hours by car from Seattle, which meant that it operated outside the sphere of core support businesses HuntCom used in the Seattle area. To avoid the publicity that would come if news of his endeavor got out, he wanted to keep everything under wraps until implementing it became absolutely necessary.
His first impression of the ultramodern decor was that it echoed the firm’s cutting-edge hype. His second was that there was no one manning the reception desk. There wasn’t a soul in sight.
Or so he was thinking when a totally preoccupied young woman in a gray sweater and skirt barreled around the corner from a hallway. Her dark head was down, her arms loaded with files. Judging from her direction and her speed, her destination was the ringing telephone on the desk. Before he could do anything more than think about stepping from her path, she walked right into him.
Her startled gasp met the rustle of papers and the soft plop of files hitting the carpet. Of the dozen thick folders she carried, half of them hit the floor. The other half she clutched to her chest as she dropped to her knees.
“Ohmygosh. I’m so sorry.” Flushing to the roots of her barely chin-length, chopped brown hair, she grabbed a file. “Our receptionist isn’t in today, so I thought I’d work out here so I could get the phone…” She shook her head, flushed. “Never mind. Please,” she murmured, clearly embarrassed as he crouched beside her and picked up a file. “I’ll get these. You don’t have to help.”
Ignoring her insistence, he reached past her for another file. Closer to her now, her scent drifted toward him. Something fresh, faintly herbal and unexpectedly, inexplicably erotic. Caught off guard by the quick tightening low in his gut, he jerked his focus to the delicate lines of her profile. As he did, she looked up—and went still the instant her dark eyes met his. A quick, deep breath, a quicker blink, and her glance fell away.
Young, he thought. That was how she looked to him as he scanned the fine lines of her profile once more. Pretty. A little self-conscious. And impossibly…innocent. As edgy as he’d felt lately, he figured her to be about a lifetime shy of his own admittedly jaded thirty-eight years. The thought made him feel older, and edgier still.
Her focus remained on her task. “Please tell me you’re not Jared Taylor.”
The name caught him momentarily off guard. To protect his plans, he’d made the appointment using his full first name and his mother’s maiden name. He needed to remember that. “Sorry,” he replied, “but that’s me.” He handed her another file as his eyes narrowed. “You wouldn’t be Candace Chapman, would you?”
Still looking a little flustered, she took the file, reached for another. She had a beautiful mouth. Full. Unadorned. Kissable.
With a frown, he reminded himself that she also didn’t look a day over twenty-two. Not exactly jailbait, but not fair game for a man who preferred women who held as few illusions as he did when it came to the opposite sex.
“No. I’m…no,” she repeated. “I know you have a one-o’clock with her, though. I can get these. Really,” she insisted, her focus on the transparencies and computer disks she quickly pushed back into a folder. She reached past him for another disk. Bumping his knee with her forearm, she pulled back, apparently deciding that disk could wait. “If you’ll have a seat, I’ll let her know you’re here.”
He handed her the disk and another file, then watched her snatch up the rest and start to rise. Snagging her upper arm, rising, too, he helped her to her feet.
“Thank you,” she murmured, and aimed an apologetic smile at his chin before she reached across the desk to punch a button on the ringing phone.
Her tone totally professional, she answered with a brisk, “Good afternoon, Kelton & Associates,” as she dumped the files on the desk.
His glance ran over the curve of her narrow hips, down to where her slim skirt ended modestly at the back of her knees. Her slender legs were covered with dark gray tights. The black ballet flats she wore spoke of comfort and practicality. Nothing about the way she dressed could be remotely construed as provocative. Yet he found himself thinking her body looked as taut as the muscles in her arm had felt, when a tall, leggy blond in killer heels and a lipstick-red suit rounded the corner into the reception area.
“I’ll need ten copies of this report, too, Amy. And when you get a chance—” she continued, only to cut herself off when her head snapped up and she saw him standing there.
The young woman at the desk immediately transferred the call she’d answered and put another on hold. “This is Mr. Taylor,” she informed the blonde with a nod in his direction. “He just arrived. Ten copies,” she repeated, and slipped into the secretarial chair to straighten the files she’d dropped while telling whoever was on the line that the person he wanted to speak with wasn’t in but that she’d be happy to transfer him to her voice mail if he wanted to leave a message.
The thirty-something ad executive in the red power suit gave him an easy smile as she extended her perfectly manicured hand. In that same moment, she managed a blink-of-an-eye once-over that somehow managed to take in everything from his Italian leather shoes to the quality of his open-collared dress shirt and hand-tailored sport coat and the neat cut of his dark, slightly graying hair.
“Jared Taylor. I’m Candace Chapman.” Eyes the pure blue of a summer sky held his. Expertly applied makeup turned her strikingly attractive features flawless. “I’ve looked forward to meeting you. It’s always exciting to be in on the birth of a new company.” She tipped her head to one side, the motion causing her shining, shoulder-length hair to shimmer in the overhead lights. She snagged it back with her left, noticeably ringless, hand.
“Hold my calls, will you please?” she asked the young woman now heading into another hallway with the report she’d been handed. “Would you like coffee?” Candace asked him.
His attention diverted as much by the woman speaking to him as his reason for being there, he replied, “Please. Black.”
“And two coffees?” she called after her infinitely more nondescript subordinate.
“So, tell me, Jared,” she continued, only to quickly pause. “May I call you Jared?”
Since he’d been J.T. all his life, “Jared” would definitely take getting used to. “If I can call you Candace.”
“Of course.” The charming smile was back. “Anyway,” she continued, leading him past offices with employees at drafting tables, “you mentioned on the phone that you’re new to the Portland market. Are you planning to offer your architectural services only in Oregon, or all of the Northwest?”
She and the agency knew exactly how to make an impression. The first thing he noticed when she led him into her corner office at the end of the hall was an expansive view of the city, its river dividing east side from west and several of the dozen bridges linking them together. Then there were the industry and civic awards on and above a black-lacquered credenza behind the matching executive desk. Photos in sleek frames of Candace and an older woman who looked much like her shaking the hands of presumably important personages graced the opposite wall.
Rather than sit in the executive chair behind the desk, she headed for the end of the room and one of four barrel chairs spaced around a low cube-shaped coffee table.
“I’m not limiting myself,” he replied, as they settled themselves. “I’ll go wherever the client wants.”
She crossed her long legs, carefully
