Leos delivered. “I have also taken note of the fact that there are no female managers, an extraordinary achievement in a firm this size.”
On that thought for the day, Leos closed the meeting. Suddenly, Susie understood that there had been nothing personal about his decision to promote her. He had simply used her to highlight his lecture about equal opportunities! A confusing mixture of reluctant admiration, pain and resentment assailed her.
A vision of masculine sophistication in a superb gray business suit, Leos showed Susie into his office. “Last month Devlin Systems settled two charges of sexual discrimination out of court. There will not be a third—”
“I thought you didn’t approve of working women—”
Leos raised a brow. “You were the first working woman I took to my bed and you were often unavailable when I wanted you. What I seek for my own satisfaction in my private life has no relation to my opinions as an employer.”
Hotly flushed in receipt of that blunt clarification, Susie tore her gaze from his and regretted her own over-familiar comment. All those months ago, she had only actually worked for Leos for three days before their passionate affair began and she had moved on to another agency placement.
“I have a long list of tasks for you,” Leos continued without skipping a beat, the heavy silence not seeming to disturb him in the slightest.
But then, she already knew that he did not have a sensitive bone in his body, didn’t she? Everything Leos did merely emphasized that she had never been more than a casual bed partner—on his terms. Her throat convulsed with tears.
He extended an audiotape to her. “It’s all on here. First, you send out the invitations to the dinner party. Then you can nip over to Bond Street and choose a bracelet for Brigitte. I’ll fill in the gift card.”
Powered by a near-agonizing sense of humiliation and pain, Susie lifted her head, green eyes alight with outrage.
“You are asking me to choose jewelry for your current lover?’ she exclaimed and flung the tape back at his feet. “You call that work? I call it victimization and revenge. Burn in hell, Leos!’
Leos studied her with incredulous tawny eyes.
“I hate you … I really hate you! You were the biggest mistake I ever made in my whole life!” And on that embittered declaration, Susie stalked out …
CHAPTER FIVE
AN HOUR LATER, Susie’s tumultuous emotions calmed enough for her to slowly fill with horror at her own behavior.
She had spent 10 minutes silently sobbing in the cloakroom, 20 minutes trying to pull herself back together and the subsequent 30 minutes hugging Ben in the day care.
Ben, whose comfort and security were dependant on her success in the job market. Ben, whose mother had just lost her foolish head and screamed like a shrew at a monstrously insensitive male. Ben, whose mother now had to eat humble pie for his sake.
Back on the top floor, Susie knocked on Leos’s office door with a hand she couldn’t keep steady. Infuriated with herself, she whirled back flat against the wall and breathed in deeply before going in.
Lounging back in his desk chair, Leos surveyed her, his lean, powerful face unreadable.
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