Tom’s attention if you keep calling him Mr. Eldridge instead of just Tom, the way the rest of us do.”
“I know,” Lili said wistfully. “I find it difficult to be familiar with him without an invitation. After all, he is my boss.”
“And he’s all business when he’s at work,” Rita added. “If you’re ever going to catch his interest, you’ll have to spread a little honey instead of making fliers.”
“Maybe the problem is that you actually believe in Sullivan’s Rules, Lili,” April interjected. “You’ve already told us you were brought up to believe that a woman’s role in a relationship is actually a lot like Lucas’s rules for marriage.”
“It is true,” Lili agreed. “The women in my family were taught from childhood to defer to their father, then their husband. I know it sounds very old-fashioned compared to the way women here in the United States think, but it is different in my country. Especially for a girl like myself, who was raised by her grandmother.”
“Then you and Tom ought to get along just fine,” Rita said soothingly. “I think he actually believes in Sullivan’s Rules. Provided you get over your shyness, and if you can do something to get him to see you’re a mixture of the woman in Lucas’s article and today’s woman, you’ll be okay.”
“Rita’s right,” April agreed. “All Tom needs is to realize you’re almost as old-fashioned about men as he is about women.” She paused to look critically at Lili. “Or are you really an old-fashioned woman? Sometimes when I see the look in your eyes, I think there are hidden depths within you.”
Lili blushed as she recalled her physical reaction to Tom whenever he was near. “Maybe so.”
“Yeah.” Rita grinned. “Personally, I believe that most rules are made to be broken—including Sullivan’s.”
Wide-eyed, Lili shook her head. “I do not want to do anything to make Mr. Eldridge more angry. I need his help to postpone the management meeting.”
“Actually, you don’t have to break Sullivan’s Rules,” Rita said. “All you have to do is bend them a little to make them work for you. Heck, if I hadn’t bent a couple, I wouldn’t be with Colby now.”
“There are so many rules to remember,” Lili said as Arthur, the office gofer, came around the corner pushing his refreshment cart. The last thing she wanted was for her situation to become office gossip. “Which of Sullivan’s Rules are you talking about?” she whispered.
“Rule number five, or for that matter, all of them,” Rita replied, carefully eyeing Arthur’s progress down the hall. “They all seem to advise a woman to try to make a man feel masculine.”
Lili’s eyes widened. “How?”
“By showing him how much you like and appreciate him,” April said.
Rita leaned closer to Lili. “Of course, it’s only part of rule five you need to think about. I’m sure you realize from your own experience that if you sublimate your own desires and allow things to happen naturally, you’re never going to get anywhere with a man like Tom.”
As Lili nodded solemnly, the subject of their conversation approached them. The three women froze.
“Good morning, ladies,” Tom said amiably as he eyed Lili. “I hope this is a business meeting.”
With that not-so-subtle warning, and without waiting for an answer, he raised an eyebrow and walked away.
TOM FELT THREE PAIRS of disapproving eyes boring into his back as he walked down the hall. If not for Lili’s crusade, he wouldn’t have thought about the survival of the day care center. He actually felt sorry about the situation, but it was out of his hands.
Besides, beyond polite conversation, or, he admitted reluctantly, sometimes not so polite conversation, fraternizing with his staff outside office hours had been a no-no ever since he’d taken over as publisher. His father may have considered all his employees as one big happy family, but not him. It only led to trouble. Lili was a case in point.
Besides, managing the magazine took most of his waking hours. The last thing he needed was to have Riverview’s management raise the figures on his lease agreement or, perish the thought, cancel the lease when it came up for renewal next month.
If only the magazine’s annual employee picnic wasn’t coming up next Sunday, he would have felt easier about the future. If he’d read Lili’s determined body language correctly, he was going to have to listen to a hell of a lot of arguments from her about keeping the day care open, and the picnic would provide her with the perfect opportunity to corner him.
TOM PASTED A SMILE on his face as he politely greeted employees arriving for Today’s World’s annual picnic. In no time, the magazine’s staff, their families and friends were scattered over the lush green meadow in Lincoln Park, enjoying games and each other’s company. Overhead, the sky was cloudless, and the temperature had climbed into the seventies.
Just his luck, Tom thought as he shook another hand and acknowledged another greeting. He might have wished for a late spring rain to break up the picnic early, but the sun was shining brightly, the flowers were blooming and the trees were sprouting buds.
Since Lili and her friends were undoubtedly out there formenting trouble, he intended to keep a close eye on the day’s activities. At the moment, things were going so well, he found himself waiting uneasily for the first sign of a problem.
Sure enough, it came with a bang, but not in the way he’d expected.
“Look out!”
At the frantic shout, Tom ducked instinctively. Considering there were at least three different ball games going on in front of him, he wasn’t sure what he was supposed to watch out for. A baseball? A soccer ball? A volley ball?
He found out the hard way when he was hit squarely in the groin by a black-and-white soccer ball apparently hurled into space by an energetic player.
With a muffled curse, he caught the ball before it had a chance to roll away. To his mortification, the private part of him he preferred to keep private hurt like hell.
Tom glanced down at the wet ball he held and noticed the large glob of brown mud smeared across the fly of his shorts. If he’d hoped to keep the point of contact a secret, he was out of luck.
A little girl, cheeks flushed with sun and excitement, her blond ponytail flying out behind her, skidded to a stop in front of him.
“Sorry mister. The ball was going too fast. I couldn’t kick it the other way!”
Tom took a series of deep breaths until the red haze in front of his eyes cleared. The blow might have been an accident, but the region south of his belt hurt like hell. The rest of him, including his head, was pounding in sympathy. Still, he tried to keep his cool.
He surveyed the apologetic half-pint in front of him. There was no use being angry. He could recognize innocence when he saw it.
Besides, with so many games going on, he should have been more alert. If he’d been hit in the head with the same force, he would have been knocked out like a light.
Fortunately, the pain in his groin was dulling to a steady throb. He moved
