in for a surprise. She glanced at the contract to confirm the figure he’d quoted her. “This Tucker person is really willing to pay that amount?”
“It’s all spelled out in black-and-white.” Malcolm slid a fancy platinum pen toward her. “Just sign, and we can move on.”
She was sorely tempted. As an ex-debutante with no employment history, minimal prospects, and if truth be told, no marketable skills whatsoever, she knew exactly how miraculous the offer was. Almost too good to be true. A ready solution to an unexpected cash flow problem. And far more palatable than bagging burgers at a fast-food counter.
She would definitely not look her best in a cardboard hat.
“What’s more, he’s willing to pay one month’s wages in advance.” This time Malcolm slid a check across the desk. “As his financial manager, I’ve been authorized to offer you the first payment today.”
“Oh, you have, have you?” This out-of-the-blue, too-easy solution smelled like a trap. She should kick off her new Ferragamo pumps and sprint to the nearest exit before she did something stupid. She had to be crazy. Why else would she even consider spending the next few months in forced proximity to a totally unsuitable man with whom she had nothing in common? One whose physical presence had made her aware of his inappropriateness in the most alarming way both times she’d passed him in Malcolm’s waiting room.
“He is an altogether intriguing, ingenuous young man,” Malcolm went on. “You’ll like him, if you give him half a chance. And I think Pru will agree, this may be a growth experience for you as well as him. She’ll be pleased you solved your problem and impressed by your resourcefulness.”
Anything to get back into Granny Pru’s good graces. “Oh, all right. I’ll sign.” Without bothering to read the fine print, Dorian grabbed the contract and scribbled her name across the bottom before she changed her mind. She tucked the check into her purse before Malcolm changed his. Growth experience or not, she was not sure she could ever forgive her grandmother for thrusting her into this horrible position.
Malcolm rubbed his hands together in satisfaction and rocked forward in his chair. “Excellent.” He punched the desk intercom. “Tina, please show Mr. Tucker in.”
Dorian groaned. “And please show me where you keep the Valium.”
Five minutes of Mr. Tucker’s company told Dorian ninety days would not be nearly enough time to buck Darwin’s theory and polish the hairy missing link into something remotely resembling a socialite. She had expected him to be rough around the edges. She was wrong. Tucker was a gum-chewing, hobnailed yokel of staggering proportions, who readily admitted he studied “rich folks” by watching Dallas reruns on satellite television. Raw and unpolished to the core. An unlikely, mustachioed blip on Lady Luck’s radar.
Dorian assessed the new millionaire. “Given time constraints and the current state of technology, complete molecular reconstruction is out. So to achieve positive results, the transformation process will have to be intense.”
“Whatever you say, ma’am. Like I told Mr. O’Neal, you’re the boss.”
For maximum effect, and for her own convenience,
