but, of course, she’d settled in and he’d quickly realised that he’d found himself the most efficient PA he could ever have hoped for. Given his chequered history when it came to PAs, he’d shelved all curiosity, because a good PA was worth her weight in gold and he wasn’t about to jeopardise his good fortune by being nosy.
But now...
He looked at the sensible dark-grey trouser suit which screamed ‘no nonsense’.
‘Was that what you found?’ he asked and Abby looked at him sharply.
‘Sorry, but I’m not following you.’
Gabriel murmured piously, ‘It’s just that you seemed to be speaking from experience just then. When,’ he elaborated to forestall any puzzled frowns, ‘You said that parents and grandparents were often more upset by this sort of thing than the person actually going through it. So...were you speaking from experience?’
‘Of course not,’ Abby blustered, for once not her usual unflappable self. ‘I just meant,’ she added with a sudden urge to give him a taste of his own medicine, ‘That your grandmother is going be so upset, when you say that she was looking forward to you settling down, and she’ll be even more upset because you really don’t seem that bothered at all.’
Gabriel grinned with open enjoyment which, Abby thought with some frustration, completely defeated the object of the exercise.
‘Yet I’m sure she’ll agree that it’s better to have been ditched at the aisle than ditched post-vows.’
‘I’m sure Lucy would have been a devoted wife if she’d married you.’
The smile faded from Gabriel’s lips at the sincerity in her voice. ‘Doubtless,’ he drawled, half-closing his eyes and affording Abby a bird’s eye view of his lush, dark lashes which would have been the envy of any woman. ‘But, bearing in mind the disappointment she would have found at the end of the rainbow, I very much doubt her devotion would have been long lasting.’
‘Why?’ Abby heard herself ask. She was inviting just the sort of out-of-bounds conversation she had sworn to avoid but she couldn’t seem to help herself.
Gabriel opened his eyes and looked at her lazily, his head tilted to one side as though he was debating the pros and cons of providing her with an answer to her question.
‘Forget I asked,’ Abby said stiffly. ‘I’m not paid to ask personal questions.’
‘Oh, for God’s sake, Abby...’
‘Well, I’m not!’ Her mild grey eyes glinted.
‘Do you avoid asking me questions because you don’t want me to ask you any?’
‘I avoid asking you questions, Gabriel, because, like I said, it’s not part of my job remit.’
‘Yet you probably know more about me than any other woman,’ he mused. ‘Maybe you know so much that you haven’t got any questions to ask. After all, you have to admit that I’m an open book.’
‘You’re impossible.’ She paused. ‘And you’re not an open book.’
‘You’ve known every single woman I’ve ever dated since you started working for me,’ Gabriel pointed out, enjoying the titillating undercurrent to their conversation, which he suspected she wished she’d never prolonged.
‘I’ve hardly known them,’ Abby said drily. ‘Yes, I’ve made arrangements for the theatre, and restaurants and the opera, and, yes, a couple of them have come into the office at some point or other.’
‘Not at my request.’ Gabriel enjoyed a varied and plentiful love life but he’d always, with the exception of Lucy, disapproved of women dropping in to see him at the office. It was a level of familiarity on a par with doing a food shop together, cooking or watching television. Not to be encouraged.
‘But you’re far from being an open book,’ she finished briskly. ‘You’re happy to be very transparent when it comes to some things but extremely opaque when it comes to others.’
Gabriel thought that she couldn’t have summed him up more accurately if she’d tried, and for a few seconds he frowned, uncomfortable at that.
‘Like I said,’ he drawled, ‘You know me better than anyone else.’
‘That’s because, through necessity, I spend an awful lot of time in your company.’
‘Angling for a pay rise, Abby?’
Abby blushed. He was playing with her and she had to accept that she’d encouraged that by stepping into private territory which was normally out of bounds.
She also had to concede that when he spoke to her like that, his sexy voice deep, rich and velvety, a pleasurable tingle unfurled inside her. Yes, it was inappropriate, but it couldn’t be helped.
No wonder women fell for the guy like ninepins. He oozed easy charm, and when he turned it on thinking straight suddenly became very difficult.
‘Far from it.’ She located the reports waiting to be read and made a show of staring at them. If they hadn’t been flickering on her tablet, she would busied herself rustling paper to get her point across. ‘I’m not at all unhappy with my pay. Everyone in this business sector knows how generous you are when it comes to salaries.’
‘No price too steep for loyalty,’ Gabriel agreed. ‘And in the world of technology, where secrets are begging to be shared with hungry competitors, loyalty is a valuable commodity. You’re tapping your finger on your tablet. Is that your way of telling me that it’s time we started talking about work?’ He laughed softly and the hairs on the back of Abby’s neck curled. ‘Okay, off you go. I can tell you’re dying to tell me what’s in those reports of yours you’re staring so hard at.’
Abby spun to look at him and breathed in deeply. In this mood, he unnerved her, made her forget the boundaries between them, and if she knew that she was partly to blame then that didn’t matter. What mattered was the importance of the lines she had drawn between them from the very first day she’d started working for him.
It wasn’t just because she knew the fate of the PAs who had preceded her, all shot down in flames for overstepping the line because. She’d gathered he’d always enjoyed having a pretty face around, and naturally, in the end, all those pretty faces had not been able to resist the lure of their sexy, charming boss. He had a special way of talking to you, a way that made you feel as though you were the only human being on earth he was interested in.
Abby had seen that in action when she’d been doing something as harmless as reporting on a conversation she might have had about some deal or other, or suggestions she might have had about some of the programmes one of his many companies was developing—because he always encouraged suggestions, which was just one of the many ways he involved his employees and made them feel invaluable.
But now this...
This was different and it felt dangerous because he wasn’t talking to her about work.
Abby had no intention of dropping her guard any more than she already had and, the sooner she filled him in on that, the better.
Because
