to turn her away. He hadn’t wanted any kind of complication at that point.
But he was so glad now that he hadn’t.
Somehow, in her innocent passive-aggressive way, she’d managed to push his buttons and, even though he’d fought it at the time, that was exactly what he’d needed.
She was what he’d needed.
After the ceremony finished they were immediately ushered out of the church and straight up the sweeping manicured driveway to the front of a grand Georgian house where an enormous canvas marquee had been set up next to the orangery.
A small affair, his foot.
As soon as they stepped inside they had toxic-coloured cocktails thrust upon them and were politely but firmly asked to make their way back outside again to the linen-draped tables on the terrace next to the house.
‘This is like a military operation,’ he muttered to Cara, who had walked quietly next to him since they’d left the church, her face pale and her expression serious. She gave him a weak smile, her eyes darting from side to side as if she was seriously contemplating making a run for it and scoping out the best means of escape.
He sighed. ‘Come and sit down over here where it’s quiet,’ he said, looping his arm through hers and guiding her towards one of the empty tables nearest the house.
To his frustration she stiffened, then slipped out of his steadying grip and folded her arms across her chest instead, her shoulders rigid and her chin firmly up as they walked. Just as they picked their way over the last bit of gravelled path to reach the table she stumbled and on reflex he quickly moved in to catch her.
‘Are you okay?’ he asked, placing a hand on the exposed part of her back, feeling the heat of her body warm the palm of his hand and send an echoing sensation through his entire abdomen.
His touch seemed to undo something in her and she collapsed into the nearest chair and gave him such a fearful look his heart jumped into his throat.
‘I’m sorry for lying to you, Max. Please don’t fire me. If I lose this job I’ll have to move back to Cornwall and I really, really don’t want to leave London. It’s my home and I love it. I can’t imagine living anywhere else now. And I really like working for you.’ Swallowing hard, she gave him a small quavering smile. ‘I swear I will never lie to you again. Believe it or not, I usually have a rock-solid moral compass and if I hadn’t felt backed into a corner I never would have twisted the truth. I was on the cusp of losing everything and I was desperate, Max. Totally. Desperate.’ She punctuated each of the last words with a slap of her hand on the table.
‘Cara, I’m not going to fire you.’
How could she think that he would? Good grief, had he done such a number on her that she’d think he’d be capable of something as heartless as that?
‘You’re not?’ Her eyes shone in the reflected brightness thrown up by the white tablecloth and he looked away while she blinked back threatening tears.
‘Of course not.’ He shifted forward in his seat, closer to her. ‘You well and truly proved your worth to the business last week.’ He waited till she looked at him again. ‘I have to admit, I’m hurt that you thought I’d fire you for admitting to being bullied.’ He leaned back in his chair with a sigh. ‘God, you must think I’m a real tool if you seriously believed I’d do something like that.’
‘It’s just—you can be a bit...fierce...sometimes. And I didn’t want to show any weakness.’ She visibly cringed as she said it, and his insides plummeted.
‘Tell me more about what happened at your last job,’ he said quietly, wanting to get things completely straight between them, but not wanting to spook her further in the process.
Her gaze slid away. ‘It’s not a happy tale, or something I’m particularly proud of.’
‘No. I got that impression.’
‘Okay, I’ll tell you, but please don’t judge me too harshly. Things like this always look so simple and manageable from a distance, but when you’re in the thick of it, it’s incredibly difficult to think straight without letting your emotions get in the way.’
He held up his hands, palms forward, and affected a non-judgemental expression.
She nodded and sat up straighter. ‘I thought I’d hit the jackpot when I was offered that position. Ugh! What an idiot,’ she said, her self-conscious grimace making him want to move closer to her, to draw her towards him and smooth out the kinks of her pain. But he couldn’t do that. It wasn’t his place.
So he just nodded and waited for her to continue.
‘When I started as Executive Assistant to the CEO of LED Software I had no idea about the office politics that were going on there. But it didn’t take me long to find out. Apparently one of the other PAs had expected to be a shoo-in for my job and was very unimpressed when they gave it to me. She made it her mission from my first day to make my life miserable. As one of the longest-standing members of staff—and a very, er, strong personality—she had the allegiance of all the other PAs and a lot of the other members of staff and they ganged up on me. At first I thought I was going mad. I’d make diary appointments for my boss with other high-ranking members of staff in the company, which their PAs would claim to have no knowledge of by the time I sent him along for the meeting. Or the notes I’d print out for an important phone call with the Executive Board would go missing from his desk right before it took place and he’d have to take it unbriefed.’ She tapped her fingers on the table. ‘That did not go down well. My boss was a very proud guy and he expected things to be perfect.’
‘I can relate to that,’ Max said, forcing compassion into his smile despite the tug of disquiet in his gut. He was just as guilty when it came to perfectionism.
But, instead of admonishing him, she smiled back.
‘Lots of other little things like that happened,’ she continued, rubbing a hand across her forehead, ‘which made me look incompetent, but I couldn’t prove that someone was interfering with my work and when I mentioned it to my boss he’d wave away my concerns and suggest I was slipping up on the job and blaming others to cover my back. I let the stress of it get to me and started making real mistakes, things I never would have let slip at the last place I worked. It rattled me, to the point where I started believing I wasn’t cut out for the job. I wasn’t sleeping properly with the stress of it and I ended up breaking down one day in front of my boss. And that—’ she clicked her fingers ‘—was the end of our working relationship. He seemed to lose all respect for me after that and started giving the other PAs things that were my job to do.’
Max snorted in frustration. ‘The guy sounds like an idiot.’
She gave him a wan smile. ‘I was the idiot. I only found out what was really going on when I overheard a couple of the PAs laughing about it in the ladies’ bathroom.’
Her eyes were dark with an expression he couldn’t quite read now. Was it anger? Resentment? It certainly didn’t look like self-pity.
‘So you left,’ he prompted.
She took a sip of her drink and he did the same, grimacing at the claggy sweetness of the cocktail.
‘I had to,’ she said. ‘My professional reputation was
